Climate Change and the Pacific: In Conversation with His Excellency Mr Anote Tong Former President of The Republic of Kiribati

Guigone Camus, view of the junction area between the islets of Katabanga and Nikutoru, Tabiteuea South, Southern Gilbert Islands, Kiribati, 2011, photo documentation. Courtesy the artist.

NTU Centre for Contemporary Art Singapore’s exhibition The Oceanic comes to an end on 6 March. It has been the Centre’s most well-attended exhibition to date and we are deeply honoured to have His Excellency Mr Anote Tong join us for the closing ceremony.

Mr Tong will share his powerful story as a climate activist and politician to Kiribati, a country of 33 islands composed of 99.98% ocean. Following his three terms as President of Kiribati, His Excellency continues his advocacy for the challenges posed by climate change to the Pacific Islands as a self-proclaimed “rational radical,” raising global awareness for this increasingly devastating threat of sea level rise and the urgency to collectively find solutions.

While in leadership, Mr Tong expressed the climate crisis in terms of national sovereignty, taking action to secure the long-term well-being of his people. In 2008 he created the Phoenix Islands Protected Area, one of the largest marine protected areas in the world with a size of 408,250 square kilometres, which was inscribed as a United Nations World Heritage site.

As a Distinguished Fellow at Conservation International, a nonprofit environmental organisation, he has continued his visionary work to protect the one blue home we all share.

This event will be the final opportunity to see The Oceanic, featuring ongoing projects and works by the 12 Fellows of Thyssen-Bornemisza Art Contemporary (TBA21)–Academy The Current’s first cycle of expeditions, in which artists, filmmakers, composers, writers, and researchers engaged with the long cultural histories of Pacific Ocean archipelagos and the environmental and economic threats these societies face today.