Nov
14

Pollution Pods at the International Cervantino Festival

Pollution Pods: Festival Internacional Cervantino

Following shows this year in Cartagena, Colombia, at the World Health Organisation’s Global Conference on Air Pollution and Health, Barakaldo Bilbao and at  BBK Klima in Urdaibai, the Pollution Pods will next travel to Mexico for the British Council’s showcase of UK arts at the Festival Internacional Cervantino. The UK is the Guest Country of Honour at this year’s festival, one of Latin America’s largest cultural events, running from 10–26 October.

https://festivalcervantino.gob.mx/actividad/1301/pollution-pods

Mar
08

Pollution Pods showing at WHO’s 2nd Global Conference on Air Pollution

Pollution Pods Take Centre Stage at WHO Global Conference in Cartagena

Visitors to the WHO Global Conference on Air Pollution and Health in Cartagena are being offered a unique and visceral experience of the world’s most pressing environmental crisis—air pollution. The Pollution Pods, created by artist Michael Pinsky, have been installed at the event, allowing delegates and attendees to physically step into the air quality of different global environments.

Each pod simulates pollution from distinct sources including transport, industry, agriculture, energy, and domestic activity, offering a powerful, multisensory insight into the invisible threats surrounding us. The installation highlights not only the differences between urban airscapes across the globe but also the shared urgency to act on climate and public health.

Supported by the World Health Organization, the Climate and Clean Air Coalition, and the University of East London, the Pollution Pods serve as a compelling call to action. As policymakers, scientists, and health professionals gather to address air quality challenges, the pods underscore the lived reality behind the data.

For many, it’s not just statistics in a report—it’s in the air they breathe.

Jan
24

Up In The Air – KunstMuseum Bonn

UP IN THE AIR

24.02.2022 – 19.06.2022

KUNSTMUSEUM
BONN

Air has an existential significance for all forms of life in the world. It is everywhere, albeit invisible and evanescent; it is literally impalpable. While until now in everyday life we have taken air for granted, in current political and social discourses air appears as a central element: during the corona crisis, we wear face masks to protect others from the air we breathe out, scientists are investigating the role of aerosols in the transmission of the Covid-19 virus, and climate activists fight for clean air and hence against climate change.

 
 

The depiction of air has been one of the artistic challenges at least since the Renaissance. Painting in particular has taken on this task. As a material, however, air is a relatively recent phenomenon in art. The artists of Modernism strived for the artistic appropriation of the world as well as its dissolution and transformation. It therefore only seems logical that they regarded air not only as an idea, but also as a material. Air was no longer depicted merely as wind, clouds, fog, steam, smoke, or breath, but has been deliberately used as a material. Thus it has been both a medium of expression as well as a subject in the visual, applied and performing arts since then.

 

The exhibition focuses on air as an artistic material and as a carrier of forms and ideas in the visual arts. The works on display, just like the material they all share, are sometimes expansive, sometimes minimal or even invisible, solid as well as ephemeral, they are located indoors as well as outdoors. The art works storm, whisper, blow, evaporate, breathe, and float.

With works by Nina Canell & Robin Watkins, Charlotte Charbonnel, Judy Chicago, Christo & Jeanne-Claude, Andreas Gefeller, Stefani Glauber, Hans Hemmert, Edith Kollath, Lang/Baumann, Piero Manzoni, Lyoudmila Milanova & Steffi Lindner, Yoko Ono, Otto Piene, Michael Pinsky , Arcangelo Sassolino, Rikuo Ueda, Ulay/Marina Abramović, Timm Ulrichs, Andy Warhol, Martin Werthmann

Oct
18

Pollution Drift

#POLLUTION DRIFT

16th Oct – 2nd Nov 2021 

Pollution Pods journey to COP26

This October, Pollution Pods by the artist Michael Pinsky will travel to the UN Climate Change Conference (COP26) to bring home the health impact of air pollution and the climate crisis.
 

Air pollution kills an estimated 7 million people globally each year. The pods will allow visitors to experience some of the worst quality air on the planet, and understand why action on air pollution is urgently needed.

The five pods will start in Granary Square, London, then disperse and drift north. Lone pods will touch down in Birmingham, Sheffield, Lancaster and Newcastle. They will reunite as a family in Glasgow on the eve of COP26, with a call for world leaders to make air pollution an explicit priority in climate action and sustainable development activities.

The Pollution Pods are a series of geodesic domes whose air quality, smell and temperature accurately recreate the pollution of five different locations on three continents: London, Beijing, São Paulo, New Delhi and Tautra, a remote peninsula in Norway. Pinsky created the pods in 2017 to test whether art can change people’s perceptions of, and actions around, climate change. Now they face their greatest challenge yet – to shift the debate on air pollution and climate change to help secure real change at COP26.


The pods will be accompanied by Ride for their Lives – staff from six UK children’s hospitals who are cycling 800km from London to Glasgow to deliver messages from the international health community including the Healthy Climate Prescription Letter, signed by 450 medical organisations across the globe.

Full details about the tour here.

Apr
17

Understanding Air Pollution

#2 UNDERSTANDING AIR POLLUTION

20th of April 15.00-17.00 BST

Book Tickets

This is an in depth examination of the causes, mechanisms and impacts of air pollution. What is polluting our air, why, and how does it affect us? Who is responsible and when and where are people worst affected?
 

Climate Acceptance Studios brings together people from all walks of life to communicate the climate and nature crisis.
 

That’s why in these webinars you will hear from teenage campaigners like Choked Up, and artists like Michael Pinsky, as well leading experts like Professor Stephen Holgate.

The series has been produced by Climate Acceptance Studios in partnership with the Institute of Health Equity.

The Institute of Health Equity was set up to develop approaches to health inequalities. Its mission is nothing less than to build a fairer, healthier society.

These webinars are designed for Health Care Professionals.

Introduction from Sir Prof Stephen Holgate

Michael Pinsky – internationally renowned artist
Michael is a British artist whose work explores the public realm. His recent installation Pollution Pods is touring internationally. Artnet included Pollution Pods in its list of the 100 Works of Art That Defined the Decade.

Tyler Knowlton – director of communication, communities and partnerships at Plume Labs
Tyler is an expert in the field of public engagement and policy development. He has developed and led projects at the international, national, and local levels—from governments to grassroots. He currently leads Plume Labs’ partnership efforts.

Dr Ioannis Bakolis – senior lecturer in biostatistics and epidemiology at the Institute of Psychiatry, Psychology and NeuroscienceIoannis leads research on how social and environmental stressors such as air pollution affect the epidemiology of mental disorders over the life course. His research has been covered in multiple (inter)national media outlets and he is an expert commentator of news stories on urban mental health. 

Anjali Raman-Middleton – campaigner
Anjali is co-founder of Choked-Up, a campaign group started by black and brown teenagers living in areas worst affected by air pollution. The group lobbies for cleaner air legislation and the right for everyone to breathe clean air.

MICHAEL PINSKY STUDIO

88 Gifford Street, London, N1 0DF

00 44 (0)7958 713 853
michael@michaelpinsky.com

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