Brasília Pre-COP Kicks Off with Urgent Call for Climate Adaptation

The Brasília pre-COP begins with a nationwide action, taking place in eight cities across Brazil, sending a strong appeal to negotiators from countries that ratified the Paris Agreement: “Triple adaptation finance.”

The projections will take place on the evening of October 13 — the first day of the pre-COP — in Brasília (DF), the political capital of Brazil and where the pre-COP takes place, and in São Paulo (SP), Rio de Janeiro (RJ), Belo Horizonte (MG), Porto Alegre (RS), Recife (PE), Alter do Chão (Santarém-PA), and Patos (PB). 

The initiative, From Today to Tomorrow with Climate Adaptation, raises questions about the future of life on Earth, highlighting the urgency of adaptation actions in a climate that has already changed, with phrases such as: “The climate crisis is real. The planet is hotter”, “World leaders: climate adaptation can’t wait”, “Adaptation is life — for all peoples and all species”, “Adaptation solutions exist, and they are working”, “At COP30: triple adaptation finance and be remembered by your courage”. 

“We want to inspire reflection that goes beyond the urgency of the moment and reaches the way we plan the future of cities, territories, and people. This is an agenda of survival,” says Natalie Unterstell, president of Instituto Talanoa, responsible for the initiative, which aims to raise awareness among decision-makers and civil society about the need to integrate climate adaptation into the core agenda of COP30, to be held in Belém in November.

The intervention seeks to shift the gaze of participants — negotiators, authorities, and the general public — toward the human, political, and collective dimension of climate adaptation. After all, adaptation is technical, but it is also deeply political.

In Brasília, where the negotiations are taking place, the projection will be at the National Museum of the Republic in Brasília, a striking modernist building that brings together art, culture, and public dialogue. The phrases will appear alongside animations inspired by the engravings of artist Evandro Carlos Jardim, known for depicting the movement of nature and cities. In the images, wind, rain, and life in cities shape reflections on the limits and possibilities of life on a changing planet.

The artistic conception is by the visual artists Gisela Motta and Mariana Lacerda, visual artists who chose to dialogue with the work of Evandro Carlos Jardim, recognizing in it the idea of transformation, human and non-human landscapes expressing, in motion, the transitions of our time.

For filmmaker Mariana Lacerda, one of the artists responsible for the artistic conception of the work, Evandro Jardim approaches the subject almost as a premonition of the future. “We have an image of Pico do Jaraguá, now an Indigenous Land in the heart of São Paulo, and in it we see the contours where water flows. The images bring us closer to the reality of the climate, in a sensitive and evocative way. Art makes us perceive the present and invites us to imagine how we can adapt to the transformations already underway in the world,” says Mariana Lacerda.

“The images bring a very sensitive view of a subject that is already real. It is politics through poetics,” says visual artist Gisela Motta. 

The initiative also draws attention to a document that will be delivered to the COP30 presidency during the pre-COP in Brasília, calling on countries to triple the volume of resources allocated to adaptation by 2030, guaranteeing at least USD 120 billion annually. Signed by Instituto Talanoa (Brazil) and 48 other organizations from Brazil and other Latin American countries, the letter aims to prevent a financial gap from 2026, when commitments made under the Glasgow Climate Pact expire.