Peril & Promise Instagram Reporting
For Peril and Promise's Instagram page, I individually researched, reported, photographed and wrote The Audubon Mural Project Photoseries. Please visit the Instagram page for more posts.
#AudubonMuralProject - The Reddish Egret is one of the rarest Egrets in North America. Climate change is its largest threat, putting this bird at-risk. The Reddish Egret mostly keeps a permanent residence in the lagoons and salt marshes in coastal Florida and Texas. This specific type of habitat is becoming increasingly sparse due to sea level rise, which threatens to overflow the small estuaries and shallow shorelines that the Reddish Egret breeds in. The artist, Matthew Woodward aka @theroyalbucketmaker, chose to depict this bird after a trip to Florida enlightened him to the realities of climate change. The project, he explains, is a fitting parallel to Washington Heights: "Washington Heights is a species of New York that is being ruined by #gentrification. The ecology of this city is deteriorating around people who built their lives here, much like the birds who are experiencing a loss of habitat and displacement," Woodward explains.
#AudubonMuralProject - On 156th and Broadway, artist @mr_mustart has painted the House Finch on the grates of now-defunct Restaurante la Libertad. This is Mr. Mustart's second mural for the @audubonsociety and @gitlerand - his first, on the walls of a nearby coffee shop, was painted over when the shop decided to redesign. Mr. Mustart mentions that that is some of the risk associated with street art. The House Finch is considered a fairly common bird that inhabits most populated regions of North America. However, only 31% of its summer habitat is stable - and there is only expected to be a 3% increase in its summer habitat in the next 62 years. Relatively, the House Finch is predicted to remain stable compared to more threatened North American species
On the side of a Harlem apartment ramp, almost hidden, is a mural of a Black-chinned Hummingbird. This tiny bird hovers over a flower collecting pollen, but that’s not the point of this painting. Instead it tells the story of this beloved bird’s survival. @ashlisisk is a New York-based artist who created this piece as part of the #AudubonMuralProject. Hummingbirds are important pollinators. Warming weather due to climate change is disrupting flower bloom cycles, and as a result, harming the Hummingbird’s livelihood and the plants they pollinate.
#AudubonMuralProject - The Cerulean Warbler migrates every spring from the Andes to Eastern United States to breed. Climate change has threatened the deciduous forests they rely on for breeding so much so that 98% of their breeding habitat is expected to be gone by 2080. Over 50% of the forests where they breed have been cleared and turned into farmland and cities as of 2006.
Here, artist Tom Sanford aka @uberkunsthas painted the bird on John James Audubon's shoulder on a boarded window on 149th street. Tom, a Washington Heights resident, says, "New York City and Upper Manhattan are associated with the birth of graffiti art, which has flourished into a massive street art movement. The project connects that street art [legacy] with Audubon, who lived here and canonized American art."