Wild tigers may be on their way back to Kazakhstan. This news is surprising for a few reasons. First, most people associate tigers with the jungles of India or Sumatra, even the snowy slopes of eastern Russia—not the dry landscapes of Central Asia. But Iran, Turkey and Kazakhstan were once home to thriving populations of […]
By Jason Bittel In Disney’s latest animated release, titular character Moana and a demigod named Maui dive to the bottom of the ocean to do battle with a giant, David Bowie–channeling crab in a place called the Realm of Monsters. But it’s not just for kicks and a catchy dance number, of course. Maui has […]
By Clara Chaisson Like so many citizens of the world, Monica Rowand spent the weeks following the presidential election feeling panicked about how the Trump administration could roll back years of hard-fought environmental progress. “I really didn’t know what I could do,” she said. But as she watched the Trump cabinet fill with climate change […]
By Clara Chaisson Elephants are extinct. If that sentence became fact, how would you feel? Artist Jenny Kendler’s Music for Elephants: A Eulogy for the Future attempts to evoke the grief of such a loss through a seamless combination of piano music, data and symbolism. The 10-minute song is a translation of projected elephant population […]
By Clara Chaisson The image of a solitary polar bear stranded on a melting ice floe is the unofficial poster child of the climate movement. But the world’s climbing temperatures are threatening more than charismatic megafauna; people’s lives and cultural heritage are at risk, too. With his portraits, artist Sean Yoro is helping to put […]
By Clara Chaisson Since April, thousands of demonstrators have been camping out at the confluence of the Cannonball and Missouri Rivers on the Standing Rock Sioux reservation in North Dakota. These peaceful water protectors—representing more than 200 Native-American tribes, plus many nonnative allies—are demanding a halt to the construction of the Dakota Access Pipeline, which […]