Land Art Contest for Climate Change Solutions

ART as a tool- MESSAGING as a goal - CLIMATE CHANGE as a problem that can be solved only with a joint effort

INTERNATIONAL CONTEST ANNOUNCEMENT

Dear Teachers and Environmental Educators,

350.org International Climate Civic Movement and Messzelato Association announce a land art and climate protection contest
for children between the age of 11-18 within non-formal youth groups or school classes in the region of Central and Eastern Europe.

OUR AIMS:
1. To raise awareness of the climate change issue among young people/schools and to get them involved in the global climate change movement.

2009 is a very important year in the fight against climate change. The world's leaders will meet in Copenhagen this December to agree a new global climate agreement to succeed the Kyoto Treaty. This conference will be a important moment in shaping the worlds future and in deciding how we jointly address this urgent crises.

The impacts of climate change are already visible -- the melting ice caps and glaciers, the burning forests, the rising see levels, increasing storm intensities and frequencies, and increasing heat waves even in your region.
We believe that our voice counts and we can influence our leaders in order to get the world back on track to the climate safety. Our global actions - including your class/ group - can have a global impact. That’s why we aim to bring the received land art pieces from the contest to Copenhagen UN Climate Conference and show them in an exhibition to share the youth voice with government officials there.

2. Introducing land art in environmental education to explore and express social messages for change and solutions through work with nature.

We encourage you to pick up a local issue and try to visualize it in  nature and with materials from the nature (rocks, stones, water, leaves, flowers).That is the basic process of land art. The land-artist is a part of nature like the wind, for example, who with organizing its pieces creates a new fragile creation without destroying the nature. The land art piece can be a cut sign into the grass or you can spell out your message with leafs on the ground. You can knit a nest from branches, but always on the place where you found them.

Use your creativity. First find an environmental problem, and then discuss it with your fellows/classmates to find the message and a final picture to express your message with building a land art piece in a public place of your town or village. It is a brilliant way to attract the attention of local people, school-director, media and politicians.

Here are some ideas for finding your local issue: garbage in local places; too many cars or heavy trucks in your town or village; polluted water in your local river or lake; high levels of energy consumption in your home/town/school; areas affected by floods or the drought; or unsustainable deforestation. If you are interested we will send you a guide how to do it.

WHAT WE OFFER:

• All the schools who are interested will be given informational materials on climate change and on the 350 global movement.
• All the schools who send back their letter of intent for entering the contest will receive an educational pack with land art lesson plans in your native language.
• 5 children and their teacher from each winning schools will be invited to spend 1 week in Hungary in an eco-camp in the Summer of 2009. The accommodation and the travel cost will be completely covered by us.
• We are going to organise an exhibition from your land art pieces at the UN Climate Conference in Copenhagen in December 2009.
• All the entries will get a calendar for 2010 including all the land art photos of the contests.

WHAT WE EXPECT:
Please send us:

• an informal e-mail with expressing your interest
• a letter of intent by e-mail by 15th of May 2009 (2 sentences are enough, like: X school would like to enter to the LAND ART CONTEST FOR CLIMATE CHANGE SOLUTION by 350.org and please send us the educational pack in order to create our land art piece.”)

Enter your land art piece by 15th of June 2009 with...

• Minimum 2 photos of your land art pieces (at least 300 dpi)
• 1 photo of the art piece with its creators and with a banner which has the name of the school and the 350 number. (Banners can be hand-made)
• Applicants data: (country, name and address of the school, group/class name, name(s) of the authors, age(s), name of the teacher(s), contacts: e-mail, website )
• A description of your entry (title, place of creating, what kind of materials used, what is its message)

TIMING - ENTRY:
Deadline of letter of intents: 15th of May, 2009
All entries must arrive until: 15th of June, 2009
Announcing the winners: 30th of June, 2009
Eco-camp for the winners: in August, 2009
Publishing the contest calendar: by November, 2009
Exhibition at UN Climate Conference in Copenhagen: in December, 2009

Please contact us by e-mail or phone or Skype. We are happy to answer all your questions:

Tünde Udvarnoki
Land art project coordinator
e-mail: palyazat350[at]gmail.com

Office: 350.org / Messzelato Association
Rökk Szilárd utca 11.
Budapest 1085, Hungary

Judit Varga
Central European campaign coordinator
e-mail: jvarga350[at]gmail.com

Phone: +36 1 7856978
Skype: messzelato1

Good luck and have fun!
Yours sincerely, the 350.org and Messzelato Team

Budapest, Hungary - March 23, 2009

The 350.org
350.org is a global campaign started in the USA and working to galvanize the world movement on climate change and address the full global scale of the problem in new, creative ways. Through connecting with the public at every level of society, we intend to shift the political debate on climate change towards the latest science on the issue. 350, measured in parts per million of carbon dioxide, is now recognized as the safe upper limit for a stable climate – one that will avoid the worst impacts of climate change. Our campaign focuses on using that number as a symbol, coordinating and connecting local events all over the world, from Parliaments to village squares. Every event makes the call for 350, and we use those events to create media stories, grassroots excitement and unity, and political change in the halls of the United Nations. The project will peak on October 24, 2009, when local 350 events will occur in every corner of the world, and we will use the time from then until the United Nations meeting in Copenhagen that December to lobby governments and their negotiators for the strongest, fairest, most scientifically accurate climate treaty possible.

The Messzelátó Association has been actively pursuing the protection of natural resources, advocating eco-tourism, promoting sustainable living, youth exchange and voluntarism in Hungary by spreading the spirit of taking an active and aware role in civil society since its foundation in 1999. The key message of our association is to protect the environment and to preserve biodiversity for the future. Our new project, a travelling exhibition was conceived to raise awareness of climate issues, the importance of the impending UN Climate Talks and the decisions made there. In the center of this travelling exhibition is a 5,5 meter tall interactive Baobab tree sculpture. This tree will travel in Eastern Europe in the Summer of 2009.
Website: www.messzelato.hu