Spotlight: "Encroaching"
Spotlight gives me an opportunity to showcase a particular image or set of images. Close-up photos can display details from larger pieces. Background stories about the concept, inspiration, circumstances, or development of a piece can be shared, including progressive images of a work-in-progress.
Spotlight library: Is More Than, Interconnected, Rivers in the Sky, The Cost of Soft, AR 4, The Coastal Zone, Time and Tide, Frame of Consequence, Wings of Resilience, Encroaching
"Encroaching"
It's a gradual thing, the encroaching sea. So much so that it allows us to perpetuate the illusion that it's not urgent. But, sea level rise will directly and indirectly affect all coastal communities around the world - some 10,000 of them. Salt water will creep into fresh water aquifers, impacting drinking water. Seaports, airports, refineries, above-ground and below-ground infrastructure will all be threatened in some way.
This photo-collage titled "Encroaching" is a visual reminder of our need to look ahead and prepare for the inevitable - with mitigation and adaptation.
During our winter King Tides, when the gravitational pull of the sun and moon are strongest, our coastal beaches, wharfs, trails, roads, and cliffs are often compromised when the tide comes in. That is certainly the case with this pathway at the Elkhorn Slough. I've chosen to juxtapose this image with a head-on photo of an approaching wave that I captured during a recent King Tide.
To create the rolling effect of the wave, I hand-rolled the photographic print around a tube for a few days. You can also see above how I cut into the edge of the wave at the crash point, creating a slot to insert the photo of the flooded pathway underneath... as if the wave is about to crash onto the landscape.
Here you can see another slit - this time in the churning surf where the bottom of the pathway print is inserted. I also added a fold to emphasize the wave action. The stitching is meant to visually "hold together" pieces of the submerged land. Edges of the print were "distressed," as if by the water.
Communities around the globe are starting to think ahead and put adaptation plans in place. The city of Boston has a "Climate Ready Boston" website. New Orleans is already looking at another upgrade to their levees, as despite the $14 billion in repairs after Hurricane Katrina, they are sinking in the marshy ground as sea level rises. Indonesia is moving its capital city from Jakarta to a newly built city called Nusantara as a solution to continual flooding, land sinking, and rising seas. Beyond extreme strategies like this situation called for, what are the options to living with increasing hazards? Now is the time to consider what we can preserve, what we need to let go of, and what we can change in new and re-imagined ways. What can we mitigate and how can we adapt? We can find out about our own community's plan and help support it.
I hope you enjoyed this Spotlight on the concept and making of this piece. You can view more images from the portfolio in my Folding and Mending gallery.
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