On the occasion of Climate Week NYC, Asia Society Announces Plans for Six-Month Photography Exhibition in New York 

New York; September 18, 2023 — Climate change will take center stage at Asia Society in 2024, with the presentation of COAL + ICE, an immersive photography and video exhibition and climate-related programming series, over a six-month period from February 13 through August 11, 2024. Initiated in 2011, COAL + ICE is an ongoing, evolving, initiative that has traveled to three continents, and that visualizes the causes and consequences of the climate crisis and foregrounds creative solutions. 

The exhibition brings together the work of more than 50 photographers from China and around the world, and 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 continued reliance on fossil fuels. The exhibition 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 Asia Society, the exhibition will be presented in four floors of the building.

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. 

A series of speaker events, performances, films, and more will take place throughout the run of the exhibition. Highlight participants include Susie Ibarra, Yo-Yo Ma, Peter Sellars, and Abigail Washburn. Asia Society will join forces with a network of organizations across New York City’s five boroughs to concurrently present exhibitions and events, expanding the conversation to inspire deeper engagement on how the climate crisis affects our global and local communities. Current participating organizations include, with more to be announced at a later date: BAM (Brooklyn Academy of Music), Billion Oyster Project, Bronx River Alliance, Children’s Environmental Literacy Foundation, Climate Fresk, The Climate Museum, Fotografiska, Global Warming Mitigation Project/Keeling Curve Prize, Hudson River Foundation/NY NJ Harbor & Estuary Program, Hunter College NYC Food Policy Center, International Center of Photography, National Sawdust, NYU Gallatin WetLab, NY Wild Film Festival, Queens Memory Project, Staten Island Museum, Swale House, The American Museum of Natural History, The New York Public Library, and WildAid. 

First developed as an exhibition for Three Shadows Photography Art Center in Beijing in 2011, COAL + ICE has since been shown across China, in Paris during COP21, and most recently at the John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts in Washington, DC in 2022. COAL + ICE continues to evolve and, in New York, the exhibition will include a newly curated section that allows visitors to envision possible futures. 

Find out more about the project and its history at coalandice.org.