This morning the Executive Director of Greenpeace UK, John Sauven, met with the Director of the British Museum, Dr Hartwig Fischer, to discuss the museum’s continued sponsorship by oil major BP.
Just before noon, the meeting was followed by a string quartet in the museum’s iconic covered courtyard, playing ‘Requiem for Sinking Cities’. The piece was a reworking of classical music previously played outside Shell’s London headquarters with Charlotte Church in protest at their involvement in Arctic oil drilling. The performance included the delivery of over 25,000 messages from people opposed to the British Museum’s decision to renew BP’s sponsorship for five more years.
This morning the Executive Director of Greenpeace UK, John Sauven, met with the Director of the British Museum, Dr Hartwig Fischer, to discuss the museum’s continued sponsorship by oil major BP.
Just before noon, the meeting was followed by a string quartet in the museum’s iconic covered courtyard, playing ‘Requiem for Sinking Cities’. The piece was a reworking of classical music previously played outside Shell’s London headquarters with Charlotte Church in protest at their involvement in Arctic oil drilling. The performance included the delivery of over 25,000 messages from people opposed to the British Museum’s decision to renew BP’s sponsorship for five more years.
London,
19 May 2016 - Greenpeace activists are scaling the British Museum in
protest at oil giant BP’s sponsorship of a new blockbuster exhibition. The
climbers are hanging seven huge banners down the front columns of the museum.
The banners carry the names of cities and regions struck by flooding and
climate change disasters.
The ‘Sunken Cities’ showcase
– which opened this morning – displays artefacts recovered from two ancient
cities submerged under the Mediterranean. But in what campaigners call ‘a
stunning irony’ the exhibition is being used to promote oil company BP.
