Guidelines & Booklets - Art

Art and creative guidance in all its XR glory.

XR Arts ~ Action Design

See the original doc here: Please copy and paste this link into a browswer - https://docs.google.com/document/d/11YiCM_fRetPE2TQOE_dffr3WEdGzfEX4mZkKRsnnp-4/edit

XR Arts ~ Action Design

Action Design - XR Arts

See the original doc in this link

ACTION IDENTITY

Creative actions can have incredible power and impact.

Working closely with your Arts, Action & Messaging teams from the outset of action planning to decide on your Action Identity.

Who is the action aimed at and does it align with our demands?

Watch this masterclass in Art Activism John Jordan Youtube video

PRINT & DESIGN

FLAGS & BANNERS

Using Flags

WORKSHOPS & CREATIVITY

CONTACT & SUPPORT

XR Arts - Groups & Campaigns database is an evolving list of XRUK contacts and links

Please contact artsxr@gmail.com if you want to connect on a project.

Principles and Values Poster

For access to this open resource click on the image itself

Principles and Values

XR Arts Working Group Guidelines

“Politics is not solely, or even primarily, about reasoned thinking and rational choices; it’s an affair of fantasy and desire. People are rarely moved to action, support or even consent by realistic proposals; they are motivated by dreams of what could be.”

— Stephen Duncombe, Dream (2008)

Extinction Rebellion (XR) is creating a world for generations to come through a mass international movement of non-violent direct action.

Your Arts Working Group offers a space to incubate, share and develop creative ideas and skills, with the aim to amplify XR’s three demands through disruptive creative work:

  1. Tell the truth about climate change & biodiversity loss
  2. Act now to reduce carbon emissions to zero by 2025
  3. Beyond Politics of today to a democratic Citizens Assembly

Extinction Rebellion invites all artists, visionaries, performers, workshop leaders, radical teachers, holders of space, luminaries and gardeners of the human spirit to come together for vital acts of co-creation, artistic expression, of connection to the planet and one another; of celebration, grief, love, transformation and resilience!

We are waking up and rising up to the climate crisis and action we need to take, and with this comes powerful emotions which we welcome into our space, inspiring transformation and empowerment as part of our regenerative culture.

“Seeing the vulnerability of ourselves and our world clearly for the first time opens us to its beauty properly, as if for the first time.”

— Dr. Rupert Read

XR Actions

Non-violence is KEY: Our actions never involve any physical or verbal violence. We show respect to our opponents, to make resolution of any political conflict more likely. More detail on Non-violence within XR here.

Civil Disobedience: The key to the effectiveness of Civil Disobedience is mass participation - everyone getting involved! More detail on how Civil-Disobedience works here.

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XR Arts Working Group Creative Aims

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Creative projects have so far fallen into 3 areas (with much crossover too!):

Workshops

Community art projects sharing skills, developing teams and creating work for protest

E.g. Art Blockers, Skeletons Rebellion, Paint the Streets, XR Print Workshop.

Art for Actions

Dynamic creative interventions

Art and performance supporting National and Local Actions by the Actions teams and XR Baroque Musicians, Samba, XR Choir, and Fashion Act Now.

Movement Building Creative work and communications which aims to raise awareness about the climate crisis, engage people into the XR movement and stimulate the International cultural community to take action

E.g. Culture Declares, Letters To The Earth, Music Declares.

“The question of art is no longer of aesthetics, but the survival of diverse life forms on this planet.”

— John Jordan

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Photo: Jess Ross www.jessicarost.co.uk

Some Tips

PLEASE NOTE:

The XR Logo and the Extinction Symbol are both legally protected and for non commercial use only. Our actions are all non-commercial expressions of defiance and beauty aimed at creating a more sustainable society.

Ways of Working

“Eco over Ego”

This is a space to re-imagine the role of art in this time of climate emergency.
How can your action promote the Core Demands of XR?

Be the change: self-organised, adaptable, resilient, compassionate, diverse, inclusive, collaborative and connected. Seek to foster empathy, frugality and humility for a new age. And don’t be an island! Creative output grows richer and reaches further through collaboration. Taking on too much or trying to do everything yourself can ruin the fun. Discover more about Regenerative culture here.

Self-Organising Systems

Anyone who adheres to the 10 principles and values outlined here can take action in the name of Extinction Rebellion.

Extinction Rebellion has been founded on a self-organising system model, inspired by holacracy. This means we have working groups with coordinators who ideally work in pairs. This document helps outline the roles of internal and external coordinators.

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You can find more info about the ever-evolving XR organism in our constitution. If you are working on a specific creative project it’s not entirely necessary for you to be part of the ‘mandates’ system as described in these docs, however, we do suggest that there are coordinators as a means of ensuring healthy integration between the activity of your group and other XR working groups. For more detail on systems please read our ways of working together document.

We advise working closely with your local Media & Messaging team to ensure that the message of your artistic work aligns with the demands and creative strategy of XR. Also with videographers, photographers and media creatives to expand the reach of your actions. Make sure your creative action is promoted in advance via your local (and National, if appropriate) XR channels (newsletter, social media) and that it is captured not only for media on the day but for archiving and sharing in the future.

It is also important to sync with your local Actions & Logistics team when developing any visions into actions. Please read this Actions doc as a helpful guide to planning actions and integrating the ever-evolving creative vision of XR. This is to ensure that your action meets the values of XR and the following roles are prepared if necessary: police liaison, legal observers, well being, stewards, technical and production teams.

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Remember, XR is You! If you’re in alignment with XR Principles & Values please go ahead and pursue your vision. Bring people together to realise it independently.

If you have an idea you’d like further support developing, or has National or International reach please send a brief to artsxr@gmail.com. Please note that the Arts team currently have limited funding and kindly ask contributors to
consult local XR group funding, crowd-funding or consider volunteering their contributions.

Include in the brief:

“Art is a weapon that penetrates the eyes, the ears, the deepest and subtlest human feelings.”

— David Alfaro Siqueiros

Arts CONTACTS

Winter 2020 - Facilitators are subject to change.

Graphic Design

For access to the XR Design Programme please firstly contact members of your local group before contacting and requesting the source file from: xrdesigngroup@gmail.com

XR Art Blockers Guidelines Printing, painting, woodblocks, flag-making!

Contact XR Art Blockers for support.

artblockers@gmail.com

Paint the Streets xrpaintthestreets@protonmail.com

Performers artsxr@gmail.com

Music xrmusicandsounds@protonmail.com

Museums artsxr@gmail.com

We want you to do something more fantastic than we could possibly imagine, without any help from us, with love & rage. Search Extinction Rebellion / Follow us on social media for updates and events

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Why We're Taking Action and You Should Join Us Booklet

Wake Up Act Now Booklet for sharing from Arts WG

If you click on the images you will be taken to the whole booklet on our Cloud.

Below are 4 of the 12 pages as a teaser :-)

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The whole booklet is downloadable here too

Bird Skeleton Making Guide

XR Skeletons Rebellion

As the Climate & Ecological crisis deepens around the world our beautiful feathered friends are dwindling in numbers. Join us in making a skeleton model of an endangered bird, using (mainly) recycled materials from your lock-down household. Exploring the anatomy of a creature and how it is structured can bring us closer to understanding the life around us we are losing, and closer to ourselves. It is a journey which invites focus and accuracy, connection and reflection. The birds which we create can hang from our living room ceilings or be turned into animated puppets to bring out when we next fly together in the street.

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1. Why a bird skeleton?

Shared joy & happiness, fun, beautiful singly and as a group.

Momento Mori appropriate to our current coronavirus situation.

This activity can be done by anyone with no previous experience, it helps to keep the mind calm and focused, gives an uplifting visual image, a symbol of liberation and raises awareness of particular Red list bird species. These are lots of important messages plus beautiful images for social media shares.

In the future: audiovisual immersive performances using shadows of skeletons.

2. Who can do it?

Anyone! It takes some time and patience but is rewarding, if you’ve never made objects before and are clumsy or if you’re a pro-sculptor.

You can choose to make a full bird skeleton or a paper one. For example, there's a little paper crow.

Wood grouse skeleton

3. Which bird species

We have listed endangered species at the end of this document. Species need to be easily identifiable and have clearly distinguishing features, eg particular types of beaks and feet. For example: Puffin, White-Tailed Eagle

4. How big and how detailed?

Life size models have the best visual impact & fits the skeleton group ethos. Technically it’s easier to make medium and larger birds, ranging from Puffins (wingspan up to 63cm & body size 30cm including feathers) to Wandering albatross (wingspan up to 3.5m and body size up to 135cm including feathers)

It needs to work at a distance and cast an interesting shadow

Ribs, breast bone, vertebrae need to be stylised because the bones are so fiddly

Skull, legs & claws: realistic and detailed. Eye catching and very recognisable in images

Wings: I think that bones alone are probably ok, no need for feathers. Wing bones likely to bend and break if flying, especially at flapping-rod contact points - will need internal structure - wire?

Top part of the mandible (beak) is attached to the skull, which makes it easier to construct strongly - only the bottom mandible moves (same as people etc). Unusually some birds eg cormorants are the other way around so it’s easier for them to catch fish.

5. What to make it with

Cheap, easily accessible materials found in your home.

Materials List >

Must be waterproof - varnished in the end.

Recycled stuff needs to be primed so the paint won't flake off.

6. Flapping/ talking / calling / singing?

It would be great if they fly: simple rod-puppet technology to flap wings? Just flapping the model up and down might be ok for little kiddies' basic paper cut out birds.

Advanced models could talk perhaps - how big does a skull need to be to house servos etc to move the bottom part of a beak up and down for mobile controlled conversations.

Musician Sam Lee made this soundtrack of birdsong with the RSPB. We could make a sound track like at Chris Packham's dawn chorus on everyone's phone used outside Downing St at the demo a couple of years ago. Best if species specific more interesting, research would engage people. eg alarm calls, contact calls, songs

Lists of Bird Species

RSPB species at risk - list of Birds of Conservation Concern 4 (BoCC 4)

accessed online accessed online 29 march 2020

UK species non-birders are likely to have heard of:

List of Vulnerable birds from wiki

accessed online 28 mar 2020

Types of larger species non-birders are likely to have heard of:

Background information

Birds of Conservation Concern 4 has placed more species onto the Red list than ever before.

The full details of this assessment can be found in Eaton MA, Aebischer NJ, Brown AF, Hearn RD, Lock L, Musgrove AJ, Noble DG, Stroud DA and Gregory RD (2015) Birds of Conservation Concern 4: the population status of birds in the United Kingdom, Channel Islands and Isle of Man. British Birds 108, 708–746. Available online here

By Claire McCormack & Kat Brendel

Infinite Growth: Now Is Time To Plant A Wildflower

Our landscape for action has changed. With dolphins returning to the canals of Venice, cougars being sighted in inner-city Santiago and pollution levels dropping in isolated cities worldwide, we find we have an extended midnight hour. What are we going to do?

Let us mourn life as we knew it, but also follow the flow, and find that ideas that were previously impossible can blossom.

(Dolphins in Santiago, Cougars in Chilean capital , Airplanes are grounded)

A council lawn left alone springs up and turns yellow A roadside verge blooms into a golden path amidst empty roads A local park grows into golden playground amongst the green lawn

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Why Mustard?

Bright: Yellow is visible from a distance and speaks of sunshine, hope and happiness.

Quick: Grows in 6 weeks.

Cheap: buy here

Hardy: Mustard will grow in just about any soil without any problems. It prefers a neutral soil but slightly acidic or alkaline soil is unlikely to give it problems. Avoid waterlogged soils.

Tall: Expect the plants to grow to about 60cm high.

Cleansing for the soil: it’s a green manure.

Wildlife: Bee and butterfly friendly.

Now’s the time: sow in spring.

Things to think about

BEST GROWING CONDITIONS FOR MUSTARD

Mustard seeds are one of the easiest crops to grow. Quite literally you could throw some on a bare patch of land, water them and end up with a good crop. Probably a better idea is to dig the soil first, draw a 1cm groove in it with a trowel and lightly sprinkle seeds in the groove. Cover the seeds with earth and water well. If you are growing more than one row space the rows 30cm / 10in apart.

RECLAIMING WORDS

Infinite adjective: Without limits; extremely large or great.

Growth noun:

  1. The growth of a person, animal, or plant is its process of increasing in size.
  2. ECONOMICS. an increase in the ability of an economy or business to produce goods and services.
  3. a lump (= a solid mass) growing on the outside or inside of a person, animal, or plant that is caused by a disease.

HAPPY PLANTING !

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Extinction Rebellion Rewilding

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Other Ideas: Dig For Victory:

Make an allotment patch in your garden/street area. Grow vegetables. Use #infinategrowth share what you’ve been doing and connect to other gardeners.

This could connect to a MAKE DO AND MEND style campaign (speak to fashion action: xrfashionaction@gmail.com) These are very simple ideas but they remind us of our connection with the earth and materials, and the wartime analogy taps into a sense of pride that can be used to foster a sense of duty towards care for the planet.

Some info: In the 1930s 75 per cent of pre-war Britain's food was imported by ship and the German U-boat blockade threatened the home front with starvation. According to the War Cabinet's records, annual food imports had halved to 14.65 million tonnes by 1941

The ‘Dig for Victory’ campaign was set up during WWII by the British Ministry of Agriculture. Men and women across the country were encouraged to grow their own food in times of harsh rationing. Open spaces everywhere were transformed into allotments, from domestic gardens to public parks – even the lawns outside the Tower of London were turned into vegetable patches. Leaflets were part of a massive propaganda campaign aiming both to ensure that people had enough to eat, and that morale was kept high. The current recession, as well as a new awareness of ‘food miles’ and climate change, has increased the demand for vegetable growing plots and the trend is supported by new, comparable government initiatives.

3 Positive Solutions Creative Actions (suitable for Lockdown)

Positive Solutions Arts

In December 2020 we asked XR Scotland rebels to make and photograph art representing a positive climate solution and to write something about this including examples of where it is already being put into practice. It was very popular and the calendar filled up quickly. We posted one solution on social media each day of December as an advent calendar.

We made a PDF of the art which you can view here

We wanted to continue the positive theme as a regenerative action to counter all the depressing news we're bombarded with. We also wanted to reach out beyond our social media followers and into the community. So in this document we have three projects we have on the go that people can do at home during lockdown (or anytime!). If you have any problems with any of the links in this document or questions please message Peach on Mattermost

  1. Positive Solutions Fabric Jigsaw Puzzle Pieces (for wall hanging)
  2. What If… (posters)
  3. (Making It Personal) My Hope For… (photographs)

1. Positive Solutions Fabric Jigsaw Puzzle Pieces (for wall hanging)

UPDATE: There has been interest from across the UK to make a large wall hanging together and to take it to COP26. So If you're interested in being a link for this work in your area please email xredinburghmakers@gmail.com

Embroider, applique, paint, draw, glue a positive solution to the climate and ecological crisis. It can be something, global, national or local. You can print this template (it’s A3 size so you may need to print over two A4 sheets and tape together) and cut your own material. (It can be useful if someone can pre-cut some puzzle fabric and post out to those who don’t have access to a printer).

IMPORTANT DIRECTION: All puzzle pieces must face the same way when completed so they can fit together as a giant wall hanging jigsaw.

Template can be found here

If you’re not sure how to print the template at home if you have an A4 printer, follow these instructions

When collecting puzzle pieces it could be useful to get name, age, location, contact details (MM, email) and a short blurb describing the design if you want to write a descriptor for the pieces when on display. Once all pieces are collected fit them together to create a large wall hanging/ banner. Can display and use to interact by inviting people in your local communities to add their own pieces (once lockdown ends).

Note: we haven’t yet collected our pieces and fitted them together so not yet sure how exactly we’re going to do this. It might be that we use a zigzag stitch along the edges to join them or place all pieces on backing fabric and stitch them on individually.

2) What If...

This is inspired by Rob Hopkins’ Book ‘From What Is to What If: Unleashing the Power of the Imagination to Create the Future We Want’ and the podcast ‘From What If to What Next’ which you can find here or on other podcast platforms (very uplifting and hope-inducing podcast. Highly recommended)

Examples of ‘what if’ questions can be found in the titles of the podcasts or here are some from chapter 7 of the book. Use these or ask your own What Ifs. Form your question in the positive...what is it you want, rather than what you don’t want? Walk around your local area and imagine how you would like it to be different. Be curious. Be playful. Invoke longing.

Rob writes that we can view the climate crisis ‘as an historic, once off invitation to our brilliance’. What if we created a fossil free energy system within 20 years? What if every new house built generated more energy than it consumed? What if urban agriculture became utterly commonplace? What if our cities became huge biodiversity reserves? What if single use plastics were only things we saw in museums? What if you could swim safely in all the local waters? What if all residential streets were play streets? What if every street had public art? What if birdsong drowned out traffic noise? What if there were more trees than people? What if a squirrel could get from one side of the city to the other without touching the ground by jumping from tree to tree? What if you could see the Milky Way from every garden? What if we rewilded the golf courses? What if our shops were locally owned? What if we could make the city/town fully sovereign by 2025? What if we could reorient the economy to work along cooperative lines? What if we had a broad participatory democracy? What if we could create a truly equitable town/city/nation?

Make a poster or other medium asking your question. Stick this around your neighbourhood to prompt your community to start asking ‘what if?’ Invite the viewer to ask their own what if. Maybe you know of this ‘what if’ being implemented somewhere in the world- why not include this in the information, maybe a link for it so the viewers can see for themselves that it’s possible.

LEGALITY- this counts as fly posting. Technically you could be prosecuted and fined but it’s unlikely. Be careful about where you place it...not on private houses-keep it public. Or ask in shops to display it.

A poster template if you want to use it or make your own

Take photos of the ‘What if’ posters and collect these to make a collage for social media.

Bonus question: Is there something that you want to do in your local area when lockdown ends that invites your community to reimagine the space/possibilities? Examples: put a picnic bench or a raised bed garden in the street. Close off a road for a day so kids can play there. Create a map of locally owned shops selling local produce. How would you go about making that happen? What is the first step? Who do you want to get on board? Who would you need to speak to? Do you want to get permission from the local authorities or do you want to do it as a civil disobedience?

3) (Making It Personal) My Hope For...

Posts on social media starts on (we are using Spring Equinox but obviously can start any time) - photos/videos need to be emailed to (Add your local XR address) (with the subject heading MY HOPE FOR) 7 days before your scheduled date. Add your name to the calendar (create a calendar)

Take a photo or short film of a tree, flower, river, landscape, walk, animal, person/people (or symbols of those people) that mean something to you.

Write a couple of sentences/ paragraphs/ poem/ song about what it means to you and what your hope is for its future. “Charles Eisenstein looks at debates about global warming and proposes a narrative shift for the climate movement. Embracing love of nature, he writes, moves people beyond denial and passivity to the action necessary to protect life on our planet.”

In addition (if you want, and to get the message out beyond our social media community) on the day of your post- email a copy of your photo/film and writing/ link to the social media post to your local councillors, MSPs, MPs. Environment MPs (you can find out how at https://www.writetothem.com/ ). Let them know what you hope that they will do about it. If you know of similar things already being done elsewhere share a link to that too to show it is possible.

Take it out into the community- print out /or create art and exhibit nearby. Add XR logo? Address for XRScotland FB. LEGALITY- this counts as fly posting. Technically you could be prosecuted and fined but it’s unlikely. Be careful about where you place it...not on private houses -keep it public.

How to make a banner

Click here for the youtube link to the video for how to make a banner

The video includes:

1. How to make a banner using a projection of a digital image
2. How to make a banner with a stencil

Performance Groups

XR performance groups

Performance Groups

Dirty Scrubbers

For anyone wanting to perform DIRTY SCRUBBERS: a how to document.

How to be a Dirty Scrubber

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Performance Groups

CORPRATS

CorpRats are a pantomime mirror designed to reflect the ugliness and cruelty of putting profit over planet back onto the those who chase money at the expense of a sustainable planet, over the health of people, over the health of ecosystems.

The CorpRats are personification of the system and how it self-sustains, there is no global conspiracy of bankers, instead we have a culture that praises/reinforces greed, cunning, short termism and hoarders at the expense of a sustainable future.

When Being a CorpRat

Yet the CorpRats are what society aspires to be, Scrooge has taught us nothing!

So revel in your worst selves, no truth will hold you to account. You will always win, you cannot be cancelled, money conquers all!

The original narrative of the CorpRats is: sell gas, sell coal, sell oil, for the climate crises effects the poor. And when the poor come for us, we sell Walls, we sell Guns, and Bombs.

For Dirty Water

The CorpRats are destroying our waterways because of their corporate greed, they don’t care about the loss of biodiversity or the hazards to human health and mental wellbeing of the destruction of our natural environment.

Roles
A picture tells a millions words

Whilst it is the role of the CorpRats to entertain the protestors and have bankers/etc question who they are. It is the photo that will live on.

Stay in Character,even when walking around and not engaging with people if you have a speech bubble up and angled right, then someone is going to get a great photo.

Always be on the look out for the iconic shot

Environment

The police/judiciary/the infrastructure are all yours, make it clear. You can give the illusion of giving orders to the police, so as to highlight them being the puppets of the natural environment-destroying institutions. Give them Praise, bribes and promises of recognition.

Protestors

You are not there to attack the protesters, but to highlight the truth of their actions. There is no calling them jobless, instead praise the plebs for paying their taxes to fund the police, who will spend the day protecting the CorpRat assets. Cause after all there would be no police if they relied on the CorpRats to pay any taxes.

This has the double effect of highlighting to passersby the truth of the situation and also demoralising the police who will spend the day stood around protecting the assets of millionaires whilst people who care about the future are paying their taxes whilst also doing the protest.

Making boasts about how the media are portraying activists as jobless scroungers and doing what you told them, and it's much easier to gang up on people once they are vilified in the press. Just look at the refugees.

There are plenty of crimes you can boast about as a CorpRat but be thanking the police for arresting protestors.

For Dirty Water

“WHO CARES IF WE PUMP SHIT INTO THE RIVER?” ONLY THE IDIOTS THAT WANT TO SWIM IN IT, I PREFER TO FLY TO SOMEWHERE NICE FOR A SWIM..

Naming convention

By having a character name it is a useful hook for remembering your persona. We have previously gone with such names as

Props

Important

Speciesism - by Dr. Steve Cooke, Associate Professor of Political Theory, University of Leicester.

Nonhuman animals suffer serious and systematic harms at the hands of humans. Part of the reason for this is that their moral status is downplayed or not recognised.

Something that’s both a symptom of way nonhuman animals are valued, and sometimes a cause of it, is that of names animal species are used pejoratively. Calling someone a cow, a chicken, or a raassociatt is a way of drawing upon negative attitudes associated with that animal. These insults can serve both to dehumanise the people they’re aimed at, and to reinforce negative views of the animals they reference.

Obviously, a small group of activists drawing upon negative associations of rats to shine a light on corporate practices is vanishingly unlikely to contribute in any meaningful way to harms to other species. This is especially true given the environmental nature of the protests. Any harms would be tiny in comparison with those done by your targets, and very likely to be outweighed by good achieved. However, it is worth keeping in mind, particularly when you think of the kinds of associations you want people to draw from your performances. Perhaps focus on attributes that are good for rats, but not what we want in corporations: stealthy, cunning, hoarders, sneaky, etc. rather than drawing upon other common associations: untrustworthiness, dirtiness, vermin etc.

How To Make A Multi-Message Banner

Did you ever wish you could change the message on your banner? This document shows how to create such a resource.

https://docs.google.com/document/d/1604PkswQ-HT7QV1_PxuEsPgfjf7pWrJl/mobilebasic

Free James Brown banner outside Bath Abbey Free James Brown banner outside Bath Abbey

Multi-message banner video

A time-lapse video of the banner in use at the Science Museum. About 30 seconds long. It is hosted on Microsoft OneDrive; the link is https://1drv.ms/v/s!AsQ-2fnGNjzIiVSQ69ykep35kKHp?e=QCMidp .

Fake Oil Recipe

Fake Crude Oil Recipe