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Sagarmatha Next Centre ©Tommy Gustafsson
Tommy Gustafsson: ‘Would they be willing to make a small contribution and carry a one-kilo bag of crushed plastic bottles?’
Tommy Gustafsson is a mountaineer, former CEO of sports marketing companies and founder of Sagarmatha Next, the world's highest museum. He and his co-founders develop highly innovative environmental concepts such as the Carry Me Back programme and have been able to recycle more than 25 tonnes of waste in the last two years.
After decades of travelling to the region as a mountaineering tourist, Gustafsson became determined to solve the huge problem of pollution in the Sagarmatha region, the national park where Mount Everest is located. Together with two friends, they embarked on a major endeavour not only to build a museum in the middle of the national park, but also to develop complex concepts to solve the waste problems of the entire region. The museum, which he describes as a showcase, is now the headquarters from which Gustafsson and his team operate. An important component of the project is the ingenious Carry Me Back programme, which was developed after years of analysis and which specifically means that each participant takes 1 kg of recycled waste with them from the region to the collection point in Lukla, where the only airfield is located. The founders also face the huge task of introducing a waste separation system throughout the region. Moreover, one of the biggest sources of plastic waste are water bottles, as people have to drink four or five litres of water a day to get used to the altitude.
The museum itself has already attracted over 38,000 visitors in its second year. Artists are selected who deal with environmental problems. The museum is doing so well that artists are surprised at the high sales figures. The museum exhibits small works of art as well as large sculptures and also produces souvenirs from recycled waste.
We recently reported on New York artist Benjamin Von Wong's art project on Mount Everest. He is one of the best-known artists and activists in the world when it comes to environmental art. The
19 November 2024
CURRENT TOPICS
Courtesy of the artist
Benjamin von Wong “Everyone has the opportunity to use whatever superpowers they have to make a difference.“
The US artist Benjamin von Wong has become world-famous for his spectacular environmental art projects. His latest project is located a little higher up, namely on the route to the base camp on Mount Everest. Ever since tourism on the world's highest peak began to increase, the problem of rubbish has also taken on ever greater dimensions, with Everest being derisively referred to as the world's highest rubbish dump. Von Wong had been planning to realise this theme artistically for some time, but several lucky coincidences meant that his project could now be realised. Von Wong teamed up with the Sagarmatha Next Museum, which had launched the ‘Carry Me Back’ programme. The museum is located in Sagarmatha National Park, which includes the eight-thousanders Lhotse, Cho Oyu, Makalu and Mount Everest. Sagarmatha Next carries out various projects and, with the help of artists, tries to reuse mountain falls and transform them into works of art or souvenir products.
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10 October 2024
©Andreas Moser
Uta Kögelsberger: "The human-made, often industrial forests are a reminder of what we have already lost."
Forest Complex is the new project by London-based artist Uta Kögelsberger. Her artistic practice focuses on the social and political effects of climate change and its impact on forests, which she expresses in photography, videos and sculptural sound installations. For Kögelsberger, climate change is at the heart of all the pressing issues of our time. The subject matter of Forest Complex follows on from Fire Complex and Cull, which attracted worldwide attention and for which she received the prestigious Royal Academy Wollaston Award. Fire Complex was a response to the 2020 Castle Fire in California, which destroyed 174,000 hectares of forest and 14% of the world's Giant Sequoia population. Kögelsberger herself lost her house in the fire. Her replanting effort mobilised local communities, and in that contributed amongst others to a new bill being introduced to Congress to protect giant sequoias.
5 May 2024
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