Meteorological Mobilities

Curated by Marianna Tsionki

Artists: Amy Balkin, Ursula Biemann, MAP Office, Andrea Bagnato, Daniel Fernández Pascual, Helene Kazan, Hannah Meszaros Martin, Alon Schwabe

One of the most tangible impacts of today's environmental crisis—which is advancing more rapidly than at any other time in recorded history—will be human displacement. Climate-induced migration is a global phenomenon that is increasingly affecting communities and individuals. Coastal regions such as the Maldives in the Indian Ocean, Sundarbans islands in the Bay of Bengal, Tuvalu in the South Pacific, the Alaskan coast, and many more are threatened by rising seas, putting their governments and communities under pressure. Either due to sea level rise, erosion, or desertification, people are called to urgently address the impacts of rapid environmental changes. However, dealing with changes requires more than regional strategies and solutions, it demands economic and social reorganization and a major retooling of our economies, institutions, infrastructures, all on a global scale. 

Contrary to mainstream visual representations of vulnerable communities at risk, this exhibition is urging a radical re-thinking on the ways we act collectively upon climate change as planetary citizens. Far from promoting planetary catastrophism, exotic miseries and passive resistance, the exhibition aims at raising awareness of climate injustice, challenging the dominant political power of the countries and corporations which are primary contributors to global warming, and proposes alternative climate change adaptations.

Meteorological Mobilities is an apexart NYC Open Call Exhibition taking place online. For more information please visit apexart.org/tsionki.php or email elizabeth.larison@apexart.org.

Marianna Tsionki is Senior Curator at CFCCA, Manchester where she is leading the program team on the development of the public program across exhibitions, events, commissions, publications, artist residencies and engagement. She is a PhD candidate in Curatorial Practice at the Manchester School of Art investigating the role of the curatorial in knowledge production, and ways that cultural institutions can instigate social change.

apexart’s program supporters past and present include the Milton and Sally Avery Arts Foundation, the Buhl Foundation, Bloomberg Philanthropies, Spencer Brownstone, the Kenneth A. Cowin Foundation, Epstein Teicher Philanthropies, The Greenwich Collection Ltd., William Talbott Hillman Foundation/Affirmation Arts Fund, the Fifth Floor Foundation, the Consulate General of Israel in New York, The Puffin Foundation, the Trust for Mutual Understanding, The Andy Warhol Foundation for the Visual Arts, and public funds from the New York City Department of Cultural Affairs in partnership with the City Council, Creative Engagement, supported by New York State Council on the Arts with the support of Governor Andrew Cuomo and the New York State Legislature administered by LMCC, as well as the New York State Council on the Arts with the support of Governor Andrew M. Cuomo and the New York State Legislature.