KELLY RICHARDSON
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1. & 2. Talisman (III), 2022, 4K video, seamless loop, silent.
STATEMENT
In August 2021, the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change released a report which made clear that it is code red for humanity. “The alarm bells are deafening, and the evidence is irrefutable: greenhouse-gas emissions from fossil-fuel burning and deforestation are choking our planet and putting billions of people at immediate risk.”
Simultaneously, ancient forests, with some of the largest carbon stores in the world, continue to be destroyed daily in British Columbia, immediately releasing the majority of their stored carbon into our atmosphere. Heinously, a code red for humanity citing deforestation as a leading cause of the collapse of our living planet has not halted operations. The lives of billions of people, along with a survivable future, remain a secondary priority to industry. Just 2.7% of the old growth forests remain. Logging continues.
In the absence of principled leadership, people are left with no choice but to take action. We will not accept our terrifying collective fate as governments continue to prioritize short term financial gain over a survivable planet. Nor should we. It is outrageous that we have reached this critical juncture in human history, having squandered decades of warnings from climate scientists globally.
In Talisman (III), butterflies rest on a tear gas canister partially covered in crystals. Connecting us with the stars from the only planet known to contain consciousness, the work pays homage to those who recognize what is at stake and are taking action to avert catastrophe. These vital acts of resistance are where hope lives.
In August 2021, the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change released a report which made clear that it is code red for humanity. “The alarm bells are deafening, and the evidence is irrefutable: greenhouse-gas emissions from fossil-fuel burning and deforestation are choking our planet and putting billions of people at immediate risk.”
Simultaneously, ancient forests, with some of the largest carbon stores in the world, continue to be destroyed daily in British Columbia, immediately releasing the majority of their stored carbon into our atmosphere. Heinously, a code red for humanity citing deforestation as a leading cause of the collapse of our living planet has not halted operations. The lives of billions of people, along with a survivable future, remain a secondary priority to industry. Just 2.7% of the old growth forests remain. Logging continues.
In the absence of principled leadership, people are left with no choice but to take action. We will not accept our terrifying collective fate as governments continue to prioritize short term financial gain over a survivable planet. Nor should we. It is outrageous that we have reached this critical juncture in human history, having squandered decades of warnings from climate scientists globally.
In Talisman (III), butterflies rest on a tear gas canister partially covered in crystals. Connecting us with the stars from the only planet known to contain consciousness, the work pays homage to those who recognize what is at stake and are taking action to avert catastrophe. These vital acts of resistance are where hope lives.
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BIO
Taking cues from 19th-century landscape painting, 20th-century cinema, and 21st-century planetary research, Kelly Richardson (b. 1972, Canada) crafts video installations and digital prints that offer imaginative glimpses of the future that prompt a careful consideration of the present. Her work has been widely acclaimed in North America, Asia and Europe. Recent one person exhibitions include NGCA (England), Dundee Contemporary Arts (Scotland), Naturhistorisches Museum Wien (Austria), SMoCA (USA), CAG Vancouver (Canada), VOID Derry (Ireland), and a major survey at the Albright-Knox (USA). She was selected for the Beijing, Busan, Canadian, Gwangju and Montréal biennales, and major moving image exhibitions including the The Cinema Effect: Illusion, Reality and the Moving Image at the Hirshhorn Museum and Sculpture Garden. Her video installations have been included in the Toronto International Film Festival as part of Future Projections, Sundance Film Festival in New Frontier and she was honoured as the featured artist at the Americans for the Arts National Arts Awards. Richardson’s work has been acquired into significant museum collections across the UK, USA and Canada, from the Hirshhorn Museum and Sculpture Garden, SMoCA and Albright-Knox Art Gallery to the National Gallery of Canada, Art Gallery of Ontario, Musée d’art contemporain de Montréal, Arts Council Collection (England) and the Towner. Her video installations have been featured in numerous media including Artforum, The Guardian, BFI Sight and Sound, New Scientist, Time Out London, Aesthetica, British Journal for Photography, CBC, BBC, ITV, Sky News and New York Times. Kelly Richardson was born in Burlington, Ontario, Canada in 1972. From 2003-2017 she resided in north east England where she was a Lecturer in Fine Arts at Newcastle University. She currently lives and works as a visitor on the traditional territory of the WSANEC peoples of the Coast Salish Nation on Vancouver Island, Canada. She is Professor in Visual Arts at the University of Victoria. |
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