Virtual Presentation: Artist Barbara Boissevain: December PHOTOVOX

For December’s online Photovox, don’t miss the chance to hear Barbara Boissevain talk about her long-term project begun in 2010 and now culminating in a monograph.
“Since the 1800s, the ecosystems of the tidal marshes have been replaced by salt ponds, and in her new book, Salt of the Earth: A Visual Odyssey of a Transforming Landscape (Kehrer), California-based photographer Barbara Boissevain documents the efforts being made to return these spaces to their natural state. She thinks of her book, which explores the nexus of art, science and environmental activism, as a “love letter” to the San Francisco Bay where she grew up and raised her two daughters. In Salt of the Earth Boissevain set out to document humanity’s impact on the environment and raise awareness of the need for preservation of pristine spaces. In addition to the salt industry’s impact on the biodiversity in these regions, the natural systems of the wetlands are a barrier to the encroaching sea level and work much better than the man-made levees that existed to trap the salt water and harvest the salt for the salt industry. The book combines several visual perspectives of the area–aerial, ground, and underwater–allowing the viewer to see the comprehensiveness of the damage to the landscape, and also the beginnings of transformation. Boisseven comments on how the images work together to present a more comprehensive narrative of the issues at hand, as well as the progress being made so far. She also notes the discrepancy between the natural beauty of the once wild spaces within proximity to multinational social media campuses.”

Speaker: Barbara Boissevain
Location: Online (through Zoom-link in registration email)
Cost: Free for CPAC members; $10 for non-members

Photo Credit: ©Barbara Boissevain