Isostatic Rebound: Earthquake & Volcano Activity

Merapi Volcano Eruption.  Photograph Courtesy AFP.

For some time now I have tracked earthquake and volcano activity in this Climate Change portion of my blog. I do this because NASA data suggests that both Greenland and Antarctica are "moving" (known as isostatic rebound) as the ice weight melts off of them, and if it is true that one of the largest islands in the world, and THE largest continent start to flex, they will shift tectonic plates worldwide setting off earthquakes and increasing volcanic activity. Clearly, this has just been personal speculation on my part, and part of the beauty of being able to blog.

Now it seems the science community may be taking more notice of this possibility. I await their conclusions, but I am buying earthquake preparedness kits for my whole family now and not expecting the empirical evidence any time soon.

This summer when I was teaching in Jackson Hole, WY, we were rocked by a large swarm of quakes of small quakes (40 or more/4.0 magnitude) at a time when no local I spoke with can ever remember experiencing a quake. On September 26, Nebraska was rattled by a small 3.0+ in an area earthquake activity is considered extremely rare.

Unfortunately, these may just be "awakening" signs. In the winter of 1811-1812, The New Madrid fault zone in SE Missouri produced three of the strongest earthquakes to ever strike the continental U.S. And, more ominously, scientists have discussed for years the danger of the Yellowstone Basin "waking up" because Yellowstone IS an ancient volcano, and a prehistoric Yellowstone produced the largest and most cataclysmic volcanic eruption in the evolution of North America.

If a changing climate triggers these kinds of activities and events, I would like us all to consider the concept of keeping the climate as stable as possible, as soon as possible, please! I don't give a damn about whose fault these changes are, we need to address these changes.

The philosopher, Thomas Huxley, said, "Human existence is a race between intelligence and extinction".

Darwin's theory has also been misstated. He actually said that it is not the smartest, nor the fittest, but those that will adapt the most quickly that will survive.

The race is on. I hope those in the human population that don't think it is, wake up and start running. We need everybody thinking about this, and for human creativity to rise to the occasion and address these changes in our environment or humanity will no longer be a relevant species.

~ Robert Glenn Ketchum

#rgk

#lbp

Midway Geyser Basin and the Grand Prismatic Spring, a hot spring located in Yellowstone National Park. Photo credit: Mila Zinkova

FotoWeek DC 2010: NightGallery, November 6-13

"MORPHIC FORMS #2, WOOD-TIKCHIK", 2001.  Photograph © 2010 Robert Glenn Ketchum.  For Display Use Only, No Permission to Reproduce in Any Form.

If you're in the Washington, D.C. area November 6-13, 2010, be sure to take-in the "FotoWeek DC 2010 Festival".  Myself and several of my Fellows of the International League of Conservation Photgraphers (iLCP) will be showcased in the NightGallery.  Our select group includes myself, Robert Glenn Ketchum, Daniel Beltrá, Amy Gulick, Thomas P. Peschak, Cristina Goettsch Mittermeier, Paul Nicklen, Thomas D. Mangelsen, Garth Lenz, and Brian Skerry.  Click on their names to view their websites, and see below for photos from the NightGallery.

NightGallery welcomes a world-renowned team of curators: James Wellford, the senior photo editor at Newsweek magazine, will curate the special documentary program entitled 'Projections of Reality'; Andy Adams, editor of flakphoto, and curator Larissa Leclair will shape the fine art projections entitled '100 Portraits / 100 Photographers'; and Cristina Mittermeier, founder and president of the International League of Conservation Photographers will curate 'Life Lives Here.' *

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ABOUT NIGHTGALLERY:

To reach the greatest range of viewers, the curated photographs will rotate through various projection locations. Viewers can obtain a program guide to the themes, times, and sites for each projection series.

NightGallery projections can be enjoyed at many locations throughout Washington, including the exteriors of the Corcoran Gallery of Art and College of Art + Design, Newseum, Holocaust Museum, American Red Cross, National Museum of the American Indian, Human Rights Campaign Dupont Circle, House of Sweden, and the FotoWeek DC Satellite on 3333 M Street. 

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ABOUT FOTOWEEK DC:

Over the past three years, FotoWeek DC has skyrocketed as one of the world’s premier photography festivals. Tens of thousands of fans have come to expect the unexpected: colossal photo projections on the walls of the city’s famed architecture..., all-night photo experiences..., evocative exhibitions of award-winning images..., lectures and workshops by internationally renowned photographers.

Innovation. Creativity. Expansion. Transformation!  That’s the power of photography.  That’s the point of FotoWeek DC.  And it’s Everywhere You See.

* * * * * * *

* LIFE LIVES HERE, curated by Cristina Mittermeier

Statement:

"Life Lives Here... and nowhere else in the universe. These projections by Fellows of the International League of Conservation Photographers will shine a light on some of our planet's most beautiful and precious natural resources... and the threats facing them. We hope they will help connect-the-dots between cause and consequence on all our environmental decisions, and lead us to understand how every action has an effect on our planet, and all life on it."

~Cristina Mittermeier

Robert Glenn Ketchum:  "No Pebble Mine:  Wild Salmon of Bristol Bay Forever":

Photograph © 2010 Robert Glenn Ketchum.  For Display Use Only, No Permission to Reproduce in Any Form.

Daniel Beltrá:  "Gulf of Mexico Oil Spill":

Photograph © 2010 Daniel Beltrá for Greenpeace.  For Display Use Only, No Permission to Reproduce in Any Form.

Amy Gulick:  "Salmon in the Trees:  Life in Alaska's Tongass Rain Forest":

Photograph © 2010 Amy Gulick.  For Display Use Only, No Permission to Reproduce in Any Form.

 Thomas P. Peschak:  "Sharks:  Apex Predator, Human Prey":

Photograph © 2010 Thomas P. Peschak.  For Display Use Only, No Permission to Reproduce in Any Form.
CLICK HERE to See More Photos and Learn About the Save Our Seas Foundation

Cristina Goettsch Mittermeier:  "Kayapo:  Amazon River People on the Edge":

Photograph © 2010 Cristina Goettsch Mittermeier.  For Display Use Only, No Permission to Reproduce in Any Form.

Paul Nicklen:  "Bipolar Disorder:  Why Ice Matters":

Photograph © 2010 Paul Nicklen / National Geographic.  For Display Use Only, No Permission to Reproduce in Any Form.  CLICK HERE to See More of Paul Nicklen's Polar Obsession Photos in this NPR Feature

Thomas D. Mangelsen:  "American West:  A Disappearing Landscape":

"Song Dogs".  Photograph © 2010 Thomas D. Mangelsen.  For Display Use Only, No Permission to Reproduce in Any Form

Garth Lenz:  "The Alberta Tar Sands:  A New Addiction to the Most Toxic Oil":

Photograph © 2010 Garth Lenz.  For Display Use Only, No Permission to Reproduce in Any Form.

 Brian Skerry:  "3 Degrees of Japan's Seas":

Photograph © 2010 Brian Skerry.  For Display Use Only, No Permission to Reproduce in Any Form.   
Yello Goby living inside a discarded soda can in Suruga Bay, Japan.
CLICK HERE to See More of Brian Skerry's Photos in this Month's National Geographic Magazine, November 2010

 

FOTOfusion 2011 and New Website Launch

FOTOfusion®2011 Palm Beach Photographic Center January 11-15, 2011 PHOTOGRAPH, "OCTOBER 24 1983 / 2:10 p.m.", 1983 In 2010, American Photo magazine featured Robert Glenn Ketchum in their Masters series making him only the fifth photographer they have recognized this way in 20-years of publishing. Of the five honored, Henri Cartier-Bresson, Richard Avedon, Helmut Newton and Annie Liebovitz, Ketchum is unique because his imagery is based almost exclusively in the natural world. For 45-years Ketchum's fine prints, and bookmaking, have addressed critical national environmental issues while at the same time helped to define contemporary color photography. His advocate use of photographs and the media has inspired successive generations of artists to work on behalf of social and environmental justice, and led to the creation of the International League of Conservation Photographers (iLCP), of which Ketchum is a Founding Fellow. It has also resulted in Audubon naming Ketchum one of the 100 people "who shaped the conservation movement of the 20th Century." Ketchum has been a longtime friend of The Palm Beach Photographic Centre, and so it is with great pleasure that the Centre will acknowledge this designation from American Photo magazine by hosting a retrospective exhibit of Ketchum's career, January 2-April 3, 2010. The exhibit is timed to open during , a weeklong celebration of photography that the Centre has been hosting for twenty years. EMBROIDERY, "YK DELTA FROM 1,500", 2003 While an undergraduate at UCLA in the mid-1960's Ketchum studied with Edmund Teske, Robert Heinecken and Robert Fichter, three very groundbreaking, non-traditional image-makers. Their influence clearly defines a whole other aspect to Ketchum's work far more experimental than those images he has produced on behalf of conservation. In the early '80's, Ketchum entered China through the UCLA-China Exchange Program, and began to collaborate with some of the historic embroidery guilds of Suzhou to develop complex textiles based on his photographs. Some of the most recent examples of this embroidery and loom weaving, many of which took years to complete, will be included in this exhibit, as will new designs from the digital darkroom that Ketchum has recently developed for the embroiderers. Ketchum's distinctive, dimensional prints are in numerous collections including the Museum of Modern Art (NY), the National Museum of American Art (DC), the Museum of Contemporary Art, Los Angeles, and the Metropolitan Museum of Art (NY). Significant archives (more than 100 images) have been acquired by the Amon Carter Museum (TX) and the Huntington Library and Gardens (CA), and substantial bodies of work can be found at the High Museum (GA), the Los Angeles County Museum of Art, the Akron Art Museum (OH), Stanford University Art Museum (CA), the Herbert F. Johnson Museum of Cornell University (NY), and the National Museum of American Art. PHOTOGRAPHIC PANELS, "CHOOSE JOY", 2007 It is seldom that The Centre has the opportunity to feature a photographer that embraces such a diverse approach to photographic image making. In appreciation of Ketchum's long friendship with PBPC and his well-earned reputation as an inspiring teacher, during FOTOfusion The Centre will present Ketchum with their annual Mentors Award. In turn, Ketchum will honor a relatively unknown photographer with the Rising Star Award. Ketchum has selected Miguel Ángel de la Cueva, a young Fellow from the International League of Conservation Photographers who is doing remarkable work in Mexico and Baja. Ketchum would also like iLCP photographers to become regular attendees and contributors to FOTOfusion, so he is introducing several iLCP Fellows at this year's festival and they will be lecturing, exhibiting, and signing recent books. Get out of the cold of winter. Come to FOTOfusion in West Palm Beach, take in a little sun... and some great photography!

One final bit of news is that my social media team and I have spent the past few months redesigning my website and today it's finally ready to be revealed! A couple of things I like most about my new site are that while it showcases my art nicely, it also coordinates my social media network, and even has video capability!  In addition, my new site now hosts an online store... just in time for the holidays. It would mean the world to me if you'd stop by the new site at some point and check it out:  www.robertglennketchum.com. Sincerely, Robert Glenn Ketchum

Think before you vote.

"John Hopkins Inlet, Glacier Bay", From the book: "The Tongass: Alaska's Vanishing Rain Forest". Photograph © 2010 Robert Glenn Ketchum. For Display Use Only, No Permission to Reproduce in Any Form.

Before you vote, you might consider what my Chinese friends think of this election. As most of you know, I have been creating textiles in China since the early 1980's. This long working relationship with these Suzhou guild artists has also become an unusual friendship that is remarkably frank and honest considering the difference in our cultures. It may be worth noting what they perceive about this forthcoming election.

Basically there are two points: the lesser point is that the Chinese are amazed that so many people that know nothing about how the government is run have succeeded in getting on the ballot. This amazes them, but in its own weird way, it is proof to them of how democracy works. As they see it, our democracy has succeeded and failed simultaneously. Because it has succeeded, our country is now perfectly divided down the middle (a perfect democracy/the promise of the dao) and now nothing will ever be accomplished because of that division.

Point two is that the rise of the Tea Party is seen as a GREAT boon to the Chinese who predict that once the Tea Party candidates and similarly sympathetic Republicans are elected, they will throw our government systems into complete chaos, choking off any hope we may have for an economic recovery and retarding our industrial output, ALL TO THEIR ADVANTAGE. As one of my friends pointed out, after the election the "new" politicians will try to stifle global warming investments, so this leaves China with NO manufacturing competition in this market and lets them take TOTAL control of much of the future market technology directed at climate change. As our political body continues to deny climate change, events related to climate change will continue to get worse. When we finally wake up, it will be to late to invent anything, so we will just buy it from the Chinese.

It was pointed out to me that this will be a HUGE change in the world market. My friends feel the US has always led the world with its inventions. China may have manufactured for us, but the US invented most of the necessary products. Now they see themselves as inventing AND manufacturing the products, cutting us entirely out of the production market and reducing us to being dependent on technology they bring to us.

Think before you vote. The outcome may change life as we know it in the US.

~Robert Glenn Ketchum

* * * * * * *

I find it curious sometimes how some things dove-tail. A new ad was just brought to my attention that depicts a less-than-subtle approach to America's growing debt obligation to China.

The ad is produced by the conservative group, 'Citizens Against Government Waste', and it has attracted much attention already. In fact, Wang Baodong, a spokesperson for the Chinese Embassy in Washington, said that it's "unreasonable" to blame America's economic woes on China and "despicable" to incite anti-China sentiment.

Watch the video here:

And just in case the video is pulled from online, for whatever reasons, here is the synopsis:

The ad called "Chinese Professor," is set in "Beijing, China 2030 AD." It shows a lecture hall with a professor speaking in Chinese. The students carry futuristic tablets that make the iPad look clunky. The ad contains subtitles and starts with the professor asking, in Chinese, "Why do great nations fail? The Ancient Greeks...the Roman Empire...the British Empire...and the United States of America." Students gaze up at a holographic screen that shows images of the four superpowers. "They all make the same mistakes, turning their back on the principles that made them great," continues the professor. He goes on to say that America tried to "tax and spend" its way out of a recession, including a health-care overhaul -- all of which led to massive debt. "Of course, we owned most of their debt," he says with a laugh, "so now they work for us." Cue audience laughter.

THINK BEFORE YOU VOTE!

#rgk

'Extreme Exposure' at The Annenberg Space for Photography, October 23 - April 17

For those of you that are fans of photography here in LA and all you see is the tepid post-modernism put up by the museums, come check out this show at The Annenberg Space for Photography.  'Extreme Exposure', is a group exhibit that celebrates five photographers who thrive in environments that few dare to explore braving dangerous conditions in order to capture rarely seen moments in the life of our planet.

Clyde Butcher does the Everglades with a 16x20 camera and some of the most amazing prints ever.

Paul Nicklen and Michael "Nick" Nichols are friends and Fellows of iLCP who shoot some of NatGeo's most significant stories, and the O'Meara's love all things volcanic. 

Because it is animals and landscapes the museums claim it is not art. Make up your own mind, these guys are all doing something like no one else,...and making a difference with their work!!! 

Thank you to the Annenberg. It is a GREAT space.

ASPP West Coast Silent Auction

I am donating the above image to support the  work the National Wildlife Federation is doing in the Gulf.

ASPP West Coast Silent Auction

For 45-years Robert Glenn Ketchum's imagery and books have helped define contemporary color photography while also addressing critical national environmental issues. His advocate use of photography has inspired successive generations of image-makers to be purposeful with their work on behalf of social and environmental justice, earning his frequent comparison to Ansel Adams and Eliot Porter.

We are just under one week away - Get your tickets today at http://bit.ly/am9mhG

We have already received a proxy bid for one of the auction prints.

Please call 310-213-4352 if you are interested in starting the bidding on any of the images.

Hail Storm Hits Brooklyn & Lightning Strikes the Statue of Liberty

Photo credit:  Jay Fine/Caters News

Read my blog post about Climate Change & its effects here.

And check-out the Earthquake and Volcanic activities possibly related to Climate Change here.

#rgk

Climate Change

My ADHD mind operates in funny ways. I am a peripatetic collector of information related to subjects of interest. Before the “gathering” capacity of the internet, I clipped from newspapers and magazines and kept the clippings in manila folders sorted by subject. Those files tracked the complex politics and media battle of the Tongass rainforest. Other files like them served as the text base of my book, "OVERLOOKED IN AMERICA: THE SUCCESS AND FAILURE OF FEDERAL LAND MANAGEMENT" (Aperture, New York, NY, 1991). The information contained in it spanned 20-years of clipping collecting.

Callison, Charles and Robert Glenn Ketchum, "Overlooked in America: The Success and Failure of Federal Land Management", Aperture, New York, NY, 1991.

Currently two issues I follow closely are the struggle to protect the salmon fishery and wild parklands of southwest Alaska and Bristol Bay, and the growing effects of climate change around the world. The net offers me many more sources of information and many new ways to collect “clippings”.

Over the past 12-years I have published 2-books (Rivers of Life: Southwest Alaska, The Last Great Salmon Fishery, Aperture, NY, 2001 and Wood-Tikchik: Alaska¹s Largest State Park, Aperture, NY, 2003) and have put together a national traveling exhibit to protecting the parklands and wildlands of Southwest Alaska and offshore fishery of Bristol Bay from the industrial invasion of oil and gas leasing and a huge open pit mine.

I track things in the press that have meaning for me when I see their "collective” effect. Many times stories I believe are truly important are buried in short bytes on page 18 of some newspaper, or more often stories come from widely disparate world news sources so never all readable in one place. Blogging lets me present some of these collections to you in real-time as they occur so I am dedicating specific blogs to specific subjects if you would like to follow what I am tracking.

With regard to climate change, as most of you know, myself and many of my affiliates at the International League of Conservation Photographers (iLCP) have worked on related stories for more than two decades. My own tracking interests follow earthquake and volcano activity which I believe are being fueled by the ice melting off great land masses like Greenland and Antarctica, allowing those land masses to “move around” and disrupt all the other tectonic plates.

Photo Credit:  Les Scott.  Volleyball-sized hail from Vivian, SD, July 23, 2010. 

There is also amazing science and discovery related to weather, and thunderstorms in particular. Massive thunderstorms are delivering microburst rains that are setting rainfall records and flooding large parts of the world at this moment. These storms are also conjuring up ever-larger hailstones that are establishing records and wreaking awesome damage.

Photo Credit:  NASA.  554 Wildfires Rage Throughout Russia, Covering Moscow in Smoke, August 8, 2010.

Simultaneously, 2010 proved to be the hottest summer in world history causing raging wildfires worldwide. Russia burned and melted down, and how far north is Moscow? New research now has identified that mega storms and mega hail are fueled by the very specific particulate matter that is created from wildfires. So, as we get hotter and burn more, it makes the storms larger, more dangerous and capable of delivering more water. These storms are also off-the-chart electrical, and the lightening strikes just fuel more fires.

Photo credit:  Jay Fine/Caters News

 We rate hurricanes by degrees, Class 4, etc, tornadoes by force strength, F5, and earthquakes by numbers that top out at 10.0 That does not mean larger storms and earthquakes aren’t possible, we have just never seen them at such scale. Nor do I want to!

I am no scientist, I am just sayin', this is interesting, and I think it is much bigger than we know...

~ Robert Glenn Ketchum

#rgk

RGK on the Telluride Photo Festival

 I spent the last week teaching and lecturing at the 1st (and I hope, annual) Telluride Photo Festival, and I would like to thank everyone that cooperated to make it possible because it was a fantastic week and I think there is a great future for this event.

Executive Director, Eric Moore, dreamed the Telluride Photo Festival up, making a connection that seems obvious now - in the peak of fall, Telluride is one of the most spectacular locations in the Rockies and hosting a photographer's conference as seasonal colors changed would provide an amazing setting they might enjoy. No kidding! And if the colors were not enough, on Wednesday eve when we 'officially' passed from summer to fall, a midnight thunderstorm put down new snow on all the surrounding peaks and shimmering golden trees. It was quite a sunrise!

From Left-to-Right, Eric Moore, Crystal Geise.  Photograph 2010 Mark Christmas

Crystal Geise was Eric's 'right-hand' in all of this, but given the amount of work and coordination these events take, Crystal was more like the East Indian Goddess Kali with many arms. Nice job Crystal, I hope you stay with the festival and continue to help Eric grow this into one of photography's premier learning destinations.

From Left-to-Right, Robert Glenn Ketchum, Tom Mangelsen, Carlton Ward, Jr., Cristina Goettsch Mittermeier.  Photograph 2010 Mark Christmas   

An important aspect of this festival (certainly from my point of view) was that Eric wanted to specifically include photographers in the presentation program who were using their work in purposeful ways. To that end, he invited the International League of Conservation Photographers (iLCP), which I helped to found, and our fearless leader Christina Goettsch Mittermeier closed the festival with an inspiring view of iLCP Fellow's work worldwide that got a 'full-house' audience to stand up and cheer.

Be sure to check out the recent article by 'A Photo Editor' or 'APE', "Using Photography to Create Tipping Points Around Conservation," on the Telluride Photo Festival.

I would also like to thank Mountain Lodge Telluride for being a festival sponsor and offering great packages to house students and teachers. The accommodations are quite nice and the bar/restaurant is called 'The View'. My iPhone snap (see below), taken shortly after I checked-in confirms the truth of that, and it only got better after the snowfall. The pool/hot spa is a great luxury, and the public areas are graced with beautiful regional photography provided by their own Director of Communications, Neil Hastings ­ a very good photographer in his own right, and one of my workshop students for the week.

Photograph 2010 Robert Glenn Ketchum

Often the reward of participating in one of these festivals is the serendipity of networking and meeting someone that becomes a friend or that inspires you. My moment at this festival came on the night of my lecture when I shared the podium with fellow photographer, Ace Kvale. Ace has had an extraordinary career of high adventure following some of the world's best climbers up to summits never previously attempted, and base-jumpers down into abysses that would scare most of us to just to peer into. In the end, however, Ace had a significant shift in purpose and vision, making the decision to photograph the people of the places his adventures passed through, and then ultimately dedicating a good bit of his work to international doctors that do humanitarian surgery for people in these communities who are sightless, restoring their vision.

Photograph 2010 Ace Kvale

It turns out that many years ago Ace and I both did stories for the then-formative POWDER magazine, so thank you David Moe (founder of the mag) for giving us both a break as young photographers. Most importantly though, it is the way Ace closed his lecture that has truly stuck with me. His final picture is of the terribly battered hands of an old woman that he found begging on the sidewalk. It is a very sensitive and powerful shot, but the closer is Ace's comment that he looks at that picture all of the time to remind himself that he has NEVER had a bad day!

Photograph 2010 Ace Kvale

Kashmir Earthquake Survivor

Ace Kvale  2006

These hands belong to a woman. She was waiting in line as we handed out medicine in the cold winter light of December. 80,000 people had been killed in minutes. Hundreds of thousands of lives were affected. This woman was missing one foot from a land mine. She had a horse missing a hoof, also a mine. When I look at this image I am reminded that I’ve never known a moment of real hardship in my life.

Thank you, Ace, for your amazing journey to purposeful photography, and for helping me to remember that I have never had a bad day, either.

I hope to see many more of you at next year's Telluride Photo Festival!

#rgk

RGK Exhibit at Telluride Gallery of Fine Art: Sept 2010 Jan 2011

...stay tuned for more!

RGK Exhibiting at the Telluride Gallery of Fine Art

As many of you know from my previous postings, I will be teaching my final workshop of 2010 during the inaugural Telluride Photo Festival starting September 20th and running through the week. During the festival I will have a small exhibit of my Bristol Bay work at the Telluride Gallery of Fine Art.

On Friday evening, I will also lecture about the way I use my work to serve conservation purposes highlighting my current efforts to protect the wild salmon fishery of Bristol Bay from the disruption of the Pebble mine.

Because several of you have asked, the Telluride Gallery of Fine Art will also have a small inventory of my 16-color, lustrous silk scarf whose design has been derived from photographic imagery. There were only 200 of these scarves and shawls printed and they are nearly sold out, so remember, Christmas is just around the corner!

Telluride Gallery of Fine Art
130 East Colorado Avenue
PO Box 1900
Telluride, Colorado 81435
info@telluridegallery.com