Climate
Examine how artists explore the changing world.
Our cross curricular resources make connections between art and other subjects, encourage new ways of thinking, and inspire art making. Send us feedback or propose a resource.
About this resource
Using art from our artists and collection, learn about the climate crisis and how artists have responded to a changing world.
Using this resource
You can use this resource in class or at the RA. You can use the whole page or incorporate one or two sections into your existing teaching plans.
This resource uses art to support students as they learn about:
Climate
Teach students how to define climate by looking at prints and paintings.
Causes
Investigate how artists have shown the causes of climate crisis.
Impacts
Look at how artists have engaged with the impacts of climate crisis.
Solutions and suggestions
Explore artwork that makes statements and suggestions about the changing climate.
Curriculum links
Alongside subjects like geography, english, mathematics, and science, art and design underpins all of our resources
• Including climate zones, biomes and vegetation belts, rivers, mountains, volcanoes and earthquakes, and the water cycle
• Relating to weather and climate, including the change in climate from the Ice Age to the present; and glaciation, hydrology and coasts
• The 5 senses
• Recording and reporting the temperature
• Working scientifically
• Planning writing by discussing and recording ideas
• Draft and write by composing and rehearsing sentences orally (including dialogue)
• Creating characters, settings and plot
Climate
What is the climate and why do artists care about it?
From landscape painters in balmy Morocco to printmakers in freezing Antarctica, artists have always worked in and shown a range of different climates.
Learn together
Let’s use art to learn about the:
• connection between weather, seasons, and the climate
• difference between climate change and the climate crisis
• reasons artists are interested in the climate crisis and other political changes
Look together
• Blobs of paint can show snow, how else is the weather shown in this painting?
• Have you ever caught a snowflake? What did it feel like?
• Does it always snow in winter?
Define climate
Climate is why, when we see a picture like this snowy scene by Young Artists' Summer Show artist Rocco, we think of winter. Rocco used a light impasto, a technique where paint is applied thickly onto the surface using a knife or brush, because he ‘wanted to make the sky really dramatic because it is stormy and snowy.’ In the UK, where this artist works, winter is the season when it’s most likely to snow.
The UK’s mild climate means we can expect warm summers, cool, wet winters and rainfall throughout the year. We know this because scientists called meteorologists have looked at the weather conditions, like how hot or cold it is and how much it rains, of different places over a period of about thirty years. You can think of the climate as weather over time.
Make it your own
Make snowflakes out of folded white paper and scissors. Then create a ‘snowstorm’ in class by hanging them with thread from the ceiling!
Look together
• A single, straight line suggests movement, does anything else in the picture show motion?
• Have you ever been ice skating? How did it make you feel?
• Where did people ice skate in the past and how do they do it now?
Climate changes
Now that it doesn’t get cold enough in the UK during the winter, most people, like the two people in this image, ice skate on indoor rinks that are mechanically cooled. But it wasn’t always that way! When ice skating was introduced to England from the Netherlands in the 17th century, people usually skated on lakes, ponds, and rivers that had frozen over.
In the 16th and 19th centuries, due to natural variations in the earth's atmosphere, there was a period of cooler temperatures in the UK and elsewhere. During the ‘Little Ice Age’ , St. James’s Park had a canal where people used to ice skate in the winter! But the changes we see today are happening more quickly and are not caused by natural variations.
Look together
• What sort of landscape do you think this is? What do you think the building was used for?
• How do you think it would feel to stand in front of this building? What could you hear, see, smell?
• Do you think this landscape looks like this today? What do you think it looked like before the factory?
Climate and artists
From labour strikes to civil rights, there’s a long tradition of artists using their work to explore the social, environmental and political issues of their time. Artists make art that explores the climate crisis to inform the viewer, to help start discussions, and to encourage people to take action against the effects of the climate crisis.
Emma Stibbon’s image of a collapsing whaling station on Deception Island reminds us of industry’s impact on the natural world. Whales were processed here for their meat and oil, which was used to power lamps and as an ingredient in soap and margarine. When commercial whaling was banned in the 1980s, whales were almost extinct.
Stibbon also reminds us how things can change. When Stibbon made this image, the island was known for scientific research and tourism rather than whaling.
Causes
Artists often use their art to explore the social, environmental, and political changes of their time. Some artists show these changes because they’re interested in showing people the world as it is at a particular time while some other artists show these changes because they want to raise awareness of an issue. With the causes and effects of the climate crisis, it’s no different.
Learn together
Let’s look at how artists have shown the causes of the climate change, including:
• fossil fuel extraction since the Industrial Revolution
• changes to and effects of agriculture
• construction and urban growth
Look together
• Where are the person, the horse, and the dog going?
• How do you think it would feel to stand in front of this building? What could you hear, see, smell?
• What do you think this landscape looked like before and what do you think it looks like now?
Fossil Fuels
The artist made this to show people how the landscapes of England and Wales were changing in the 19th century.
Coalbrook Dale is sometimes known as the birthplace of the Industrial Revolution. New factories meant landscapes like this changed dramatically so did almost everything about the way people lived.
The climate crisis has its roots in the Industrial Revolution. Industrialists burnt fossil fuels like coal, oil, and gas to power the factories so that they could make and sell more products.
We can look at the image from the 21st century and see what’s changed. Fossil fuels are still used today, from manufacturing to transport, but there are also renewable energy sources. Can you think of any?
Make it your own
Create a sketch showing how you think the landscape looked 100 years before. Then sketch how you think it may look in 100 years’ time. Compare the changes and discuss.
Look together
• What do you think the people in this image do with their days?
• How do you think it would feel to work in this place?
• Is farming always done on a small scale?
Agriculture
This image was painted 150 years after de Loutherbourg’s landscape but it shows a landscape that was more common in his lifetime than in Sheila Fell’s.
In the 1950s, two decades before Fell painted Farmyard in Cumberland, scientists had begun raising the alarm about the effects of greenhouse gases. Most farms by this time were not small-scale or smallholdings, like the one in this picture, but had become more like factories. The production of food on an industrial scale contributes to around a quarter of greenhouse gases!
Showing the work of the farming community in Cumbria was very important to Fell, perhaps because the way of life it depicts was under threat from these more industrial forms of farming.
Look together
• What does this image show?
• What do you think it feels like to be in a stadium like this?
• What do you think this place looked like before and what do you think it looks like now?
Growth
This engraving shows the stadium that was built for the 2012 London Olympics. The work is part of a series called Olympic Metamorphose that Anne Desmet made while the stadium and other buildings were being built.
The series shows the changes to the East London landscape made by all the construction work. She was interested in the topic because she lives nearby and she felt ‘as though the whole familiar cityscape on my doorstep has been shifting seismically’
To develop the Olympic park, an area the size of 297 football pitches, estates like The Clays Lane estate were demolished. In the years since, lots of new residential blocks have been built in the area around the Olympic park. Did you know buildings and the construction industry currently generate nearly 40% of annual CO2 emissions?
Anne Desmet RA discusses her Olympic print series
Anne Desmet uses collage and print to depict the built environment. She is interested in the changing city. She uses traditional printmaking techniques of wood engraving and lino-cutting. Her work ranges from small scale, detailed examinations to sweeping, often fantastical, panoramas viewed from a bird’s eye perspective.
Impacts
Some artists don’t set out to make art ‘about’ the climate but the way you choose to interpret art and the era in which you encounter the work of art can change how you see it!
The following works of art aren’t necessarily works of climate art, but they can tell us things about the impacts of climate change anyway.
Learn together
Let’s see how:
• we can ‘read’ or interpret works of art in different ways at different times
• artists find inspiration in the natural world
• the natural world changed as a result of the climate crisis
Look together
• How many colours and shapes can you see?
• Where do you find new colours and new shapes for your works of art?
• How are oceans changing?
Changing nature
Like a lot of artists, Eileen Agar is interested in the colours and shapes of the natural world. Collective Unconscious is a multi-coloured, acrylic painting that uses organic and biological forms like leaves, seaweed, as well as more geometric shapes like squares and triangles.
She found inspiration for these marine shapes in her favourite place: the beach. While walking, pausing, and looking closely at the natural world she saw molluscs, shells, and fossils.
The natural world has undergone lots of changes even since Agar painted this in the 1970s. The earth has become warmer, glaciers have melted and become smaller, and sea levels have risen. The extra heat makes it difficult for some sea creatures, like corals, to survive, as they’re not used to existing in such high temperatures. If Agar made her picture today, it might look very different!
Look together
• What could you see if you were in the kayak?
• How would you feel if you were there?
• This image shows a flood, can you name other kinds of extreme weather?
Flooding
This illustration for a fantasy novel shows a city so flooded that only the rooftops are poking out the water. In the book, the protagonist Titus wants to escape his strict life and, when endless rains come, he seizes his opportunity and leaves his castle.
When you look at art you can 'read' it in different ways. For instance, this image is an illustration for a fantasy novel but, because flooding and other kinds of extreme weather have become regular issues around the world, you could look at it and think about climate change.
It might make you think about what the world would look like if places that are already wet, like floodplains or areas with monsoon seasons, get wetter. Or, when you look at the clutch of white flowers tumbling over the castle’s turrets and the birds flying beneath the clouds in the distance, you might feel hopeful!
Look together
• Where do you think this is?
• How do you think it would feel to stand in front of the mountains? And what about standing at the top?
• Describe what you see
Moving zones
This colourful painting shows a place called Majorca, in Spain. The painting shows a mountainside peppered with a few green trees, probably olive trees and palm trees that grow in the area.
Majorca is in an area of the world called the Mediterranean. The Mediterranean has a different climate from the UK, with dry, hot summers and cool, wet winters. Gore has shown this by painting with warm colours: bright yellows, tangy oranges, and deep reds.
As the climate crisis and the earth gets warmer, climate zones are changing. In time, the UK might become as warm as this Mediterranean island.
Visit the RA
Unlike other landscape artists, Terry Setch doesn’t paint a traditional picture of the landscape. Instead, he channels the emotions and feelings he has about a particular landscape into his painting.
This abstract painting shows a swirl of earthy tones and different textures. It’s made of wax, found objects like pieces of litter and natural materials such as dried plants. He painted it for an exhibition that examined the destruction of the Brazilian rainforests and the threat to the indigenous people who had long lived on the land.
Setch uses such a wide range of materials to show both natural and man-made destruction of the environment. The title refers to the smoke from fires used to clear trees for mining and plantations.
In this and other works, the artist looks at the ways man-made detritus becomes part of the landscape, transformed by the weather, until gradually it has become part of the natural space. He demonstrates this by coating and breaking pieces of litter so that you can still recognise them, but they’re no longer separate from the environment more broadly.
Look together
• What do you think this artwork is made of?
• Can you see anything you recognise?
• Why do you think the artist has incorporated litter?
How to paint in encaustic
The ancient Egyptians painted with hot wax and so did Jasper Johns in his iconic Flag paintings. The technique is called encaustic, after the Greek word for “burned in”. Royal Academician Terry Setch has been painting in encaustic for 40 years, and here he demonstrates some of the wax-wrangling techniques he uses to create his multi-layered and richly textured paintings.
Solutions
Because art relies on the imagination so much, artists can help us to imagine a better future!
Sometimes the climate crisis feels like such a big problem, it’s difficult to know what to do or whether you can help. Artists can play an important role in showing us how things looked in the past, how things might look in the future, and the impact of the climate crisis on the world now.
Learn together
Let’s see how:
• we can work together
• make every day changes
• make art about or against the climate crisis
Look together
• What do you think this work of art is about?
• Have you ever made a sign or protest banner like this, what for?
• Is it important to join together with other people to combat the climate crisis? Why?
Collaborate
This work of art uses words and images together to take a powerful stance against the climate crisis. One of the pieces shows a crying polar bear and another one shows the popular climate protest phrase ‘There’s no plan(et) B’.
The work of art is called HELP! and it’s a collaboration between a group of young people whose work was included in the YASS 2020. These young people demonstrate that when people collaborate and work together, they’ve got more power!
Joining together with other people to take a stand, make a work of art, or make changes in your school or local area is a great way to tackle climate change. If there’s a group at school or near your home that’s interested in combating the climate crisis, you could join it!
Look together
• What do you think this work of art is made of?
• Have you included recycled items in your works of art?
• What changes can people make in their daily life to combat the climate crisis?
Make everyday changes
El Anatsui is a contemporary artist who makes large, shimmering artworks that look, from a distance, like rippling fabric. Get up close and you can see that these mesmerising artworks are actually made from thousands of aluminium bottle tops.
He sources these bottle tops and other metal scraps from recycling stations and sews them together with copper wire to transform them into the enormous hangings.
But his artworks don’t just transform trash into art, the use of recycled items suggests larger topics, like climate crisis, pollution, global networks of trade, and excessive consumption. At many points throughout history and in some places today, recycling and reusing was or is not optional, it’s a way of life.
Lots of things that could be used again are thrown away. Transforming these items into art, giving them to someone else, or recycling them instead of sending them to the landfill is a great way to make a change in your everyday life.
Make it your own
Ask your school and parents to save bottle tops for a collaborative installation. Once collected, make a wall-sized area to place a ‘landscape’ of cardboard. Then involve the whole school by setting it up in a communal area everyone can add to, including the adults! Place boxes of bottle-tops and glue nearby and play a recording of how important it is to save our planet! Watch and record how this artwork evolves!
Look together
• Can you say what you see?
• What do you think this would feel like to touch? Does it remind you of any textures?
• Do you think this work of art is trying to tell you anything?
Make art
It’s not too difficult to understand the collaborative work of art HELP! because you can read the words on the placards and the polar bear looks pretty unhappy.
With works of art like Decay, by YASS artist Leo, the message is not expressed so directly—but it’s still there! The title gives the viewer a hint and if you look closer, there are more layers of meaning.
This piece of art is made of blackened clay and it’s got a rough texture, almost like tree bark. The inside of the piece is hollow, like a tree stump from a tree that’s been ripped down.
The artist was inspired to make this work because of the effects of deforestation. Leo is worried that animal habitats are being lost ‘just for money.’ This art makes a strong statement against deforestation. Leo says ‘It’s not too late to make a change and I want to be part of that change.’ Making art is a great way to make a change, because you can help people see things from a different perspective!
Create
Go outside together, write, recycle, and work together with these cross curricular classroom activities.
Write a flood story
You’ll need to think about:
Character
• What’s the person called?
• How old are they?
Setting
• What’s beneath the water?
• What happened to submerge it?
Purpose
• Where is this person going?
• Are they looking for something or someone in particular? If so, what?
Problems
• Does this person run into any problems on their journey?
• If they solve the problems, how do they do it?
Make a character house
Instead of throwing cereal containers and milk cartons away, use them to make a miniature house with character.
Follow these simple instructions and have a go at designing your own character house!
We’ve taken inspiration from our John Hejduk exhibition London Masque.
Make a recycled work of art
Unlike other landscape artists, Terry Setch doesn’t paint traditional pictures of the landscape. Instead, he uses the emotions and feelings he has about a particular landscape to create his images.
• What do you think this image is made of?
• What kind of place does it make you think of?
Think about your own local landscape and collect what you find there: this could include natural elements like earth, sand, stones, twigs or man-made and discarded things like paper, plastic, lost things and litter.
What you need
Collected natural items | Coloured paints | Tray | PVA glue
Create your own
To make your own feeling landscape:
• go out and gather things you can find in a specific place
• when you're back in the classroom, think about the main colours which express how you felt in that landscape
• use a shallow food tray or container from the recycling bin
• mix PVA glue and selected colour
• embed found objects gathered into the glue colour mixture to create a Feeling Landscape
Make your own paintbrush
Venture outside to hunt for dry leaves, flowers and twigs so you can make your own brushes
Can you find any seed heads, feathers on the ground, or thick grasses? Try and think about what mark each one could make if it were used as a paintbrush.
Make a group climate artwork
What you need
A thermometer | A big sheet of paper, pinned up on a wall | Cool and warm coloured paints
Steps
To make a climate artwork together:
• decide on a different paint colour for every 5 degrees celsius on a scale from -5°C to 40°C—pick cool colours for the cooler temperatures and warm ones for the hotter temperatures
• on your paper, create a grid of 365 columns (or the number of days of term time within a year)
• check the temperature at the same time every day and note it down
• paint one of the squares with the colour you have chosen to correspond to today’s temperature!
At the end of the year you can look back and see if there have been any unusually hot or cold days. You could try repeating this over the years, to see how the temperatures are changing.
Make a recycled sculpture
Be inspired by the work of Phyllida Barlow RA and create a sustainable sculpture from reusable household rubbish. Build it, play around with decoration and then recycle the parts.
Look mindfully
Recent promising research shows that practising mindfulness can help change behaviour and attitudes towards climate change.
Mindfulness is awareness of how things are in this moment: in ourselves and our surroundings.
Bring art and mindfulness together: mindful, attentive looking encourages:
• appreciation for the visual beauty of our natural environment
• understanding of how humans and nature are interconnected
• empathy and a caring attitude towards nature
Look at a landscape painting mindfully
Explore the natural world with all your senses:
• note 5 things you can see, 4 things you can hear, 3 things you can touch, 2 things you can smell, 1 thing you can taste
• spend a mindful moment noting the colours in the sky, and compare with what you see outside your own window
• make a slow line drawing of branches, the veins of a leaf, the lines on the palm of your hand… as a way of tuning into similarities
Look slowly: Oriana Reinagle's 'Study of trees'
Take a 5-minute pause: this recording guides you to look at art with mindfulness.
Image gallery
Mist Clearing, Storm Brewing, Frith Farm, 1991
Catching Snowflakes, 2020
This is a painting of catching snowflakes with my tongue. I challenged myself to draw a face from an unusual perspective. I had to mix all the colours myself from the primaries. The flesh colour was a real challenge. I tried to use no colours straight out of the pot, they are all my own colours. I wanted to make the sky really dramatic because it is stormy and snowy. I made it feel windy by making the scarf look like it was flapping. When the paint was dry, I added details to the jumper and the fluffiness of the scarf with coloured pencil. The snow is a mixture of white blobs and pencil drawn snowflakes, because all snowflakes are different.
Happiness, 2014
Collapsed Whaling Station, Deception Island, Antarctica, 2006
On the Flood, 1887
Iron Works, Coalbrook Dale, ca. 1824
Farmyard in Cumberland, ca. 1974
Olympic Shadows, 2011
The Fifth Plague of Egypt, 10 June 1808
The Flood, 1974
Collective Unconscious, 1977-8
Near Soller, Majorca, ca. 1960
Smoked Out, 1989
HELP!, 2020
A student led collaborative installation by young people with Social, Emotional & Mental Health problems who wanted to support the growing and global campaign for Climate Change.
TSIATSIA searching for connection, 2013
Decay, 2021
This piece is inspired by the destruction of our forests due to human impact. The charred or broken remains of trees that are ripped down destroying our earth. Animal habitats lost just for money. It's not too late to make a change and I want to be part of that change.
Protesters on the Piccadilly, 2020
This piece was inspired by one of the Youth Climate strikes in 2019, and painted from a photo taken on the Piccadilly line. Inspired by Ewing Paddock’s artwork of people on the London Underground, I reflected on emotions associated with protests and climate change amongst the youths of London.
Eradication, 2019
My final A-level project discusses the issues of deforestation and climate change in a surreal and fabricated environment, illuminating the current global crisis. I conveyed this through creating an atmosphere which alienated my subjects, as if portraying the future of our planet.
Leak, 2020
This is a digital artwork. I created LEAK in a surrealist style, inspired by the symbolism of a door being a meaningful link between one place and another. The shallow-ocean theme is in accordance with the chaotic climate situation at the moment, something which is very important to me.
Creditss
Produced by the Royal Academy’s Learning team in collaboration with Aliki Braine, Karly Allen, Leah Golding and Caroline Marcus Associates.