Asia Society present this immersive photography and video exhibition, which brings to life the environmental and human costs of climate change, while also highlighting the innovative solutions that provide hope for a more sustainable future. At once intimate and universal, the powerful images capture the human face of climate change across the globe.

Comprising the work of more than 30 photographers from China and around the world, the exhibition traces a photographic arc from deep within coal mines to the melting glaciers of the greater Himalaya and across the globe, where rising sea levels and extreme weather events are wreaking havoc. The imagery in COAL + ICE is drawn from diverse materials, from glass-plate negatives to smartphone videos, spanning more than a century. Through intimate portraits and vast altered landscapes, these photographs document the consequences triggered by our continued reliance on fossil fuels.

The third floor of the exhibition takes things a step further to reflect the innovative ideas for climate solutions that have germinated most recently, with Maya Lin, Jake Barton (of Local Projects), and Superflux contributing to the actions we can take collectively.  Maya Lin’s project What Is Missing? comprises videos and a visually stunning and in-depth website, focusing attention on species and places that have gone extinct or will most likely disappear within our lifetime if we do not act to protect them. Jake Barton’s CarbonVision Cards provides visitors with take-home postcards. Organized by categories from fashion to finance to local government to K–12 schools, the postcards list fundamental changes that are needed.

Superflux, the London-based international award-winning design firm co-founded by Anab Jain and Jon Arden, has created New York, 2050: A Possible Future, a fully-immersive, multi-sensory, installation, in the final section of COAL + ICE. As visitors enter the space, experience what New York actually looked like in 2023, when Canadian fires coated its skies with a thick orange smog. The second space is a 360-degree, slow-moving, visual rendering of what the city could look like in 2050, with utopian views of self-sustaining rooftop, balcony, and indoor farms, pedestrian walkways and riverboats in place of cars, and wind and solar energy in place of coal and gas. New York 2050 invites viewers to take a step into New York in 2050 and beyond to experience what a hopeful future can look and feel like.

COAL + ICE is co-curated by Magnum photographer Susan Meiselas and international exhibition designer Jeroen de Vries, and led by Orville Schell, Asia Society Vice President and Arthur Ross Director of the Center on U.S.-China Relations.

History 

COAL + ICE was first developed by Asia Society’s Center on U.S.-China Relations for exhibition at Three Shadows Photography Art Center in Beijing in 2011. After publishing numerous policy reports on the urgent need for the U.S. and China to collaborate on climate issues, Orville Schell, the Center’s director, began looking for other methods of change: “In recognizing that policy alone could not solve this crisis, we began asking, how else can we go at this problem? One way was visually. If we could present something that was telling at the same time that it was beautiful, then maybe we could get people to look.” The exhibition traveled across China, and was on display at the U.S. Ambassador’s Residence in Paris during COP 21 before finally coming to the U.S., to Fort Mason in San Francisco and the Kennedy Center in Washington, D.C.

Through the curatorial vision of Susan Meiselas and Jeroen de Vries, the imagery in the exhibition has continued to evolve along with the climate crisis, most significantly with the addition of a growing set of works that visualize the human consequences of climate change, including droughts, floods, fires, and migration. That said, COAL + ICE is not a comprehensive photographic overview of the climate crisis, but rather a presentation of imagery curated from long-term, authored bodies of work, which demonstrate each photographer's commitment to capturing our changing environment and its human toll. Ultimately, COAL + ICE is about humanity, the resilience of the coal miners and their families, and also of those already dealing with the consequences of climate change.

The first presentation of COAL + ICE in Beijing was now over a decade ago, and yet the urgency to combat the climate crisis is more pressing than ever. What will ultimately move the needle? This exhibition, and our related programming series during its six month run, are an ongoing creative experiment to help catalyze more effective action

Visit coalandice.org for more information about the project and its history.

Song Chao
Miners - No. 7, Shandong Province, China, 2002
Photograph
Courtesy of the artist

Geng Yunsheng 
Zhenxiong, Yunnan Province, China, 2002
Photograph
Courtesy of the artist

Noah Berger
California, USA, 2020-2021
Photograph
Courtesy of the artist

Darcy Padilla
California, USA, 2017
from the After the Wildfires series
Photograph 
Courtesy of Agence VU’

Camille Seaman
Iceberg in Blood Red Sea, Lemaire Channel, Antarctica, 2016
Photograph
Courtesy of the artist

David Breashears
Mount Everest, Main Rongbuk Glacier, Tibet, China, 2007
Photograph 
Courtesy of GlacierWorks

Clifford Ross 
Nazaré Wave IX, Portugal 2022
Photograph
Courtesy of the artist

Gideon Mendel 
João Pereira de Araújo, Taquari District, Rio Branco, Brazil, 2015 
from the Submerged Portraits series
Photograph
Courtesy of the artist

Meridith Kohut
Mexico, 2019
Photograph
Courtesy of the artist

Ingka Group (IKEA) 
with Superflux (est. 2009, London, UK)
Detail from New York, 2050: A Possible Future, 2023
Video, sound, and scent installation with four-channel video
Duration: 3 minutes, 30 seconds 
Courtesy of Ingka Group (IKEA)

LEARN MORE ABOUT THE ARTISTS HERE

Participating Artists and Photographers

Jake Barton
Bernd and Hilla Becher
Daniel Beltrá
Noah Berger
Matt Black
David Breashears
Jimmy Chin
Bruce Davidson
Cameron Davidson
John Davies
Willem Diepraam
Anna Filipova
Geng Yunsheng
Lewis Hine
Jane Hirshfield
Joris Ivens
Dolf Kruger
Meridith Kohut
Maya Lin
Dana Lixenberg
George Mallory
Gideon Mendel
Niu Guozheng
Darcy Padilla
Gordon Parks
Clifford Ross
Camille Seaman
Vittorio Sella
Nichole Sobecki
Song Chao
Jamey Stillings
Henri Storck
Superflux
Peter van Agtmael
Major E. O. Wheeler
Witho Worms
Yu Haibo

Additional Contributors, Galleries, and Archives

Agence VU'
​​Louis Andriessen
British Antarctic Survey
China Features / China Photo Archive
Decaneas Archive
EUMETSAT
Fondazione Sella
Fonds Henri Storck
GlacierWorks
GRIMM
Ingka Group (IKEA)
L. Parker Stephenson Photographs, New York
Library of Congress
Magnum Photos
Royal Geographical Society
SK Stiftung Kultur
Tamasa Distribution
The Gordon Parks Foundation
The National Archives
University of Louisville Digital Collections
VII

COAL + ICE has joined forces with a wide range of artistic, environmental, and service organizations. While COAL + ICE is on view at Asia Society, these organizations will concurrently present climate-related programs to diverse audiences across the five boroughs and beyond. These collaborations aim to inspire deeper engagement and meaningful dialogue on how the climate crisis affects our global and local communities.

visit our Climate Action Partner page

(in alphabetical order):

American Museum of Natural History
Billion Oyster Project
Bronx River Alliance
Brooklyn Academy of Music (BAM)
Brooklyn Grange
Children’s Environmental Literacy Foundation
City of Water Day
Climate Fresk
Climate Film Festival New York
The Climate Museum
Dysturb
Fotografiska New York
French Institute Alliance Française
Hudson River Foundation/NY NJ Harbor & Estuary Program
Hunter College NYC Food Policy Center
International Center of Photography (ICP)
LA MAMA
Lincoln Center
Magnum Foundation
Melting Metropolis
National Sawdust
New York Botanical Garden
The New York Public Library
New York WILD Film Festival
NYU Gallatin WetLab
Park Avenue Armory
THE POINT Community Development Corporation
Queens Public Library
Staten Island Museum
The Trust for Governors Island
Waterfront Alliance
Working & Learning Together Electronics (WALTER)

Visualize and share your thoughts and ideas about the climate crisis with the COAL + ICE Climate Posterator.

Create Poster

The “Map of Memory” section of Maya Lin's What Is Missing? highlights ecological histories of habitats, species, waterways, and cities—with timelines, videos, historic accounts, conservation success and disaster stories, and user-submitted personal memories. 

Please share your own memory of the natural world, helping to make a global memorial something personal and close to home 

Share A Memory

By texting the phrase Future Me to 1 (877) 763-1612, you can talk with your “future self,” and hear about the impact of the climate actions you are going to take.

The chatbot is part of The Accelerator 2050, a time machine inviting visitors to see, talk, and inhabit a conditional future, one that is still in flux and undecided, from artist Jake Barton.

COAL + ICE is funded by the generous contributions of The Schmidt Family Foundation, Janet Ross, Rockefeller Brothers Fund, Bloomberg Philanthropies, Frank and Susan Brown, Adobe, Jerome Dodson, Stephanie Hui, Denise and Andrew Saul, Carlo Mormorunni and Magdalena Gross, and Anonymous Donors. Additional support is provided by Nancy Stephens and Rick Rosenthal, Laumont Editions, and Jane Shaw.

Support for Asia Society Museum is provided by Asia Society Council on Asian Arts and Culture; Asia Society Friends of Asian Arts; Arthur Ross Foundation; Sheryl and Charles R. Kaye Endowment for Contemporary Art Exhibitions; The Hazen Polsky Foundation; The Mary Griggs Burke Fund, and Mary Livingston Griggs and Mary Griggs Burke Foundation; the New York State Council on the Arts with the support of the Office of the Governor and the New York State Legislature; and the New York City Department of Cultural Affairs in partnership with the City Council.