About the Exhibition
by Gesche Würfel
In this interdisciplinary studio course, Directed Projects: Climate Change, students explored the artistic possibilities of working on semester-long projects dedicated to climate change. They were encouraged to use any photo- or media-based approach to best serve their ideas and directions. The students from this class closely examined several case studies across NYC, focusing on sea level rise, resilient neighborhoods, environmental racism, and pollution. That included taking field trips to Red Hook, Two Bridges, and Governors Island and meeting with experts. Additionally, they explored the carbon footprint of photography and other media, the intertwinement of climate change and racism, their role as image-makers in the climate change discourse, and investigated (artistic) projects on climate change across the U.S. and the globe.
In his project exploring New York City’s waterfront, Jan Matis Jurgensen questions how varied flood infrastructure strategies transform the landscape and shape its use. Aiden Wong Achuck takes us to Far Rockaway, Queens, where he documents the ongoing gentrification in the community following Hurricane Sandy in 2012. Meiyang Li and Yi Shi examine the city’s polluted waterways. Meiyang Li photographs Gowanus Canal’s ongoing pollution crisis and the contrasting forces of environmental restoration and urban gentrification. At the same time, Yi Shi subjects his prints of the Gowanus Canal and Newtown Creek to chemical processes similar to those in the waterways. Yuhua John Zhao observes Ravenswood Generating Station, reflecting on urban energy, (in) pollution visibility, and the silent structures behind climate change. One of the few green spaces, Elizabeth Street Garden, may soon fall into the hands of developers. Andrew Sun captured its fragility in a black-and-white photo series, highlighting its quiet resilience against urban development. Suppose no nature is left in the city. In that case, we will have to turn to artificial plant life and museums, as Avery Munson Clark depicts in his project on the extinction of multisensory nature experiences within Manhattan.