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Our Shifting Baseline Syndrome Sustains the Anthropocene

Legal researcher Niels Hoek explores the phenomenon of Shifting Baseline Syndrome in our experience of the ever-changing natural world, exemplifying a generational amnesia that conservation lawyers, environmentalists and creative practitioners can help combat as we navigate the Anthropocene.

1,650 words: estimated reading time = 6.5 minutes

The natural world has been on a steep decline in the past couple of decades, and most of the readers of ClimateCultures most likely can name a personal account which highlights this decline [1]. Perhaps you have witnessed how a local grassland was converted into cropland. Additionally, you may well have observed how your favourite animal was added to the IUCN Red List, removed from its original habitat, or noted first-hand how your local forest was logged extensively [2]. All these modern issues highlight the pressing need for conservation and restoration measures, both within and outside of natural areas.

However, addressing our impact on the natural world through regulation and conservation policies is a significant challenge. Whilst a duty for conservation seeks to maintain what is still present, a legal duty for restoration returns a natural habitat to a former, more complete version [3]. Be that as it may, the extent of the damage can be widespread or dated to the point where the original image is lost entirely. Whilst there are many interesting questions on nature restoration, this short blog post reflects on which starting point may be taken within (regulatory) instruments and conservation practice. A question that, at least on the surface, appears to be uncomplicated — but on closer inspection is a rather difficult issue.

The Anthropocene and the Shifting Baseline Syndrome

The starting point, or baseline, is an important concept within nature conservation law: when the state of nature deviates from the recorded status quo, it stipulates the need for conservation measures and the enforcement of nature conservation laws, such as a deterioration prohibition as found within the EU Habitats Directive [4]. Moreover, it flags the need for additional research from all disciplines and creative activism; a starting point used for comparison is vital for ecologists, lawyers, and activists. However, the recorded baseline on which we rely in our appreciation of nature can be a double-edged sword — provided we do not pay attention to the problem of the shifting baseline syndrome, sustaining the Anthropocene [5].

Shifting Baseline Syndrome - illustrated — Tweet from @BiodiversitySoS (2021) – image source unknown

In essence, the shifting baseline syndrome is quite simple and consists of two parts. First, it starts with the grave premise that each generation leaves the state of nature slightly worse for the next [6]. Species become extinct whilst invasive alien species are introduced, and natural ecosystems are altered or destroyed; one generation at a time. And secondly, it is a psychological phenomenon that people are inclined to take the state of nature as recorded within their youth as a starting point for comparison to the present. And in turn, each generation adopts a different baseline for conservation practices — a hollowed-out version compared to the previous. This means that essential parts of the natural world are not only lost but also forgotten; a term coined as generational amnesia [7].

Once aware of this issue, the state of nature deemed as ‘sufficient’ in our modern times can be seen in an entirely different light. For example, the summer field painted by Jac van Looij at the turn of the previous century is now part of the collection of the Dutch Rijksmuseum. It portrays a rich field of blue flowers, most likely lupines. This may have been a common sight for the painter at the time in the Netherlands, but wildflower meadows have become increasingly rare due to significant levels of nitrogen deposition [8]. A sight such as this, in turn, is at risk of escaping from our perceived baseline, falling prey to generational amnesia.

Shifting Baselin Syndrome - July (‘Summer Luxuriance’), by Jac van Looij — July (‘Summer Luxuriance’), Jac van Looij, c. 1890 – c. 1910 Image: The Rijksmuseum, Netherlands https://www.rijksmuseum.nl/en/collection/SK-C-1645

A plethora of other examples could be noted here. Tim Flannery, in his book Europe: the first 100 million years [13] portrays a story of environmental destruction — starting as early as the time of the hunter-gatherers. In his book, he argues that Europe can be deemed an empty ecosystem, devoid of large predators such as lions or keystone species such as elephants — all of which resided, and thrived, on the European continent before overexploitation drove many of these species, which were not used to human predation, locally extinct. In this regard, credit must be given to Arie Trouwborst and Jens-Christian Svenning, who unravelled the shifting baseline and highlighted the moral and legal obligation for the restoration of megafauna on the European continent — especially when reviewing article 8(f) of the Convention on Biological Diversity (CBD) [10]. Within their article, they convincingly argue that the loss of megafauna impacts the functioning of ecosystems and the prospects of biodiversity at large, due to their vital function as ecosystem engineers. In other words, the restoration of keystone species still surviving elsewhere is a key objective ahead — which would require the shattering of our generational amnesia.

The Shifting Baseline Syndrome: embedded within legal instruments?

This brings us to the baseline currently recorded within the instruments of nature conservation law. European nature conservation law, in turn, can pose as a relevant and leading example; the Natura 2000 network reaches 18% of the continent and is the largest coordinated ecological network in the world. However, the European Natura 2000 network establishes the benchmark recorded within the year 1992 for most natural habitats, both as a baseline for its conservation measures, and for assessing which habitat types can be deemed to be in favourable conservation status.

A recent Proposal of the European Commission, which supplements the Habitats Directive, proposes restoration measures going back at least seventy years in time, which has opened the door to implement a historic approach — should the Proposal be adopted [11]. However, when reviewing the environmental destruction which occurred in the past centuries, seventy years, whilst a considerable amount of time compared to a human lifespan, merely reaches the top of an iceberg — consisting of centuries of overexploitation and land-use changes. An integrated approach to halting the decline of biodiversity loss is much-needed, as is illustrated below. [12]

Shifting Baseline Syndrome - showing how to bend the curve — ‘Bending the curve’ – illustration from ‘Global biodiversity loss can still be halted’ (WUR 2022 see [12])

Looking beyond the modern state of nature

In conclusion, it is vital that society at large is aware of the limitations imposed by the Shifting Baseline Syndrome and generational amnesia. With the help of ecologists, natural historians, and lawyers, returning long-lost species back to the European continent may not be a crazed idea. As is argued by Trouwborst; how can we demand that Africans live together with megafauna when Europeans refuse to do so themselves?

In this regard, a recorded baseline codified within a legal instrument is not an inherently bad tool. However, a modern baseline can be deemed an Achilles heel for restoration practice. Environmentalists, therefore, must be aware of the shifting baseline, so that the wildflower meadows from van Looij may not be forgotten in a hundred years’ time. And, more crucially, for nature restoration laws to be effective, a historic baseline that can still reach parts of the Holocene may be desirable going forward — both from the perspective of good (biodiversity) governance, as well as our personal understanding and appreciation of the natural world.

References

[1] Global Assessment Report on Biodiversity and Ecosystem Services (IPBES secretariat, 2022)

[2] The IUCN Red List Of Threatened Species (IUCN, 2022)

[3] Verschuuren J, ‘Restoration Of Protected Lakes Under Climate Change: What Legal Measures Are Needed To Help Biodiversity Adapt To The Changing Climate? The Case of Lake Ijssel, Netherlands’ [2019] SSRN Electronic Journal; Hoek N, ‘The Habitats Directive And Heath: The Strain of Climate Change and N Deposition’ (2022) 31 European Energy and Environmental Law Review.

[4] Schoukens H, ‘Non-Regression Clauses in Times of Ecological Restoration Law: Article 6(2) of the EU Habitats Directive as an Unusual Ally to Restore Natura 2000?’ (2017) 13 Utrecht Law Review.

[5] Caro T & others, Conservation in the Anthropocene – chapter in Keeping the Wild, ed. George Wuerthner, Eileen Crist, Tom Butler (2014: Island Press, Washington, DC)

[6] Europe: The First 100 Million Years, Tim Flannery (2014: Penguin, UK)

[7] Jones L & others, ‘Investigating the Implications of Shifting Baseline Syndrome on Conservation‘ (2020) People and Nature, Volume 2 Issue 4.

[8] Nitrogen (Wageninen University & Research, 2022)

[9] as [6]

[10] Trouwborst A, and Svenning J, Megafauna restoration as a legal obligation: International biodiversity law and the rehabilitation of large mammals in Europe, (2022) Review of European, Comparative & International Environmental Law, Volume 31, Issue 2; ‘Megafauna Restoration is a Legal Obligation‘ (Rewilding Europe, 2022)

[11] ‘Green Deal: pioneering proposals to restore Europe’s nature by 2050 and halve pesticide use by 2030‘ (European Commission, 2022)

[12] ‘Global biodiversity loss can still be halted’ (Wageninen University & Research, 2020)

Find out more

You can explore the background to the problem in Are You Suffering From Shifting Baseline Syndrome? by Reagan Pearce for Earth.Org (19 June 2020): “Coined by Daniel Pauly in 1995, while speaking of increasing tolerance to fish stock declines over generations, SBS also has roots in psychology, where it is referred to as ‘environmental generational amnesia’. Simply put, Shifting Baseline Syndrome is ‘a gradual change in the accepted norms for the condition of the natural environment due to a lack of experience, memory and/or knowledge of its past condition’. In this sense, what we consider to be a healthy environment now, past generations would consider to be degraded, and what we judge to be degraded now, the next generation will consider to be healthy or ‘normal’.” There is an interview with Daniel Pauly for Mission Blue (March 2012) here, following his TED Talk on the Ocean’s Shifting Baseline.

In Spot the difference: shifting baseline syndrome in our own backyard for ZSL (24 July 2018), PhD student Lizzie Jones looks at the phenomenon of shifting baseline syndrome with “a rare example of a positive shifted baseline, in which we have not noticed positive change” — the growing population of Red Kite in the UK after successful reintroduction projects.

And Shifting Baseline Syndrome is one of the terms explored in the book Anticipatory history (2011), edited by Caitlin DeSilvey, Simon Naylor and Colin Sackett (Uniform Books) – reviewed for ClimateCultures by Mark Goldthorpe here.

Update January 2023: Thanks to the comment posted below by ClimateCultures visitor Peter Collins, we became aware of the work of Escaping Agharta, and Avery Dart’s track Shifting Baseline Syndrome in particular. “The goal of Escaping Aghartha is to educate people about specific examples of ongoing destruction in the biological world, using extreme music as an educational tool. Avery, a biologist, started Escaping Aghartha as an experimental solo project. Now Escaping Aghartha has started to feature skilled musicians on some releases.”

Niels Hoek

A legal researcher specialising in EU Environmental Law, whose PhD project addresses how the EU ‘governs’ light pollution and who mobilizes for this to change.

Bone Landscapes

Artist Jo Dacombe explores sense of place, layers of history and the power of objects. Jo describes her work with museums and researchers on visual art inspired by relationships between bones and landscapes, now and into the future.

1,430 words: estimated reading time 5.5 minutes

I often consider the continuum of time, and how the present is part of the past and the future, one influencing the other, both forwards and backwards. Commissioned by Leicestershire Museums to create Myth Maps in 2011, in my proposal presentation for the project I drew a timeline on a sheet of transparent acetate. I held this up and explained that we experience time in a linear way, because of the way we think about it (by ‘we’ I refer to Western thinking; there are other ways of perceiving time, such as cyclical time; perhaps a subject for a future post). Then I folded up the timeline, so that you could still see the line but now it was concertinaed onto itself, and different parts of the timeline could be seen in the same place, one on top of each other. This, I explained, is how time is contained in a landscape.

This happened before I came to work with archaeologists, but I believe was probably the beginning of that particular thread of interest. In 2014 I became Artist in Residence in the School of Archaeology and Ancient History at the University of Leicester; however, I was working with zooarchaeologists in the Bone Lab and looking at animal bones rather than at landscapes per se. But throughout the residency, it became clear that landscape, bones and animals (including ourselves) cannot be separated out so easily.

Future fossils, future landscapes

In looking back at archaeological landscapes, we also begin looking forward to what archaeology of the future will perceive of our time now. What will be the future fossils?

Working with archaeologists, my perception of landscape has become framed by the idea of time past and time future — a time continuum that all landscapes contain; in fact landscapes are a manifestation of time, formed by aeons of material shaping and movement.

Jan Zalasiewicz writes of the Technosphere, an era where our mass-produced technological objects will clutter up the world and end up as strange fossilized shapes in the future. He has created examples of what these objects might look and feel like. He tries to imagine how our technological world will shape the stratigraphy of the future. Zalasiewicz, Professor of Palaeobiology at the University of Leicester, is both studying fossils from the distant past and imagining future fossils. Again, looking back is looking forward.

However, there is another and perhaps more profound change in the landscape that we are creating now. A change that is more directly linked to our bodies, and draws on the interrelationship between ourselves as material beings in a material landscape, and our modern world of mass production. It is to do with our mass production of food and how this affects what our bodies are made of.

During my work with the University of Leicester, zooarchaeologist Dr Richard Thomas and others proposed the idea that one of the markers of the Anthropocene that future archaeologists will discover will be broiler chicken bones. The broiler chicken has a skeleton that is vastly accelerated in its growth, genetically engineered to reach huge proportions within a short life span in order to feed ever-increasing human populations across the world, cheaply. As he explains, there will be thousands of millions of broiler chicken bones deposited into the landscape over our time:

Over 65.8 billion meat-chicken carcasses were consumed globally in 2016 and this is set to continue rising… The contrast between the lifespan of the ancestral red jungle fowl (3 years to 11 years in captivity) and that of broilers means that the potential rate of carcass accumulation of chickens is unprecedented in the natural world.

I cannot imagine the piling of chicken bones of that scale, even for only one year of consumption. But humans have been eating animals and leaving their carcasses and bones for many centuries, and we do not find our landscapes overrun with bones because they decay and return to the earth. Won’t this happen with chicken bones too? Perhaps not, because our way of disposing of so much rubbish has changed; we put this in landfill, piling up all our waste in one place, which changes the way that they degrade. As Cullen Murphy and William Rajthe have written in Rubbish! The archaeology of garbage, “organic materials are often well preserved within landfill deposits, where anaerobic conditions mean that bones ‘do not so much degrade as mummify’”.

How will this shape a landscape? I imagine future fossils of boulders created from the shape of broiler chicken leg bones. A lump of stone with jutting humerus shapes rippling across its surface.

Future Fossil 3, Jo Dacombe © 2019. Conte and graphite on paper.
jodacombe.blogspot.com

Bodies as bones as landscapes

In working with Richard, I came to realise that landscapes and bones, and therefore us, are inextricably linked. When we die, we become deposits in a landscape, and our bones become part of the layers in the earth. But before that, our bones are created from our environment; the minerals within the food and water we eat drink and in the landscapes that we inhabit, actually create our bones. Archaeologists can work out the location of where an animal or human has been living by analysing the isotopes contained in the bones that they excavate. We are, in fact, a part of our landscape in a material way, not just a spiritual way.

This idea became two drawings that I created for The Reliquary Project exhibition in 2016: Bone Landscape and Bone Forest. Although the project studied archaeological animal bones, I don’t recognise a difference between humans and animals on a material level, and so my two drawings relate humans to landscapes too.

Bones: Bone Landscape, Jo Dacombe — Bone Landscape, Jo Dacombe © 2015. Charcoal on paper.
jodacombe.blogspot.com

I tried to make stone bones. I cast bones into reconstituted stone, to think about how a fossil is a material transformation of an object. Making a cast is like making an instant fossil. The rather beautiful quality of a bone, the smoothness and whiteness of chicken bones, which are like silken tools in my hand, are completely lost when they become stone. The stone bone is a bit of a monstrosity. Its surface is odd, its weight is wrong, and it seems to have a material permanence that bone does not. I imagine these stone fossils stacked to the height of a landfill deposit, one day to be excavated by future archaeologists as they pick through the sky-high garbage left behind by our epoch.

Bones: Bone Forest, Jo Dacombe — Bone Forest, Jo Dacombe © 2015. Charcoal on paper.
jodacombe.blogspot.com

We are reshaping and reconstituting our landscape by the deposits that we make, including broiler chicken bones. But by doing this, perhaps we are reconstituting ourselves too. As our environment changes, how will we evolve as a part of this interconnected recycling of material that is the process of life, death and landscape?

Future landscapes will be made of bones, and our bones are made of our landscapes… As our landscapes become transformed by the plastic and metal remains of our technological objects, what will we become as animals living on and made from our landscapes?

Find out more

The University of Leicester’s School of Archaeology and Ancient History Bone Lab conducts a range of interesting research projects, including the work led by Richard Thomas on the ‘rise’ of the domesticated chicken as humanity’s most widely established livestock species, and the proposal that one of the markers of the Anthropocene that future archaeologists will discover will be broiler chicken bones: The broiler chicken as a signal of a human reconfigured biosphere (published in the Royal Society’s journal Open Science, Dec 12 2018).

Jan Zalasiewicz’s writing on the Technosphere includes The unbearable burden of the Technosphere (published in UNESCO’s journal Courier, 2018): “In the geological blink of an eye, a new sphere has emerged, and is evolving at a furious pace. Weighing thirty trillion tons, this is the technosphere. It includes a mass of carbon dioxide which is industrially emitted into the atmosphere – the equivalent of 150,000 Egyptian Pyramids!” He also wrote A Legacy of the Technosphere (published in Technosphere Magazine, Nov 15 2016), with illustrations by artist Ann-Sophie Milon: “In the end, the technosphere will be buried deep as any other conglomeration of earthly materials, forming timelines of past eras as patterns on the face of cliff faces.”

Rubbish! The archaeology of garbage, by William Rathje and Cullen Murphy, was published by University of Arizona Press (2018).

Jo Dacombe

A multimedia artist creating work, installations and interventions, interested in mapping, walking, public space, sense of place, layers of history and the power of objects.

The Ocean as Abject: Painting as Installation

Visual artist Mary Eighteen updates us on work that imagines a world where the ocean is on the trajectory to extinction. Here, Mary focuses on concepts of ‘framing’ as a means to provide the visual encounter with abjection.

1,290 words: estimated reading time 5 minutes

Mary introduced her collaboration on this project with multimedia artist and fellow ClimateCultures Member Julien Masson in her post The Ocean as Abject: Between Seduction and Defilement.

***

Our project is ready to launch in terms of seeking the correct exhibition space. The appropriation of Kristeva’s abjection, by reversing the abject as human trauma and positing it within the world of oceanic trauma, remains central to the work.

When preparing or proposing ecological scenarios for an exhibition that invites the spectator to view and consider the abjection of our oceans, it is important that our frame itself also challenges the oceanic problems facing humanity. Both of us have explored this in relation to the idea of the architectural space provided for our proposed exhibition.

The viewer and the frame

Our further research into spectatorship, regarding the viewer and the frame, responds to Paul Sharit’s concept of “presenting and viewing a film as close as possible to the conditions of hanging and looking at a painting.” (1) Therefore, for The Ocean as Abject, I have as a painter responded to a process of painting as installation, so that spectatorship is addressed not as an observational exercise, but as a concept of thought in terms of viewer participation. To this end the viewer is invited to contemplate both video and painterly installation within the structure of the frame.

In my previous post I presented my painting Abjection 1 and said:

“I have produced three further paintings which are narrow (70cm wide), and in two vertical sections. With a nod towards installation the paintings will each sit on a set of steps that will be in line with the canvas and flush with the wall.”

Since then the steps have been made and suitably sprayed black with car spray paint. It can be seen from the images here that the paintings aligned with the steps are moving towards installation. The steps are symbolic of a possible sixth extinction, and of the steps we need to make to prevent such an occurrence. The frame therefore challenges spectatorship on two levels. The steps incite interest by deconstructing formal notions of the frame. In doing so, the viewer is invited to question further the purpose of the artwork. Subsequently they must consider the powerful insights evoked by the exhibition.

Abjection 2. Artist: Mary Eighteen — Abjection 2
Artist: Mary Eighteen © 2018
www.maryeighteen.com

Abjection: steps to the future

The three paintings — Abjection 2, Abjection 3, Abjection 4 — are the beginning of a body of work that embraces this notion of the frame. While the top smaller sections on all three (70cm x 60cm) make a reference to landscape, albeit in an abstracted manner, the lower long canvases (70cm x 122cm), suggest a disruption of flow that symbolises a world where meaning has started to collapse. The steps are a prelude to that plausible collapse and invite the spectator to consider this conundrum. They make reference to both ecological concerns as well as exploring the art object in relation to the frame.

Abjection 3. Artist: Mary Eighteen — Abjection 3
Artist: Mary Eighteen © 2018
www.maryeighteen.com

While the paintings — unlike video — are static, the steps are a move away from the manner in which a canvas is so often traditionally presented. This could be further investigated by also interrogating the way in which painting can be displayed on a wall. After his death in 2015, Ellsworth Kelly’s last paintings were exhibited at Mathew Marks Gallery in New York (May 5^th to June 25^th 2017). In his critique of the exhibition, Terence Troullot shares Branden Joseph’s quote on the artist, “The wall is part of the painting and always has been.” (2) Troullot’s own summary of Kelly’s painting White Diagonal Curve (2015) suggests that “a crescent shaped white canvas set against an all-white partition wall, seems to be part of the background, and yet escaping from it as well, outwardly moving in all directions.” (3) In relation to Troullot’s observation The Ocean as Abject makes it essential that frame as well as painted image emanates the idea of a sullied ecology. This is to ensure an enlightened spectatorship, by presenting painting via a disrupted surface that not only interrogates the viewer but also the architectural space within which it is exhibited. By ‘disrupted surface’ I mean that, in my case, the nature of displaying a painting is challenged by the addition of the steps.

Painting, video and architecture

Similarly, Julien Masson’s video for The Ocean as Abject (which can seen in the earlier post) was initially presented as a concept in three parts. It was suggested that the video would work well as a series of slow panning shots stacked (in strata), on one screen or in succession. This makes me think of montage and the whole idea of assembly or editing. In his thesis Eisenstein’s Theory on Montage and Architecture Jeffrey M Todd states that “Montage then deals with the combination of several dissimilar elements which through their assemblage establish new meaning “(4) For me this statement elaborates the purpose of our proposed exhibition. The Ocean as Abject juxtaposes painting and video for the purpose of evoking an ecological awareness for the spectator, and this assemblage as installation uses the designated architectural space to convey meaning and purpose via the frame.

Abjection 4. Artist: Mary Eighteen — Abjection 4
Artist: Mary Eighteen © 2018
www.maryeighteen.com

“If as Eisenstein suggests, film and by extension, moving image installation descends down one line from architecture, then another branch must necessarily proceed from painting, that other creature of duration.” (5) Within the historic links of architecture and painting, punctuated by the more recent mercurial rise of video art and installation, The Ocean as Abject will in the end be defined by the architectural space provided. Within this space, spectatorship must then focus on the frame in order to transcend the meaning and purpose that lies beyond the frames presented.

Together, Julien and I have created work that aligns a relationship between video and painting, but we have also considered work that has the flexibility to relate to the architectural space that it will be exhibiting in. In her book Installation and the Moving Image, Catherine Elwes says “There are obvious continuities across both practises arising from formal considerations — both moving image and painting organise pictorial elements: shapes, textures, colours, light and dark into readable signs, for the most part defined by the frame.” (6)

Two artists — one a fine artist and painter, one a multimedia artist whose work straddles both video and the visual arts — have addressed how the frame can be used to heighten awareness of the worrying conditions that are affecting the survival of our oceans’ future, and in turn our own.

Find out more

Notes from Mary’s text:

Elwes, Catherine: Painting, Approaches to Painted Surfaces in Installation and the Moving Image, p21. Wallflower Press. 2015
These Are The Last Great Paintings Ellsworth Kelly Made Before He Died: Terence Troullot, Artnet News, 4th May 2017. This essay includes the painting, White Diagonal Curve (2015).
Troullot: Ibid
Todd, M Jeffrey: Eisenstein’s Film Theory on Montage and Architecture. A Thesis Presented to The Faculty of Division of Graduate Studies. Georgia Institute of Technology. 1989
Elwes, Catherine: Painting, Approaches to Painted Surfaces. In Installation and the Moving Image, p21. Wallflower Press. 2015
Elwes: Ibid

Mary Eighteen

An abstract artist and painter whose work addresses the anoxic in relation to human responsibility and far-reaching ecological scenarios impacting the ocean.

Questioning the frame? Space for creative thinking... 

Consider a specific frame - whether a structure or a concept - that contains, sets apart or maybe makes ready for investigation some cultural representation of an aspect of environmental change. How is the frame sometimes visible, or sometimes not, and does this change your understanding of the change? 

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Near / Far

Visual artist Rebecca Chesney, whose location-specific work is informed by her research and conversations with scientists, describes her experiences of drought and tree death in California while on a residency and shares some of the images she produced.

1,360 words: estimated reading time 5.5 minutes

I am a visual artist based in Preston, Lancashire. My interests lie in how we perceive the landscape: how we romanticise and translate our rural and urban surroundings; how we define, describe and categorise nature. I look at how politics, land ownership, management and commercial value all influence the environment we live in. Air pollution, water quality, invasive plant species, weeds, bees and weather are all subjects my work has dealt with previously, with the results taking the form of installations, interventions, drawings, maps and walks.

In 2016 I was invited to attend a residency at Montalvo in California. At that time California was experiencing one of the most severe droughts on record. Having just finished a winter here where storms Desmond, Eva and Frank had caused extensive flooding in Lancashire and Cumbria, I was interested in looking at extreme weather episodes and learning more about how climate change is affecting different geographical sites.

Split into two trips, my first visit in September 2016 was five years into the drought.

Bark beetle attack

Situated an hour south of San Francisco, Montalvo sits on a hillside surrounded by redwoods and oaks. The river running through the site had long since run dry; the warm air, sweet with the smell of the gigantic redwoods, was full of dust. My visit coincided with the run-up to the presidential election, which became a frequent topic of discussion amongst the staff, other residents and locals alike with the majority agitated, nervous and deeply concerned about what the future might hold.

Dry river beds, reservoirs at historically low levels and the outbreak of wildfires nearby all revealed the extent of the drought, but it was the sheer number of dead trees on the hillsides in Yosemite National Park that I found completely overwhelming. I saw thousands and thousands of dead trees. The continued drought and subsequent increase of bark beetle attack had resulted in huge losses: the US Forest Service estimated a loss of 66 million trees in the Sierra Nevada in 2016, with the most vulnerable species being Ponderosa Pine, Incense-cedar, Sugar Pine and White Fir Trees.

Dead trees in Yosemite National Park, California. Photograph by Rebecca Chesney — Dead trees in Yosemite National Park, California
Photograph: Rebecca Chesney © 2018
rebeccachesney.com (click image to link)

During my travels, I started to make drawings in my sketchbook of the exit holes of the bark beetles found on dead branches and tree trunks. I was drawn to the random patterns made of tiny holes, singly meaningless, but collectively devastating. And with these drawings I embroidered fabric with the patterns of dots, each individual mark taking time to create.

Near, embroidered cotton material. Artist: Rebecca Chesney — Near, embroidered cotton material.
Artist: Rebecca Chesney © 2018
rebeccachesney.com (click image to link)

Returning from Yosemite National Park my journey took me through the vast agricultural Central Valley. The nation’s leading producer of almonds, avocados, broccoli, grapes, peppers and many other crops, this highly managed area is in stark contrast to the native forests of the mountains. Almonds are California’s most lucrative exported agricultural product: jobs and livelihoods depend on their success. However, almonds alone use approximately 10% of California’s total water supply. It was not difficult to see that thirsty crops in a time of drought can present difficult dilemmas and make us question our priorities.

Central Valley, California. Photograph by Rebecca Chesney — Central Valley, California
Photograph: Rebecca Chesney © 2018
www.rebeccachesney.com (click image to link)

The time between my first and second visit to California brought many changes. On my return in spring 2017 Trump, elected and sworn in as President since my first trip, continued to be the main focus of intense discussion and deep concern: he had already withdrawn from the Paris Agreement. The drought had been declared over, with above average rainfall and storms over the winter months resulting in numerous landslides and local road closures around Montalvo. Further south, the Pfeiffer Canyon Bridge on Highway 1 was damaged beyond repair, with the extreme rainfall causing it to crack and sink on the shifting mountainside. With no option but demolition, it is expected to take over a year to replace, and with no detour available it leaves communities and businesses cut off and isolated.

During my second trip I was invited to meet Ramakrishna Nemani, a senior earth scientist at the NASA Ames Research Center, and Professor Eric Lambin at Stanford University. Nemani’s research uses satellite and climate data to produce ecological nowcasts and forecasts, while Lambin’s research is looking at land use change using GIS, remote sensing and socio-economic data. Providing an insight into these complex subjects, both meetings helped me understand the complex layering of issues involved and the need for balance within ecosystems.

Sudden Oak Death

I was also able to attend a Sudden Oak Death bioblitz workshop with Matteo Garbelotto from UC Berkeley. Caused by the microscopic pathogen Phytophthora ramorum, Sudden Oak Death (SOD) is an exotic disease introduced from an unknown region of the world into California 20 – 25 years ago. During the workshop I learned how to ID the disease and was asked to collect leaves from Californian Bay Laurel trees. Although carriers of the disease, Bay Laurels don’t die of SOD; however they infect surrounding oak trees that do die from the disease. I enjoyed being involved in the bioblitz and learned a lot about the complicated relationships between humans and the environment and the consequences of tiny imbalances in nature.

Continuing on from my sketches and embroideries about tree loss in the Sierra Nevada, I used data supplied by NASA satellites to produce a series of prints. Showing tree losses caused by the drought, bark beetle attack and wildfires in the last four years, the resulting images look like maps of swarms: intense and dark in places, sparse in other areas. Where the embroideries (Near) show individual minute dots, the prints (Far) reveal kilometre upon kilometre of dead trees visible via satellite.

Far, print derived from Nasa satellite imagery of tree loss in Sierra Nevada. Artist: Rebecca Chesney — Far, print derived from Nasa satellite imagery of tree loss in Sierra Nevada.
Artist: Rebecca Chesney © 2018
rebeccachesney.com (click image to link)

The small made large

Now back in Lancashire, I have had time to reflect on what I learned from my trip to California. Although different in so many ways, both regions are similar in facing increased pressure from the changing climate.

I saw how even the slightest shift in the balance of nature can have a huge impact on the health of ecosystems: seemingly minute actions we make have consequences. I saw how the economics of land influence decision-making and often take priority over the conservation of natural heritage. And the political uncertainty and upheaval added a new dimension from which to experience the situation. This amazing opportunity to visit some incredible places and meet world-leading experts all contributed to a fascinating trip that will continue to influence me and my work into the future.

Find out more

Rebecca’s images of Near / Far have been published in Uniformannual Twentyeighteen, available from Uniformbooks: 124 pages with contributions from 24 writers, artists and researchers. Rebecca’s trip was supported by Arts Council England and Lancaster Arts.

You can explore the work of the Montalvo Arts Center at their site.

The problems and management of Sudden Oak Death in California are described at the site of the California Oak Mortality Task Force. And the Firewise Madera County site has a well-referenced article on the dangers of Bark Beetle attack on the state’s trees.

Want to know more about ‘bioblitz’? Have a look at the European Citizen Science Association’s Bioblitz Group and the UK’s National Bioblitz Network.

Rebecca mentions Eric Lambin’s research; his 2012 book An Ecology of Happiness looks like an interesting read.

Rebecca Chesney

A visual artist interested in the relationship between humans and nature, how we perceive, romanticise and translate the landscape and our influence on the environment.

Questioning distance? Space for creative thinking... 

Perceptions of 'near' and 'far' can trick us, misdirect our attention and our conversations. What new patterns in familiar surroundings would you look for - or create - to bring your own focus to an overlooked environmental change? 

Share your thoughts - use the Contact Form, visit the ClimateCultures Facebook page or write a response on your own blog and send a link!

Anticipatory History: Living With the Question

Environmental artist Linda Gordon responds to Anticipatory history with reflections on personal memories, intimations of change — ‘places and objects within them become part of our personal inner world’ — and a recent example of her ephemeral art.

580 words: estimated reading time 2.5 minutes

You can read my original review of Anticipatory history here. And you can download the book’s introductory essay from the publisher’s link on that page.

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Are we, as Anticipatory history suggests, largely not culturally equipped to respond thoughtfully to environmental change, or to imagine our own futures?

The trouble is that places and the objects within them (natural or manufactured) seep into our consciousness and become part of our personal inner world, complete with its private collection of received stories.

Looking at Mark’s reference from the book, “Many of these changes… will register as subtle (or not so subtle) alterations in familiar landscapes…”, I remembered that many years ago, when I was living in East Sussex, someone living a few miles inland from the Seven Sisters cliffs demolished a World War II pillbox (a concrete machine gun emplacement) that was sited in their garden, in order to make his garden more pleasant. This was followed by a vociferous outcry from local people, and at first, I thought: “It’s his garden, and he can do what he wants!” Then I realised those people probably saw his act as part of their world being destroyed, and therefore threatening their sense of identity.

Not far from where I live now, is one of my favourite trees. Nothing particularly outstanding about it — but it is special to me because I return to it again and again in times of trouble. If it keeled over tomorrow in a gale, and died — I would feel a few moments sadness, and then accept it as a natural part of life’s processes. But if someone deliberately and illegally killed it, say, in order to cram in an extra housing unit for pure profit, I should find it extremely difficult not to react with outrage!

History and the present moment

It is my view that people’s wellbeing and felt experience should be respected and fully taken into account during times of change, and when planning ahead. (The same goes for other lifeforms too). However, I don’t currently believe that looking to history and story-telling, in itself, will do very much to help us to cope with “changing landscapes, and to changes in the wildlife and plant populations they support”. I tend to think it is more a matter of paying close attention to the present moment.

I like how the authors are taking an exploratory approach to this whole question, rather than attempting to formulate any rigid conclusions, and definitely think it is important to keep living with the question, and allow the intelligence of life itself to inform and guide our actions.

Time to let go

The photo is of an ephemeral work I made in Bucks Valley Woods, North Devon, at the end of September, at the time when all the sweet chestnut fruits were falling. The title is Time to Let Go.

Linda Gordon

An environmental artist making temporary works in the landscape as a way of re-connecting with life’s endless processes and essential unity and sharing this with others.

Creative conversations for the Anthropocene

Want to share your response to my original review or to Linda's thoughts? Send in a mini-post of your own - and why not complement it with a piece of your own work or someone else's, as Linda has done? Or use the Contact Form to suggest a topic for ClimateCultures to explore as a conversation.