Catherine Canac-Marquis – Sungazing

While California recently adopted a law that requires it to obtain 100% of its electricity from clean energy sources by 2045, new infrastructure is needed to meet demand that paradoxically threatens natural habitats of the American Southwest. Millions of hectares of protected areas – from the iconic Joshua Tree National Park to the distant Mojave Desert – are currently under threat from the pressure of the solar energy lobby. Because large-scale solar installations transform lands where they’re located into a new kind of built environment, Catherine Canac-Marquis seeks to emphasize the importance of understanding an ecosystem before irrevocably changing it. She is interested in the impact of solar development on conservation values in the California deserts, and how to achieve a balanced plan for addressing both biodiversity preservation and greenhouse gas emissions reduction. With her images, she presents a lyrical vision of solar energy, as well as its exploitation. Punctuated with allusions to the sun, her images oscillate between the representation of wildlife and other forms of biodiversity adapted to the desert and its immensity, the visible consequences of global warming, and infrastructures allowing the production of clean and renewable energy.

Catherine Canac-Marquis is a French-Canadian photographer living and working in Long Beach, California. Her most recent work is broadly focused with the study of the desert ecosystems and geosystems of the American Southwest, and addresses the major environmental issues of our century, such as water scarcity, preservation of natural environments, desertification, and climate change. Her practice is research-based, and promotes the use of current scientific knowledge, data collection and field studies. She recently co-founded Envelope, a collective that aims to empower female artists while sustaining their creative growth as they pursue professional editorial work. She is also an executive committee member of the Long Beach Chapter of the Surfrider Foundation, a non-profit organization dedicated to the protection and enjoyment of the world’s ocean and beaches, for all people, through a powerful activist network. She holds a Bachelor of Fine Arts with Distinction from Concordia University (Montreal, Canada) and recently completed a Graduate Certificate in Climate Change at Laval University (Quebec City, Canada). She is currently pursuing a Bachelor of Science in Interdisciplinary Studies (Environmental Science, Geography and Sustainability) between Laval University and the University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA). Her work has been included in solo and group exhibitions at The Reykjavik Museum of Photography (Reykjavik, 2019), The Letter Bet (Montreal, 2018) and Gallery 44 | Centre for Contemporary Photography (Toronto, 2017).