Update:
Once we left Mahu Whenua, we returned to Wanaka to work with Martin Hill. He is a world-renowned sculptor who uses pieces of plants and rocks and such to create his works. His focus is extremely environmentally-friendly, and he designs his creations to harmlessly return to the natural place they came from. Most of his designs are circular and play on the reflective property of water.
Martin Hill and his partner, Phillipa Jones, were kind enough to invite us into their studio and home. They try to use their land as sustainably as possible; this idea created their very impressive vegetable garden and fruit orchard.
The next day, we met them at Butterfield Wetlands to attempt some sculpting of our own. Martin and Phillipa were lashing together dried sticks into the shape of a circle, then cutting it to make a donut and an arch. We helped them for a little bit, weaving the sticks together using bits of flax, then split off to make our own projects. He called our creative process "sketching," where we just took an hour to scavenge some materials and create whatever popped into our heads. Mine definitely started with no direction, but once it floated around in the rain for a bit, it took on the appearance of a half-sunk canoe; I was really pleased by it!
The morning after our day in the swamp, we returned to see how our sculptures had fared overnight. Mine had floated away or sunk, and I could not find it. I know it will decompose and maybe someday fertilize a new flax plant, which makes me very happy and excited about environmental art.
We left Wanaka and drove all day to the small town of Franz Josef. It is named after the large glacier that lurks in the nearby mountains. This glacier is special because it is the third of its kind; it exists in a temperate rain forest, building itself up from the constant rainfall and alpine landscape. However, it is only 2,000 ish meters above sea level. The glacial spread ebbed and flowed like the tide, constantly cycling through advancing and receding. People used to ice skate on it or climb it, but now the only route to the top is via helicopter for fear of rock slides. However, in the past few years, the glacier has undergone extreme shrinkage. It lost roughly 800 m since 2008. As we hiked up the path to reach its face, we passed several markers that pointed out how far the glacier extended at different times. Walking through the area formerly occupied by ice and snow but now dominated by rivers and trenches, it was really a sobering moment.
Climate Change:
In my opinion, the change in the glacier is proof of human-caused climate change. In the past century or so, humans have ramped up their pollution and production of greenhouse gases. This change in the chemical composition of our atmosphere has correlated with the largest net change in the glacial spread recorded since we first began measuring this glacier. It has advanced and receded, but its net change has been overwhelmingly negative. I think the fact that this has happened in the same timeframe as mass industrialization is no coincidence, and that the changes in Franz Josef are further evidence of anthropogenic climate change.
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