When
people think of climate change, they often imagine some sort of dystopian
futuristic scene, or something that will only become serious in the year 2100. We find comfort in
thinking of the immediate, planning out of lives in hours, days, weeks, and months. But our
installation is not a story about a distant far-off future, it is a story about
the past and present. We put our homes on display to show the ways in which the
climate is already shifting in Iceland and Louisiana.
To imagine what the world will look like in 78 years is intimidating, the image is so far in the future that it is blurred, too slippery to grasp. But ecological collapse doesn’t exist in sci-fi futures, it is happening now.
Full Curatorial Statement:
We are presenting a world of contradictions.
A push and pull. An ebb and flow.
A coming and going.
It exists in Iceland and Louisiana.
In melting glaciers and rising seas.
The ocean is our model and a character.
When people think of climate change, they often imagine some sort of dystopian futuristic scene, or something that will only become serious in the year 2100. We find comfort in thinking of the immediate: planning out our lives in hours, days, weeks, and months. To imagine what the world will look like in 78 years is intimidating. The image is so far in the future that it is blurred, too slippery to grasp. But ecological collapse doesn’t just exist in sci-fi futures, it is happening now. This is what is so alarming about living in our world today: we are witnessing once vast geological time happen within single generations.
This is not a story about a distant far-off future. This is a story about the past and present. We put our homes on display to show the ways that the climate is already shifting in Iceland and Louisiana. We reach backwards to our grandparents to think forwards to the next generations. We tell the stories of our homelands to shift this long-term thinking into the immediate moment, displaying our homes in moments of chaos and calm, to show how they are already being dramatically altered.
The next 100 years are uncertain, but we know that our glaciers are already melting away and our sea levels are already rising. The rate of these changes is accelerating. Time is speeding up, getting faster and faster with each moment, before we know it, we will be tumbled into this future.
In presenting our homes in this way, we’d like to shift perception, to bring it back to the natural world around us, to exhibit the ways we have already tumbled over the edge.
To imagine what the world will look like in 78 years is intimidating, the image is so far in the future that it is blurred, too slippery to grasp. But ecological collapse doesn’t exist in sci-fi futures, it is happening now.
Full Curatorial Statement:
We are presenting a world of contradictions.
A push and pull. An ebb and flow.
A coming and going.
It exists in Iceland and Louisiana.
In melting glaciers and rising seas.
The ocean is our model and a character.
When people think of climate change, they often imagine some sort of dystopian futuristic scene, or something that will only become serious in the year 2100. We find comfort in thinking of the immediate: planning out our lives in hours, days, weeks, and months. To imagine what the world will look like in 78 years is intimidating. The image is so far in the future that it is blurred, too slippery to grasp. But ecological collapse doesn’t just exist in sci-fi futures, it is happening now. This is what is so alarming about living in our world today: we are witnessing once vast geological time happen within single generations.
This is not a story about a distant far-off future. This is a story about the past and present. We put our homes on display to show the ways that the climate is already shifting in Iceland and Louisiana. We reach backwards to our grandparents to think forwards to the next generations. We tell the stories of our homelands to shift this long-term thinking into the immediate moment, displaying our homes in moments of chaos and calm, to show how they are already being dramatically altered.
The next 100 years are uncertain, but we know that our glaciers are already melting away and our sea levels are already rising. The rate of these changes is accelerating. Time is speeding up, getting faster and faster with each moment, before we know it, we will be tumbled into this future.
In presenting our homes in this way, we’d like to shift perception, to bring it back to the natural world around us, to exhibit the ways we have already tumbled over the edge.