We protect our gentle hearts and our fearful brains by saying things cannot change, telling ourselves it isn’t as bad as it is, or just ignoring environmental and social breakdown all together. Our disillusionment can be a slow erosion of imagination and hope, day by weary day, with global tragedies playing out behind our personal triumphs and pains. As an antidote to disconnection and despair, artists have a powerful role to play: making space to feel grief, sparking imagination, knitting people together in solidarity and shared experience, and rekindling a belief in what is possible. 

Guest Rebeka Ryvola de Kremer is an artist and illustrator who is creating a more just and caring world, as well as a learning advisor for the Red Cross Red Crescent Climate Centre. From guerilla protest art to art galleries to scientific reports to international UN conferences, Rebeka’s art brings creativity and human responses to creativity into many spaces and places. She sees art as a powerful medium to communicate climate messages and build community. Rebeka brings her faith in the power of curiosity, wonder, and connection to the work she does in service to people and the planet. She currently works primarily with illustration, visualization of data and information, live visual communication like scribing & cartoons, group facilitation, and public art installation. Her clients and collaborators include Black Lives Matter DC, the World Bank, the Red Cross Red Crescent Movement, The Metropolitan Museum of Art of New York City, Yale University, Columbia University, and community organizations in Los Angeles, Washington DC, Mexico City, and Beirut.

Rebeka is the type of person who reignites your belief in magic and makes you want to reconnect with your creative self. She is also the artist who created the cover art for Reseed, and she was a part of the project before it ever reached listeners. This conversation examines being an artist in “serious” spaces, human migration across places, and disconnecting from social media and information overload for the sake of sanity and creativity. Art can be informed by science and evidence, and can responsibly connect humans with information and steward action. Art has often been disregarded or sidelined in climate and justice conversations, but creativity is essential for the revolution towards a regenerative and caring reality.

Listen at reseed.ca.