An Earthquake in the Groninger Art Museum
Activists call for museum’s new leadership to end ties with gas companies.
This Sunday at three in the afternoon, rumbling sounds could be heard in the basement of the Groninger Museum. But don't panic (yet). The earthquake sounds came from the lockers in the Groninger Museum, where activists from the movement Fossil Free Culture had placed speakers, that were creating this soundscape.
“This is not an earthquake, this is an Art installation,” the activist collective Fossil Free Culture NL informed the museum visitors. In an act of protest, they transformed the basement of the Groninger Museum into a shaking institution—literally and metaphorically.
As the Groninger Museum searches for its next director, FFCNL’s message is clear: this is the time for a decisive break from fossil fuel money. They are calling on the museum to “immediately cut all ties with Gasunie and GasTerra” and for other cultural institutions across the Netherlands to follow suit.
The protest, titled “This Is an Image of Your World Collapsing," aimed to draw attention to these long-standing sponsorship ties that FFCNL argues to be “art washing” which is the use of cultural backing to clean up the image of industries responsible for environmental degradation.
FFCNL spokesperson Maria Rietbergen states: “By accepting sponsorship from companies like GasTerra and Gasunie, the Groninger Museum is complicit in artwashing the industries that have caused the climate crisis.” She described how Gasunie and GasTerra, despite positioning themselves as leaders in the green energy transition, are still expanding fossil fuel infrastructure and international imports. “We cannot trust the fossil fuel industry to lead us to a green future,” she emphasized.
This intervention marks FFCNL’s sixth action targeting the Groninger Museum. Their protests are part of a larger, global movement to remove fossil fuel money from cultural institutions. FFCNL had previously campaigned successfully at prominent Dutch institutions like the Van Gogh Museum, NEMO Science Museum, and the Concertgebouw in Amsterdam.
FFCNL is a collective of artists, researchers, and climate activists who believe that the cultural sector has an important role in the climate fight. Their mission is to end oil and gas sponsorship in the arts, a campaign that has gained traction worldwide. The group has aligned itself with other international organizations such as the UK’s BP or Not BP?, France’s Libérons le Louvre, and the U.S.-based Occupy Museums.
For the climate justice movement, the stakes are high, and FFCNL insists that cultural institutions must choose a side. “We stand with grassroots movements worldwide resisting fossil extractivism,” said Rietbergen. “This fight is bigger than Groningen—it’s about dismantling the system of exploitation that endangers our planet.”
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Good article and action. 💚Karin (XR)