Has everyone heard about the march for climate change movement? I actually hadn't until a few days ago in art class but it seems like a pretty big thing. If you haven't, click here for a little background on it!
Basically, it's an international movement to bring attention to climate justice, and carbon pollution. It's pretty huge, many major cities across the world are participating in it! Anyways, to relate this back to what we have been talking about lately; the attacks on Paris, the influence these attacks had on the world, and how people are responding; I will be focusing this post around Paris' march for climate change.
So, like many big cities around the world, Paris had planned to participate in the walk for climate change on the weekend of November 28th. However, they have just endured a terrible tragedy and in result of this they decided to cancel the scheduled walk. "French Foreign Minister Laurent Fabius said earlier that the government hoped “to avoid any extra risk”, the Associated Press reported. The rallies—scheduled for Nov. 29 and Dec. 12—were expected to draw 200,000 or more people." As much as I'm sure all of the citizens respected and understood the reasoning behind this decision, many of the citizens still wanted to show there participation, and demonstrate there dedication toward this cause, and toward the lost lives of friends and loved ones.
These images have been travelling around social media, I'm sure you've all seen one or another over the past few days.
"As the world gathers in Paris to stand up for climate action, let us also stand in the shoes of all victims of terrorism, war and persecution [...] and respond with compassion," - Ki-moon
So let's look at this visual display like art, photography is art, and we can analyze what we see going on in this picture, and others like it.
Okay, so I chose to look at this picture because it really revolves around the symbolism of the shoes, and not so much the people putting down the shoes. It's a clear picture, you can see the variety of shoes, and it's pretty evident that it is Paris.
I think that this really shows how a community came together to make a statement. I don't know if this started out by someone placing there shoes down because they were disappointed they couldn't have used them. I don't know if this started because activists wanted to make a statement that the lost lives in the recent attack can no longer stand up for anything anymore. I don't know how this started, but it did, and word spread and the shoes grew and deeper meanings and motives were presented. I think that this can be considered art because this act is all about perception, did people who recently lost loved ones place there shoes here? This could totally be a way to continue to remind people of the attacks. In today's media, bad news seems to keep on coming, tragedies from last week aren't as important as they were before, we begin to forget, until we never give it a second thought. But, those were peoples lives that were lost, those families will mourn forever, they won't forget that easy, so why should we be able to? I think that this really kept the recent attacks in the media, making us all give what happened a second thought.
Also, the climate change movement was a pretty big deal, and I'm sure many people in Paris were looking forward to marching for change. This display of shoes is like a silent protest. Obviously people respected the decision to call off the walk, due to recent events, and safety. But, does that mean that nothing can be done? Sometimes, actions are more powerful than words, and this display of shoes could not be ignored. Instead of being just another city marching for climate change, Paris found a respectful way to make this movement viral.
These shoes basically take 2 completely separate issues, and join them together. They show the strength in community, the desire to move forward, and the hope to never forget, but learn to move on from tragedy.
