seven thousand oaks is a not-for-profit, whose mission is to create a space where art and sustainability connect. We place art in the public sphere to raise awareness around sustainability issues and we are an online resource of artists, green arts suppliers and information around the sustainable arts movement.
news
Find out about news and events in the art and sustainability field, alongside updates in the lead up to the 7KO festival. If you would like to contribute news or events, download the contributor guidelines [PDF 78KB].
WARMING UP - Environmental impacts in our world
17 July – 15 August 2010
Over 35 artists from North East Victoria will exhibit a range of works including photography, painting, drawing, sculpture, printmaking and textiles at the Wangaratta exhibitions Gallery WORKSHOP SPACE from 17 July - 15 August 2010.
A theme that is of great current interest, the exhibition provides insights into the anxieties shared by many as we witness the continuing degradation of the landscape and the social and political tensions that continue to abound across the world. The exhibition provides an opportunity for discussion and debate and the possibility to initiate change that many now agree is long overdue.
Dianne Mangan, Gallery Director, will officially open the exhibition on Friday 16th July at 5.30pm for 6pm.
A Public Program will be held on Saturday 31 July 1.30 – 4pm with 2 guest speakers: Guy Abrahams will speak about "Climate Change, Sustainability and the Arts" and artist Susan Purdy will make a presentation on her commissioned work made for the Tarrawarra Museum, in response to the 2009 bushfires in Victoria.
For more information visit the City of Wangaratta website
Changing the climate: Utopia, Dystopia and Catastrophe
30th August – 1st September 2010
The word ‘utopia’ was famously coined by Thomas More in 1516. However, ideas of utopia have been common throughout literature and philosophy ever since ancient times.
Throughout history, there has been a continuing tension about the ideal utopian society: the domination of nature on one hand, and the desire for reconciliation on the other. By the middle decades of the twentieth century both versions of utopia had fallen into disrepute, displaced by ‘science’ on the political left or by ‘dystopia’ on the political right. From the 1960s, utopian politics in new social movements re-emerged. It found expression in literature and the arts, including architecture, but also in popular culture as science fiction.
The University of Tasmania hosted the first Australian conference on Utopia, Dystopia and Science Fiction in 2001, organised around the theme of Antipodean Utopias. Since then, the Centre for Comparative Literature and Cultural Studies (CCLCS) has convened a series of conferences as part of its’ research strength in the areas of utopian and science fiction studies.
Monash Conference Centre
Level 7, 30 Collins Street
Melbourne Victoria
For more details head to the conference website
CSPA Quarterly is open for submissions
The third edition of the CSPA Quarterly is now open for submissions. This time around, we’re hoping to cover art made from found objects and existing materials. Spring cleaning for the spring issue, if you will! Many of you are working with existing materials to create work- let us know what you’ve been up to!
Questions to consider: What dictates the “sustainability” of the work? If the found objects are made of plastic, is the work green? If the materials are raw, but held together with chemical adhesives, is the work green? Musicians or media artists: how does using existing material affect the sustainability of culture, and fight against limitations of copyright? Performance and theater artists: are you making work with found objects, set pieces, or written material?
Head to the website for more details.
Discreet Objects
9 July - 31 July
Utopian Slumps
Lauren Berkowitz
Elizabeth Newman
Alex Martinis Roe
Sriwhana Spong
Discreet Objects brings together four female artists from Australia and New Zealand whose practices variously invert, subvert or distort the phenomenological body of minimalism. Each of the works exhibited in Discreet Objects forms a critical dialogue with both the traditional form and materiality of the minimalist movement, as well as its conceptual impact that largely pivoted around the relationship between the body and the art object in space.
For more details head to the Utopian Slumps websiteCall for papers - Staging Sustainability: Arts, Community, Culture, Environment
How can we produce art that reflects, celebrates, critiques and advances the cultural life of our community without contributing to the destruction of the setting that inspires these artistic endeavours?
The Faculty of Fine Arts at York University (Toronto - Canada) invites proposals for papers for Staging Sustainability: Arts, Community, Culture, Environment, a conference taking place April 20-22, 2011.
The conference will provide an opportunity for artists and those who support the arts in a myriad of ways - from scholars, critics, producers and designers to policy-makers, industry and government - to engage in interdisciplinary dialogue about issues associated with the creation of environmentally sustainable arts practice and performance.
The conference committee welcomes proposals for papers that consider the relationship between the cultural and ecological aspects of sustainability in the arts, and may encompass aspects of subjectivity with respect to community and identity.
Submit a 250-word abstract of your proposal, including your name, affiliation, mailing and email address.
Submission deadline: September 1, 2010
Find out more at the conference website
Your recyclable waste for contemporary art exhibit
The Museum of Contemporary Art, Sydney (MCA) will soon be holding an exhibition entitled In the Balance: Art for a Changing World with works by Australian and international contemporary artists that respond to ecological concerns.
MCA needs your help in collecting thousands of plastic bags, as well as other recycled materials for the exhibit by Lauren Berkowitz. The exhibition runs from 19 August – 31 October 2010 and you will be able to view these inspired creations at the MCA for free, for more information visit http://www.mca.com.au.
Recyclables needed (clean and without holes):
· Used white or clear plastic bags without logos, they need 3000 – so, keep them coming!
· Clear plastic, square sliced cheese containers
· Large, 2 or 3 litre clear plastic bottles (rinsed)
· City Campus: Building 1, Level 3, at the info desk opposite the eatery
· Haymarket Campus: At the eatery
· Kuring-gai Campus: At the eatery
· Museum of Contemporary Art: Information desk, Level 1 of the MCA 140 George Street, Sydney
HotHouse: Call for 1-min videos on sustainable futures
Hothouse is new long-term project focusing on the role of art, design and creative action in transforming the urban environment and promoting sustainability.
An initiative of the National Institute of Experimental Arts (COFA, UNSW) in conjunction with Object: Australian Centre for Craft and Design, Hothouse is supported by the City of Sydney and the Sydney Opera house.
In July we will be launching the Hothouse website and holding a 2-day event at the Sydney Opera House, leading to further large-scale exhibitions and public art events.
For the website, we are looking for short [up to 1-min] videos by artists, designers and any creative thinkers interested in the environment.
Topic: "What the City needs ... " (envisaging sustainable futures/the transformation of the urban environment through environmentally conscious art/design)
Format: short videos [up to 1 minute long] uploaded to Vimeo (or YouTube)
Send link via email to UNSW by 15 June if possible
To be part of HotHouse’s 2-day event at the Sydney Opera House on 27-28 July see the Hothouse website
Profits / Populations - It's all Numbers
Launching on World Environment Day, June 5th, Debbie Symons new video work will run until the 30th of June at Federation Square’s Urban Screen
‘Profits / Populations- It’s all Numbers’ a visualisation from Australian visual artist, Debbie Symons, looks at the demise of the Amazon Rainforest as recorded by the IUCN Red List of Threatened Species and National Institute of Space Research – Annual deforestation figures for the Amazon since 1990.
Video will be screened daily between 11am – 3pm and again from 11pm to 3am.
More information can be found at Debbie Symmons' website
Call for papers - The Carbon Issue
Craft Australia is calling for papers for its next issue of craft + design enquiry. Issue #3 is called The Carbon issue - Sustainability in craft and design.
This issue welcomes academic papers documenting research that contributes to an understanding of sustainability as a context for craft and design. This understanding ranges from the practical to the symbolic.
- Papers can include:
- A review historical movements such as the Arts & Crafts movement or Bauhaus
- A reflection on current craft and design projects
- An engagement with contemporary sustainability discourse
- A speculation on the future of craft and design in a world more than two degrees warmer than today
- A critical examination of the relationship between sustainability and the aesthetic dimension
Papers due by 30 June 2010.
For more details, head to the Craft Australia website
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festival updates
The 2010 festival done and dusted!
Thank you to everyone who came along to the inaugural seven thousand oaks festival. We really enjoyed all the conversations that came out of it and hope to continue them into the year with more 7KO events.
We will be putting photos up on our flickr account, so watch this space
Buy the t-shirt!
7KO printed off a limited edition of gorgeous organic cotton t-shirts. For $30 grab a mens or women's print.
Men's available sizes are S, M, L, XL
Women's available sizes are XS, S, M, L and XL
Send your order to
Missed out on catalogue?
There are still a few of the beautifully designed catalogues left, filled with essays from our curators and commissioned writers. If you would like (or a few) sent to you, send an email to
Next up- the SAFE toolkit
7KO is now working on collating the results from its sustainability audit conducted on the festival. These results will form the basis of the Sustainable Arts Festival Educators (SAFE) Toolkit.
