In 2024 we offered an online series of one hour sessions that covered a range of topics and perspectives on climate conscious creative practices. The aim was to bring attention to how we can transition our work practices – both making work and touring work, what tools are available to help understand and measure emissions, how we can use our voice to advocate for change in the sector and with audiences, and the steps you can take to make an emissions reduction plan.

A second aim of this series was to build community so we can learn, share, support, inspire and amplify the great work that is happening in this space.

Each session included two, 20-minute presentations from guest speakers on a particular topic followed by a 20 minute discussion, where participants were able to ask the guest speakers questions.

Watch a replay of each of the sessions below:

Session 1

A First Nations Approach – Baiame's Ngunnhu
With Lily Shearer, Moogahlin Performing Arts

This session focusses on Moogahlin’s Baiame's Ngunnhu, a cultural festival celebrating the connection local communities have with the Brewarrina Fish Traps and Barwon River. Lily speaks about caring for Country from a First Peoples perspective, and what it means to make art and come together on land that is a traditional gathering place. From a touring perspective, Baiame's Ngunnhu is also an example of low emission, high impact ‘micro touring’: where artists and audiences travel locally from across a region.

Alternative Touring Models
With Pippa Bailey, Director/Producer

This session "imagines into a future touring landscape that puts the environment front and centre, hand in hand with arts experiences that create connection." This quote is from Creative Adventures in Sustainable Touring, a paper written by Pippa for AOT to stimulate conversations about alternative, low emissions touring models. This session also discusses the definition of touring, and how an adaptive approach could see 'touring' reframed and expanded to allow for more climate conscious practices. 

Session 2

Developing a Sustainability Strategy and Emissions Reduction Plan
With Aimee Smith, Sustainability consultant

This session gives a practical guide to getting started on a strategy - for your practice, or your organisation, with reference to plans Aimee has written for a range of organisations including arts companies and festivals like The Last Great Hunt and  Freedom Time. Aimee is keen to empower individuals to get started themselves and is also available as a consultant.

Using 'Circulate': Arup's carbon emissions calculator
With Kim Jones, Arup

This session will give an overview of Circulate and also take participants through an example of how it can be used. Designed specifically for the creative industries in Australia and NZ, this easy-to-use tool can be used in the planning stage of touring projects to facilitate decision-making that reduces emissions. Circulate features in Arts on Tour's Green Touring Toolkit.

Session 3

Towards Eco-creativity in Theatre Making and Performance Design
With Tanja Beer, Griffith University

This session introduces the emerging concept of Eco-creativity in theatre making and performance design. Eco-creativity combines ecological thinking with creativity to inspire long-term solutions to environmental and social issues in cultural practice. A key enquiry of the session was to explore how artistic imagination can be linked with ecology and environmental sustainability, thereby giving agency to practitioners to pursue climate narratives and actions in inspiring ways.  The session includes tangible examples of ‘eco-creativity’ in practice, including how storytelling and practical approaches can be combined to showcase sustainability in action.

Developing a sustainable making practice
With Bryony Anderson, Designer/ Maker

Working for many years in an off-grid shed in the mountains of NSW, Bryony developed techniques for working with salvaged and low-impact materials and including local community in creative projects. Since then she's led the establishment of Terrapin Puppet Theatre's workshop and mentored emerging makers from a sustainable foundation. She has also navigated the path to carbon accreditation with the company, an eye-opening process. Bryony will talk through her ongoing practice, her philosophy of resource stewardship, and the complexities of upscaling a sustainable practice from a personal to an organisational model. 

Session 4

Reducing emissions from a Production Manager’s perspective – 'Scenes from the Climate Era' 
With Dana Spence, Belvoir St Theatre

This is a practical session that explores the introduction of eco principles into theatre making from a production management perspective. Dana draws on recent Belvoir productions, including David Finnigan's 'Scenes from the Climate Era', as well as change practices she has been involved in at NIDA and Griffin Theatre. In the session, Dana gives examples of how an environmental sustainability focus can be introduced into a Production Department, what tools can be used, and how lower emission choices can be made across the design, procurement, and disposal stages of bringing a new production to life.

Theatre Green Book Australia
With Grace Nye Butler & Chris Mercer

This session dives into the Theatre Green Book Australia. Adapted by Grace and Chris from the Theatre Green Book UK and published in 2023, this excellent resource provides a roadmap and tools to green your theatre practice. Grace and Chris use practical examples to demonstrate how the Green Book can be used, and draw on their experiences of consulting to a variety of theatre organisations and institutions more broadly to offer insights and advice about both getting started, and getting more ambitious, with your sustainability goals.

Session 5

Lessons from a year of Green Touring
With Simon Turner, Sydney Dance Company

In 2023 AOT and SDC piloted carbon neutral touring with SDC's annual regional touring program. This involved reducing emissions as much as possible in the planning and delivery of the tour, then purchasing carbon credits to offset the remaining emissions. Back at the SDC office, Simon also set up the Green Team to look at internal systems. This session explores the strategies implemented, from a carbon literacy session with the touring company ahead of the tour to replacing flights with bus travel, and ask: what were the challenges, and what were the results?

Alternatives to Offsetting and FEAT
With Beatrice Jeavons, Sustainability Consultant

The final topic for this Series speaks to the complexity of offsetting. If using offsets to achieve a Net Zero goal is problematic, what are the alternatives? In exploring this question, Bea talks about her work with Future Energy Artists (FEAT), and the aims of this initiative to empower artists to take ownership over accelerating our clean energy future as well as how to build in sustainability into the eco systems of the live performance sector with FEAT's Solar Slice mechanism.