Envision Resilience: Shifting Tides and Evolving Landscapes

Envision Resilience: Shifting Tides and Evolving Landscapes

This exhibition Envision Resilience: Shifting Tides and Evolving Landscapes brings together seven Maine-based artists and creative design research from graduate and undergraduate students in the 2024 Envision Resilience Portland and South Portland Challenge.

Artists Ben Spalding, Haley Nannig, Ian Ellis, Jordan Carey, Lokotah Sanborn, Michel Droge and Posey (aka Pamela Moulton) explore resilience through sculpture, painting, installation and mixed media. Some reflect on the emotional and cultural connections to a changing coastline, while others imagine speculative futures or experiment with materials that embody adaptation. Their work challenges us to see climate change not just as a crisis but as an opportunity for new ways of thinking, feeling and creating.

In conversation with these works, design students from the 2024 Envision Resilience Portland and South Portland Challenge highlight the role of artistic practice in research and design. Throughout their semester, the students turned to the artistic process to deepen their understanding of place and engage with the subtleties of Portland and South Portland’s landscapes.

Together, these works remind us that adaptation is not just about solutions but is also about understanding the world through a new lens. Whether through painting, sculpture, research or design, they ask: How do we see, feel and shape the changing tides? And how can creativity help us navigate the uncertain waters ahead?

Learn more at envisionresilience.org/exhibitionsevents.

About Envision Resilience

Envision Resilience works to advance innovative city planning and design in the face of climate change through student and community partnerships. By connecting current and future professionals working across disciplines, the organization creates opportunities for communities to reimagine climate challenges and inspire resilient solutions. Envision Resilience, originally developed by Remain, is part of the philanthropic organizations and initiatives created and funded by Eric and Wendy Schmidt to work toward a healthy, resilient, secure world for all.

Host or Publisher Envision Resilience