Two Presentations with the Beehive Design Collective
Thursday, April 21 and Wednesday, April 27

The bees are coming to town!  In addition to participating in a longer workshop on Sunday, April 24 as well as the annual Mayday festivities in Minneapolis and St. Paul, they’ll be doing two poster presentations while in the TC.  Bring a friend to see what the buzz is all about!  Both events are FREE, but posters and patches will be available for purchase, and donations to the bees and to MARS will be gladly accepted.

Thursday, April 21, 6:30pm: The True Cost of Coal
Blegen Hall Room 130, U of M West Bank, 269 19th Ave. S., Minneapolis
Near bus routes 2, 3, 16/50, 22, and light rail. Map: http://www1.umn.edu/twincities/maps/BlegH/

Long exploited as a resource-extraction colony within the US, the Appalachian Mountains are home to a fight for survival whose outcome will determine in part the industrial power of this country. Without coal, there would be no ‘cheap’ electricity. Today’s energy corporations and government bodies are continuing to show the extent of their violence and greed as they push their extractive agendas in the “New Coal Rush.”

Our insatiable demand for cheap power has lead to the most extreme, devastating form of coal mining yet, Mountaintop Removal (MTR). The True Cost of Coal graphic uses MTR in Appalachia as a lens through which to understand the historical and contemporary story of energy, resource extraction, and American empire accelerating throughout the world. We will expose the deceptions of “clean coal” technologies and bring to light the ensuing cliamte chaos facing the world today.

With a gigantic portable mural teeming with intricate images of plants and animals from the most bio-diverse temperate forest on the planet, the Bees will share (and seek) stories of how coal mining and Mountaintop Removal affect communities and ecosystems throughout Appalachia and beyond.

This graphic also looks to the future, raising questions about resistance, regeneration, and remediation while celebrating stories of struggle from mountain communities. The True Cost of Coal will challenge all of us who casually flip on a light switch to examine our own connections to MTR–and to think about what we can do to stop it from within our own communities.  To learn more, visit: http://www.beehivecollective.org/english/coal.htm

Download the True Cost of Coal flyer to help us promote!: 8.5×11 PDF | 11×17 PDF

Wednesday, April 27, 7pm: Dismantling Monoculture
joined by the Root Force collective
Walker Community Church, 3104 16th Ave S., Minneapolis
(near bus routes 14 and 21)

Featuring the Beehive’s first two works in our trilogy about globalization in the Americas–the Free Trade Area of the Americas and Plan Colombia graphic campaigns–the Dismantling Monoculture picture-lecture weaves together images and stories from the past 10 years of our work. With two giant illustrated portable murals, a six foot tall fabric storybook, and an engaging narrative, the Bees take audiences on an interactive visual tour of the connections between colonization, militarization, and resource extraction disguised as “industrial development.”

The result is a compelling and inspirational tale of struggle and resistance in this era of immense change. Dismantling Monoculture grows and evolves with each telling, as we all carry these histories within our own lived experience. The Bees hope to share and seek stories about how these themes manifest in our daily lives and what people do to resist and regenerate.

The presentation will also include previews and updates from Mesoamerica Resiste, the final epic chapter in the trilogy, our most ambitious and elaborate illustration to date… seven years in the making and nearly hatched!  To learn more, visit: http://www.beehivecollective.org/english/ppp.htm

The Beehive Collective will be joined for this presentation by Root Force, a strategic campaign designed to exploit weak points in the global economy and hasten the system’s collapse. Read more about Root Force at http://www.rootforce.org.