A New Initiative for Climate Action in the Art World
At the upcoming editions of Frieze London and Frieze Masters, a group of galleries will take part in an innovative initiative that aims to support environmental causes through the art market. The project, called 10% Of, involves donating 10 percent of the sale price of certain artworks to benefit the London-based nonprofit Gallery Climate Coalition (GCC). This effort is not only a fundraising campaign but also a way to raise awareness about climate change within the art world.
The 10% Of initiative includes 22 blue-chip galleries participating in either of the fairs, which represents around 8 percent of the more than 280 exhibitors at both events. All the participating galleries were invited to join the project, and many have already committed to it. Some of the notable names involved include Gagosian, Hauser & Wirth, Thaddaeus Ropac, Lisson Gallery, Sprüth Magers, Thomas Dane Gallery, Sadie Coles HQ, Victoria Miro, and Hollybush Gardens.
GCC, which has been working to reduce carbon emissions within the art world by 50 percent by 2030, approached Frieze earlier this year with the idea of the initiative. The goal was to celebrate its fifth anniversary of a group of galleries coming together to combat climate change and address it in the art world.
“We saw an opportunity to combine those ideas into a new model of climate-focused giving that could feel both natural to the market and powerful in its impact,” said Heath Lowndes, director of GCC, in an emailed interview.
Each participating gallery has selected at least one work from their booth at the upcoming fairs to be part of 10% Of, committing to donate 10 percent of the sale price to GCC. While that figure might seem relatively small, Lowndes emphasized that “small actions taken together generate more meaningful impact.”
Those works will be viewable ahead of the fair in a dedicated online viewing room that will go live on October 4. As of now, GCC has revealed one work that will be included in the project, Eis (2025) by Thomas Demand, who shows with Sprüth Magers.
The name “10% Of” is inspired by the discount that galleries often offer to some of their most important collectors, as well as a comment made by artist Gary Hume in a 2021 op-ed detailing the goals of GCC. “I can’t claim to be an environmental activist, I’m more like a ten percent activist. But I think there are lots of us who are ten percent activists, and if you put a lot of ten percent together, it begins to add up,” Hume said at the time.
Art fairs often have some of the largest carbon footprints within the art world, with works shipped internationally and dealers, collectors, curators, and artists traveling from everywhere. Lowndes said that “partnering with them is essential for creating meaningful change.” When considering the additional impacts from air travel, venue energy consumption, and single-use waste, the rationale for engagement becomes clear.
In a statement, Romilly Stebbings, Frieze’s director of business development, said, “Frieze is proud to support GCC as they mark their fifth anniversary with the new ‘10% Of’ initiative. By raising funds and amplifying conversations around climate action, their work continues to challenge the art world to imagine and pursue a more environmentally responsible future-an imperative that feels even more pressing today than when they began.”
Lowndes pointed to data collected from its membership in which about one-third of a gallery’s annual carbon emissions can be attributed to their participation in art fairs, “with air freight alone making up an estimated 70% of that figure.”
He added, “‘10% Of’ is a major show of support for this aim, recognizing that art fairs, with their centralized format, are key players who can enable the effective, coordinated action needed for measurable decarbonization across the arts.”
GCC has partnered with fairs before, including Frieze London, Art Basel, and MiArt in Milan, to have booths at the fairs to maintain visibility, but Lowndes said that those past experiences “highlighted the operational hurdles for a small charity dealing with logistics, shipping, and installation. ‘10% Of’ was conceived as a simpler, more scalable way for GCC to be visible and raise funds at fairs, one that could draw strength from collaboration rather than infrastructure.”
The funds raised through 10% Of will help support GCC’s work, which has included organizing a Climate Conversations Conference with the Helen Frankenthaler Foundation and Teiger Foundation at the Museum of Modern Art in New York this past May. GCC also launched the Artist Toolkit for Environmental Responsibility, which provides artists with guidelines about how to reduce the environmental impact of their respective practices.
Additionally, GCC made the Art Fair Alliance, through which 13 art fairs have committed to reducing their collective emissions. In November, during the U.N.’s COP30, it will host Art+Climate Week in London and publish the GCC Stocktake Report, which Lowndes said is “the first comprehensive review of climate progress in the visual arts, benchmarking achievements, exposing gaps, and setting out a roadmap for the decisive years ahead.”
“At the heart of all this work,” Lowndes said, “is the same ambition: to provide the visual arts with the tools, frameworks, and cultural momentum needed to reduce environmental impacts in line with climate science.”
Participating Galleries
Here is the full list of galleries participating in 10% Of:
- Axel Vervoordt
- Edel Assanti
- Frith Street Gallery
- Gagosian
- Hauser & Wirth
- Hollybush Gardens
- Kate MacGarry
- Lisson Gallery
- Pippy Houldsworth Gallery
- Sadie Coles HQ
- Soft Opening
- Sprüth Magers
- Thaddaeus Ropac
- Thomas Dane Gallery
- Victoria Miro
- D’LAN CONTEMPORARY
- October Gallery
- Peter Blum Gallery
- Berry Campbell
- Maisterravalbuena
- BASTIAN
- Pedro Cera
