RISING ATLANTIC: Continuing Work on Climate Change Ann Shapiro

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Ceres Gallery is pleased to present Ann R. Shapiro's continuing work on climate change. 

The world is increasingly being affected by the transformation of earth's climate. Often, what is local really provides us with understanding and knowledge, and Shapiro being a New Englander seriously informs her sensibility. For her,  the only doubt remaining regarding sea rise as a result of climate change is how much and when. The oceans will continue to rise and the time will come when the water will rise and the surge will stay.

Shapiro has scoured the digital world for maps and images depicting this imminent catastrophe. She alters and layers these images, adjusts them and splices them to form visually arresting and heart-rending pictorial expressions of her reaction to the destruction of her world. 

The digital works in this exhibition are specifically of Boston and  Boston Harbor. Each of them shows aspects of Boston itself, both past and present. Two of the digital pieces have tables that show the increase in sea rise and tidal flooding that has already happened and predict the size of future sea rise and tidal flooding. Another table displays the predicted increase in 100 degree days. Two digital pieces contain three maps which depict future sea level rise in very particular ways.  

Memory and forebodings as well as the past and the future form the underlying rationale and bases of the paintings. They embody Shapiro's fears but in more abstract form and are powerful in their open narrative but informed by the digital work. Each communicates the artist's inner turmoil in a very unique way.