Reflection

The prompt, “Tell Your Climate Story,” immediately sparked my memories of the raging forest fires that have been taking place in Greece, my ancestral country. During my family and I’s summer trips to return to our home-village, we have been threatened by wildfires. Although wildfires have been ever present in Greece’s history, recently they burn for longer and spread farther because of hotter and drier climates due to climate change, a topic I have explored. My piece takes a photo of my “Mama” and I in our village, but replaces the beautiful mountains with a crashing wave of fire and smoke. The wave represents a barrier that climate change, and the subsequent powerful fires, place between me and visiting and learning about my culture; it also represents an incoming future inflicted with weather disasters. Us people are typically placed in the foreground, with little attention or care for the future; so, I minimized the effect of my Mama and I by placing us in black and white, in order to force viewers to see how climate change (the wave) affects us. I even used two mediums, charcoal and marker, to create further contrast between elements. Climate change is a global issue, and every action we take to prevent further warming is beneficial to every aspect of our lives.