Glacial Optics -Wildfires of the American West, 2022-ongoing
Expeditionary, Process-based Experimental Photography

Upon returning from the Arctic I turned my ice lenses to document wildfires across the American West. Perhaps nothing could seem further afield from the Arctic origins of my Glacial Optics project. But through the lens of climate change the connection is clear: rapidly warming poles and melting glaciers are intimately linked to record heatwaves, unprecedented droughts, and massive wildfires around the globe. Now I was bringing the gaze of the glacier to bear witness to the smoke and fire of the Anthropocene.

This is part of my ongoing series Glacial Optics, exploring glacier ice as a literal and conceptual lens through with to understand ourselves and the world. In this work I explore the ‘gaze of the glaciers’ as offering a perspective beyond the human fame —invoking the glaciers massive scale, its sense of deep time, and, increasingly in the face of climate change, its massive fragility.