ART NEWS
World Wildlife Fund Taps Tracey Emin, Anish Kapoor, and More for Climate Crisis Initiative
An online campaign launched by wildlife conservation group World Wildlife Fund has tapped contemporary artists by the likes of Tracey Emin, Anish Kapoor, and Jadé Fadojutimi for an initiative to raise funds to combat climate change.
The project, Art For Your World, was established by London-based Artwise Curators on behalf of WWF-UK, as part of the organization’s 60th anniversary program. The launch of the project follows the release of the WWF’s report “Feeling the Heat,” published last month, which detailed the impacts of climate change and the risks to wildlife and global populations amid rising temperatures.
“The pandemic has created time and space for us to consider a new way forward, and we believe that now is the time to join forces, so both the art world and the art-loving public can respond to the urgency of the climate and nature crisis,” Tanya Steele, the WWF-UK’s chief executive, said in a statement.
Other artists involved in the project include Chila Kumari Singh Burman, Heather Phillipson, and Bob and Roberta Smith, who are all producing prints for the campaign to be sold on the Art For Your World’s website starting in September. Works by Tracey Emin, Anish Kapoor, Vera Lutter, and Gavin Turk will be sold during an online contemporary art day sale, hosted by Sotheby’s London, from October 8 to 15.
The organization is also enlisting galleries and art world nonprofits to donate a portion of proceeds from art sales to the initiative. Dealers who have pledged to donate to the campaign include Gagosian, White Cube, Thaddaeus Ropac, Maureen Paley, Ingleby Gallery, Edel Assanti, and Marianne Boesky.
The campaign’s initiatives will support projects ranging from restoring natural habitats in the U.K. to fighting deforestation in the Amazon. The projects’ initiatives will take place leading up to the 26th UN Climate Change Conference of the Parties (COP26) taking place in Glasgow in November.
