Nicolas Lampert
I collaborated with the organization How Green is Chicago on the long-running campaign to close down the Fisk and Crawford coal burning plants in Chicago. Both plants, located in residential neighborhoods and close to downtown, omit toxic emissions in the Pilsen and Little Village neighborhood, home to one of the nation’s largest Latino communities. Asthma death rates in Chicago are twice the national average, and both plants are facing multiple federal, state, and civil lawsuits for violating the Clean Air Act. A Harvard School of Public Health Study found the two coal plants responsible for 40 premature deaths, 550 visits to the emergency room, and 2,800 asthma attacks per year. Despite these figure, many residents in Chicago are still unaware of the existence of these two plants. My work involved installing 12 street signs in various neighborhoods in Chicago to inform viewers on how far away they stood from either the Fisk or Crawford plant. The goal of the project was to create public attention and media coverage about the dangers that these plants pose to community and the climate.
Nicolas Lampert is a Milwaukee / Chicago based interdisciplinary artist and author. He organized the environmental art show Seeing Green: Art, Ecology, and Activism in Milwaukee 2008 and co-organized Watershed: Art, Activism, and Community Engagement in 2010. He works collectively with Justseeds
