Environmental organisation Greenpeace has launched a new campaign video against oil company Shell drilling in the Arctic by showing several priceless works of art being burned and defaced.
In the advert, titled A Song Of Oil, Ice and Fire, several famous landscape artworks are set ablaze, including Pearblossom Highway by David Hockney, Christinas World by Andrew Wyeth and An Arctic Summer: Boring Through the Pack in Melville Bay by William Bradford.
After each artwork is burned, we are then shown a new, dystopian version of each landscape by political photomontage artists Peter Kennard and Cat Phillips, who are most famous for creating Tony Blairs selfie at a burning Iraqi oil refinery.
Elena Polisano, Arctic campaigner for Greenpeace, said: Shell could be risking disaster by drilling for oil in Arctic waters in less than six weeks. We made this video to expose that, and show how its plans affect all of us too – because the impact of climate change affects the places we all live in.
If Shell drills in the Arctic it could devastate this iconic and beautiful place, and its incredible wildlife, like polar bears and narwhals. All the evidence shows Shell cant drill for oil safely in the Arctic. The extreme conditions mean its when, not if, a spill will happen.
Shell has a huge PR machine behind it, but it didnt count on millions of ordinary people standing up to protect the Arctic. We need everyone to watch and share this video, to show Shell it wont get away with destroying the world we love.
Greenpeace will be hoping that this new video emulates the success of last years ad, Lego: Everything is Not Awesome that was viewed by over seven million people on YouTube and led to toy company Lego ending its 50-year marketing relationship with Shell.
