Art & Activism of the Anthropocene Series | Strange Reality: The Art and Activism of Transitional Environments

Climate change is no longer a mere possibility—it’s already happening. Glaciers are melting, animal and plant populations are failing, and agricultural practices no longer prevent famine. Around the world, scientists, artists, and activists are addressing climate change in media from nonfiction books to documentary films to live theater. This series brings together writers, journalists, and artists in robust discussion on how they address climate change—and why their work is important in the Anthropocene Era.

In Annihilation, the first book in Jeff VanderMeer’s Southern Reach Trilogy, we meet an unnamed biologist who specializes in “transitional environments”—that is, regions of land undergoing change so dramatic they’re barely recognizable. In this panel, Vandermeer is joined by Zaria Forman, a visual artist who captures real-life environmental transition in her work; Gleb Raygorodetsky, a conservation biologist studying the transitional state of indigenous communities hit hardest by climate change; and Victoria Tauli-Corpuz, an Indigenous leader and activist. Together they will discuss how art and activism can bring greater awareness to communities and environs most vulnerable to the effects of climate change.

Jeff VanderMeer is the author of the bestselling novel Borne and the Southern Reach Trilogy. His books have won the Nebula and Shirley Jackson Awards.

Zaria Forman is an artist whose work has appeared in National Geographic, Smithsonian Magazine, the Wall Street Journal and The Huffington Post, and as part of Banksy’s Dismaland.

Gleb Raygorodetsky is a Research Affiliate with the POLIS Project on Ecological Governance at the University of Victoria and the author of Archipelago of Hope, a book that explores the effects of climate change on indigenous communities.

Victoria Tauli-Corpuz is an Indigenous leader from the Kankanaey Igorot people of the Cordillera Region in the Philippines and a UN Special Rapporteur on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples.

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