Artist Statement
Inspired by extreme weather events and a warming planet, Equilibrium, contemplates the dichotomy of water. While water sustains life, it can also be a destructive force. We fear its absence and its presence, as both can be catastrophic and alleviating. This dichotomous nature of creation and destruction is greatly impacted by the onset of climate change, a disruption exacerbated by human intervention. Through its use as a commodity for the wealthy, the sustaining trait of water is impacted by depletion and waste. Thus the very action of exploiting the intrinsically nurturing qualities of water leads to the destructive element of it coming alive.
This body of work is a reflection on how humans capitalize, waste, exploit, fear, relish, conserve and revere water, as it transforms into a greater destructor than sustainer. Each image is a visual meditation on the characteristics of water, from the cataclysmic element unleashed to the serene, pure, life-giving source.
Marie-Luise Klotz
2012-2016 :: California experiences the worst drought on record.
Winter 2016-17 :: California records the wettest winter in history, ending the 5 year drought, causing major flooding and forcing large scale evacuations.
Summer 2017 :: Record breaking heatwave in California.
August 2017 :: Hurricane Harvey brings catastrophic rainfall and flooding to the Houston metropolitan area.
September 2017 :: Catastrophic Hurricane Irma is documented as the most powerful Atlantic hurricane in recorded history.
September 2017 :: Hurricane Maria, the eighth consecutive hurricane of the 2017 season, devastate’s Puerto Rico and goes down in history as the worst natural disaster on record on the island.
October 2017 :: The deadliest and most destructive wildfires burn in Napa and Sonoma County.
December 2017 :: Thomas fire, the largest California wildfire, burns wide swaths of Southern California.
In the year 2017 alone, 15 catastrophic weather events were recorded, making it one of the most disastrous years on record.
January 2018 :: Heavy rain and mudslides devastate the same terrain in Southern California that was scorched by wildfires.
The Central Valley aquifer extends for about 400 miles under the Sacramento and San Joaquin valleys. The subterranean water, some of which seeped into the ground 10,000 to 20,000 years ago, is California’s biggest reservoir. Yet it has been largely unregulated and unmonitored. Most of the more than 100,000 wells that pierce the valley floor are unmetered and landowners have taken what they wanted.
—Los Angeles Times
Many of the residents living in and around the reservoirs didn’t even know they slept in harm’s way — until the water came pouring in from the prairie during Harvey.
Time and again, America has bent the land to its will, imposing the doctrine of Manifest Destiny on nature’s most daunting obstacles. We have bridged the continent with railways and roads, erected cities in the desert, and changed the course of rivers.
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Unfortunately, nature always gets the last word. Houston’s growth contributed to the misery Harvey unleashed.
The very forces that pushed the city forward are threatening its way of life.
Climate change holds a mirror up to every place its impact is felt.
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Something else was nagging Ms. Micu. She wondered how the subdivisions could have been built in a reservoir. And if they had to be sacrificed, shouldn’t the homeowners be compensated?
—New York Times
Irma leaves not only destruction but more broken global hurricane records.
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It is the first storm ever observed, in any ocean, to sustain winds of 185 miles per hour for longer than 24 hours. They whipped around its eye wall at that speed for 37 straight hours. And Irma helped make Thursday, September 7, the most energetic day for hurricanes on record in the Atlantic. Two other cyclones, Jose and Katia, also churned through the Atlantic basin that day.
—The Atlantic
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Tap Water, Oakland, California
Water from the tap
0 km // 0 miles from Oakland, California
While the surface water drought is over, the groundwater drought is not.
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As a rule of thumb, in many areas it will take as many above average to wet years to recover our groundwater storage, as it has taken to draw it down.
—UC Davis Center for Watershed Sciences
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Experts say the storm and its widespread devastation undoubtedly have sped up the pace of migration as residents have dealt with extended power outages, communication lapses, infrastructure failures and, in some cases, isolation. What already was the largest exodus in the island’s history now includes people fleeing in droves simply to achieve some sense of normalcy.
—Washington Post
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Even as California struggles with surface flooding, the state is going dry underground, triggering sinking in parts of the great San Joaquin Valley, according to a new NASA report released by the Department of Water Resources.
The most comprehensive study yet of the problem reveals the startling pace and extent of the damage: NASA satellites found the ground subsiding up to 20 inches in a seven-mile area near the Fresno town of Tranquillity, because the state’s subterranean water supply was drained to record lows by farms and towns coping with the recent drought.
—The Mercury News
In 2015, about 70 percent of plastic water bottles in the United States were not recycled and ended up in landfills, as litter or incinerated. Much of this plastic waste ends up in our oceans and surface waters.
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Bottled water companies profit by depleting local water supplies; Nestlé pumped California water during the recent historic drought, withdrawing 705 million gallons of water annually — enough to supply nearly 2,200 families per year.
—Food and Water Watch, Washington DC
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Boxed Water Is Better
Water bottled in Michigan and Utah
3850km // 2393 miles from Oakland, California {Michigan}
1421km // 883 miles from Oakland, California {Utah}
A gallon’s worth of single-serve bottled water costs almost $9.50 — nearly 2,000 times the price of tap water, three times the national average price for a gallon of milk and four times the national average price for a gallon of regular grade gasoline.
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—Food and Water Watch, Washington DC
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Icelandic Glacial Water
Water bottled at Ölfus Spring in Iceland
6781km // 4214 miles from Oakland, California
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Earlier this year, rain and snow that brought life to California hills parched by six years of drought foretold dangerous times. The moisture produced a bumper crop of grass and brush that then dried out, leaving ample fuel for wind-driven flames that burned large swaths of Napa and Sonoma counties in October and Santa Barbara and Ventura counties this month.
—Time Magazine
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Scientists typically hesitate to say any specific event happened because of climate change, Westerling said. Yet, he said, “we know that these events are affected by the weather and the climate and how dry it is. The climate system has been altered by people ... all the weather we’re experiencing and what’s driving these wildfire events is climate change.”
—Scientific American
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Major drinks brands produce the greatest numbers of plastic bottles. Coca-Cola produces more than 100 billion throwaway plastic bottles every year – or 3,400 a second, according to analysis carried out by Greenpeace after the company refused to publicly disclose its global plastic usage. The top six drinks companies in the world use a combined average of just 6.6% of recycled Pet in their products, according to Greenpeace. A third have no targets to increase their use of recycled plastic and none are aiming to use 100% across their global production.
—The Guardian