Ryan Rusiecki’s Photography Will Change How You Think About Environmentalism

AGE: 26
BASED IN: Kingston, New York
NOMINATED BY: Lyle Ashton Harris 

My photographic practice playfully embraces the complexity located between the margins of art, ecology, and history. I collect physical items, like books, maps, vernacular photographs, or objects I find alongshore. They spark my imagination. I go to a wonderful used bookstore in Kingston, whose name is actually a reference to the Hudson River, at least once a week.

My practice is directly informed by the loosely-defined large-format photographic tradition, especially the work of An-My Lê, Elger Esser, Dawoud Bey, and Richard Misrach. These artists are exceptional practitioners of the photograph, who have used the medium as a way to embrace, and render visible the complexity of their subjects. My practice has [also] been informed by disparate sources beyond photography, including adventure stories like Moby Dick, the field of visual forensics, and Eyal Weizman's work—and pop culture phenomena such as Steven Spielberg’s 1975 film, Jaws.

The subject of my practice—the Hudson River estuary—is a globally rare habitat that is under threat by rising sea levels and climate change. It is a marginal space that has been rendered invisible by the built environment and the undulations of cultural interest. I have only been able to photograph the estuary after having spent four years of repeated return, and multidisciplinary research, to understand its nuances and visual fragility. I consider the estuary a friend.