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This book brings together Indigenous and non-Indigenous artists and scholars to explore how environmental changes in the Arctic are being experienced, understood, and represented. As climate change unfolds across vast geographies and long timescales, its impacts-on identity, wellbeing, cultural resources, and ways of life-are intimate, abrupt, and deeply felt.
Across thirteen chapters, authors from diverse regions, disciplines, and artistic practices document and respond to these shifts, offering nuanced insights into the lived realities of a warming North. From ephemeral transformations in the land to the erosion of shared memory and subsistence traditions, these creative and scholarly responses serve as powerful forms of witnessing and response. Rather than relying solely on metrics or models, this volume emphasizes sensory, emotional, and cultural knowledge, foregrounding how individuals and communities are making sense of, and responding to, ecological disruption. It offers a vital perspective on the disproportionate and uneven impacts of climate change, and the urgent need to attend to its effects at both personal and planetary scales.
This is an essential resource for scholars, students, and practitioners in environmental history, Indigenous studies, climate policy, art and visual culture, and global development, and for anyone seeking new ways to engage with environmental change through art, experience, and collaboration.
List of contents
Acknowledgements Introduction by Antonia Sohns
Part 1 Art as witness 1 Observation of change as a new genre Arctic art by Maria Huhmarniemi and Anja Kath Lande 2 Community Photography as a tool for witnessing environmental change and contamination in Labrador by Jessica Penney and Eldred Allen 3 Sensing, Storytelling, and the Sacred: Two Creative Multimedia Projects Exploring Arctic Change by Chris Dunn 4 Silmin (from weather) by Erin Gingrich
Part 2 Art as response 5 Exploring perceptions of Northern Landscapes through nature photography by Petri Hoppu and Esa Pekka Isomursu 6 Art and Activism on the Antlers by Mirja Hiltunen and Korinna Korsström-Magga 7 Knowing with the Seatrout: Place-specific Artwork for Addressing Environmental Conflict by Timo Jokela 8 Artistic experience and response to climate change in the Republic of Sakha (Yakutia) by Vera Solovyeva 9 The Glutton by Brendan Griebel and Jude Griebel
Part 3 Artistic practices that may deepen connection or reconnect people or communities with the environment and cultural heritage 10 To heal the woods of the earth (and the mind) through play and art by Antti Stockell and Nina Luostarienen 11 Blueprints and the topography of loss by Hannah Perinne Mode 12 Arctic Encounters: Material Culture, Indigenous Worldviews and AI projections by Elisa Palomino and Jonathan Katz 13 At the river - stepping in the flow by Timo Jokela Conclusion by Antonia Sohns
About the author
Antonia Sohns earned her PhD in Geography from McGill University (2020). Her research and work focus on water security and climate change adaptation. She holds an MSc in Water Science, Policy and Management from the University of Oxford (2011) and a BSc in Earth Systems, Oceans track from Stanford University (2010). She has conducted environmental and social science research from the Arctic to the tropics, including for the Smithsonian Tropical Research Institute in Panama and for international NGOs. She currently works for the World Wildlife Fund for Nature.
