Projects
23 Climate Things
23 Climate Things is a new global initiative designed to help the library, museum and cultural sectors (including science centers, children’s museums, zoos and aquaria, etc.) become dramatically more engaged with the climate emergency.
23 Climate Things is built around a series of 23 video missions (episodes, or things) that introduce participants to different ways of understanding and responding to the climate emergency.
Through hands-on learning, doing, and social sharing participants will learn, together, how to find the confidence and skill they need to create their own climate initiatives for their own organizations and communities.
23 Climate Things borrows its name from the seminal Web 2.0 training initiative 23 Things created in 2006 by library technologist Helene Blowers. 23 Things was notable for its open and accessible DIY approach which encouraged groups of participants to co-create their learning experiences as a community.
Request the full concept note.
Current status: 23 Climate Things has completed an inception/early startup phase and is currently in a short R&D and business planning phase with funding from a consortium of 5 GLAM* institutions in the US, Canada, and Europe (August, 2023).
The Culture for Climate Innovation Prize
The Culture for Climate Innovation Prize is to be a €10-million incentive competition that will award its purse to the first cultural organizations (such as museums, libraries, science centers, zoos and aquaria, etc.) to generate 10-million hours of bottom-up community effort towards the climate emergency.
The goal of the prize is to get the cultural sector massively and consequently involved in society-scale climate initiatives (for example, the European Green Deal and New European Bauhaus); to catalyze game-changing cultural innovation; and to establish new ways to mobilize the imagination and energy of citizens — especially young people and the young at heart — at a transformational scale and speed.
Incentive competitions are a well-proven mechanism for generating game-changing breakthroughs in a variety of industries, but their use in cultural innovation is unprecedented. This bold approach is justified by both the magnitude of the climate emergency and by the untapped potential of culture as a driver of positive change.
The prize is being initiated by a working group led by the Europeana Foundation and the Network of European Museum Organizations (NEMO).
Request the full concept note.
Current status: The Culture for Climate Innovation Prize has completed an inception/early startup phase and is currently in a short R&D and business planning phase with funding from a consortium of 5 GLAM* institutions in the US, Canada, and Europe (August, 2023).
Achieving Green / Cultural Co-green
Achieving Green is a 10-partner consortium of European research universities, cultural NGOs, and localities who are working to develop a greater understanding of the cultural components of green transformation.
Cultural Co-green — short for cultural co-creation for inclusive green transformation — is a new term created by this consortium to denote an emerging set of co-design and cultural engagement practices that communities can use to make their urban design and architecture projects more beautiful (culturally rich), sustainable (transformational), and inclusive (welcoming) in line with the goals of the New European Bauhaus and European Green Deal.
The overarching goal of Achieving Green is to find practical ways to dramatically increase local participation in green-transformation initiatives — making them better, more inclusive, and more sustainable — by using culture as a vector for engagement and change. We also hope to have a dramatic impact on how, and how many, cultural institutions (including libraries, museums, creative and performing arts organizations) commit themselves to climate action.
Workshops
Co-creation, “sense and learning from each other is at the heart of our work and values. If you’re interested in meeting and exploring together please get in touch!