Acceleration Lake

2023

When we imagine environmental crisis we see devasted landscapes, urban development, massive industrial plants, mountains of waste, and overpopulation. We rarely imagine a well-kept conservation area with an undisturbed lake surrounded by a boardwalk and a recreated historical Iroquois village. Yet this is the scene that represents the Anthropocene—the geological epoch marked by human impact. Crawford Lake, a tiny body of water located in a small conservation area in the heavily industrialized region close to Toronto, is the "golden spike" that marks the moment of global human impact on Earth. The very deep lake stores layers of sediment that track the climate over thousands of years and show us that climate change has accelerated exponentially through the unfettered expansion of industrialization, consumerism, population, and profit. Tourists seek relaxation and enlightenment from serene scenes that frame a view of how it was before colonization while also marking the unrelenting process of a human-made environmental crisis. Acceleration Lake is a work-in-progress project that documents a unique site that portrays the contradictory ways we experience the Anthropocene.