EARTH PARTNER: ART WITHOUT WALLS

VATICAN CITY’S BORGO LAUDATO SI’ IS HOME TO EARTH PARTNER’S LATEST EXHIBITION, ENGAGING VISITORS IN A CONVERSATION BETWEEN ART AND THE NATURAL WORLD

By Morgan Becker

Take a virtual tour of Earth Partner’s Exhibition 2025 here. Learn more about the Earth Partner Prize and its open call to artists here.

Over his reign, Pope Francis upheld a range of progressive opinions—from gay rights to remarriage to reproductive health to interfaith exchange—opening up the Catholic church to issues long-fallen by the wayside. Amongst his strongest reforms was asserting the Vatican’s position on the climate crisis: not a scientific or political debate, in his view, but a moral responsibility the whole world must contend with.

To demonstrate his commitment to the cause, Pope Francis repurposed Borgo Laudato Si’—the former gardens of the papal summer residence—into a zero-impact educational complex, open to the public. It makes concrete the church’s stance on the importance of integral ecology, manifesting the “seed of hope that Pope Francis [left as his] legacy,” as Pope Leo XIV stated upon the center’s inauguration.

When it comes to the climate crisis, action is crucial from every corner. We need the voices of politicians, institutions public and private—and yes, even religious figures. But beyond that, we need the perspectives of people not in direct power, the world over. That’s what makes Earth Partner’s exhibition in Borgo Laudato Si’ particularly meaningful. Through October 4, the garden’s visitors—likely over a million in this Jubilee year—will come face-to-face with the work of young artists who’ve been directly affected by the climate crisis. They’re past winners of the Earth Partner Prize (formerly known as #CreateCOP) hailing from all over the world, experimenting across a variety of mediums. Here, Pope Francis’s conviction is put into the hands of the very people set to inherit the defining challenge of our time.

Amber Olson Testino—founder of the prize and leader of sustainability at the creative agency Art Partner—asserts that the exhibition has no overarching ideology. “They generate a felt experience, both of the shared crisis and of our ability to come together in the face of it.” She notes the symbolism of the show’s lack of walls, its nonlinear structure: “This community of young artists is truly global, and the challenge is one that affects absolutely everyone and everything.”

Says Cardinal Fabio Baggio, on behalf of Borgo Laudato Si’: “[We’re] honored to host, to see the world through the eyes of the other. Through those who have seen and observed this world.” He thanks the artists on view—who count among their ranks Aakash Malik, whose photo essay Escaping Inferno documents the wildfires around the Yamuna Ghat in Delhi, Adedolapo Boluwatife of Invitation to Invade, a series on the impact of plastic pollution, and many more.

“Growing up, I saw how clogged drains and recurring floods revealed the scale of this human-made menace,” explains Adedolapo of his work. “I began collecting plastic waste from my neighborhood, incorporating it into my creative process before sending it to a local recycling plant. My aim is to present the issue as immediate and grotesque rather than distant or abstract.”

Showing the images in Borgo Laudato Si’ endowed the work with new meaning for the artist: “My family moved from the dense, blocked-up city to the outskirts, where they were able to nurture their love for plants and the land. [It makes] the setting feel almost like a spiritual confirmation that the project is on the right path… Viewers can not only admire the richness of the environment, but also imagine how it might look if it were overtaken by waste. In that way, it becomes a confrontation, asking people to live for a moment with the realities of places like my own community.”

The Earth Partner Prize has a long road ahead, and many more voices to uplift. This year’s exhibition coincides with its next open call, organized in collaboration with the Global Environment Facility. Hopefully, a few of the Borgo’s visitors will be moved by the artwork on view—and inspired, in the end, to add their own perspective to the mix.