Jesús Armas is a Venezuelan activist, Obama Foundation Scholar, and McCain Global Leader who is currently under unlawful detention for his human rights work. Read the statements of the Obama Foundation and the McCain Institute.

The Obama Leaders Network and Jesús’s friends and family are currently mobilising for his immediate release. Please follow the news from the official campaign on the website and on Instagram.

Over the holidays, I designed the logo for his campaign — a small contribution to the big efforts of everyone else. Here is a quick note on the design process:

As with Hong Hoang‘s campaign, the goal was to humanise Jesús to provide a three dimensional glimpse into him as a person beyond his activism. After collaborative meetings hosted by the Leaders Network, I learned that Jesús loves rock and roll music, and the universal hand gesture with the index and pinky fingers sticking out came to my mind.

I had an exchange with Liangyi Chang whom I worked with on the Free Hong logo, and we were debating between whether the thumb should stick out or not as we have seen rock fans use both though the first image is the actual symbol for rock and roll. The second image also means ‘I love you’ in American Sign Language, and so I stuck with the first hand. My third and fourth fingers kind of form a heart anyway, so love was not lost.

I thought of Jesús going to rock concerts with his friends and imagined his hand sticking out with this gesture wrapped in paper wristbands typical of concerts and festivals, and substituted this with barbed wire as a symbol of his activism.

When I showed this to the team, one of Jesús’s fellow scholars sent a photo of Jesús doing this with both hands, so I took it as a serendipitous sign that this was the direction to go.

A few exchanges with the team about Pantone colours…

And here we go:

I am honoured and sad to have made this and I hope that Jesús gets returned to his family as soon as possible.

Thank you to the Obama Leaders Network and friends of Jesús Armas for all their efforts.

My PhD dissertation can be read here, and the documentation of practice (screenshot below) can be viewed here.

Last week, I co-organised a pizza watch party with my friend and fellow Obama Leader Jackson Rowland to watch and reflect on President Obama’s speech on pluralism during the third Democracy Forum by the Obama Foundation held in Chicago. You can watch the speech and more here, but here are the key takeaways:

“[Pluralism] is the idea that because we live alongside individuals and groups who are different from us, we commit to a system of rules that helps us peacefully resolve our disputes, and not only tolerate each other, but join in collective action.

 Here are a few principles to consider as we move forward: 

1. Building bridges isn’t contrary to equality and social justice. In fact, it’s our best tool for delivering lasting change.
2. Pluralism doesn’t require us to deny our unique identities or experiences. But it does require that we try to understand the experiences of others and look for common ground.
3. Pluralism works better when it’s about action and not just words.
4. We’re not born with the muscles to make pluralism a habit. It takes practice, and we need to rebuild the institutions that give us that practice.”

— President Barack Obama

We had a nice group of six attend the call. Clockwise from top left: Jackson Rowland (New Zealand/Australia), Catherine Sarah Young (Philippines/Australia), Kyaw Thu Htet (Myanmar), Dan Ilic (Australia), Dina Jezdic (New Zealand), Skye Riggs (Australia).

Using a Miro board, we collaborated on the pizza. The pizza toppings reflect what we think pluralism is:

I had the pizza base made in my favourite local cafe and arranged the toppings according to the board above:

This was harder than it looks. And the blue flower around the pizza stumped me for a bit until I realised I had lavender at home. As an artist, I saw this as an edible sculpture, and it was 10/10 delicious (lavender included)!

We’ll likely do this again in the future. Thank you all for coming!

This month marks my 11th year of making art about the climate crisis. Once a response to Supertyphoon Haiyan impacting the Philippines in 2013 through an artscience residency in Singapore, the projects have now multiplied to respond to the many environmental catastrophes worldwide that are projected to continue. While the future is not without uncertainty and fear, I find that working as an artist is a hopeful position to have. This week, I keep seeing Rebecca Solnit’s article quoted everywhere, especially the line, “The fact that we cannot save everything does not mean we cannot save anything, and everything we can save is worth saving.” Making art is an act of love that persists even when they tell us that all is lost. Thanks for sticking around!

The Sewer Soaperie was part of ‘Are You Ready?’, an art exhibition held from 13-18 October 2024 alongside the Asia-Pacific Ministerial Conference on Disaster Risk Reduction (APMCDRR) in Manila, the Philippines. The opening of the event included Mr. Kamal Kishore, Special Representative of the UN Secretary-General for Disaster Risk Reduction; The Honourable Maria Antonia “Toni” Jugo Yulo-Loyzaga, environment secretary of the Philippines; and SM Prime Chairman of the Executive Committee Hans Sy.

The “Are You Ready?” art exhibition presents a wide range of artworks that show the challenges and solutions related to disaster risk reduction in Asia and the Pacific. It highlights the role of art as a powerful form of education to raise awareness and inspire action to build more resilient communities, as is the theme of the International Day for Disaster Risk Reduction 2024. The exhibition also commemorates the 2004 Indian Ocean Tsunami, 20 years on.

The exhibition was organized by the United Nations Office for Disaster Risk Reduction (UNDRR) with the support of the Philippine Government and SM Prime, and with contributions from the UNESCO Intergovernmental Oceanographic Commission and the International Federation of Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies. It was curated by Dr. Hannah Entwisle Chapuisat.

The Sewer Soaperie (2016) is an artscience project that turns sewage into luxury soaps. During extreme storms in the Anthropocene, many cities are ill-equipped to handle the flooding that follows. One reason is the coagulated grease in the sewers, with some as big as airplanes and nicknamed “fatbergs”. Among the sources of grease is used oil or fatty waste that is poured into sinks, which drains into the sewers and hardens in the pipes. The world already experiences extreme storms because of the climate crisis, and cities will experience even more flooding if exacerbated by human actions. The Sewer Soaperie takes samples from different points of the journey of oil — from raw palm oil, used cooking oil, and sewage. These were sterilized and turned into luxury soaps through the artist’s saponification experiments. 

The Sewer Soaperie. Images by Studio Catherine Sarah Young.

Thank you, everyone!

Exhibition images courtesy the Department of Environment and Natural Resources of the Philippines, and Dr. Hannah Entwisle Chapuisat and the APMCDRR.

I gave a talk in this cool speaker series in Queen’s University in Ontario, Canada this November 3, 5pm-7pm (November 4, 8am-10am Sydney) on my artscience and sustainability practice. It was an honour to speak with our keynote speaker, Dr. Benjamin Bolden (music educator, composer, and UNESCO Chair in Arts and Learning at Queen’s University); Evan Sharma (multidisciplinary artist); Ren Challacombe (PhD candidate and choral arranger); and Heather Haynes (artist). Exhibit Change is a Queen’s Club that aims to inform the community about social issues and uses the power of art as a conduit for advocacy. Thank you for having me!

I am stunned to share that my artwork, Arctic Ice Chess, won third place in the 10th Tashkent Biennale in Uzbekistan last week! My deepest thanks to our tireless curator Sukhrob Kurbanov; Akmal Nurodinov, Chairman of the Academy of Arts of Uzbekistan; the esteemed jury: Adam Budak (Germany), Her Excellency Sheikha Mai Bint Mohammend Al-Khalifa (Bahrain), Chang Min Lim (South Korea), Hu Muqing (China) and Ing Phousera (France); the incredible biennale team; and the wonderful volunteers who translated for us and kept everything running smoothly. 

Arctic Ice Chess is a melting chess game about the climate crisis and how the resulting sea level rise and geopolitical race for Arctic petroleum deposits affect the world. It was borne in 2021 as part of my PhD dissertation in UNSW Sydney School of Art and Design. That this work brings so many communities together reflects how the climate crisis connects us all, calling for action to reduce fossil fuel emissions and aligning with the biennale’s theme, ‘Art and World’. 

The video of Game 1 is between Gorm Gunnarsen, a politician and then-candidate for mayor in Copenhagen, and Jon Rahbek-Clemmensen, military lecturer of the Danish Armed Forces. Game 1 was curated in 2021 by my dear friend the indefatigable curator Malou Solfjeld, organised by SixtyEight Art Institute who also edited the videos, and played on a boat owned by Neils Heilberg and docked on Copenhagen Harbour. Part of the research was funded in 2019 by the Kone Foundation in Finland.

I am deeply grateful for the chance to exhibit one of my favourite projects and to teach a masterclass at the Central Exhibitions Hall at the Academy of Arts in Uzbekistan, sharing my PhD research and practice. I also had the privilege of giving a lecture at the State Museum in Memory of the Victims of the Repressions, an institution dedicated to the memory of the people who fought for the independence of Uzbekistan for the biennale’s International Scientific and Practical Conference with the theme, ‘Nationality and Universality in Contemporary Art: The Individual of Understanding and Interpretation’.

I have always seen biennales as a form of diplomatic exchange – like a caravanserai – and although I have never visited this part of the world, I believe it is important to fill in the gaps of one’s understanding. I was mesmerised by the beauty of Tashkent, Samarkand, and Bukhara, crucial Silk Road cities, where ideas and cultures have mingled for centuries. 

Most importantly, I am thankful for the friendships I made with artists from this side of the planet. Despite me coming all the way from Australia, when you share each other’s baby pictures, dance to Uptown Funk and the Macarena, and come to my rescue when I got food poisoning, then language and cultural difference matter less. I will always remember everyone’s kindness and hospitality. I hope our paths cross again soon! Uzbekistan will always be in my heart. ❤️

One of my projects is on this list of artists working on the climate crisis in El Periódico, a daily newspaper based in Barcelona, Spain. ‘Climate Change Couture’ was a series I started in Singapore in 2013, collaborating with sustainability researchers as an artist-in-residence at Singapore-ETH Centre to co-create garments we might wear under various climate futures. I’m honoured to be on a list of artists I admire, such as Olafur Eliasson (I cited his and Minik Rosing’s work, ‘Ice Watch’, in my PhD), Ai Weiwei, and others. Most importantly, I consider this a full circle moment, because back when I used to live in Barcelona for art school, I would read El Periódico to improve my Spanish. Reading this today made me smile — because I understood the text. Gracias!

The Federal Emergency Management Agency, an agency of the United States Department of Homeland Security whose mission is helping people before, during and after disasters, profiles The Sewer Soaperie in their newsletter Climate Chronicles.

Download the entire newsletter here. Thank you to Ryan Bourgart for reaching out!

I finally attended my graduation ceremony at UNSW on 22 August 2024. For PhDs, you wear a bonnet and they read out your thesis title. You also doff the bonnet as a sign of respect. I doff the bonnet virtually to you all! Petrichor rules!