Daryl King

ew Yorkers have never been known as environmentalists. We restrict our outdoor activities to parks, and even committed progressive activists focus their energy on more immediate concerns. Amid the general feeling of indifference that permeates American attitudes towards the environment, “Ecotopia,” at the International Center of Photography's Triennial, strikes at the core of apathy by showing images that disturb and raise consciousness.

The first images to confront visitors are photographs from Robert Adams' series, Turning Back. From 1999 to 2003, Adams trailed through Oregon and other states for the bicentennial of the Lewis and Clark expedition. Today, Lewis and Clark would be aggrieved to discover huge deforested areas along the trail. Adams's photography shows that what was once lush and majestic has now become a natural cemetery. The desolate tree trunks resemble tombstones, reminding the viewer of what was. Arguably didactic but immediately striking images like these pervade the exhibit.

Sophie Ristelhueber, Iraq

Iraq, by Sophie Ristelhueber, explores the destruction of nature in a different context, with three chromogenic prints. Ristelhueber's work shows charred and devastated fields of palm trees, exposing the destruction of the environment as a tragic but often overlooked facet of war's devastation.

Even well-intentioned interventions in the natural order can go astray. Goran Devic´'s film, Imported Crows, tells the story of a gypsy moth infestation in Sisak, Croatia, in the 1950s. Gypsy moths are highly destructive to the environment; if left unchecked, the moths can deforest an area within one to three years. The townspeople decided to import crows to get rid of the moths. However, the crows multiplied to the point where they are now a problem. Born in Sisak, Devic´ captures scenes of city employees climbing into trees and destroying crows' nests. The film ends with the camera lingering on the fragile bodies of baby birds lying among the twigs of their broken nests.

Wang Qingsong addresses Chinese politics and its environmental fallout. The first photograph of the work, entitled Come! Come!, shows protesters carrying signs with political slogans. The next photo shows debris left after the protest. The ironic final photo, taken from behind the protesters, reveals an advertisement on the backs of their banners. Other works address contemporary politics closer to home. Using a heat-sensitive trap camera, Mark Dion captured images of Pennsylvania deer and other forest wildlife. He displays these photographs alongside an installation of office furniture and photo equipment. The whole exhibit is satirically titled The Bureau of Remote Wildlife Surveillance.

Not all of the works tell such clear morality tales. Two pieces by Adam Broomberg and Oliver Chanarin, Rabin Park and The Saints' Forest, convey a deeply ambiguous narrative. They present photographs of strikingly beautiful forest scenes that suggest, at first glance, North American idylls. The accompanying text reveals that the forests were planted over Palestinian villages evacuated after 1948. The artists write that the seemingly timeless forests are actually “political constructions,” inverting the typical sequence of humans destroying forests. It is impossible not to see these forests as both a crime against people and a gift to the earth.

“Ecotopia” is much broader and subtler than an environmentalist polemic. It portrays the human and natural worlds as tightly intertwined, suggesting that any human action has implications for the environment and that the violence we commit to our surroundings and one another inevitably turns on us. Even New Yorkers would do well to pay attention to this lesson.