Announcing the launch of the Gallery Climate Coalition
22 October 2020
On Thursday 22 October, the Gallery Climate Coalition (GCC) officially launches as its website goes live. The GCC is a non-profit organisation founded by a group of gallerists and professionals working in the arts as an attempt to develop a meaningful and industry-specific response to the growing climate crisis. With today’s launch, the GCC is actively recruiting galleries, art workers and artists to join the coalition and work towards its core goal of collectively reducing carbon emissions by 50% over the next ten years (in line with the Paris Agreement), as well as promoting near zero-waste practices.
The GCC website has been developed as a key tool to help members achieve these targets. Working together as a voluntary peer-led group, the GCC founding team met via regular virtual meetings over the summer months and secured the ongoing assistance of two leading environmental science and policy experts to join the coalition in order to add current research and learning to the website. Galleries, organisations and individuals comprising the GCC founding team are: Thomas Dane Gallery, Kate MacGarry Gallery, Lisson Gallery, Sadie Coles HQ, Frieze, Artlogic, Scott & Co, Louisa Buck, Daisy Garnett and Dr. Harris Kuemmerle.
The content of the GCC website is specifically designed to inspire, educate and – crucially – to provide practical tools and information to help members reduce their carbon footprint. Foremost of these – and what is shaping up to be an industry first – is an easy-to-use yet robust carbon calculator, available free of charge to all GCC members, built pro bono, along with the website, by Artlogic. This tool has been specifically tailored to galleries and the commercial art sector to regularly determine and monitor an organisation’s carbon footprint. The calculator will provide tangible emissions estimates for all sizes of businesses, from single operators and artists to galleries with a full staff and multiple geographical locations. Complementing the calculator, the GCC website sets out research and information on issues that pertain to the art world and its contribution to carbon emissions. Categorised under a number of headings, the topics include: travel; shipping; buildings (covering exhibitions, storage and office spaces); carbon offsetting; packaging; digital; and recycling.
Find further information and join at www.galleryclimatecoalition.org, and read more about the GCC in the Financial Times.
