Changing Climates
Forests and Climates
Forests play a central role in maintaining global climate/temperature stability. They can absorb carbon dioxide that will otherwise cause global warming. Cutting down and burning forests generates carbon dioxide, in what can become a negative feedback cycle. Healthy forests may hold the greatest potential for preventing this, or reversing this, to create a positive feedback cycle..
Mychorrhizae
Trees and plants rely upon symbiotic links via "Mycorrhizae" between their roots and fungi. These web or tree-like membranes transfer nutrients in both directions between plants/trees and the fungi. Twentieth century science and industry was slow to realize the significance of these networks for both healthy forests and sustainable agriculture.
Strandboard, hydrocal, canvas, threads + Acrylics
24" x 40"
2024
Talking Roots
Research is increasingly showing that there is communication occurring between trees via their root systems and surrounding fungi. The ability of trees to perceive and respond to some threats has been documented.
Photo prints to canvas, burlap string + Acrylics
36" x 21"
2021
See Symbiotic Rootscapes in Granta 153 Second Nature, Autumn 2020:
Roots-Fungus-Epiphytes-Vines
The interdependent worlds of trees links roots with fungus linking with other trees. Vines and air-nurtured epiphytes bring additional layers of plant structure in New Zealand’s temperate rainforests.
Photo print to canvas, collaged wood, fiber + Acrylic
49" x 24"
2023
Mothering Tree
Among the noted pathways of nurturing relationships now documented in the life of trees is the “mothering” connectedness that can support its seedlings and power the regeneration of forest species more broadly. Dr. Susanne Simard and the Mother Tree project.
Visit http://mothertreeproject.org
Photo print to canvas, collaged fiber + Acrylics
23" x 26"
2023
Heat and Fires
The rising temperatures on earth can seem like small numbers, but the extreme consequences are becoming apparent. Fires represent obvious threats, but straight up heat can be as or even more devastating. However they’re started, fires are decimating forests and rural, even urban communities; their smoke is enshrouding greater regional areas, affecting air quality across the country.
Heat and Drought
In Africa and elsewhere drought and heat are parching lands, including some communities which have recently completed fresh water supply infrastructure to face an uncertain and foreboding future. Photo at right is from Amnesty International calendar for 2024; caption cites “Children enjoying fresh water from a modern well… no rain in 3 years….”
Acrylics on strandboard and canvas
18.5" x 27"
2024
Forest Heating
Reducing the use of wood for building and for heating (such as by pellet stoves) holds potential for restoring temperate forests.
Photo print to canvas + Acrylics
19.5" x 30"
2021
California Fires
However they’re started, fires are decimating forests and rural, even urban communities; their smoke is enshrouding greater regional areas, affecting air quality across the country.
Ridge Fire
In 2020 California experienced a record-setting number of fires (almost 10,000) with one fire exceeding 1 million acres.
Photo print to canvas + Acrylics
18” x 24”
2020
Oakland Under Smoke
Oakland in September 2020 came under a blanket of smoke-filled air.
Photo collage print to canvas + Acrylics
18.5" x 28"
2020 - 2021
Winter Forest Burnt
in 2021 the Caldor Fire burned over 200,000 acres and devastated communities in the vicinity of Lake Tahoe. The snow a year later lends a calm to the aftermath
Photo collage print to canvas + Acrylics
20" x 36"
2023
Bicoastal Smoke
Seasonal west coast smoke travelled strikingly far in the summer of 2021.
Photo print to canvas + Acrylics
24.5" x 14"
2021
Flooding
Too much water is coming all at once. With causes as different as rising sea levels and increasingly erratic and intense rainfall, traditional patterns of flooding are being rewritten. Increases in drought (annual precipitation) are even possible at the same time as increasing flooding.
See under “Changing Cities” the complex causes of flooding in Jakarta. See below the extreme flooding in Pakistan, which is suffering from drought in the same times that it is suffering from flooding.
Descending Smoke - Rising Water
NYC dealing with the smoke descending from the Canadian wildfires of 2023, with still looming memories of the rising waters of “superstorm” Sandy. Ever adapting to a changing world.
Photo prints to canvas + Acrylics
22" x 48"
2023
Pakistan Flooding 2022
Pakistan is extremely populous, developing and vulnerable to both drought and flooding. In 2022 these were both in extreme conditions, resulting in billions of dollars worth of damage and the loss of nearly 2000 lives. Global weather patterns such as La Nina (cumulatively from 2020) and heatwaves in China and Europe combined to result in damages, deaths, and massive population displacement. (“Pakistan Flooding and its Linkage with China and Europe Heatwaves”. Nature 14 October 2023)
Photo prints to canvas + Acrylics
23" x 30"
2023
Arctic Heat
Rising temperatures are disproportionately transforming land and atmosphere‘… as the Permafrost melts and dead plant material decomposes and releases greenhouse gases, the tundra has flipped from a carbon sink to a carbon contributor. That means not only is the planet less capable of preventing greenhouse gases from accumulating, but the tundra is also contributing to their buildup.’—Christine Nunez 2/20/20,
Over-heating Tundra
Both the peat that characterizes most tundra soil and the limestone rock formation that typically underlie the tundra are common around the arctic circle. They both contain extensive methane, as well as carbon, that are being released into the atmosphere with destructive force. Temperature increases are significant in the arctic regions causing significant releases of methane and carbon dioxide
Canvas, burlap, zinc + Acrylics
28" x 24"
2020
Root Fires
"…Overwintering fires in boreal forests are associated with hot summers generating large fire years and deep burning into organic soils, conditions that have become more frequent in our study areas in recent decades.”
Contoured wood panel, burlap, fibers + Acrylics
21" x 39"
2021
Collapsing Tundra
Rising temperatures are causing loss of tundra and permafrost. Tundra fires steadily increase with the warming climate.
Photo source: USGS Alaska Science Center.
Photo print to canvas + Acrylics
19.5" x 33.5"
2020
Tundra Methane
With rising temperatures, tundra releases methane and CO2. Both the peat that characterizes most tundra soil and the limestone rock formations that are common around the arctic circle contain extensive methane as well as carbon that is being released into the atmosphere with destructive force.
Boiling Tundra
Photo print to canvas, fibers, zinc + Acrylics
24" x 36"
2020
Photo source: Boiling Tundra, Sterlegova, Taimyr, Russia (1991); Peter Prokosch
Siberian Mounds & Craters
New geologic features are appearing in the arctic tundra environment. In the remote Siberia recent decades have seen explosions creating craters with high concentrations of methane gas. Though there was early hope that the methane might be extracted for energy uses, more recently the focus seems more on the risks including subsidences and explosions.
Methane Mounds
Mounds have emerged, likely trapped methane released by thawing permafrost. Methane can be stored below ground in crystaline as well as gaseous states; the solid contains extremely high concentrations of methane. The transition to the gaseous state is believed to be causing both mounds and explosions, which have created craters.
Assembled wood, wire mesh, burlap, fibers + Acrylics
19” x 27"
2022
Summer Crater
Explosions and subsidences in Siberia have created craters, for which methane is the expected cause.
Assembled wood, wire mesh, plaster of paris + Acrylics
19” x 27"
2022
Winter Crater
The Siberian winters further transform the landscape of explosions, craters, and subsidences. Methane in sold state as well as a gas goes through fluctuations of temperature and pressure which make for very unpredictable situations.
Assembled wood, fiberglass , plaster of Paris + Acrylics
19” x 27"
2022
Glaciers & Moulins
Rising temperatures not only cause melting at the Glaciers’ surface but also cause melted water to collect at their base on land. The water at the base reduces the friction and thus speeds the glacier’s movement. Moulins are vertical shafts, carrying water from the surface to the base of the glacier, accelerating its collapse.
Glacial Slide
Photo prints to canvas + Acrylics
24" x 30"
2020
