Turning to LED light mapping, I have created a series of photographs that address my anxiety for the future of our planet and seek to extend the capacity of the photographic image to depict a deeper truth. Traveling across the country, I have documented both the beautiful and the already disfigured landscapes of America, chronicling impacts from climate change that are sometimes obvious and other times invisible to the naked eye. The landscapes depicted comment on our denialist tendencies to see only what we want to believe—to deny our lifestyles are harming our planet and to see America as an enduring symbol of beauty, abundance and resilience. My photographs serve to disturb this pretense, layering climate change data visualizations and tales of its impacts which confront the viewer with a reality divergent from the one the camera alone can capture.


In the LED Light Mapped images, I photograph landscapes at dusk using long exposures. During the exposure I walk a programmable light stick through the space as it reads out a digital file from left to right. In essence, I am imprinting an image into the landscape using light as I capture an image with my camera.


In Our Hands (Summer Lake, OR)
2019, Archival Pigment Print, 20" x 30"
Fireline (Lovelock, NV)
2019, Archival Pigment Print, 20" x 30"

The orange image in the photograph is a scene from the 2018 Mendocino Complex Fires. By transposing it into a Nevada landscape, I illustrate the increased vulnerability of western ecosystems as they become drier.

Fireline (detail)
They Are the Canaries (Summer Lake Wildlife Refuge, OR)
2019, Archival Pigment Print, 20" x 30"

Graph from journal article shows amount of migratory bird species from 1968 to 2015. Warmer years and lower stream flow since 1990 has caused declines in bird populations.

Anxiety Arrows (Badlands National Park, SD)
2023, Archival Pigment Print, 20" x 30"
In Just 10 Years (Summer Lake, OR)
2019, Archival Pigment Print, 20" x 30"

The 'light mapped' images in the photograph show global CO2 Maps in 2016 (left) and 2006 (right). In 2016 the air concentration of CO2 surpassed 400ppm, something that hasn't happened for 3 million years.

How the West Was Lost (Summer Lake, OR)
2019, Archival Pigment Print, 20" x 30"

The image of the Western United States shows changes to the depth of snowpack between 1980-2010. Red dots indicate loss of snowpack over 30 years, blue dots indicate an increase. Nearly all snowpack in the west has decreased.

Access Denied (Slide Mountain, OR)
2019, Archival Pigment Print, 20" x 30"

'Light fence' design references the molecular drawing of Carbon Dioxide (1 carbon atom + 2 oxygen atoms). Together the CO2 makes a fence, blocking one's passage or entry to the vista of the mountain beyond.

Plant Some (Spearfish, SD)
2022, Archival Pigment Print, 20" x 30"
Betting on a Last Minute Fix (Indianapolis, IN)
2022, Archival Pigment Print, 20" x 30"

The graph depicted shows the speed at which decarbonization will need to happen to limit global temperature rise to 2 degrees Celsius. Starting mitigation in year 2000 only required a 2% decline per year. Starting in 2030 will require an 10% decline per year.

As Goes Utah, so Goes the West
2019, Archival Pigment Print, 10" x 15"

The West is getting hotter faster. Graph shows temperature rise from 1895 to 2010; pink is global, orange is Utah.

Corn vs. Coral (Cloverdale, IN)
2021, Archival Pigment Print, 20" x 28"

When we fertilize crops, soil bacteria gives off nitrous oxide. It is 300 times worse than CO2. Farming here in the US impacts coral reefs all over the ocean. In recent years catastrophic coral reef bleaching events, like those depicted in the 'light mapped' photographs here have occurred around the world. Even in Australia's famed Great Barrier Reef.)

The Year of Bootleg, Dixie and Caldor (Greenfield, IN)
2021, Archival Pigment Print, 20" x 28"

in 2021 there were 3 large wildfires simultaneously burning in California. These are the geographical outlines of the fires. In total nearly 1.6 million acres burned.

It's Fire Season Somewhere (Greenfield, IN)
2021, Archival Pigment Print, 20" x 28"
We Watch from Here as the West Burns (Greenfield, IN)
2021, Archival Pigment Print, 20" x 30"
The Great American Greenwash (Trafalgar, IN)
2022, Archival Pigment Print, 20" x 28"

40% of the corn grown in the U.S. is distilled into ethanol. While distilling corn into ethanol creates a renewable source of fuel, just like fossil fuels, burning them emits carbon into the atmosphere which adds to global warming. Calling this a green energy is suspect as It is also actively debated whether growing crops like corn with modern agricultural practices has a net negative or positive carbon footprint.

Projected Heat Zones in 2100 (Brownsburg, IN)
2021, Archival Pigment Print, 20" x 28"

The USDA forecasts growing regions by temperature. The map inlaid into the edge of a corn field here shows the predicted 'heat zones' by the end of the century. Indiana is projected to feel more like northern Alabama by 2100.)

1,200 Gallons of CO, #2 (Summer Lake, OR)
2021, Archival Pigment Print, 20" x 28"
Sea Level Rise is Real #3 (near Omaha, NE)
2021, Archival Pigment Print, 20" x 30"

The Missouri River valley north of Omaha pictured here experienced major flooding in 2019 due to premature spring rains which accelerated snow melt along the northern Rocky Mountains. Many fields adjacent to this one were still flooded in August.

The Phases of Lake Abert (Paisley, OR)
2021, Archival Pigment Print, 20" x 30"

The light mapped forms show the alkali lake's outline from 2011 to 2018. A 2014 drought caused it to nearly dry up, killing the native brine shrimp population. It is believed by some the severity of the lake's shrinking was due to how many ranchers draw from the water table to grow alfalfa to feed cattle.

Minefield (Cape San Blas, FL)
Minefield (detail)
Sea Rise (Cape San Blas, FL)
Ominous Prognosis (Chesapeake Bay, Harrington Harbor, VA)
2018, Archival Pigment Print, 20" x 28"

By next century the sea is predicted to rise 3 feet in the Chesapeake Bay threatening thousands of properties and lives including Tangier Island, VA.

Outlook Bleak: Marine Heatwaves 1982-2023 (Woods Hole, MA)
2023, Archival Pigment Print, 20" x 28"

The top row of the 'light mapped' data visualization represents 2023, the bottom 1982. Red means warmer than average sea temperatures, blue means cooler. Marine heatwaves are increasingly common in the Gulf of Maine.

Paving Paradise (Woods Hole, MA)
2023, Archival Pigment Print, 20" x 28"

Roadsigns from fuel depots along interstates are light mapped into a photograph looking out on Buzzard's Bay.

Could it All Look Like this Eventually? (Near Arco, ID)
2021, Archival Pigment Print, 20" x 30"