newseason.ca

Essay by Kristin Ivey

The collective result of environmental havoc wreaked at every level,
from massive scale corporate emissions to the recycling habits of the
suburbs has tipped Global Warming into the forefront of political
agendas. Unlike its broader, and seemingly more politically correct
umbrella term climate change; global warming implies a level of human
culpability. Because global warming refers to the rise in temperature to
the lower atmosphere, largely attributed to excessive amounts of
greenhouse gas, the blame it seems, justly, falls directly on us.

The political is personal in newseason.ca, a interactive, web-based
project by Lunenburg-based Media artist, Kristy O’Leary. The project
juxtaposes topographical maps of Lunenburg county, with the personal
recollections and observations from elders of the community. The
participants of newseason.ca live in coastal, and peninsular Nova
Scotia, in Lunenburg’s surrounding communities along the province’s
south shore. A lifetime spent working, living and reaping from the
Atlantic Ocean makes for invaluable first-person accounts from the front
lines of climate change.

The observations are recorded and mounted on the website as audiowave
files, ranging from 30 seconds to 10 minutes in length. The murky mix of
an ambiguous black and white topographical map with the audio waveform
files, paint an overall impression of our impending doom. For the
viewer, the voices are removed from specificity, and removed from their
respective identities. Overall, viewed as a whole. the voices blend
together creating a sense of community, rather than taken on their own
accord, as you would, for example, view the various contributors in a
documentary film.

The lack of specificity with the detached voices is mimicked in the use
of a topographical map as opposed to geographical, nautical or more
place-identifying charts. The use of such a map narrows the focus
placing issues and discussion points into a very specific geographical
context. The use of a topographical map negates this narrowing of
focus. We are viewing any coastal community, this is both Lunenburg or
Japan. This point opens up the work to a globally minded discussion by
using a community minded framework. In this way the discussion becomes
such that we all may participate.