Action: Greenwash

On 14 June, guests and judges arriving for the BP Portrait Award ceremony came face to face with portraits of people affected by BP's massive oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico. The blowout of the Deepwater Horizon caused the deaths of 11 oil workers and untold, ongoing damage to the people and the environment of the Gulf Coast. Lining the entrance to the National Portrait Gallery, London Rising Tiders were joined by folk from Climate Rush and Platform to mount our Living Exhibition of portraits from the Facing the Gulf project.

Sunday 17 April 2011, 2:15pm The Tate Modern, Southbank, London

This Sunday the Tate Modern became the site of a spontaneous BP-sponsored sleep in as around 100 people answered Rising Tide’s call for a flashmob at 2:15 pm within the iconic museum.

With watches synchronised and BP-branded sleeping gear at the ready, the participants found themselves falling as one under a sponsorship-induced stupor, on the floor of the Tate Modern. The flashmob provided an excellent way to catch the attention of the browsers in the gallery, and as the sleepers lay all about the turbine hall and first 3 floors, and the public stared, our cameras were there to catch their reactions.

BP Week of Action
A week of action to kick BP out of our cultural spaces
14 – 20 April 2011

Bristol CoMutiny: Debunking BT's Greenwash
18 September 2009

On Friday 18th September during the Co-Mutiny Repossess the Banks protest, Rising Tide took action against BT offices in Bristol to highlight the link between the BT Pensions Scheme and the giant Ffos y Fran opencast coal mine at Merthyr Tydfil in South Wales. Fake coal was strewn on the floor of one office and walking lumps of coal attempted to enter another. A number of activists were arrested.

London Rising Tide has been helping out our friends at UK Tar Sands Network and Liberate Tate with these two kick ass actions...

Greenwash Guerillas deal with greenwash spill... by visionontv

Last night at 6.07 PM the London brigade of the Greenwash Guerrillas got a call from a panicked pedestrian outside the National Portrait Gallery. It seemed that the prizegiving ceremony for BP Portrait Award was about to start, and toxic greenwash had begun to gush uncontrollably from the gallery’s front doors.