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TITLE PAGE

Insta l la t ion art as a cata lys t for change

An analysis of the ‘art’ of COP21

Master thesis by Medine Duvarci

Student no.: 42361

Supervisors: Prem Poddar and Maria Bee Christensen-Strynø

Date of submission: July 28th, 2016

Total number of pages: 86

Front-page photo by Martin Argyroglo

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ABSTRACT

This thesis looks at installation art by Olafur Eliasson and Jens Galschiøt,

exhibited during the COP21-conference in December 2015, to understand how climate

change is being visualised and how this has an effect on the way climate change can be

perceived and communicated.

The thesis has used a theoretical apparatus consisting of theories on frame

analysis and visual methodologies to understand how visual installations are used to

address contemporary issues of climate change. Furthermore, affect theory has been used

to understand how the concept of sense of belonging can be used to create a new

framework and methodology for climate change communication. The thesis is both

methodological and rhetorical, which means that is has been concerned with different

theories of science to understand the progression of the thesis. The prerequisite of the

study is a social constructionist approach.

The results finds that installation art and artists, as the sustainability leaders

of tomorrow, are able to innovate the way we communicate climate change by using sense

of belonging to create a framework for disseminating knowledge about climate change.

Keywords

Framing, visual communication, social semiotics, multimodality, affect

Discipl ines

Communication Studies | Cultural Encounters

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TABLE OF CONTENT

1. INTRODUCTION ................................................................................................. 6

1.1 PROBLEM DEFINITION ........................................................................................................... 7

1.2 MOTIVATION ........................................................................................................................... 7

1.3 HYPOTHETICAL CONSIDERATIONS ...................................................................................... 8

1.4 DELIMITATION ........................................................................................................................ 9

2. CATALOGUE OF CONCEPTS ........................................................................... 11

2.1 CLIMATE ACTION .................................................................................................................. 11

2.2 COP21 AND PARIS AGREEMENT ........................................................................................ 12

2.3 CLIMATE CHANGE ART INSTALLATIONS .......................................................................... 12

3. METHODOLOGY ................................................................................................ 15

3.1 LITERATURE REVIEW ............................................................................................................ 15

3.2 TESTING THE WATERS .......................................................................................................... 19

3.2.1 Cultures and Practices of Belonging .................................................................................... 19

3.3 QUALITATIVE INQUIRY ........................................................................................................ 23

3.3.1 The qualitative researcher ................................................................................................... 23

3.3.2 Hermeneutic phenomenology ............................................................................................... 25

3.3.3 Social constructionism ........................................................................................................ 26

3.4 RESEARCH DESIGN ................................................................................................................ 27

4. THEORIES AND THEMES ............................................................................... 30

4.1 FRAMING THEORY ................................................................................................................. 30

4.1.1 Framing as a research paradigm ......................................................................................... 31

4.1.2 Processes of framing ............................................................................................................ 32

4.1.3 Concepts and metaphors ..................................................................................................... 34

4.2 READING IMAGES .................................................................................................................. 36

4.2.1 Social semiotics and semiotic resources ................................................................................. 37

4.2.2 Social semiotic analysis framework ..................................................................................... 38

4.3 EMOTIONS, AFFECT AND SENSE OF BELONGING ............................................................. 40

4.3.1 Sara Ahmed and the cultural politics of fear ....................................................................... 40

4.3.2 Lauren Berlant and modes of belonging mediated by compassion ......................................... 42

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4.3.3 Lilie Chouliaraki on spectators and sufferers ...................................................................... 44

4.4 SUMMING UP .......................................................................................................................... 47

5. ANALYSIS ............................................................................................................ 49

5.1 ICE WATCH BY OLAFUR ELIASSON AND MINIK ROSING ............................................... 49

5.1.1 Framing analysis of “Ice, Art and Being Human” ............................................................. 50

5.1.2 Social semiotic analysis of Ice Watch .................................................................................. 58

5.1.3 Ice Watch and sense of belonging ........................................................................................ 62

5.2. UNBEARABLE BY JENS GALSCHIØT ................................................................................... 63

5.2.1 Framing of the polar bear ................................................................................................... 65

5.2.2 Social semiotic analysis of Unbearable ................................................................................ 66

5.2.3 The polar bear as an object of fear ...................................................................................... 67

5.3 OPPORTUNITY IN ART AND CROSS-COLLABORATIONS .................................................... 68

6. DISCUSSION ....................................................................................................... 70

7. OUTRO ................................................................................................................. 76

REFERENCES ........................................................................................................ 77

SUMMARY IN DANISH ......................................................................................... 84

APPENDIX .............................................................................................................. 86

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1. INTRODUCTION

In December 2015, Paris hosted the 2015 United Nations Climate Change Conference,

COP21, to bring together world leaders to negotiate a universal and legally binding climate

deal. The negotiations led to the landing of the Paris Agreement1. A range of artists used

the COP21-negotiations in Paris as an opportunity to exhibit installations, and to showcase

art projects to shed light on global climate change. Some of these were the Danish sculptor

Jens Galschiøt and the Danish-Icelandic artist Olafur Eliasson. Galschiøt collaborated with

WWF to exhibit the art installation ‘Unbearable’, which featured a life-size polar bear being

pierced by a thick spear, which functioned as a curve in a graph that exemplifies how our

use of fossil fuels is rising. Eliasson collaborated with Minik Rosing, professor of geology,

and used the COP21 platform to exhibit the art installation, ‘Ice Watch’, consisting of 12

blocks of ice harvested from Greenland to make people aware of global warming2.

Albeit the different shapes and forms, all art installations, which found their way to the

marketplace of the COP21-conference, were embedded with a call to action. The examples

above call for action because species are threatened and our consumption of fossil fuels is

rising drastically. And due to the accelerating technology, images of the art installations

were being distributed on social media and digital platforms worldwide; thereby the calls

for urgent action on climate action were being transmitted from Paris to the whole word.

In a conversation with the Journal of Visual Culture, Martin Jay, Professor of History, said

the following: “[…] we live in a culture whose technological advances abet the production and

dissemination of such images at a hitherto unimagined level, it is necessary to focus on how they work and

what they do, rather than move past them too quickly to the ideas they represent or the reality they purport

to depict.” (Jay, 2010: 88)

1 The 2015 United Nations Climate Change Conference, COP21, took place from November 30-December 12, 2015. During the period, the conference negotiated the Paris Agreement to combat climate change. On December 12, 2015, 195 countries agreed to adopt the agreement. 2 http://grist.org/climate-energy/check-out-these-9-climate-art-projects-that-are-wowing-people-in-paris (Last retrieved April 21, 2016)

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This thesis picks up on Jay’s words and looks at the two aforementioned art installations,

which made their way to marketplace of COP21, to understand what climate change art

installations are; what are they doing, why are they using e.g. the polar, and what reality are

they depicting? It is only in our scrutiny of the climate change art installations that we can

understand how historic moments, such as the adoption of the Paris Agreement, can

leverage art as a catalyst for change.

1.1 Problem definition

This thesis looks at climate change art installations from during the COP21-conference to

understand how climate change is being visualised and how this has an effect on the way

climate change can be perceived and communicated.

- How are visual installations being used to address contemporary issues of climate

change?

- And how can the concept of sense of belonging be used to create a new framework

and methodology for climate change communication?

1.2 Motivation

I work as a Junior Communication Executive at Sustainia, which is a think tank and

consultancy headquartered in Copenhagen, Denmark. One day at work a colleague asked

me if she could pick my brain about something. She was planning a presentation that she

would be having for a group of young professionals. They would be participating in an

advocacy and innovation boot camp, pre-COP21, on how to tackle global health

challenges, whilst pursuing the Sustainable Development Goals.3 She knew that I was going

to participate in the boot camp and wanted to make sure that her presentation on

3 The Sustainable Development Goals were adopted by world leaders at United Nations Sustainable Development Summit on September 25th, 2015, as part of the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development via http://www.undp.org/content/undp/en/home/presscenter/pressreleases/2015/09/24/undp-welcomes-adoption-of-sustainable-development-goals-by-world-leaders.html (Last retrieved on July 27th, 2016).

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communicating sustainability and climate change would stress that a positive narrative4 is

imperative when dealing with how to tackle climate change and how to communicate

complex issues. The correspondence had my thoughts accelerating.

“Is it too aggressive with a headline that reads: “Kill the polar bear”?” she asked. At the

time, I was startled by her question, and found myself thinking that it would be a tad too

much to employ the heavy loaded term ‘kill’. I told her that I found it aggressive to use a

term that is loaded with negative connotations, and that the headline could possibly derail

the discussion that she wanted to initiate about climate change communication. She ended

up going ahead with another headline, which read: “Forget about the polar bear”. The last

thing she wanted was for the polar bear to take the focus of her presentation; it would be

counteractive.

I have found myself returning to her question when I stumble upon climate change art

installations featuring a polar bear or if I see an image of a polar bear alone on an ice floe

when navigating the waters of different social media platforms and following social media

streams on climate change matters. But what is it about this polar bear, and what does it

say about the state of climate change? It is not to miss in the discussion and debate about

climate change, but its iconic status (Slocum, 2004; O’Neill and Nicolson-Cole, 2009) give

rise to a scrutiny on our communication habits when it comes to communicating disasters

and the scale of the disaster, and it is especially interesting to see how it is used in climate

change art installations, and why.

1.3 Hypothetical considerations

Not only did the brief correspondence trigger questions about the way we communicate

climate change, it has also made me consider my own approach to communicating climate

4 Sustainia is seeking to change the way we communicate about urgent matters pertaining to climate change. It is imperative, in Sustainia, to communicate solutions that incentivises sustainable living and to create a vision for tomorrow that does not discard the urgent need for climate action. The positive narrative entails creating visions, also imaginary ones, with solutions available for implementation today.

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change and how I use images of plants and species in my presentations about sustainability

and climate change, and has motivated me to look at several hypotheses and trends, which

I have identified in my studies and by working with communication in practice. These are

listed below:

- Plants and remote species considered to be facing extremely high risk of extinction

are used strategically and objectified in communication about climate change and

sustainability, and often becomes the visual face of climate change in campaigns

and reports.

- Emotions such as fear and social suffering are used as tools to engage people to

take action on, and to fight, climate change.

- Climate change is a topic, which is only covered and negotiated in elitist and high

circles – and political negotiations are opaque.

- There is too much focus on scare stories when we can focus on tangible and readily

available solutions that can incentivise climate action, and which reduce the

magnitude of climate change.

- Artists are emerging as sustainability leaders who are putting climate change on the

agenda through their installations.

It is in the light of these hypothetical considerations that I want to look at climate change

art installations that are reframing the message on climate change, and especially how the

installations by Galschiøt and Eliasson leverage art as a catalyst for change in

communication about climate change.

1.4 Delimitation

As a starting point for this thesis, it is necessary to delimit the ecological and evolutionary

matters that my thesis partly articulates. This thesis does not form the framework for an

account of the science of climate change, evolution, environment and sustainability, but

only representations of climate change and how the representations are being used as a way

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to produce meaning between human beings, in a certain social, cultural and historical

context – respectively COP21 – about climate change.

I am looking at the signifiers of climate change made visible in climate change art

installations, and how these are serving to change the way we communicate about climate

change. Albeit the fact that I am looking at two installations, respectively, I am not

analysing them on the basis of having experienced them nor am I going into details about

the production, construction and the historical and stylistic contexts. Nor will I be

conducting a comparative analysis of the selected installations. This thesis solely looks at

images of the installations and text materials (e.g. an essay and flyers) that are

accompanying the installations. The images and text materials are the objects of study in

chapter 5 on the basis of the theoretical framework in chapter 4.

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2. CATALOGUE OF CONCEPTS

I have already employed a set of terms such as climate action, climate change art

installations, Paris Agreement and COP21. This chapter briefly describe a set of terms and

concepts that I am using throughout this thesis or which I have coined to facilitate a

methodical approach to comprehend my problem field.

2.1 Climate Action

We are increasingly faced with figures confirming global warming (World Meterological

Organization5) and that our activities on earth are getting out of hand, and that this will

have consequences for people and species. Politicians, civil society, activists, etc. want us to

scrutinize our habits, and to prepare ourselves for a sustainable transition as a way to

cushion the blow of climate change. Climate change adaption should be set in motion now.

Another term for climate change adaption is climate action. Climate action is also goal

number 13 out of the 17 Sustainable Development Goals, which were adopted

unanimously by 193 UN members. The Sustainable Development Goals sets the frame for

an agenda to end poverty and pursue a sustainable future by 2030.6 Goal 13 combats

climate change and the impact of the changes by strengthening resilience and adaptive

capacity to climate-related challenges.

Throughout this thesis, I will be using climate action when addressing solutions for

combatting climate change and when I point to the taken action taken to mitigate climate

change.

5 http://library.wmo.int/pmb_ged/wmo_1167_en.pdf (Last retrieved July 26, 2016). 6 http://www.un.org/sustainabledevelopment/blog/2015/09/historic-new-sustainable-development-agenda-unanimously-adopted-by-193-un-members/ (Last retrieved July 26, 2016).

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2.2 COP21 and Paris Agreement

COP21 is an abbreviation of ‘Conference of the Parties (COP)’, and is a conference to the

United Nations (UN) Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC)7. The city of

Paris hosted the 21st COP; thus the coining of COP21.

The COP is an annual meeting, which brings together parties to discuss and to take

decisions with regard to framework of UNFCCC and pressing climate change matters. The

COP21-negotiations resulted in the landmark Paris Agreement to accelerate climate action

and to meet climate change with solutions for a low carbon future. According to

UNFCCC, the aim of the Paris Agreement is: “[…] is to strengthen the global response to the

threat of climate change by keeping a global temperature rise this century well below 2 degrees Celsius above

pre-industrial levels and to pursue efforts to limit the temperature increase even further to 1.5 degrees

Celsius.” (UNFCCC8) The Paris Agreement was adopted by on December 12, 2015.

2.3 Climate Change Art Installations

In this thesis I employ the term climate change art installations. Since it is a term that

permeates the thesis, I will try to clarify the concept, and explain why it is crucial to this

thesis. During the COP21-conference, Olafur Eliasson and Minik Rosing installed twelve

blocks of ice, harvested from Greenland. The twelve blocks made an art installation, which

was arranged at the Place du Panthéon. People bypassing the famous Parisian square would

find the blocks melting from December 3rd till December 12th, 2015, during the COP21-

negotiations, and people were not shy to share images of the blocks on social media

platforms.

The same was the case with the display of shoes on Place de la République, which became

the visual face of the COP21-negotiations. The negotiations were kicked off on November

7 http://www.un.org/sustainabledevelopment/cop21 (Last retrieved July 26, 2016). 8 http://bigpicture.unfccc.int/#content-the-paris-agreemen (Last retrieved July 26, 2016).

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30th, 2015, and a series of marches had been scheduled to take place. However, due to

security matters post the Paris-attacks9 the marches were cancelled. The many climate

activists, who had planned to march the Parisian streets, manifested their presence by

placing their shoes with messages on Place de la République, as an act of activism. Images

of the many shoes dotting the place flourished on social media, and marked the beginning

of the conference.

In this thesis the term climate change art installations will be used when I am addressing

installations such as the two mentioned above. But what is this quintessence of? And why

is it crucial to define what it is the epitome of? The newsroom of UNFCCC described the

shoe display as a “shoe installation”10. In a feature in Tate Modern’s magazine, Tate Etc.,

Claire Bishop (2005) defines the term installation art as something that can mean many

things, but that installations are a characterised as a type of production, and that it derive

from neither a movement nor an ideological framework. Contemporary artists who make

installation art are very different from each, but common for them all, according to Bishop,

is a set of values: “These values concern a desire to activate the viewer – as opposed to the

passivity of mass-media consumption – and to induce a critical vigilance towards the

environments in which we find ourselves. When the experience of going into a museum

increasingly rivals that of walking into restaurants, shops, or clubs, works of art may no

longer need to take the form of immersive, interactive experiences. Rather, the best

installation art is marked by a sense of antagonism towards its environment, a friction with

9 UNFCCC is United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change. The newsroom features stories pertaining to the topic of climate change, which are written by UNFCCC staff. On December 7, 2015, they featured an article, with the headline; ”Creativity Backs Climate Action in Paris”, in which they described the shoe display as a shoe installation, which served as a virtual march: http://newsroom.unfccc.int/unfccc-newsroom/creativity-backs-climate-action-in-paris (Last retrieved July 26, 2016). 10 UNFCCC is United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change. The newsroom features stories pertaining to the topic of climate change, which are written by UNFCCC staff. On December 7, 2015, they featured an article, with the headline; ”Creativity Backs Climate Action in Paris”, in which they described the shoe display as a shoe installation, which served as a virtual march: http://newsroom.unfccc.int/unfccc-newsroom/creativity-backs-climate-action-in-paris (Last retrieved July 26, 2016).

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its context that resists organisational pressure and instead exerts its own terms

of engagement.”11

The employment of installation art is relevant in the context of this thesis. However, as this

thesis is focusing on the respective installations by Galschiøt and Eliasson and Rosing in

terms of climate change communication, I will not be focusing on the user-experience of

the art, but rather the visuals of the installation to understand the framings and elements of

the installations, and how the installations are being used to address contemporary issues of

sustainability and climate change. It is in the light of this consideration that I have decided

to employ climate change art installations as a concept that embodies the installations that

are used as cases for exploration in this thesis. This is also a way of delimiting my problem

field area, as I am not focusing on art installations per se, but thematic art installations that

are addressing climate change and/or sustainability.

11 This piece was featured in Tate Modern’s magazine, Tate Etc. Issue 3: Spring 2005. It is available here: http://www.tate.org.uk/context-comment/articles/it-installation-art (Last retrieved on April 16, 2016)

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3. METHODOLOGY

In this chapter I will describe my research design and my quest for knowledge. The first

part of the chapter looks at selected texts, which has helped me define my area of research.

3.1 Literature review

We are often exposed to presentations of climate change; be it in written material, news

reports, illustrations, politics and campaigns. Regardless of the form, these representations

are rarely simple representations, but complex representations of climate change with a

political agenda embedded (Luke, 2015). According to Timothy W Luke (2015), climate

change is represented as something, which pulls together “[…] complex clusters of signs,

symbols, and stories”. (Luke, 2015: 281).

Luke points to Al Gore, whom he refers to as a key player in a contested arena of

ecological communication. Gore has changed the nature of communicating climate change

matters with his book and film An Inconvenient Truth , a lecture series about climate

change and global warming (Hansen, 2011: 14), and his employment of photography,

aesthetics and visualisations (Luke, 2015) has positioned him as one of the most notable

contemporary pioneers for climate action. However, the way his visualisation of climate

change in presentations has been received and perceived in certain circles also goes to

show that he is indeed navigating a contested area. His depictions and visualization of

climate change has made others respond with caricature about climate change:

“A popular image circulated by angry conservative climate change deniers presents Gore spitting flames, like

a fire breathing dragon, to characterize their political opposition to his arguments. Obviously, irritated

reactionaries use images of fire to fight protests against other larger fires that Al Gore opposes in his global

warming work, portraying environmental activism as nothing but the hot air of fire breathing liberalism.”

(Luke, 2015: 283).

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One cannot get around the political attachments to the caricature, and it makes one

question how these visualisations, also caricatures, can strike and stick with, what Luke

refers to as, the popular imagination (Luke, 2015: 283). And it furthermore calls for

scrutiny of the signifiers that are pushing the political agendas.

Before I leap into an analysis of these signifiers, I am finding different shortages in this

contested area. One of them is the political and scientific ones. It is easy for climate change

deniers to deem the environmental activism, that Gore is leading, as nothing but hot air of

fire, because they argue on the basis of their ideological views that have framed climate

change as something that is out of their hands.

In 2003, Frank Luntz authored a language advisory to the Bush administration in which he

encouraged a change of language: “It’s time for us to start talking about ‘‘climate change’’ instead of

global warming . . . ‘‘Climate change’’ is less frightening than ‘‘global warming’’ . . . Stringent

environmental regulations hit the most vulnerable among us—the elderly, the poor and those on fixed

incomes—the hardest . . . Job losses . . . greater costs . . . American corporations and industry can meet any

challenge, we produce the majority of the world’s food, . . . yet we produce a fraction of the world’s

pollution.”12

This example goes to show what a play of words is able to do. Not only does this framing

allow the Bush administration to assume no responsibility, it also shows how concepts and

the coining of terms can describe and create a reality that does not necessarily reflect the

reality that science describes.

Another leading thinker, Anthony Giddens, is also looking words into the seams in his

account of climate change and energy from a European perspective in his book Turbulent

and Mighty Country (2014). He describes himself as an ungreen green, which is someone who 12 The title of the memo, which Luntz authored, is “Winning the Global Warming Debate: An Overview”. The full memo is not available, however, titbits of it has been featured in a range of articles. The quote used here is taken from Lakoff’s text “Why it Matters How We Frame the Environment” (2011: 71).

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shares “[…] some of the aspirations of the green movement, especially the overriding importance of limiting

the impact of climate change.” (Giddens, 2014: 162). However, he is adding the ungreen due to

some of the factors that are driving the movement, such as “[…] ideas incompatible with

countering the environmental dangers we face today.” (ibid.) One of these ideas is that nature is in

need of protection. He points to the green group “Friends of the Earth” to exemplify his

point. They are employing nature as a term that shows that they are on a quest for

protecting the nature. However, that is depleting the task of alleviating climate change.

According to Giddens, we need to move beyond words, terms and notions such as ‘nature’

because “[…] what we call ‘nature’, including large aspects of the climate, is no longer natural at all.”

(ibid.)

Picking up on Giddens has made me look into, what geologists’ regards as, the

anthropocene age. According to Paul J. Crutzen and Christian Schwägerl (2011) we are

now navigating in the anthropocene age where we, humans, are at the core for change.

Albeit the fact that the International Commission on Stratigraphy13 has yet to adopt the

name for our age, the two scientists suggest that we might as well adopt the name for our

age so as to get used to living in an age where we have a responsibility to build “[…] a

culture that grows with Earth’s biological wealth instead of depleting it.” (Crutzen and Schwägerl,

2011) Because according to the two scientists “[…] human dominance of biological, chemical and

geological processes on Earth — is already an undeniable reality.” (ibid.) This proves that we cannot

wait for the International Commission on Stratigraphy to coin a global term for our age.

We need to act on responsibilities now.

The concept of the anthropocene brings me back to the beginning of this section. There

are many opportunities for describing climate change and how to take action in order not

to aggravate the situation of our rapidly changing climate. The complex clusters of

symbols, concepts and stories and descriptions are helping to create a representation of

13 International Commission on Stratigraphy is a scientific body in the International Union of Geological Sciences, and which has the sole purpose of defining global units such periods, epochs and age. Accordingly, they are setting the standard and framework for how we express the history of our planet. (http://www.stratigraphy.org / Last retrieved on July 25, 2016.)

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climate change, but they are also providing the means for a catalogue of scarce concepts

that serve various purposes; both scientific and political ones. One can argue that the many

uncertainties and vague definitions and terms are creating a reality that we cannot reflect

ourselves in. Which means that our sense of belonging, or lack thereof, determines whether

we will want to take climate action.

A study from Australia by Patrick Devine-Wright, Jennifer Prize and Zoe Leviston (2014)

finds that it can be crucial to examine how, and the extent to which, one’s personal

attachments, especially in terms of national and global levels, can influence the way we

perceive climate change. The results from the study find that there is interplay between our

senses of place when it comes to climate change that is worth looking into the seams. And

it concludes that people who have a global sense of place are more prone to accept the fact

that climate change is man-made: “This study extends this literature by showing the relevance of place

attachments, in particular that individuals holding a stronger sense of belonging at global than national

levels were significantly more likely to perceive climate change to be anthropogenic rather than naturally

caused.” (Devine-Wright, Price and Leviston, 2014: 76).

Other studies finds that 3D simulation and virtual game environments can influence

climate change communication (de Suarez et al., 2012), and that by employing a method of

design inquiry to educate about climate change challenges; interactive simulations can be

used to communicate possible futures and climate change solutions (Aleksandra, Jeannette

and Stephen, 2016).

So far I have made notice of political framings of climate change as something that frames

communication about climate change; ambiguous terms on nature and the green

movement, which allows the coining of terms such as ‘ungreen’; the need for changing the

name of our age; available and tangible solutions for educating about climate change via

design inquiry; and finally I have made notice of the lack of sense of belonging in climate

change communication. The findings so far show that our lives are not homogenous, and

the way we make sense of them varies greatly. The respective interests expressed tell of us

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incongruities and clashes between contradictory beliefs, but the literary findings also show

that there are solutions out there that are readily available. All this has prompted further

research into looking at sense of belonging, communication and climate change. The next

section offers an account of how I went about this, and how I tested the waters.

3.2 Testing the waters

Things are changing rapidly and there is a dire need for changing and reframing messages

that combat the ambiguities on climate change. To understand the field I am navigating,

on the basis of the readings in the previous sections, I went to Cambridge, United

Kingdom to acquire new knowledge. The following part offers an account of my

qualitative research conducted in Cambridge.

3.2.1 Cultures and Practices of Belonging

In March 2016, I attended a symposium on Cultures and Pract i ces o f Belonging at Anglia

Ruskin University, Cambridge, United Kingdom. The symposium gathered a group of

approximately twenty-five academics, graduate students and artists working with

sustainability to create space for discussion, debate and exercises on belonging as a starting

point for approaching issues of sustainability. The symposium facilitated exercises that will

be used as examples in this thesis. Furthermore, the symposium also facilitated a multi-

disciplinary network of people interested in developing collaborative research. I will draw

on the exercises and the network in this thesis.

The organising committee counted representatives from Cambridge Sustainability

Residency, Cambridge School of Art, Global Sustainability Institute at Anglia Ruskin

University and artists who shed light on sustainability in their work.

Exerc ise : Soc ia l Sculpture

The symposium began with an exercise, which had the following headline: ‘A gentle

introductory social sculpture’ (see the full program of the Symposium in the appendix).

Marina Velez, Ph.D. candidate at Plymouth University and a multidisciplinary artist based

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in Cambridge, facilitated this. The exercise required of the participants to place themselves

on three places on the floor, which served as a big world map. The contours of the world

map were not on the floor, so it was up to the participants to make sense of the map. The

three places were: 1: the place we were born, 2: the place where we live and 3: the place we

belong at heart.

A Scottish woman living in the United Kingdom belonged to Iran. A German woman

living in Germany belonged to Italy. A British man belonged to Morocco etc. The

discussion that followed was what struck me as interesting. The participants were guided by

the three places that defined the task at hand. When all the participants were standing on

the floor – scattered about – thoughts were shared. Some of the participant remarked that

they were surprised about how they had placed themselves on the map. The woman who

belonged in Iran at heart noted that it had been more than a decade since she had been in

the country, but that she had memories from there that made a strong impression on her. I

was surprised by how I placed myself. Being born and having lived in Denmark all my life,

I identify myself as a Dane. However, having a non-Danish name has trained me in saying

that I am a Dane with Kurdish roots so as to avoid people asking me where I am really

from when I note Denmark. And if I had not been a part of the exercise and had been

forwarded the question, I would have placed myself in Denmark as a place where I belong

at heart, I am sure.

This act triggered many thoughts, which I returned to after the symposium, and which has

motivated the progression of this thesis from hypothetical considerations to the focus on

two art installations as objects for study.

The symposium Cultures and Practices of Belonging had the purpose, and aimed to,

explore the opportunities embedded in the challenges of boundaries – associated with

communicating about sustainable futures – through cross-disciplinary dialogues and

collaborations. The symposium wanted to navigate the waters of opportunities with a

specific emphasis on the experiential processes. One of these experiential processes was

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the social sculpture described above. The late artist Joseph Beuys developed the concept of

social sculpture in the 1970s. According to Matthew Biro (1995), Beuys was not concerned

with the function of his objects and performances: “Rather, their function lay in getting their

viewers to think, ask questions, and, above all, to recognize their own inherent creative potential. "Every

human being is an artist," became one of Beuys's best known mottoes; and his theory of social sculpture —

which held that politics, law, economics, and science must be rethought on the basis of an expanded concept

of art — became his most important artwork.” (Biro, 2015) This exercise positioned the

respective participant as not only an artist, in the terminology of Biro, but also as a change

and decision-maker.

Exerc ise : ‘Let i t go…’

Debby Lauder, artist and art tutor who holds a BSc in Psychology and a BA (Hons) in Fine

Art, facilitated the second exercise. ‘Let i t go…’ (2015) is a performance and sculptural

work by Lauder and scientist Elena Loginova, and the second exercise was a performance

of ‘Let i t go…’ . All participants went outside the room of the symposium and were

invited back into the – now darkened – room one by one. Upon entrance in the room:

“Pieces of ice, containing gold leaf, are placed directly into the hands of the participants, who are then

prompted to consider the implications of this simple gesture, at the same time as having to take into account

the action of their body heat on the ice they are holding.” (See appendix). The participants were

standing in the darkened room with a piece of ice in their hands with no one being allowed

to say anything. Everybody was holding the piece of ice in each their own way; some were

just standing holding the ice, some were trying to cup it to make it melt faster, some were

getting impatient and were fidgeting with their feet, and the majority of the participants

were beginning to notice the gold leaf dissolving in their palms. After the ice had melted,

the lights were turned on, and participants could now address their thoughts about the

performance.

One of the fellow participants, Lindum, an artist, noted that she did everything she could

to save the water from dripping onto the floor. After the symposium, I asked her if she

could share thoughts on the performance. She replied with the following:

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Another participant, Grace, a graduate with a BA in Politics and International Relations

and an MA in Environment, Politics and Globalisation, also shared her thoughts:

The performance considers the following practical questions: “Do they try to keep the ice frozen

in some way? Do they attempt to document the process? Or do they simply discard the piece of ice, having

decided it is not their problem? The participants may also find themselves reflecting upon questions of

aesthetics, ethics, politics or alchemy.” (See Let it go… flyer in the appendix)

This exercise incited a conversation on how we can promote physical and emotional

engagement when working with sustainability matters and issues. How can we get the

“I walked in to the darkened room and stood where instructed. I noticed everyone else inspecting and

experimenting with an object they held in their hands. I looked to my right and a lady, Debby I think,

stood before a bowl and handed me a globe of ice. Unaware at the time of the gold trapped within, I

cupped the ice in my palms, desperately trying not to agitate it, to prevent the melting of this precious gift.

Perhaps it was the context of the Symposium; ‘Sustainability’ that promoted this thought process, but

whilst I held the ice, my palm chilled and the sphere began to melt, the feeling wasn’t one of discomfort,

but desperation. The metaphors streamed through my mind, a globe, representative of the planet; the

melting evocative of the ice caps, but more importantly the desperate waste; the unjust waste and

poisoning of water, when many suffer drought and walk miles for as much as I held in my hands. I

cupped my hands together, resisting the feeling of water escaping through my fingers. Only once the

lights came on did I become aware of the Gold, another precious resource that has paved the course of

man. Then Bob handed me a cup. I still have it now. The water may have evaporated, but the gold

remains at the bottom, to remind me of the experience. I will make something of it. Thank you.”

“When I had the ice cube/ball in my hands, I was thinking mostly about the fact that my hands

were getting cold and wet. Also, that other people's ice was melting faster than mine. I also

remember feeling quite awkward as we were standing there for some time in silence. When I

noticed the gold coming out from the ice, I remember thinking it was a shame that it was

coming out in bits, too small for me to grab and keep. Instead, it was dripping on the floor with

the water and specs were covering my hand. I also remember thinking that someone is going to

have to clean this up.”

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world to hold the ice cube in their palm? That was one of the questions that the

conversation brought about.

Input

The symposium; the exercises and the cross-disciplinary talks with artists, students and

graduates inspired me to look at art installations that are using objects and natural materials

to make the public aware of pressing climate change issues. And it helped me to narrow

down my area of focus to COP21 so that I am not just analysing climate change art

installations, but analyse the art installations in the light of historical moments (COP21 and

Paris Agreement), and how historic events can leverage art as a catalyst for change, and

change the frameworks for communicating climate change. I would also refer to the input

of the symposium in the next section where I account for my theory of science, research

design and scientific approaches.

3.3 Qualitative inquiry

The prerequisite for this study is a social constructionist and hermeneutic-

phenomenological approach. The following section offers an account of the research

design of this thesis. It serves to give the reader a systematic overview of the procedures

for qualitative inquiry.

This thesis is twofold; in the previous chapters, I have identified my area of research

through literature readings and fieldwork, the second part of my thesis looks at the

theoretical framework and the climate change art installations, which are objects of study.

3.3.1 The qualitative researcher

According to John W. Creswell: “The language of the qualitative researcher becomes personal, literary,

and based on definitions that evolve during a study rather than being defined by the researcher.” (2007:

19). This, the reader will find, is also the case in this thesis. I am positioning myself as

researcher in the field; this entails bringing worldviews, paradigms and beliefs into the

conduct of study (Creswell, 2007: 16). The section where I account for my hypothetical

24

considerations is a testament to that. However, as the chapter 4 will show, there is a

theoretical framework, which shapes my study.

The influence of my positioning on the conduct of inquiry is of crucial importance to this

study. Creswell operates with philosophical assumptions that are influencing the

framework for qualitative research. Attending to these is paramount before I leap into

research design.

As my problem field demonstrates, this study does not look at the aspect of user-

experience as felt; thus it does not have an ontological orientation as per se, but still I will

argue that my thesis use the ontological assumption – one of Creswell’s philosophical

assumptions – in the sense that it looks at the ways in which reality is depicted in climate

change art installations, e.g. the polar bear and the ice. The polar bear and the ice are

objects and themes defined by the artists behind the climate change art installations, which

provide me with a perspective. However, I am not studying the two objects ontologically;

by looking at ‘what it is to be’ a polar bear or ice. I do, however, use the objects to bring

clarity by analysing the respective objects to acquire knowledge about the nature of said

objects.

The thesis is two-fold; it is methodological and rhetorical, and this positions me as a

qualitative researcher from a methodological and rhetorical perspective. According to

Creswell, a methodological researcher is more concerned with the process of research and

uses inductive logic and, and “[…] continually revises questions from experiences in the field.”

(Creswell, 2007: 17). The rhetorical researcher is more concerned with the language of

research and is not shy to use first-person. (ibid.). The positioning of the qualitative

researcher will be elaborated in accordance to hermeneutic phenomenology and the social

constructivist approach.

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3.3.2 Hermeneutic phenomenology

The first part of this thesis is phenomenological in the sense that I use the experience of a

group of people from the symposium and their take on experience to develop an idea and

my hypothetical considerations (Laverty, 2003: 4). It is the experience of two of my fellow

symposium participants, and specifically their response to my question ‘what is this (holding

an ice ball) experience like?’ that has prompted me to look at climate change art installations

which are using either ice or is a result of collaboration – and it is the frame of the

symposium that has provided me with knowledge that has made me select a focus

(COP21) for my analysis of the two climate change art installations. In the terminology of

Laverty (2003), the experience with ice is a taken for granted experience that is an

opportunity for a researcher to uncover new meanings.

In the section on the exercises from the symposium, I emphasised some of the things that

I noted from the symposium that I attended. Like exemplified above, I am not only using

what I noted as my own methodology for developing the ideas that prompted this

research, I am also using the bodily experiences of others to define my area of focus and to

select objects for study. This is aligned with Crowther, Ironside, Spence and Smythe’s

(2016) notions on hermeneutic phenomenology as a research method. Hermeneutic

phenomenology grants a researcher access to data and meaning from lived experiences in a

given field. Accordingly, the researcher is not dependent on pre-given structures and

methodologies for inquiry per se, but instead the respective researcher adopts “[…] an

attitude or stance that ponders unfolding and evolving questions allowing them to be surprised by how their

thinking on phenomenon transforms over time.” (Crowther, Ironside, Spence and Smythe, 2016: 1).

Crowther, Ironside, Spence and Smythe’s (2016: 2) also emphasize the intimate

understanding of place as paramount for hermeneutic phenomenology. This means that I,

as a researcher, must be in the same place of the said others whose bodily experiences with

ice has brought me closer to my research area as a way to bridge the distance between our

minds. This inheritance of hermeneutic phenomenology is what sets it aside from

phenomenology. According to Laverty, the hermeneutic phenomenology “[…] approach

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asks the researcher to engage in a process of self-reflection to quite a different end than that of

phenomenology. Specifically, the biases and assumptions of the researcher are not bracketed or set aside, but

rather are embedded and essential to interpretive process.” (2003: 17). This is aligned with my

positioning as a qualitative researcher where I am also giving considerable thought to

worldviews and hypothetical considerations as part of my circuit of inquiry.

3.3.3 Social constructionism

Laverty distinguishes between methodology and method (2003: 16). Methodology sets the

frame for how a researcher goes about in their circuit of in their respective circuit of

inquiry. A method guides the research in their analysis. In this respective, I am also

operating with the two terms and what they epitomise according to Laverty. This I do to

reduce the semantic width.

When I note that the prerequisite of this thesis is a social constructionist approach, I do it

in the light of the selected objects of study. I use frame analysis and a framework for

reading images to analyse the climate change art installations. Frame analysis is a discourse

analysis method (Hope, 2010), which Neimeyer and Torres assert is a social constructionist

method for inquiry. According to Burr (2003) social constructionism and social

constructivism are used interchangeable, but that she is leaning more towards the use of

social constructionism to avoid linkages to Piagetian theory (Burr, 2003: 1), which is

particularly concerned with cognition, learning and education whereas the social

constructionism is multidisciplinary and embodies sociological and linguistic disciplines.

Norman Fairclough operates with the concept of intertextuality. He asserts that

intertextuality is a vital component in critical discourse theory due to contemporary matters

that are rapidly changing, and which are restructuring “[…] textual traditions and orders of

discourse […]” (Fairclough, 1992: 270). Fairclough refers to this process as a striking

contemporary phenomenon. This calls for the employment of methods to analyse

discursive events. It is on the basis of this that Fairclough operationalises intertextuality.

“Intertextuality entails […] an emphasis upon the heterogeneity of texts, and a mode of analysis which

27

highlights the diverse and often contradictory elements and threads that make up a text.” (Fairclough,

1992: 272)

In the context of this thesis, the concept of intertextuality will be employed as an explicit

tool for analysis, which explicitly looks at what Fairclough defines as, productivity of

texts. The productivity of a text implies that texts can be transformed and can contribute to

changing and restricting conventions, which are prevalent. This is very much up to par with

Burr’s definition of social constructionism, which gives a researcher reigns to “[…] take a

critical stance towards our taken-for-granted ways of understanding the world (including ourselves). It invites

us to be critical of the idea that our observations of the world unproblematically yield its nature to us, to

challenge the view that conventional knowledge is based upon objective, unbiased observation of the world.”

(Burr, 2003: 2).

And as a social constructionist researcher, I am positioning myself as someone who takes

something that is arguably taken for granted (e.g. art installations in a communication

perspective) and looks at it as something which is sustained by and constructed by people.

Social constructionism is accordingly characterised by a critical stance towards knowledge,

historical and cultural specificity, social processes, and patterns of social action sustained by interactions

(Burr, 2003: 2-4). Finally, truth is then not based on objective observations we make of the

world, but by our social constructions of language and social interactions. The notion on

truth will also be elaborated in the final chapter, the outro, of the thesis.

3.4 Research design

The field that I am navigating in not fixed in the sense that one can take climate change art

installations and understand them in the light of a traditional communication and social

theory. We live in an age where things are progressing fast and the rapid advancement of

technology is causing barriers and challenges to emerge when it comes to climate change

communication. Some are trying to address the challenges by generating new models and

frameworks, for e.g. gaming, and testing if these can contribute to climate change

communication and perhaps even meet some of the barriers associated with climate change

28

communication with tangible and readily available solutions (Aleksandra, Jeannette and

Stephen, 2016). And then there is the study from Australia, that I referred to earlier, which

finds that a stronger global sense of belonging is more likely to convince someone that

climate change is man-made (Devine-Wright, Price and Leviston, 2014).

The literature review that I conducted touches upon some of the barriers associated with

climate change communication, which is a field of study that is booming and emerging as a

salient topic for research. It was not until since the late 1990s that climate change

communication began proliferating as a discipline in communication (Nerlich, Koteyko

and Brown, 2010). And the symposium Cultures and Practices of Belonging was also an attempt

at testing the waters of this contested area of study. The aim of the symposium was to

explore ways of turning risks associated with sustainability into opportunities that would

change the way we engage in cross-disciplinary dialogues and the way we conduct research

in e.g. the discipline of climate change communication.

The first part of the thesis explores the field that I am navigating and has prompted and

inspired me to select and delimit my problem area. And it has provided me with a focus,

which has made me design a research framework that will equip me to answer my problem

statements the best and in the light of the prerequisite of this study (social constructionist).

As I have mentioned, my thesis is both methodological and rhetorical. Chapter 1-4 sets the

stage theoretically and methodologically, and I am positioning myself as a methodological

researcher (Cresswell, 2007). As mentioned earlier, this makes me reason inductively, which

is evident in the way that I am leaning on recent studies and scientist findings to support

and perhaps even justify the validity of my problem area.

In the analysis in chapter 5 I am using the theoretical framework to explore the extent to

which the COP21-negotiations can leverage art as a catalyst for change. I am exploring the

language and visualisation of the climate change art installations as a rhetorical researcher

concerned with language and words that manifest reality. The analysis introduces the object

29

of study, and is guided and shaped by visual methodologies and framing and affect theories

from the disciplines of communication studies and culture studies. The analysis is the

empirical backdrop of chapter 6 where I look at the themes that can leverage art as a

catalyst for change in climate change communication.

In chapter 7, the outro, I look at my results and findings and consider how these can be

utilised in relation to other global negotiations on climate change.

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4. THEORIES AND THEMES

The first sections of the chapter looks at framing theory and methodologies for reading

images to understand how climate change art installations are used to address

contemporary issues about climate change. The final section of the chapter looks at the

cultural construction of emotions according to cultural theorists Sara Ahmed (2004),

Lauren Berlant (2004) and Lilie Chouliaraki (2006, 2009) to understand how emotions are

used as a socio-cultural phenomenon; and to understand the methodological implications

of studying emotions in relation to climate change art installations.

4.1 Framing theory

Framing theory looks at how things are put on the agenda and how reality is depicted,

organised and communicated. Framing theory deals mainly with the aforementioned whilst

looking at how the frames influence the recipient, and is most often used in relation to how

the media creates meaning and use frames to create an agenda. According to George

Lakoff (2011), framing is vital and matters to a great extent when it comes to talking about

environment. This chapter looks at texts developed by George Lakoff (1980, 2010), Robert

M. Entman (1993) and Richard J. Alexander (2009), and particularly in relation to the

question of art installations being used as a method governing the dissemination of

information about climate change, sustainability and the environment.

Framing theory can have multiple purposes. It can be employed as a theory that guides an

analysis of a given text, or it can be used to explore how texts influence thinking or change.

According to Entman (1993: 51) framing theory “[…] consistently offers a way to describe the

power of a communicating text.” As mentioned earlier, I intend to use this chapter to shape my

analysis in the next chapter. In Entman’s terminology, I am then using framing theory to

guide my analysis of climate change art installations.

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4.1.1 Framing as a research paradigm

Entman operates with framing as a research paradigm – the framing paradigm – that is

applied to different fields of studies. He points to different studies of mass communication,

which can benefit from operationalising framing as a research paradigm. One of them is

content analysis: “The major task of determining textual meaning should be to identify and describe

frames; content analysis informed by a theory of framing would avoid treating all negative or positive terms

or utterances as equally salient and influential.” (Entman, 1993: 57) This kind of analysis is

aligned with Entman’s notions on salience and selection as vital terms when utilising the

concept of framing (Entman, 1993: 52). E.g., in the context of this thesis: An artist often

has free reigns to highlight their perceptions of the world, or the way they want the world

to perceived, in their installations. Selecting an aspect from their reality and making this

aspect of their reality salient does this. This process of framing deviates from the kind of

content analysis that approaches a text by treating all messages, words – whether positive

or negative – equally salient.

Entman’s take on framing theory includes the operationalisation of four framing functions

as guiding terms. These provide one with resources to evaluate a text, and to identify

frames in the respective text that prompts further research. The four steps are defined as

follows:

“[…] define problems—determine what a causal agent is doing with what costs and benefits, usually

measured in terms of common cultural values; diagnose causes—identify the forces creating the problem;

make moral judgments—evaluate causal agents and their effects; and suggest remedies—offer and

justify treatments for the problems and predict their likely effects.” (Entman, 1993: 52).

Accordingly, Entman suggests that frames also have, at the very least, four locations, which

he classifies as: the communicator who makes use of frames to organise their judgments and

belief system; the text which is compromised of frames that “[…] are manifested by the presence

or absence of certain key-words, stock phrases, stereotyped images, sources of information, and sentences that

provide thematically reinforcing clusters of facts or judgments […]” (Entman, 1993: 52); the receiver

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who does not necessarily interpret or make sense of the frames of the text in accordance to

the judgments and beliefs of the communicator; and finally the culture which Entman

defines as the “[…] the empirically demonstrable set of common frames exhibited in the discourse and

thinking of most people in a social grouping.” (Entman, 1993: 53).

4.1.2 Processes of framing

George Lakoff is another theorist who looks at framing theory. He operates with a

theoretical framework that looks at the interplay between frames, metaphors, concepts and

structures, and especially how frames activate our meaning and conceptual systems. He

uses the example of a hospital frame to stress how unconscious structures are “[…] realized

in neural circuits in the brain.” (Lakoff, 2010: 71). A hospital is tied to other frames, which

could be the roles of a doctor, nurse, patient, receptionist, or it could be certain elements

and equipments in hospitals such as operating room, recovering room, scalpel etc. The way

we think and talk involves the process of framing. Our understanding of knowledge is

dependent of the frames we have to support it. According to Lakoff (2010: 73), words, in

themselves, are not frames, but words evoke frames. And these frames are conceptually

structured.

As I mentioned earlier in the thesis, Frank Luntz authored a language advisory to the Bush

administration in which he encouraged a change of language; and that we talk about

climate change and not global warming. According to Lakoff (2010: 71) this marked the

beginning of the employment of climate change. This exemplifies the result of a framing

process. The agenda of the Bush administration is being used to create a new framework

for a terminology that disclaims the Bush administration from liability. One thing is to deny

liability; another thing is to send a signal to the public about climate change, which is

arguably encouraging a behavioural change that is destructive. Global warming is

embedded with a meaning system, which indicate that we also have an influence on the

earth’s development. Climate change however point to climate as the main actor; the

climate is changing, and not our habits on earth, which deplete the earth.

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Richard J. Alexander (2009) also points to the inequality of access to information as

something which allows this kind of framing: “In view of the way the world is ordered, it is evident

that the underlying inequality of access to information about the world—ecology or the environment, in our

case—is overlaid by façade which occasionally represent what goes on in the world as ‘natural’, as

‘harmless’ or even as ‘inevitable’.”(Alexander, 2009: 5).

Alexander sees dismantling of language as one of the objectives of critical discourse

analysis (Alexander 2009: 5), which is an analysis method he is using to frame discourse on

the environment. This objective is vital when operating in the tension field between

discourse and ecology. Albeit the fact that the latter is of minor focus in this thesis and that

the analysis in the next chapter is not subjected to a critical discourse analysis framework, it

is crucial to look to sciences to grasp the process of dismantling. In his account of critical

discourse analysis, he focuses on how speakers and writers are positioning their listeners

and readers to make them see and comprehend facts and events (Alexander, 2009: 7).

Lakoff breaks with the idea that the majority of us “[…] were brought up with a commonplace

view of how we think that derives from the Enlightenment.” (Lakoff, 2011: 72). He finds that it is

crucial to note a break with this tradition because it leads people astray when it comes to

dealing with topics such as global warming. This old view claims that reason is conscious,

unemotional, logical, abstract and universal. For Lakoff, it is essential to break with this

idea because it is false. He believes that reason is unconscious, emotional and makes use of

metaphors, narratives, logic and frames (Lakoff, 2011: 72). This break with tradition is

crucial considering the fact that some people are subscribing to a view that reason is fact

(Lakoff, 2011: 72).

Reason to Lakoff is unconscious, when we are in the process of framing, we cannot avoid

the emotional aspect. Lakoff considers emotions to be “[…] inescapable part of normal

thought.” (Lakoff, 2011: 72). In this respect, emotionality also becomes a question of

rationality. Lakoff asserts that if we are not able to reach emotionally to something, this

something can seem meaningless to us. In the same fashion we are linking frames to other

34

roles to make sense of e.g. a hospital room, we are using our emotions to make rational

decisions. This notion is also applicable when looking at climate change, and will be

elaborated on the basis of texts by Sara Ahmed and Lauren Berlant in the next chapter.

4.1.3 Concepts and metaphors

As mentioned above, Lakoff believes that reason is unconscious and it makes use of

metaphors, and the way we think is conceptually structured. Different concepts are

governing our thoughts, and it crucial that we do not reduce this to intellect. According to

Lakoff and Johnson (1980), concepts “[…] also govern our everyday functioning, down to the

mundane details.” (Lakoff and Johnson, 1980: 3). We do not shed light on or consider our

conceptual systems. We act in everyday life without thinking of our mundane actions and

activities. But the way we communicate and engage in communication is dependent on our

conceptual systems, which, in the context of the case studies in this thesis, is particularly

interesting to look at. According to Lakoff and Johnson (1980), we can try to understand

the conceptual systems by analysing language. One way to approach such an analysis is by

looking at metaphors. They see metaphors as linguistic expressions and metaphorical

concepts that are part of our conceptual systems, and argue that our conceptual system is

metaphorically structured (Lakoff and Johnson, 1980: 6).

Lakoff and Turner work from the viewpoint that metaphor is omnipresent, conventional

and irreplaceable (Lakoff and Turner, 1989: xi). They assert that metaphors are used

without us being particularly aware of it. It is something that suffuses our thought currents,

and it “[…] allows us to understand our selves and our world in ways that no other modes of thoughts

can.” (Lakoff and Turner, 1989: xi). They go on to explain that metaphors are more than

just words and constructions: “Far from being merely a matter of words, metaphor is a matter of

thought—all kinds of thought: thoughts about emotion, about society, about human character, about

language, and about the nature of life and death.” (Lakoff and Turner, 1989: xi).

Metaphors are a tool for understanding. Often we find that metaphors are reduced to

words, however, Lakoff and Turner assert that metaphors reside in our thoughts and

35

should not be reduced to something, which only resides in words (Lakoff and Turner,

1989: 2). This distinction is crucial to their theoretical take on what metaphors are, and it is

crucial in terms of how we make sense of metaphorical conceptions of e.g. climate change.

Lakoff and Turner points to poetry’s use of metaphors, as something that is both

illuminating experience and something that challenges the mind-set and helps us to be

critical. The poet, or in the context of this thesis, the artist, mentions sequence of things

(Lakoff and Turner, 1989: 5). This could be sequence of ice melting, which refers to other

metaphors for understanding life. We understand the sequence of things that the artists

refer to, in accordance and relation other metaphors for understanding life.

Lakoff and Johnson operate with the metaphor “Argument is war” as a starting point for

their scrutiny of how metaphorical concepts contribute to our understanding of the world

and its subjects. The key point of this metaphor is that we are not only talking about

argumentation and war, but that we use mental mechanisms to understand things and their

context:

“It is important to see that we don’t just talk about arguments in terms of war. We can

actually win or lose arguments. We see the person we are arguing with as an opponent. We

attack his positions and we defend our own. We gain and lose ground. We plan and use

strategies. If we a position indefensible, we can abandon it and take a new line of attack.

Many of the things we do in arguing are partially structured by the concept of war. Though

there is a no physical battle, there is a verbal battle, and the structure of an argument—

attack, defense, counterattack, etc.—reflects this. It is in this sense that the argument

ARGUMENT IS WAR metaphor is one that we live by in this culture; it structures the

actions we perform in arguing.” (Lakoff and Johnson, 1980: 4)

Lakoff and Johnson stress that the language of argument should not be reduced to being

poetic and rhetorical, but that we must understand language of argument as something that

is literal (1980: 5). We talk in circles, which means that we speak in conformity of our

conceptual systems, and the way we imagine and perceive things.

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4.2 Reading images

Framing theory as described in the previous section gives me tools to dissect the object of

study and look at how issues relating to climate change are defined and organised. This

theory is mostly applicable to the analysis of the text materials of the climate change art

installations. Gunther Kress and Theo van Leeuwen’s (2006) methodology for reading

images will guide an analysis of the visuals of the installations.

Kress and van Leeuwen see in images something that moves beyond the idea that images

are solely aesthetic and expressive. They read images as modes, which carry dimensions of

social, political and communicative character (Kress and van Leeuwen, 2006: 20) and use

semiology as a resource for reading images. The methodologies for reading images will

support Entman, Lakoff and Alexander’s framework for identifying frames.

According to Gillian Rose (2016), semiology is a method that looks at what is beneath the

surface and which “[…] confronts the question of how images make meanings head on.” (Rose, 2016:

106). This confrontation entails deconstructing images to study the respective elements and

signs to understand how these work in relation to other systems of meanings. Rose asserts

that “A semiological analysis entails the deployment of a highly refined set of concepts that produce detailed

accounts of the exact ways the meanings of an image are produced through that image.” (Rose, 2016:

107).

Semiology thus focuses on the social effects and dimensions of meaning. This means that

social structures and power relations define the way we communicate – whether it is

through art, images, texts, etc. This section looks at social semiotics as a method for

reading images by Gunther Kress (2006) and Theo van Leeuwen (2005, 2006), and Rose’s

notion on meaning-making will be taken into account to understand how visual

methodologies can be used to understand the functions of the climate change art

installations.

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4.2.1 Social semiotics and semiotic resources

Theo van Leeuwen points to the shift in linguistics, where the focus shifted from focusing

on the sentence to focus on the text, and from grammar to discourse, to explain that a

similar shift has occurred in relation to social semiotics: “[…] in social semiotics the focus

changed from the ‘sign’ to the way people use semiotic ‘resources’ both to produce communicative artefacts

and events and to interpret them – which is also a form of semiotic production – in the context of specific

social situations and practices.” (Van Leeuwen, 2005: xi).

Semiotic resource is a term, which is vital when operating with social semiotics. To Theo

van Leeuwen, language is a set of semiotic resources that generate meanings (2005: 3). He

defines these as “[…] the actions and artefacts we use to communicate, whether they are produced

physiologically […] or by means of technologies […] etc.” (ibid.) His employment of the term also

breaks with the traditional usage of the term sign, which embodies the same as semiotic

resources. Accordingly, the employment of resource is more favourable due to the fact that

it “[…] avoids the impression that ‘what a sign stands’ is somehow pre-given, and not affected by its use.”

(ibid.) This is also aligned with van Leuuwen’s notions on social semiotics as an applied

theory. He argues that it is not a self-contained field, and that one of the key factors of

social semiotics is that it leverages interdisciplinarity; and thereby cannot stand alone, but

must engage with social theory (van Leeuwen, 2005: 1).

Semiotic resources are signifiers, which are to be perceived as objects that have “[…] been

drawn into the domain of social communication and that have a theoretical semiotic potential constituted by

all their past uses and all their potential uses and and an actual semiotic potential constituted by all those

past uses that are known to and considered relevant by the users of the resource.” (van Leeuwen, 2005:

4). It is the domain of social communication that this thesis is navigating it. By looking at

climate change art installations, this thesis explores the semiotic resources, signifiers, in art

installations that trigger semiotic behaviour. According to van Leeuwen, we can look

physical activities – such as touching the ice of Eliasson and Rosing’s installation – to be

able to describe the semiotic potential of a resource, ice in this context, and the potential it

has for making meaning (Rose, 2016). The process of studying semiotic resources, to make

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sense of the semiotic potential, entails looking at the semiotic resources into the seams to

understand how it can be leveraged for use in purposes of communication (van Leeuwen,

2005; Rose, 2016).

4.2.2 Social semiotic analysis framework

Social semiotics then offers a methodology for looking at resources and how these are

used. van Leeuwen describes the latter as something that is socially regulated, which is

exactly what social semiotics explores (van Leeuwen, 2005: 93). Social semiotics is,

accordingly, “[…] about the how of communication. How do we use material resources to produce

meaning? But there can be no ‘how’ without a ‘what’. We need to look at ‘meaning’ itself as well.” (ibid.)

To create a framework for how to understand the 'how' and the ‘what’, van Leeuwen has

created a social semiotic analysis framework, which is structured with four key dimensions:

discourse, genre, style and modality.

Discourse

Van Leeuwen definition of discourse embodies the idea that discourses are frameworks for

making sense of things, and that these are plural because we all make sense of reality in

different ways (van Leeuwen, 2005: 94). Discourse as defined by Norman Fairclough

(1992, 1995, 2003) and Ferdinand de Saussure (1974) often uses discourse as a concept,

which looks at discourses in texts, either spoken or written. van Leeuwen operationalise the

dimension of discourse by making it apt for use when looking semiotic modes (van

Leeuwen, 2005: 95), such as those prevalent in climate change art installations. This

dimension of study looks at the ‘how’; and looks at how semiotic resources are used as

representations.

Genre

The epitome of genre in social semiotic studies is different from the epitome of genre in

content analysis. The latter looks at genre as a heading for content analysis whereas

discourse serves that purpose in social semiotic analyses. The dimension of genre in this

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context then looks at genre as a multimodal concept (van Leeuwen, 2005: 129), and looks

at the resources that are triggering communicative interactions. (van Leeuwen, 2005: 91)

Style

This dimension of study looks at the employment of semiotic resources and how these are

performing and enacting communicative interactions. It is a dimension; and is multimodal

in the sense that it is not only about speaking and writing styles, but also embodies the

dimension of doing. (van Leeuwen, 2005: 139).

Modali ty

The final dimension in the four key dimensions framework is the concept of modality,

which looks at the question of truth. It looks at all the other dimensions in the light of, and

the extent to which, something is true. The concept of modality is approached from a

social constructive perspective. Van Leeuwen assert that “[…] what is regarded as true in one

social context is not necessarily regarded as true in others, with all the consequences that brings. Linguists

and semioticians therefore do not ask ‘How true is this?’ but ‘As how true is it represented?'” (Van

Leeuwen, 2005: 160) This notion is interesting to keep considering the task at hand. My

thesis looks at climate change art installations and how they can create a new framework

for climate change communication, and I have a hypothesis about artists emerging as the

sustainability leaders of tomorrow. Van Leeuwen denotes that linguists and semioticians

are not concerned with absolute truth, but merely with the truth they perceive.

Modali ty and the real

Kress and van Leeuwen operate with modality and a social theory of the real. In their

account of this, they claim that “[…] generally, and with particular relevance to the visual, we regard

our sense of sights as more reliable than our sense of hearing, ‘I saw it with my own eyes’ as more reliable

evidence than ‘I heard it with my own ears’.” (Kress and van Leeuwen, 2006: 154). This shows

that every day we act according to the extent to which something is reliable, credible, true

and factual. Without sparing it a thought, we use modality markers – though unconsciously

– as justification for our actions and behaviour. These modality markers have been

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developed in a particular context in which particular values and social needs apply for the

respective group. Kress and van Leeuwen’s operationalization of the concept of modality

entails accounts of visual communication and visuals; which represent people, places and

things as authentic framings that are represented in their actual form or as imaginings or

fantasies (Kress and van Leeuwen, 2006: 156).

4.3 Emotions, affect and sense of belonging

In the past years, we have seen how affect and emotions has been used as a focus of

analysis in e.g. education from a cultural and political aspect (Albrech-Crane & Slack, 2007;

Zembylas, 2007); thus breaking with the idea of emotions only being the subject of study in

psychological and biological categories. Sara Ahmed (2004), Lauren Berlant (2004) and Lilie

Chouliaraki (2006, 2009) are among some of the contemporary theorists positioning

emotions in the realm of social and cultural theory. This section will draw on theories and

readings by the aforementioned theorists to understand how the concept of sense of

belonging can be leveraged as a framework for climate change communication.

4.3.1 Sara Ahmed and the cultural politics of fear

Sara Ahmed is a cultural theorist who has created a methodology for reading the cultural

construction of emotion. Her work on the cultural politics of emotions draws on gender

and cultural studies. Albeit the fact that her work appropriates examples pertaining to texts

about terrorism, asylum, migration, race, reconciliation etc., her methodology for reading

emotions is relevant when analysing contemporary cultural and/or political conditions

(Burman, 2008: 149).

Sara Ahmed looks at the affective politics of fear: “[…] fear works by establishing others as

fearsome insofar as they threathen to take the self in. Such fantasies construct the other as a danger not only

to one’s self as self, but to one’s very life, to one’s very existence as a separate being with a life of its own.”

(Ahmed, 2004: 64) According to Ahmed, “Fear involves an anticipation of hurt or injury.”

(Ahmed, 2004: 65). By this Ahmed asserts fear of the future is something that can be

experienced bodily due to the mobility of signs.

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Mobil i ty o f s igns

Mobility between signs is not rooted in the psyche, but in history. Ahmed asserts, “The

movement between signs does not have its origin in the psyche, but is a trace of how such

histories remain alive in the present.” (Ahmed, 2004: 66) Ahmed takes an example of ‘the

black man’ to explain how the black man has been produced via signs. This example can be

used to understand how the fear of climate change is manifested in our perception of the

situation. One could even try to replace the black man with a polar bear to understand how

the polar bear promotes fear of the future. In the line of this, it is then interesting to look

at the mobility of signs and how these construct an emotional value. According to Ahmed,

fear is contained in a body. Ahmed uses the example of ‘the black man’ to explain how the

black man becomes the object that contains fear: “And yet the containment of fear in an

object remains provisional: insofar as the black man is the object of fear, then he may pass

by. Indeed, the physicality of this ‘passing by’ can be associated with the passing of fear

between signs: it is the movement that intensifies the affect.” (Ahmed, 2004: 67) Ahmed

relates this to what she refers to as the economy of fear. I will come back to the economy

of fear. But first, it is crucial to look at the body as the container of fear.

Objec t o f f ear

The object of fear, the body, is able to create distance between bodies: “[…] fear […] re-

establishes distance between bodies whose difference is read off the surface, as a reading

which produces the surface (shivering, recolouring).” (Ahmed, 2004: 63). Ahmed’s reads

fear as an intense emotion, which is unpleasant and which thrusts us into a future through

a bodily experience in the moment: “One sweats, one’s heart races, one’s whole body

becomes a space of unpleasant intensity, an impression that overwhelms us and pushes us

back with the force of its negation, which may sometimes involve taking flight, and other

times may involve paralysis.” (Ahmed, 2004: 65). It is an embodied experience, and fear in

action does something to the mobility of signs; it restricts the mobility of signs.

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Economy of f ear

Ahmed also operates with she calls the affective economies. She is of the view that

emotions are like a form of capital: “[…] affect does not reside positively in the sign or commodity,

but is produced only as an effect of its circulation. I am using “the economic” to suggest that emotions

circulate and are distributed across a social as well as psychic field.” (Ahmed, 2004: 120). This means

that affect is not something that is to be found in a respective sign or an object, but it is via

the mobility and circulation of signs and objects that converts into affect: “Some signs, that is,

increase in affective value as an effect of the movement between signs: the more they circulate, the more

affective they become, and the more they appear to “contain” affect.” (ibid.).

Ahmed’s notions on fear as an emotion that is part of the sociology of emotions, according

to Ahmed, allows me to analyse my objects of study in relation to how emotions, and the

cultural politics of emotions, can affect the way we perceive climate change art installations

which are using fear to spur action.

4.3.2 Lauren Berlant and modes of belonging mediated by compassion

Another theorist who looks at the cultural politics of emotions is Lauren Berlant (2004).

She looks at compassion, as an emotion, which, she asserts, “[…] implies a social relation

between spectators and sufferers, with the emphasis on the spectator’s experience of feeling compassion and its

subsequent relation to material practice.” (Berlant, 2004: 1). Berlant’s reading of compassion

entails looking at compassion as an emotion mediated by aesthetics of social suffering, and

which alleviates social suffering. She points to a case of the Republican Party in the Unites

States where they are branding themselves with the following expression: Compassionate

conservatism. In her account and reading of the phrase, she finds that the Republicans are

using compassion to advocate for a change that entails shrinking the gestures of the welfare

state by promising to protect an individual’s economic sovereignty: “[…] the attendant policies

relocate the template of justice from the collective condition of specific populations to that of the individual

[…].” (Berlant, 2004: 2).

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Berlant goes on to exemplify how compassion is being used to reframe the responsibilities

of state by drawing a link to faith. Faith is able to provide with a moral tone of the nation,

which the Republications are adopting to make themselves look like the moral actors: They

are using compassion as an emotion to reframe the view of the state and the nation, and to

show that the United States is better served with individuals taking action, rather than the

state leading the alleviation of suffering by coming forward with help to those who are less

fortunate. The latter is what the compassionate conservatives aims to do. Compassion is

being used to shrink the gestures of the welfare state and to emphasise a view where the

conservatives are put at the core for change. They are also using compassion to activate

local belonging: “In this view all occupants of the United States are local: we cultivate compassion for

those lacking the foundations for belonging where we live, and where we live is less the United States of

promise and progress or rights and resources than it is a community whose fundamental asset is humane

recognition.” (Berlant, 2004: 3).

Berlant is operationalising emotion as a social and aesthetic technology of belonging. Her

reading of the Republicans employment of the compassionate conservatives phrase serves

as a method for looking emotions into the seams. Especially when looking at the relation

between spectators and sufferers, and in the context of this thesis, the extent to which the

concept of sense of belonging can create a framework for climate change communication.

The following example by Berlant shows how emotion can be utilised in political matters

and to promote ideological views and standpoints. In this thesis, the methodology for

reading emotions will be used in place with framing theory to understand how, and the

extent to which, climate change art installations evoke, and perhaps even promote, feelings

that can change the way we communicate climate change. Although this thesis does not

conduct an analysis of how the installations are received, the example shows how power

and responsibilities can be distributed by use of emotional mechanisms:

“When the response to suffering’s scene is compassion—as opposed to, say, pleasure, fascination,

hopelessness, or resentment—compassion measures one’s value (or one’s governments value) in terms of the

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demonstrated capacity not to turn one’s head away but to embrace a sense of obligation to remember what

one has seen and, in response to that haunting, to become involved in a story of rescue or amelioration: to

take a sad song and make it better.” (Berlant, 2004: 7).

4.3.3 Lilie Chouliaraki on spectators and sufferers

In a similar fashion to Berlant, Lilie Chouliaraki also uses the terms spectators and (distant)

sufferers. Albeit the fact that Chouliaraki uses the terms to shape a study of the relationship

between spectators in the West and distant sufferers in Africa and Asia from a media

perspective, I would argue that her framework is applicable to shape an analysis of how,

and the extent to which, sense of belonging can become a framework for climate change

communication.

She uses the case of the Asian tsunami emergency in December 2004 as a case that conveys

the spectacle of suffering in the media. This tsunami marked the ‘unity of the world’

(quoted in Chouliaraki, 2006: 1) as we witnessed how the international community united

to respond to the suffering. According to Chouliaraki, the Secretary General of the UN at

the time of the emergency, Kofi Annan, noted two factors that caused the emergency to be

‘a unique display of the unity of the world’ (ibid.): Global footage and global suffering. Global

footage was a result of the advanced technology and that the tragedy was unfolding on our

television screens. The tidal wave that hit the coastline claimed citizens from more than 40

countries. According to Chouliaraki, the two factors, responses, emphasized the aspect of

witnessing the event and the aftermath as something that evoked a lot of emotions

(Chouliaraki, 2008: 1-2) and a mediation of suffering.

Cosmopol i tan c i t izenship

Chouliaraki questions this mediation of suffering, and if its enough to witness tragedy,

suffering and distant suffering, and if this is enough to incentivise action. The spectacle of

suffering as conveyed through the case of the tsunami questions the norms of ethics in

public life. According to Chouliaraki the latter insists “[…] that suffering invites compassion, it

must be acted on and on the spot if it is to be an effective response to the urgency of human pain. Its ideal

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moral citizen is the figure of the good Samaritan.” (Chouliaraki, 2006: 2). Chouliaraki argues that

this discourse is out-dated for the sole reason that, the experience and representation of,

suffering is mediated, which implies that it is also “[…] impossible to act on in a compassionate

manner.” (ibid.) This shift calls for a scrutiny of what it entails to be a cosmopolitan citizen.

One of the main problems of the concept of the cosmopolitan citizens is the fact that

public action is reduced to compassion, which Chouliaraki defines as “[…] on-the-spot action

on suffering - but not needs to be acted as a pity that is action that incorporates the dimension of distance.”

(ibid.).

In the introduction to Chouliaraki’s book The Spectatorship of Suffering (2006), she poses the

following rhetorical question:

“How are certain scenes of suffering construed as being of no concern to Western spectators

or capable of arousing the spectators’ emotions? Do visual properties – such as the absence

or presence of moving images – play a role in the construal of these scenes? How can we

differentiate between representations of suffering that may simply bring a tear to a

spectator’s eye and those that may actually make a difference in the sufferers’ lives?”

(Chouliaraki, 2006: 7)

To understand how suffering is being construed, she emphasises the ‘how’ question that

guide a scrutiny of how suffering is represented and narrated in respective texts. She has

therefore conducted an analytical framework, which will be described in the next section,

which allows one to problematize action, and the discourses that prompt action, which is

mediated.

Analyt i cs o f mediat ion

Lilie Chouliaraki (2006) has created a framework she calls the analytics of mediation. This

approach is developed from the point of view that the visual is an object of a semiotic

study due to the fact it “[…] has the ‘potential’ to produce content and a grammar for the realization

of meaning.” (2006: 72). Chouliaraki points to the effect that aesthetics have and how the

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aesthetic impact makes stronger impressions on our memories. On the basis of this, she

calls the image an instrument, which helps spectators remember suffering (2008: 76), and

points to the political means and concept ‘politics of memory’ to emphasize how pieces of

suffering are selected and framed in media; which piece “[…] of suffering is worthy of retention

and repetition by the spectator and which is not.” (2008: 76). This process of selecting the pieces

goes to show that there has been a shift from having no visuals to visualizing emotions:

“The shift from no visual towards an increasingly intensive visualization of suffering is, in

this sense, a shift towards an increasingly intensive involvement with sufferers and, thus, an

invitation to spectators to remember and repeat the sufferers’ misfortunes.” (2008: 76).

The concept of politics of memory and Chouliaraki’s notions on aesthetics is very much

aligned with Berlant’s notion on emotion as a social and aesthetic technology of belonging.

In the context of this thesis, it is interesting to understand the scope of the climate change

art installations in the light the three categories of the analytics of mediation, which

are: multimodality, space-time and agency, and the concepts of hypermediacy and immediacy.

- Multimodal i ty looks at the modality markers that assign meaning to the

spectacle of suffering (Chouliaraki, 2008: 8). This is aligned with Kress and van

Leeuwen’s account of modality earlier in the chapter.

- Space- t ime looks at the extent to which the degrees of intensity and

involvement differ in the encounter of the spectator and the distant sufferer (2006:

85). Accordingly, “[…] space–time is responsible for establishing a sense of immediacy for the

scene of suffering and regulating the moral distance between spectator and sufferer.” (ibid.)

- Agency looks at the actors in the scene of suffering; and how these operate

in the scene and how they take action on suffering, and on the basis of whom

(Chouliaraki, 2006: 85). According to Chouliaraki it is crucial to remember, when

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using the category of agency, that these two dimension that characters this mode of

analysis: The appearance of sufferers and how actors happen to engage with the

said sufferers. “These two dimensions of agency come to shape how the spectators

themselves are invited to relate to the suffering – that is, if they are supposed to

simply watch, feel for or act in a practical way on the ‘other’s misfortune.” (ibid.)

- Hypermediacy calls attention to the staging of emotions and the act of

watching. (Chouliaraki, 2006: 209).

- Immediacy is when one is exposed to representations that show suffering as

it is felt. Thereby calling for immediate action on suffering. (ibid.).

These categories and concepts shape an analysis of the imagined communities and the

production of ‘others’ in climate change art installations through the aesthetic quality and

the affective discourse (Chouliaraki, 2009: 521). According to Chouliaraki, this kind of

analysis enables reflexivity, which makes one aware, and able to identify, the choice of

language and image, and how these have an effect on our senses of belonging.

Chouliaraki’s notions and terminology is aligned with that of Kress and van Leeuwen.

However, in the context of this thesis, Chouliaraki’s notions will be shaping the part of my

analysis that looks at the extent to which sense of belonging can be utilised as a

methodology for climate change communication.

4.4 Summing up

Before I proceed with an analysis, I will briefly account for the theoretical apparatus that I

am using to shape my analysis. Entman’s four framing functions (define problems,

diagnose causes, make moral judgments and suggest remedies) and the four locations of

frames (the communicator, the text, the receiver and the culture), and Lakoff notions on

concepts and metaphors will be aligned with Entman’s four functions and shape the part

of the analysis that looks at how visual installations are used to address issues pertaining to

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climate. The theoretical apparatus will be used to analyse the text materials that

complement the climate change art installations.

Kress and van Leeuwen’s methodology for reading images will be used to conduct a social

semiotic analysis of the climate change art installations, and to understand the results of the

framing process and what the dismantling of the climate change art installations signify.

Finally, the readings on emotions by Ahmed, Berlant and Chouliaraki will be used to

analyse the extent to which the concept of sense of belonging can be leveraged as a

framework for climate change communication.

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5. ANALYSIS

As mentioned throughout the thesis, my thesis is twofold: methodological and rhetorical.

These two approaches will be accounted for in this chapter, which is structured by themes

that have been identified in the thesis. The proceeding chapter looks at the analysis in the

light of the problem field.

5.1 Ice Watch by Olafur Eliasson and Minik Rosing

Ice Watch Paris is a project by the Danish-Icelandic artist, Olafur Eliasson and Danish

professor of geology at the natural history museum of Denmark at University of

Copenhagen, Minik Thorleif Rosing. The project consists of an essay and a batch of images

of the climate change art installation, which are object of study in this chapter. Minik

Rosing and Olafur Eliasson are the authors of the essay. The headline of the essay reads:

“Ice, Art and Being Human”, and it touches upon the very same topic. This chapter looks

at the installation, the essay, and the issues addressed in the project.

The climate change art installation consists of twelve big blocks, of 80 tonnes, of ice, which

were harvested from the Nuup Kangerlua fjord outside Nuuk, Grenland. The blocks were

harvested as free-floating icebergs. The blocks of ice were arranged in a clock formation at

the Place du Panthéon. Bypassers frequently passing the place daily would notice the ice

melting away from December 3-12, 2015, during the COP21-negotiations in Paris. Ice

Watch Paris was a part of the Artists 4 Paris Climate 2015-initiative14, which collaborated

with a range of artists mobilising climate action through climate change art installations

showcased in Paris during the COP21-negotiations.

Ice Watch Paris was installed at Place du Panthéon with support from Bloomberg

Philanthropies. And in the press release for the installation, Michael R. Bloomberg, founder 14 The initiative was supported by United Nations Conventions on Climate Change and Desertification. http://www.artists4climate.com (Last retrieved on July 11, 2015)

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of Bloomberg, is quoted for saying: “Ice Watch is a great example of how public art can draw

attention to big challenges and spur people to action.” (see appendix page 40). The Ice Watch Paris

project was realised in collaboration with Julie’s Bicycle, which is an organisation and a

leading advocate for sustainability in the cultural and creative industries. The press release

also tells of the Artists for Paris Climate 2015-initiave, and that Ice Watch Paris was a core

project of the initiative.

Glacial i c e

As mentioned earlier, the blocks of ice that was used for the installation were harvested as

free-floating icebergs. This means that the ice was already lost from the ice sheet and

already separated from the Greenland ice sheet. The ice sheet is produced by snow over

the course of millions of years. According to Ice Watch Paris, the “[…] glacial ice flows slowly

towards the ocean, where it either melts or breaks apart to form icebergs. The amount of ice lost at the edges

used to equal to the accumulation of new snow every year, but the warmer climate has thrown the Greenland

ice sheet out of balance. Currently, the amount lost each year is 200–300 billion tonnes, a rate that is

expected to increase dramatically.” (icewatchparis.com).

It is the melting glacier that causes the water level to rise. The water that evaporated from

the sea has been stored as ice. When the ice returns to the sea again, the water level rises.

This means that the glacier ice is different from sea ice formed in the winter when the sea

freezes. Sea ice is part of a cycle equal to the seasons; therefore, it does not have the same

effect as glacier ice. The water that freezes in the winter and melts in the summer is in the

same sea.

5.1.1 Framing analysis of “Ice, Art and Being Human”

In the essay, “Ice, Art and Being Human”15, Eliasson and Rosing unfold a tale on the ice

and the cultural, social and political implications of the natural material. They describe ice

as a substance we all have a relation to. And it is something that is part of our collective

15 The essay is listed in the reference list. However, as it is available from a webpage about the installation which is no longer being exhibited, I have attached it to the appendix (page 11-15).

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memory: “The collective memory so deeply etched into our consciousness is a memory of ice and the effect ice

has had, not just on the climate, but on our entire civilisation.” (Eliasson & Rosing, 2015: 1). They

describe it as something, which is both wonderful and unusual, with specific references to

the way water freezes, ice melts, and the way ice is formed:

“When water freezes, it expands; most other substances occupy less volume in their solid

state than as a liquid. Ice melts under pressure; most other solids melt when pressure is

removed. Ocean water absorbs almost all the solar energy that reaches it; ice reflects it. The

earth is close enough to the sun that most water is warm enough to remain liquid, yet the

temperature is still cold enough that ice can form at the poles and at high altitudes. It takes

large quantities of energy to melt ice; conversely, when water freezes, large quantities of

energy are released. As water melts and freezes again, it helps limit temperature

fluctuations from one season to the next and from day to night, making it possible for

humans to live at almost any latitude.” .(Eliasson & Rosing, 2015: 1).

In their presentation they also describe how the ice in Antarctica and Greenland is

different: “The ice contained in the Antarctic and Greenland ice sheets was not formed in the same

manner that ice is formed on a lake or to create the ice cubes in your gin and tonic. It formed through

hundreds of thousands of years of accumulated snow, compacted into glacial ice under its own weight.

Glacial ice is made up of visible layers, each a snapshot of the snow that fell during a given year.”

(Eliasson & Rosing, 2015: 1)

Why is it that ice is so important? And why is ice described in detail? For the two essayists

it is crucial for our understanding of the scope of climate change and rising sea levels. As

mentioned, ice is part of, what they call, our collective memory. It is something which we

can make sense of. And ice makes it possible for us to measure and calculate winds, water

levels, and we can measure the movement in the sea. All of this makes it possible for us to

withstand climate change, which Eliasson and Rosing assert is man-made. We have all the

technologies and we have the science (Eliasson & Rosing, 2015: 3) to withstand it.

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In the terminology of Entman, the framing of ice as part of our collective memory is

aligned with the framing function that entails defining a problem. As mentioned earlier, the

aspect of defining a problem entails look at what the causal agent is doing and how this is

measured in the light of common cultural values. Not only do Eliasson and Rosing do this,

they also diagnose causes by asserting that climate change is man-made. This framing of

climate change then epitomises climate change as something, which human beings are

responsible for, and at the same time they are the cause and the direct causality between

climate change and ice. This framing positions Eliasson and Rosing as the communicators

who are organising their belief system by the framing of ice in the essay.

Another one who is interpreting ice as a common cultural value, in the terminology of

Entman, is Kuupik Kleist, the former Prime Minister of Greenland. He told the New

Yorker the following about ice in the wake of the COP21-negotiations: “It is a great part of

our national identity. We follow the international discussion, of course, but to every Greenlander, just by

looking out the window at home, it is obvious that something dramatic is happening.”16 Andrew Jamison

employs the term glocal environmental catastrophe to describe events that has taken “[…]

place locally but had global causes and repercussions […]” (Jamison, 2001: 22), which applies to this

example, and is in line with Eliasson and Rosing’s interpretation of ice as something that is

a part of their collective memory.

Conceptual is ing i ce

The reference to the ice as part of a collective memory calls for an analysis beyond

Entman’s framework for the four framing functions. The idea of collectivity permeates the

following excerpt from the essay, which takes the reader on a trip down memory lane and

through adolescence. This is done to draw a link to ice as something, which is etched in the

depths of our memory:

16 http://www.newyorker.com/culture/culture-desk/the-artist-who-is-bringing-icebergs-to-paris (Last retrieved on July 27th, 2016)

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“In the depths of human consciousness, there is a collective notion of a time long past. It is

a time before we had the knowledge or the insight to understand how the world works, and

it was a time before we had the capacity to influence the world around us. We were innocent

and we called this state paradise. One can read the narrative of human history as mirroring

the development of a person from the carefree innocence of childhood into adulthood, with

the knowledge and responsibility that entails. Yet, one could also make the claim that this

narrative of humanity’s childhood is a collective, accurate memory of events of such

enormous proportions that we are still struggling to come to terms with it, in our

mythologies and religions, thousands of years later. The collective memory so deeply etched

into our consciousness is a memory of ice and the effect ice has had, not just on the climate,

but on our entire civilisation.” (Eliasson & Rosing, 2015: 1).

According to Lakoff and Johnson (1980), we are carrying out activities every day without

giving said activities a second thought. And it is through concepts and metaphors that we

make sense of the world and the human character. Thus, by framing and conceptualising

ice as something mundane which everybody has felt or has some kind of memory of,

Eliasson and Rosing are using framing, and leaning on metaphors and concepts so as to

not reduce ice, and climate change, to a question of intellect, but instead using the framing

and concept of ice as something, which governs our thoughts. By describing ice in this

fashion, they are attempting to evoke concepts, which are already a part of our conceptual

maps, as defined by Stuart Hall (1997), or conceptual systems in the terminology of Lakoff

(2010). Our conceptual systems and maps allow us to make sense of something and to

generate meaning of said something. This is aligned with Lakoff’s (2010) notion on words

evoking and activating frames. The framing and conceptualisation of ice then becomes

more than ice as an object in essay, but becomes a framing of climate change, which

activates memories or experiences, which are circuiting in our representation system (Hall,

1997: 1).

Eliasson and Rosing are also conceptualising ice by using ice cubes used to make gin and

tonic to stress and exemplify how the ice contained in the Antarctic and Greenland is

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different because it is formed of snow accumulated over thousands of years. It is

interesting to look at this framing in the light of what Lakoff calls environmental hypocognition

(Lakoff, 2011: 76). This means that we are lacking ideas to connect frames. Lakoff asserts

that it is a problem in terms of the environment, that we do not have enough frames to

connect the dots. It distances us from the core of the problem, which Eliasson and Rosing

also finds a challenge. However, one can also argue that by using the example of gin and

tonic, one is appealing to mundane everyday activities that we are not usually thinking of in

terms of climate change and climate action.

As mentioned earlier, Eliasson noted that if someone is to put ear to the ice, the person

would be able to hear a pop and crack. And he wants the recipient to understand this in

relation to climate change. Imagine putting an ice cube in a gin and tonic drink. The ice

cube is taken directly from the freezer and the moment you put in the drink, a sound of

crack and pop will emit. According to a video by journalist Brady Haran from Periodic

Videos 17 – who works with chemists from the University of Nottingham to make

informative videos about chemistry – the pop and crack sound is a phenomenon that is

knows as differential expansion.18

When someone takes ice from the freezer and drops it in a drink immediately, the ice will

suffer a crack. If someone takes the ice out of the freezer and place it on a tray for a couple

of minutes, and then drop it in a drink, the sound of the crack will not emit. This is due to

the levels of temperature. The drink is always warmer than the freezer and upon

connection the other core of the ice expands and the inner core remains freezing, which

causes the crack sound to emit. But when it has been on a tray for a couple of minutes,

then it has adjusted to the temperature in the respective place.

17 http://www.periodicvideos.com (Last retrieved on July 27th, 2016)

18 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sPScqP3mFKQ (Last retrieved on July 27th, 2016)

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One can aruge that Eliasson and Rosing are taking up the problem of environmental

hypocognition and are attempting to frame a mundane activity, such as putting ice in a

drink, to evoke frames of climate change character.

The metaphoric conceptualisation and framing of ice is articulated to activate a

representational system that does not necessarily activate thoughts about climate change.

This is the strength of the essay that it is able to use a mundane object to draw a link to

climate change, thereby making it a concern for all.

Metaphoric conceptual isat ion o f humanity ’s chi ldhood

The metaphoric conceptualisation of humanity’s childhood, which is quoted earlier, is used

to explain how there is a resemblance between human history and the development of a

person who is leaving the realm of childhood to become an adult. We have all been there,

and it is a narrative that is in our consciousness. Albeit explicitly, Eliasson and Rosing are

using this metaphoric conceptualisation to explain how the climate grew warmer, and how

this made it easier to predict the future, and how human beings exploited the resources of

the planet optimally: “At the end of the most recent ice age, some 10,000 years ago, the climate entered

into an unusually stable period. The climate grew warmer (much like it is today), and, most importantly, it

became more predictable. Average temperatures since that time have varied by less than two degrees. The

stability of the climate made it possible for humans to predict the future. As a result, we could use our

intellect to make plans and to exploit nature’s resources optimally. Humans developed agriculture, and the

first civilisations arose in the fertile lowlands along the coasts. It was during this period of climatic stability

that our civilisations took root.” (Eliasson and Rosing, 2015: 3).

Human beings could now predict climate change and exploit it optimally. However, the

climate grew warmer and the ice sheets receded. This resulted in the sea levels rising, which

had an enormous backside for the first civilizations that disappeared. According to

Eliasson and Rosing this knowledge is recollected in humanity’s collective memory: “All

civilisations have myths of a great flood that destroyed its people. Understanding, coming to terms with, that

incomprehensible event has preoccupied us ever since.” (3) The keyword here is myths. And it is this

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keyword that sets then apart from now. The climate is changing rapidly; the melting glacier

ice should serve as an urgent reminder of that. But why and how does myths set then apart

from now? We accepted the stories about the civilisations disappearing and accepted it as

something a part of our history. We could feel climate change then and exploited it without

further ado. Accordingly, what we are witnessing now is a man-made, and we know why it

is happening. We are no longer in the stage of childhood, but yet we are reluctant to take

action. By activating frames of childhood we are reminded of the stages we have to pass to

get to adulthood. We are reminded of a time where responsibility was not ours to claim.

As I have already established, Eliasson and Rosing are diagnosing causes by claiming that

climate change is man-made. This is arguably also a way of making moral judgments. The

metaphoric conceptualisation of childhood is telling us something beyond childhood,

which is most likely to activate frames relating to the receivers respective childhood. It is

also activating frames relating to religion. Eliasson and Rosing use the term unwillingness to

note that there are people out there who are reluctant and not taking climate action. This is,

according to the essayists, a challenge. And they are using the metaphoric conceptualisation

of humanity’s childhood to activate frames about Adam and the apple. Adams action –

eating of the apple – meant that he acquired knowledge and that he lost his innocence.

According to Eliasson and Rosing, Adam’s action connects knowledge and guilt, and that

this guilt “[…] pervades our whole understanding of responsibility, sin, and punishment.” (Eliasson

and Rosing, 2015: 3). The religious reference is used as indication to describe why we have

a challenge when it comes to addressing the importance of science in relation to issues

pertaining to climate change. Eliasson and Rosing writes, “One of the biggest challenges in

addressing the extent of the already widespread effects of climate change is the general unwillingness to accept

that science can help us understand the connection between the way we act and the future of the planet.

Climate-change sceptics […] claim that science cannot comprehend the connection between the combustion of

fossil fuels and the climate. If we are ignorant, then we are also innocent. If we don’t know, then it is not

sin. The dream of Edenic ignorance is a very pleasant place to hide.” (Eliasson and Rosing, 2015: 3-

4).

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This framing can be a dangerous framing if we look at the Entman’s framework for four

locations. One of them is classified as the receiver who might not make sense of the frames

of religion in accordance to the communicator. Eliasson and Rosing might lead their

receivers astray by making religious references to a global issue. However, Berlant notes

that faith is able to provide with a moral tone, and the religious reference can thereby be

perceived as a way to use religious references as reason. As mentioned earlier, Lakoff

believes that reason is unconscious and emotional and is dependent on frames. Framings

and emotions can activate our conceptual systems (Lakoff and Johnson, 1980), which are

metaphorically structured. We might be able to make sense of climate change if it is

brought to us with frames that can activate an emotion which Lakoff asserts is part of

normal thought.

Arguably, Eliasson and Rosing are using the metaphoric conceptualization of humanity’s

childhood as a framing that should encourage the respective reader to take action on

climate change. Just like we are moving from the innocent realms of childhood into the

stages of adulthood, human history also began somewhere e.g. the link to Adam, and

human history is rapidly changing with the many technological advances and habits of

human beings and in a constant transition. Albeit the fact that they are not writing it

explicitly, the transition is coming to a halt because of our actions on earth, which is

depleting it. One can even argue that this conceptualisation and framing of humanity’s

childhood – activating frames about childhood and religion – is an attempt at disrupting

our train of thought and is an attempt at making us connect the links between childhood

and climate change, which can activate a sense of obligation, as defined by Berlant, which

makes us apt to take action.

The strength of framing lays it in its ability to conceptualise. As mentioned earlier, Frank

Luntz authored a language advisory to the Bush administration where he was calling for a

change of language and terminology when it comes to global warming. This was a framing

process that replaced global warming with climate change. I will argue that Eliasson and

Rosing are engaging in a framing process when they are conceptualising ice and humanity’s

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childhood and using the metaphoric concepts to activate frames that are calling on

individuals to take climate action. In the light of this note it is then interesting to dive into

an analysis of the climate change art installation in Paris. Especially considering the fact

that the ice was placed in a public space where people are bypassing everyday and are able

to witness what is happening to the ice without harming it perceptually. The next section

offers a visual and social semiotic analysis of the installation.

5.1.2 Social semiotic analysis of Ice Watch

We are becoming more aware of the disappearance of non-human nature. Jamison (2001)

points to recent events and disasters, within the course of the past fifty years, as one of the

contributing factors that has raised our awareness of this disappearance: “[…] it can be

suggested that this perceived disappearance of a separate, non-human sphere of existence has helped to spawn

a new definition, or conception, of the environmental problematic – from protecting nature to transform

society.” (Jamison, 2001: 21). The latter is applicable to the climate change art installation.

Richard J. Alexander suggest that the “[…] perceptions or non-perceptions of ecological crises or of

environmental problems, such as global warming or the destruction of the ozone layer, are not sensorially

experienced.” (Alexander, 2009: 3). Eliasson told the New Yorker that if someone puts his or

her ear to the ice, the person would be able to hear a pop and crack. According to Eliasson,

this touch, or sensory experience in the terminology of Alexander, releases clean air: “It is a

little pop that has travelled fifteen thousand years to meet you in Paris, and tell the story of climate

change.”19

But what is it that Ice Watch does, and how, and to what extent is ice, as non-human

nature, in the terminology of Jamison, able to transform and trigger communication about

climate change? I will try to understand this with the use of Van Leeuwen’s framework for

social semiotic analysis, which consists of four key dimension. In the following section, I

will analyse the visuals of Ice Watch within the social semiotic analysis framework.

19 http://www.newyorker.com/culture/culture-desk/the-artist-who-is-bringing-icebergs-to-paris (Last retrieved on July 27th, 2016)

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Ice as a semiot i c resource

Ice is a semiotic resource, which is an artefact used to communicate a message about the

vulnerability of ice in relation to climate change. In the terminology of Van Leeuwen, this

artefact is produced by means of technology. This does not mean that it is man-made per

se, however, by seeing the ice as something, which is produced by means of technology, I

am acknowledging the history of the ice. The blocks of ice are harvested from Greenland

and transported to Paris by means of technology (see appendix). As mentioned earlier, Van

Leeuwen is prefers the employment of resource rather than sign. The latter can diminish

the scope of the ice by reducing it to something that is pre-given. By perceiving the ice as a

semiotic resource, I am able to understand what the ice implies beyond being a sign of

climate change in Greenland.

The first key dimension of the social semiotic analysis is discourse. According to Van

Leeuwen, this dimension looks at how the semiotic resources are represented and the way

ice is used a discourse for making sense of the issue at hand. In the terminology of Van

Leeuwen, ice is also a genre. By perceiving ice as a genre, in the terminology of Van

Leeuwen, I am able to understand how ice is a multimodal concept, which triggers

different communicate interactions. As images from page 16-37 in the appendix shows,

different people are touching the ice blocks. Some are touching them with their hands,

others are putting their ear to the ice and some are even licking the ice.

Ice is a semiotic resource and a multimodal concept that triggers different sensory actions.

This is also aligned with Chouliaraki’s and Kress and van Leeuwen’s notions on modality,

which looks at modality markers as something that makes meaning. The ice blocks triggers

sensory actions such as touching and licking it, and even touching the ice and watching it

melt. The sequence of ice melting - and people touching and licking it - is a metaphor for

understanding life. This is not to say that the children featured in the images are prone to

connect the dots and understand the installation as being about climate change. However,

it is a semiotic resource, which can trigger questions about the sequence of things and how

this relates to our understanding of life (Lakoff and Turner, 1989).

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This brings me back to Kress and van Leeuwens’s notions on images moving beyond the

idea that they are only aesthetic and expressive. Arguably, the ice blocks are used

stylistically to embody the dimension of doing (Van Leeuwen, 2005). This is what makes

semiotic resources multimodal; they are also able to enact communicative interactions,

which is the case, if we look at the images of kids touching and exchanging words or adults

who are leaning towards the ice, listening and touching it.

So what does this framework utilise? So far I have denoted ice as a semiotic resource,

modality marker, genre and discourse, which enacts communicative interaction. How can I

make meaning of this using Berlant’s (2004) notion on emotion as a social and aesthetic

technology of belonging? According to Berlant emotions can measure one response to a

scene of suffering. Albeit the fact that nobody is suffering per se, I will argue that the

example, I quoted earlier, can be used to analyse the emotions expressed in the images of

Ice Watch:

“When the response to suffering’s scene is compassion—as opposed to, say, pleasure, fascination,

hopelessness, or resentment—compassion measures one’s value (or one’s governments value) in terms of the

demonstrated capacity not to turn one’s head away but to embrace a sense of obligation to remember what

one has seen and, in response to that haunting, to become involved in a story of rescue or amelioration: to

take a sad song and make it better.” (Berlant, 2004: 7).

When a child is taking pieces of melting ice or cupping their hands to hold the melted ice

in their palms, or a an adult is leaning their ear towards the ice to listen, they are all

expressing something. They are not turning their heads away, but interacting and trying to

make sense of the semiotic resource. They seem mostly curious and happy about the

semiotic resource, which is arousing amusement for some of the children and curiosity

among other children and the adults.

This brings me back to the symposium in Cambridge. Lindum whom I quoted in chapter 3

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uses the emotion of desperation to describe her experience of holding ice. And it made her

think of a range of metaphors about the planet, resources, waste and injustice. Lindum

noted that her train of thought could be triggered by the place she was in. We were

attending a symposium on sustainability, and this could have motivated her metaphoric

conceptualisation of the ice. But I will argue that, especially in the context of Ice Watch, it

is a crucial point when looking at how COP21 can leverage art as a catalyst for change in

communication about climate change. The installation was installed in the heart of Paris

where COP21 was on everybody’s lips. This creates a setting, which makes semiotic

resource and the metaphoric conceptualisation of ice thrive on different levels.

Another one of the participant, Grace, was more indifferent and more concerned with the

bodily feelings triggered by holding the ice, such as hands getting cold and wet. If we are to

measure this in relation to Berlant’s notion on compassion, Grace is arguably turning her

head away and thereby not using the ice to embrace a sense of obligation. She also noted

that she was thinking that someone would have to clean this up. This is not valid reason

enough to deem her a climate change denier, as Luke (2015) puts it, but it shows how

multimodal the semiotic resource of ice is, and how it can trigger communication about

climate change. The different postures of the people in the images are also a testament to

the strength of ice as a multimodal semiotic resource that can enact communication and

interaction.

In other images with people interacting and touching the blocks of ice, we see how they are

putting their ear to the ice. As mentioned earlier, Eliasson told the New Yorker that the

person would be able to hear a pop and crack sound and this sensory experience could

perhaps activate other framings related to ice, e.g. the gin and tonic example exemplified

earlier. Paramount for this example is to have something to relate the framing to. Being in

Paris might not make one think about Greenland, however, the setting of the COP21 and

the city of Paris is a framing in itself that will make one think of climate change as they are

walking around and in between the ice blocks. This is aligned with Chouliaraki’s framework

for the analytics of mediation (2006). She asserts that aesthetics affect us and that they

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make stronger impression on our memories. The memory of the COP21 can be signified

through the ice as a semiotic resource.

The categories of the analytics of mediation can also be used to understand the installation.

The category of space-time looks at degrees of intensity and involvement between

spectators and distant sufferers. The distant sufferers in this context are the Greenlanders

who are experiencing the effects of climate change and seeing something dramatic unfold

in their country. The spectators are the ones featured in the images of the Ice Watch

installation. Most of them seem fascinated, curious and amused. According to Chouliaraki

the category of space-time is responsible for establishing a sense of immediacy. Ice Watch

does exactly this. According to Chouliaraki immediacy is when spectators are exposed to

representations that show suffering as it is felt. Suffering as it is felt is watching and feeling

the melting of the glacier ice, which the spectators are experiencing when they touch the

ice from Paris. Ice is then also the object that bridges space and time, and the sense of

immediacy is what spurs action.

5.1.3 Ice Watch and sense of belonging

The bridging of space and time is interesting to look to understand the extent to which the

concept of sense of belonging can be used to create a new framework for climate change

communication. Joshua Meyrowitz (2005), a professor of communication, uses the coined

term glocality to explain how today’s consciousness of self and place and the mobile

advances and evolutions in communication have changed the way we perceive sense of

place. According to Meyrowitz we live in glocalities, which has created new frames for co-

existense without us leaving our localities:

“Although we continue to live in particular physical localities, we now increasingly share information with

and about people who live in localities different from our own. We more frequently intercept experiences and

messages originally shaped for, and limited to, people in other places. Not that long ago, even the general

appearance of distant locations – and the appearance and mannerisms of the people who inhabited them –

were not that easily accessible.” (Meyrowitz, 2005: 23).

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This example is aligned with Chouliaraki’s (2006) notions on the analytics of mediation and

how the categories of her framework are producing imagined places and the production of

‘others’ in climate change art installations. This is done through the semiotic resource of ice

which has an aesthetic quality that makes people want to explore and touch it, as we see in

the images of the installations, and it is done through the affective discourse that the

semiotic resource of ice is.

Different points have been made in the analysis of the Ice Watch Paris project. I will pick

up some of the key points and understand these in the light of the problem field in the next

chapter. The next section of the analysis looks at the Unbearable installation by Jens

Galschiøt.

5.2. Unbearable by Jens Galschiøt

Another artist who used the COP21-negotiations in Paris, as an opportunity to exhibit

installations and to showcase art projects to shed light on global climate change, was the

Danish sculptor Jens Galschiøt. Galschiøt collaborated with World Wildlife Fund (WWF)

to exhibit the art installation ‘Unbearable’, which featured a life-size polar bear being

pierced by a thick spear, which functioned as curve in a graph that exemplifies how our use

of fossil fuels is rising. This part will look at the sculpture and the flyer, which accompanied

the sculpture and which introduces us to the collaboration between WWF and the artist.

According to the flyer, “The Danish artist Jens Galschiot and his organisation Art In Defence Of

Humanism (AIDOH) are known for sculptural outcries and art installations which can be seen all over

the world”. (see appendix)

The climate change art installation consists of a life-sized polar bear that is impaled on an

oil pipeline in shape of a graph. The installation is made of copper. The polar bear being

pierced is an unfamiliar sight, however, it is very common to use the polar bear in

communication about the effect of climate change. Organisations such as WWF and

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Greenpeace (Slocum, 2004) are known for their usage of the polar bear in their

information and fundraising campaigns.

According to the flyer, which accompanies the installation, the shape of the graph is used

to show “[..] the cumulative global fossil fuel carbon emissions. The graph shows the emissions since year

0. It continues along the ground for 17 metros, then rises dramatically around year 1850 as human

consumption of fossil fuels like coal and oil takes off. The graph ends in year 2015 five metros above

ground impaling the polar bear.” (see appendix page 44).

The installation responds to the disappointing results of the COP15-negotiations, which

took place in Copenhagen 2009. In the timeframe between COP15 and COP21, climate

change has become more severe. The flyer refers to IPCC’s20 warning about the global rise

in temperature, and the risk of climate change becoming self-reinforcing. The flyer also

refers to consequences of climate change, which we have already witnessed. These are:

“Droughts, hurricanes, forest fires and flooding.” (see appendix page 46).

The installation was being showcased at the artistic marketplace in Paris to illustrate the

path we are on and to urge and call on “[…] world leaders, governments, businesses and all people

on earth to take the necessary steps before it is too late.” The flyer also features comments from

Gitte Seeberg, Secretary General WWF Denmark, who asserts that the purpose of the

installation is to “[…] engage the public so that we send a joint, unmistakable message to world leaders

that now is the time for action, not procrastination.” (see appendix page 47).

A comment on the installation by Galschiøt is also featured: “I have created the sculpture

Unbearable to showcase humanity’s negative effect on our climate. At first sight the sculpture might seem

foolish or tragicomical. But then you realize that a polar bear is being pieced by graph of carbon emissions

created by human consumption. Many believe that we are on the right path to solving the climate crisis, but

we won’t get there unless we change our ways - now.” (see appendix page 47).

20 Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change.

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5.2.1 Framing of the polar bear

The installation addresses the challenge of fossil fuel records and the human consumption

of fossil fuels like coal and oil, which are causing temperature to rise dramatically. Our

behaviour and use of fossil fuels harms the earth. The challenge is to get the world citizens

and relevant stakeholders to understand that we are causing climate change and that we

have to take action, change our habits, and do our part to ensure that the temperature does

not rise.

In Galschiøt’s installation, the polar bear is being framed and climate change is framed

through the polar bear. It is used to tell us that our behaviour and use of fossil fuels makes

the ice melt and causes the temperature to rise, which makes it impossible for the polar

bear to inhabit the ice. The polar bear as a framing can evoke visual images, in our stream

of thoughts, that we might have been exposed to through organisations such as WWF and

Greenpeace showing a starving polar bear alone on an ice floe. When it visually appears

that a polar bear is alone and starved, emotions are evoked, which makes it easier for us to

sympathise with the polar bear. In the terminology of Lakoff, the framing of the polar bear

is capable of activating other frames. The framing of the polar bear is used to diagnose a

problem: If we continue with depleting the earth with the use of fossil fuels, then the lives

of polar bears will be claimed.

In the framework of Entman, the framing of the polar bear also uses the framing function

that makes moral judgments. One can argue that Galschiøt’s framing of the polar gives the

receiver a sense of power because we are the only ones able of changing the track and re-

evaluate our habits. Galschiøt is the communicator who is organising his belief system by

the framing of the polar bear.

However, one thing is to sympathise with the polar bear, another thing is to take action.

Lakoff explains that there are some ambiguities in the way we communicate issues

concerning the environment. Environment as a framing is inherently difficult because there

is a danger that it creates a gap between nature and us when we really should be looking at

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nature as an inseparable part of ourselves (Lakoff, 2011: 77). This othering of nature makes

us detach, which makes it even more difficult for us to relate to the issue at hand.

5.2.2 Social semiotic analysis of Unbearable

Galschiøt is using the polar bear as an artefact to generate meaning. It is made of copper,

thus by means of technology and tools for sculpturing. As mentioned earlier, van Leeuwen

defines semiotic resources as the artefacts that we are employing as tool for

communication regardless if they are produced physiologically or by technology. It is

noteworthy that the polar bear is made in the approximate same size as a real polar bear.

One can argue that this is done to arouse fear, as Ahmed defines it (2004, 2013), and used

as a signifier that is pushing political and cultural agendas in the sense that it is being

presented to us in Paris, a western country, and we are the ones using the fossil fuels which

are causing the polar bear to be speared. To understand the extent to which the polar bear

is signifying something beyond what the graph is saying, I will be attempting to understand

how the semiotic resource of the polar is utilised in communication about climate change

by using van Leeuwen’s framework for analysis of social semiotics.

The semiotic resource of the polar bear is used as a discourse for the receiver so that the

receiver is able to make sense of what the communicator, in this context, the artist, is

representing through the semiotic resource, which is triggering communicative interactions.

The climate change art installation is not activating senses through touch like with Ice

Watch Paris. However, the graph is framed as a statistic with numbers, and by visualising

how our use of fossil fuels is rising, one could most likely be activating other frames related

to statistics. We are often exposed to graphs and statistic through news broadcasting,

however, it rarely claims lives but is done in a sober fashion, and mostly only features

numbers and stats.

It is also interesting to look at the semiotic resource of the polar bear in the light of van

Leeuwen (2005) and Chouliaraki’s (2006, 2008) notions on multimodality. The multimodal

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strength of the polar is its size and the fact that it is made with copper. The latter is not

something that we are unfamiliar with. Cities and towns all over the world have sculptures

in their public places, some of them are made with copper and are most likely to activate

frames that relate to other sculptures. By using copper to sculpt the polar bear, Galschiøt is

arguably putting fear in action by making it seem as if the polar bear is already history, a

monument, and that the installation is merely a lasting reminder of something that once

were.

This arguably makes the polar bear stand out as a scare image, which is not an effective

way of activating and spurring an individual to take climate action. The Australian study,

which I have referred to earlier, finds that people who have multiple attachments to other

places are more likely to see the opportunities in climate change instead of perceiving it

solely as a threat. The people who are leaning more towards their national attachments are

picking countries over the planet. If the people with more national attachments were to be

introduced to the installation by Galschiøt, one can assume that they might feel indifferent

about it, because the use of the fossil fuels are not affecting their country. One can attempt

at understanding this dilemma by understanding it in the light of Chouliaraki’s concepts of

hypermediacy and immediacy. Hypermediacy calls attention to the staging of emotion and the

act of watching. As spectators we are watching the polar bear, the sufferer, being speared.

Framing of this size makes the polar bear an object of fear, and is not likely to activate a

sense of obligation to mitigate climate change by reducing and minimising the use of fossil

fuels. I will argue that it does not give one a sense of immediacy, which would make one

act on the suffering immediately. This could be due to the fact that the framing of the polar

bear is a weak framing in the sense that it is not an animal we relate to in our everyday

lives.

5.2.3 The polar bear as an object of fear

As established earlier, the polar bear is being used as both an object of fear and it is

represented as a sufferer. The polar bear then becomes the object of fear declared by the

communicator, the artist, who has subjected the polar bear. According to Ahmed, the

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object of fear is able to create distance between bodies by recolouring the polar bear so the

difference can be read of the surface of the polar bear.

It is not the polar bear in itself that is making us fearful; it does not wish to harm us in any

way. However by framing of the bear in a graph that spears we are supposed to fear the

graph and what it does to the polar bear. According to Ahmed, “[…] fear announces itself

through an ontological statement, a statement a self makes of itself and to itself – ‘I’m frightened.’” (2004:

62). This fear is signified through the visualisation of the graph (see appendix), which is

making an object out of the polar and thereby subjecting it to fear. This fear does

something to us.

As I mentioned earlier, Berlant perceives emotion as a social and aesthetic technology of

belonging. With this notion in mind, one can argue that the polar bear as an object of fear

and the recolouring is affecting us in the sense that it is providing us with a scare image of

what could happen if we do not take action on climate change. The graph is not claiming

human lives, but only animals. Some might see this, as something, which distances us from

the polar bear, and the action that it conceptualises, and makes us feel hopeless. However,

in the words of Ahmed, this could do something to us.

However, others might see the installation and feel compassion, as Berlant defines it. They

might understand the implications of the graph, and the numbers it visualises, as a call for

action and use this to break the curve before polar bears face extinction. The polar bear

being speared is also a form of suffering that can invite compassion; an emotion that can

easily turn into reasoning (Lakoff) for taking action and responding effectively to the

urgency of the situation (Berlant).

5.3 Opportunity in art and cross-collaborations

Galschiøt is known for his sculptures that address pressing issues that call for attention.

WWF is one of the world’s largest organizations with over 5 million members worldwide.

Cooperation between the artist and the organisation offers challenges and opportunities for

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climate change communication, but it can also limit the free reigns of the artist. There is no

evidence that it has been the case of between Galschiøt and WWF. However, WWF is

known for their use of images of animals facing risk of extinction due to climate change,

which could alter the artist’s mobility. However, it is also worth noting, in the spirit of the

Cultures and Practices of Belonging symposium, that collaborations across disciplines can

promote a creative approach to solving global problems.

The same is the case with the Ice Watch Paris project, which is collaboration between an

artist, a geologist, an organisation and a corporation. This kind of collaboration also

leverage opportunities for widespread coverage, which can give the respective artist reigns

to explore e.g. the concept of glocality as a solution for addressing climate change by

means of sense of belonging.

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6. DISCUSSION

This thesis has been looking at two climate change art installations exhibited during the

COP21-conference in Paris, in December 2015, to understand how climate change is being

visualised and how this has an affect on the way climate change can be perceived and

communicated. This section is structured by the two questions – my problem definition –

to understand the things that has been noted and observed in the thesis, and the

hypothetical considerations that I noted in chapter 1 will also be used to structure this

chapter.

- How are v isual instal lat ions be ing used to address contemporary i ssues

o f c l imate change?

By using a framing analysis and a social semiotic framework to dissect how issues

pertaining to climate change are addressed, I have been able to understand the ways in

which the communicator, artist, is making meaning and sense of things by the use of

modality markers, framings, metaphors and conceptualisations. And I have been able to

understand how this relates to the artists’ use of climate change art installations to address

issues related to climate change. It is in the dissection of the climate change art installations

that I have been able to find out what the different elements, such as ice and the

conceptualisation of humanity’s childhood and the framing of the polar bear, are

conceptualising, and how these conceptualisations are serving as a tool for understanding

how issues pertaining to climate are addressed. Furthermore, the theoretical apparatus has

made me understand how art is being used to align cultural and social paradigms with

human beings’ responsibility towards the earth. Albeit the fact that the latter is not a focus

area in this thesis, it is interesting to look at in the light of framing. The strength of framing

analysis is that it is able to activate other frames, which are circulating in the unconscious

depths of our conceptual systems. This is proving strength for the conceptualisation and

framing of ice in regard to the Ice Watch installation. The ice is activating frames about ice

as a substance in drinks. We know the contextual feeling of it and we have heard the

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sounds it makes. This makes it a strong framing, because it is able to activate something

mundane.

The use and the framing of the polar bear in Unbearable is not activating frames similar to

the ones that Ice Watch is activating. As I mentioned, I have no intention of conducting a

comparative analysis, but it is crucial to note that the polar bear is creating a space-time

gap. The space-time gap, as defined by Chouliaraki, looks at the degrees of intensity and

involvement and how these differ in the encounter of the spectator and the distant

sufferer.

One can argue that the ice positions the Greenlander, whose local climate is changing, as

the explicit distant sufferer and the ones touching and licking the ice as the spectators. The

spectators’ encounter with the ice intensifies their attachment to the ice and they are more

likely to act on what they have seen. The encounter between the spectator and polar bear,

as the distant sufferer, does not intensify the degree of involvement in the same fashion as

with the ice for the reason that the polar bear is reduced to an object of fear, which

arguably creates a distance.

This kind of measurement allows us to understand how visual installations are being used

to address contemporary issues of climate change, and it is making us capable of measuring

the extent to which it is a good idea to use weak framings that have little likeability of

activating other frames.

It is also the dissecting of installations that makes me understand why it is crucial to give

our age a new name, as Paul J. Crutzen and Christian Schwägerl (2011) suggests. Their

suggestion of calling the age the anthropocene age where we, human beings, are at the core

for change is also reflected in the climate change art installations that were object of study.

Both are explicitly calling upon the public to take climate action through metaphoric

conceptualisations and framings that are evoking emotions, which can be used as reasoning

for taking action, which is aligned with Lakoff theoretical apparatus.

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The recurring theme of the Ice Watch Paris is the art installation and ice. The latter is used

as a metaphoric concept that leverages understanding of the challenges related to the scope

of climate change through touching and sensing. Eliasson and Rosing identify

opportunities for communication in art by using mundane elements, which we are familiar

with. The writers themselves identify the culture and creative industry’s versatility and

ability to reach out to recipients, in a similar fashion to what consumer communication

does, but this industry also make co-producers out of the recipient, which consumer

communication fails to do. This means that they are able to create incentives for action by

activating the embodied mind and the neural being by making the receiver able to use their

body, embodied mind and sensorimotor to make sense of the world.

One thing which is noteworthy is Eliasson and Rosing’s capabilities of bridging the

boundaries between the public and the environment, and using this bridging to make

someone able to consider how our use of the Earth and its resources is getting out of hand

and is depleting it, which puts the responsibility on us, the spectators. This they are doing

by conceptualisations such as the one exemplified in the previous chapter; the

conceptualisation of humanity’s childhood.

As I mentioned in the section with my hypothetical considerations, I am of the belief that

artists are emerging as the sustainability leaders of tomorrow. I still believe this is the case,

and the analysis that I have conducted is a testament to that. However, I would like to add

that artists are emerging as more than sustainability leaders. They have the opportunity of

engineering a communicative interaction between human beings and art, which can prompt

climate action. Art is able to arouse emotions whether it is curiosity and amusement with

regard to Ice Watch or fear and compassion in regard to Unbearable.

Employing Sara Ahmed’s terminology and framework for reading emotions and to

consider the significant role of emotions in communication on climate change goes to

show that emotions are indeed performative, and that these are used to position the

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respective objects in climate change art installations and contributes with reiterating past

associations (e.g. the polar bear), and to engineer the communicative action.

- And how can the concept o f sense o f be longing be used to create a new

framework and methodology for c l imate change communicat ion?

Eliasson and Rosing assert that, “A work of art can contribute to the creation of a sense of community

or reciprocity, and it can motivate us to do something together, to become conscious and active members of a

global we, without surrendering our personal, emotional experiences.” (see appendix page 15). One can

argue that this is aligned with what Jamison calls the glocal environmental catastrophe. By

activating the sensorimotor through a touch one is able to make sense of global warming

by the touch of hand.

Galschiøt is operationalising Ahmed’s notions on affective economies and using fear as a

form of capital to activate a sense of obligation and belonging. The polar bear is arguably

already an affective sign that is circulating (e.g. campaigns by Greenpeace and WWF),

which, according to Ahmed, converts it into affect. This sense of affect is crucial for

Galschiøt’s installation because it is the affect that used to evoke interest, but it is the

visualisation of the graph and the rise in use of fossil fuels that prompts us to take action.

The polar bear might not be in the same place as us, but we know that if we are not

mitigating climate change then we will experience the conditions that the polar bear is

experiencing, because it is our use of fossil fuels locally that changing the climate globally.

However, as I also write, the framing of the polar bear can be measured to be weak if it is

not able activate other frames that makes us understand the urgency of the situation. It is

framings like these are creating uncertainties in climate change communication.

Sense o f be longing as a new framework for c l imate change communicat ion

So how can the concept of sense of belonging be used to create a new framework and

methodology for climate change communication? The answer is explicitly answered in the

methodological section of this thesis and in the analysis.

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The analysis of the installations shows how words, language, concepts, metaphors and

framings are manifesting reality, and how these are likely activate other framings and a

sense of obligation and belonging. This shows that sense of belonging can be used as a

strategy for climate change communication to reach wider audiences who are able to make

sense of the pressing climate change issues on the basis of established framings that are

circulating in their conceptual systems.

The methodological part is the cross and interdisciplinary processes, sense of belonging

exercises, and the symposium that prompted the research area. This methodological way of

acquiring knowledge offers a framework for how to go about a topic and field of study,

which is not established as discipline. As I mentioned earlier, it was not until since the late

1990s that climate change communication began proliferating as a discipline in

communication (Nerlich, Koteyko and Brown, 2010). It is still a fairly new discipline,

which is constantly changing. The advanced technologies are both an opportunity and a

challenge in this respect. Technology is able to provide us with new frameworks, but

techonology is accelerating at a fast pace, which can prove to be difficult if the discipline of

climate change communication has to keep up with the pace.

The thesis, however, finds that global summits, such as COP21, can leverage art as a

catalyst for change. In the section with my hypothetical considerations, I assert that climate

change is a topic, which is only covered and negotiated in elitist and high circles – and

political negotiations are opaque. To a great extent, this is the case. Prior to the

negotiations, I was in Paris to attend a youth leadership conference about climate change.

This was a way of warming up for the prominent leaders that would be visiting Paris in

December to negotiate and land the Paris Agreement. My experience confirmed my

hypothesis, but it also made me realise that we, human beings, are able to accelerate change

outside of the high circles.

75

One way to do it is by engaging more people and encouraging organisation and

corporations to collaborate with the creative industry in the wake of global summits to use

art as an alternative method for disseminating knowledge about climate change.

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7. OUTRO

As I mentioned in the previous chapter, artists are emerging as both sustainability leaders

and engineers because they are able to engineer communicative interactions between

human beings and art by the use of emotions, framings and sense of belonging. And they

are able to make themselves a valuable part of annual global climate summits, such as the

COP21, which resulted in the adoption of the Paris Agreement.

The global summits are often closed for the public who are only able to see it broadcasted.

However, by having a marketplace for art, in the respective host country, artists are able to

facilitate and engineer communication processes with the public and to engage them in

matters about climate change and their future on the planet. The scrutiny of the climate

change art installations show that words, language, framings, concepts, visuals and images

are manifesting reality and that they are able to make for communicative artefacts that are

spurring climate action.

As I mentioned in chapter 3, the prerequisite of this thesis is a social constructionist

approach, which is characterised by a critical stance towards the objects of study. However,

a social constructionist approach does not make me acquire new knowledge that can be

used to tell something general nor objective about the world. Everything is based on my

social constructions of language and social interactions, which has an impact on the

outcome of this thesis. I will still argue that it offers a framework for cross-collaboration

and interdisciplinary as a methodological quest for knowledge, and the methodological

quest for knowledge and the results show that art is a catalyst for change in

communication, and thereby breaking with the idea that a certain terminology pertaining to

climate change should serve as communication about the development of our planet. More

people are likely to engage with artefacts that are encouraging them to engage in

communicative interaction using e.g. their sensorimotor. Not only does this activate our

sense of obligation and belonging, it also bridges the gap between global and local, which is

Ice Watch is doing.

77

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(Last retrieved on July 28, 2016)

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SUMMARY IN DANISH

Kunst instal lat ioner som katalysator for forandring

I december 2015 var Paris vært for COP21, som havde til hensigt at samle verdens ledere

til at forhandle en universel og bindende klimaaftale i hus. Resultatet af forhandlingerne

resulteret i Paris-aftalen. Klimatopmødet tjente også andre formål. En række kunstnere så

COP21 som en anledning til at valfarte til Paris for at udstille en række kunstinstallationer,

som, på hver deres måde forsøgte at kaste lys over klimaforandringer på anden vis end på

de bonede gulve.

Denne afhandling tager udgangspunkt i to installationer af henholdsvis Olafur Eliasson og

Jens Galschiøt. Olafur Eliasson installerede, i samarbejde med professor Minik Rosing, tolv

isblokke af indlandsis, som var opsamlet i Nuuk, Grønland, for at sætte fokus på global

opvarmning. Jens Galschiøt så sit snit til at udstille en kobber skulptur af en isbjørn blive

spydet af en kurve i en graf, der viser, hvordan vores brug af fossile brændstoffer er

stigende.

Med udgangspunkt i de to installationer, kigger denne afhandling på, hvordan

klimaforandringer bliver visualiseret qua de to installationer og hvordan dette har en effekt

på den måde klimaforandringer italesættes og kommunikeres via kunsten. Afhandlingens

teoretiske ramme tager udgangspunkt i framing teori defineret og udviklet af George

Lakoff (1980, 2010), Robert M. Entman (1993) og Richard J. Alexander (2009) og visuelle

metoder til at forstå, hvordan tematiske kunstinstallationer bliver brugt til at adressere

nutidige problemstillinger i forhold til klimaforandringer. Afhandlingen trækker også på

affektteori til at forstå, hvordan og i hvilket omfang begrebet tilhørsforhold kan bruges

som et metodisk greb til at skabe nye rammer for kommunikation om klimaforandringer.

Afhandlingen er både metodisk og retorisk i den forstand at forskellige

videnskabsteoretiske tilgange er taget i brug for specialets progression fra ide til analyse.

Den overordnet forudsætning for afhandlingen er en socialkonstruktivistisk tilgang.

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Resultaterne af analysen viser, at der er rige muligheder for at skabe nye rammer for

kommunikation om klimaforandringer ved brugen af kunstinstallation som greb til

formidling. Samtidig viser analysen at kunstnere fremspirer som morgendagens klimaledere

der er i stand til at innovere den måde, vi kommunikerer klimaforandringer. Dette gør de

ved at implementere begrebet tilhørsforhold i deres kunstinstallationer, hvilket bidrager til

at folk er i stand til forstå klimaforandringer som andet end et emne, der er forbeholdt

dem, som har deres gang på de bonede gulve.

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APPENDIX

1. Cultures and Practices of Belonging - Multidisciplinary Symposium on Sustainability

2. Notes: Belonging Symposium 21st March 2016 Anglia Ruskin University

3. Let it go… (2015)

4. Ice, Art, and Being Human by Minik Rosin and Olafur Eliasson

5. Images of Ice Watch Paris*

6. Press release – Ice Watch Paris

7. Flyer about Unbearable, art installation by Jens Galschiøt

8. Images of Unbearable**

Nota bene: Some of the attached documents are numbered, however, I have numbered

the appendix in total. The numbers that I am using and referring to in the thesis are the

ones in the footer on the right.

* Images by Martin Argyroglo

© 2015 Olafur Eliasson

** Images by Nina Munn

© 2015 Nina Munn / WWF