Shifting Tropics, 2024
"Shifting Tropics" explores a sobering reality: mangroves—tropical bastions of resilience and biodiversity—are pushing northward, taking root in places they’ve never been before. Through a blend of AI-generated images, intervened maps, documentary photography from the mangroves of Mata Oscura, Panama, this project examines the quiet, unsettling shifts underway as climate change nudges entire ecosystems toward unfamiliar territory.
Mangroves are nature’s guardians of the coast, sheltering diverse species, filtering pollutants, and protecting shorelines from storms. But as temperatures rise and freeze events decline, these salt-tolerant forests are expanding north, encroaching upon colder ecosystems that aren’t equipped for their arrival. Their presence in unexpected landscapes is not simply an example of adaptation—it’s a warning. The migration of these tropical trees disrupts existing habitats, alters the delicate balance of biodiversity, and raises complex questions about what is lost and gained as natural boundaries blur and ecosystems collide.
"Shifting Tropics" invites viewers to confront the visible and invisible impacts of climate change on our natural and cultural heritage. These surreal visions reveal a world caught off-balance, where the boundaries between past and future, tropics and temperate zones, collapse under the weight of warming temperatures. This journey of mangroves northward is both a testament to the tenacity of life and a stark signal of environmental upheaval, urging us to reckon with the profound and irreversible changes our planet faces.
Through this work, I hope to evoke both wonder and alarm, asking viewers to consider the deeper implications of nature’s migrations—a process that speaks to resilience but also foreshadows a world increasingly transformed, where the line between adaptation and survival grows ever thinner.
