Isabelle Scott - 2022

Artist Statement

For my final project, I decided to craft three poems which reflect some of the key concepts I have learned this semester about human impact on the planet. The first poem, “sea bones,” is inspired by our study of coral reefs and the coral bleaching phenomenon—which is occurring because of climate change and global warming. In this poem, I hope to inform the reader of the destruction of our coral reefs and how we as human beings are directly responsible for this; however, we still have the chance to stop this extinction. It is not too late to address these issues of global warming and human-caused climate change. The second poem, “soil lessons,” looks at the complex soil system as a reminder of the complexity of our own human systems and earth systems—showing how everything is connected and intertwined. The final poem, “Exponential Economic Growth,” uses some of the most impactful quotes from Dr. Davies’ Anthropocene lectures and arranges these quotes in a way which reflects to the reader the issue of exponential economic growth and its unsustainability. This poem follows a “graph-like” structure to lead the reader into a mindset of what it means to have exponential growth in an economy and the issues with our current system.