BUENOS AIRES — Artists have taken the global fight against environmental degradation and climate change to the streets in Argentina’s capital.
From endangered species to river pollution, melting glaciers and deforestation, street artists in Buenos Aires are using their brushes to paint a planet threatened by mankind.
Environmental damage from mining and fossil fuel drilling in particular is a crucial issue for activists in this South American country. They worry about fracking for resources in the gigantic oil and shale gas formation discovered in 2010 in the southern Patagonia region.
This deposit called Vaca Muerta (Dead Cow in English) is estimated to hold the world’s fourth largest shale oil reserves.
The murals’ stark warnings especially target Shell, the Dutch energy giant, which in August won rights to exploit two Vaca Muerta oil areas for the next 35 years.
The messages dot the vista of this picturesque city just when voters are about to vote for president on Sunday.
Both center-right opposition candidate Mauricio Macri and the left-wing candidate Daniel Scioli, the chosen successor of the current government, see Vaca Muerta’s riches as an economic opportunity for Argentina. Polling front-runner Macri said he would create a business-friendly environment in Argentina to bring in more foreign investment and exploit the country’s oil and gas wealth.
Up-and-coming street artists here are taking advantage of lax rules about painting buildings to spread their messages. No official authorization is needed — just a property owner’s consent.
“It’s much easier to get permission to decorate buildings and walls here than in many other cities, which makes it very attractive for foreign street artists to come and paint,” says Matt Fox-Tucker, founder of Buenos Aires Street Art, an organization that supports local urban art in the Argentine capital.
“I think Buenos Aires has one of the most exciting street art scenes in the world right now with lots of large scale murals,” he adds.
Some of the works were created by individual artists and some were the work of collective groups. In one example of the latter, in August 100 artists and volunteers painted a 1,000-foot mural on Juan B. Justo Avenue, in the high-end neighborhood of Palermo, to raise awareness of the Arctic’s environmental contamination.
Under the banner “Make visible the invisible,” this Greenpeace campaign features polar bears on melting glaciers and indigenous tribes suffering from oil companies’ harm of the Earth.
This photo story was published in Global Post on November 21, 2015. Link here.
