Photography brings threats to oceans into focus
Award-winning photographers Shane Gross and Cristina Mittermeier are using their images to aid global marine and freshwater ecosystem conservation efforts, and to bring public attention to the importance of our oceans.
Gross, a co-founder of the Canadian Conservation Photographers Collective, and Mittermeier, who is also a trained marine biologist, joined journalists Jenn Thornhill Verma and Ryan MacDonald in a pair of conversations at a Globe and Mail event in Toronto on June 24, in partnership with Rolex. They discussed the power of photography to spur change, responses to some of the best-known images, and current areas of focus.
Questions and answers have been edited for length and clarity.
Jenn Thornhill Verma: You've experienced the ocean from so many different places. What commonalities do you see from behind the camera?
Shane Gross: The creatures and the currents don't care about our borders. One example is humpback whales: they'll migrate from Antarctica to French Polynesia. We need to do what we can to make sure that we are protecting not just what's in our waters but beyond that. A big topic of discussion today is the global oceans treaty. Beyond countries' (boundaries) there is still a lot of ocean, and right now it's completely lawless. The global ocean treaty is a United Nations event that hopefully will put some rules in place for that because we desperately need it.
JTV: Your seahorse photo is a prime example of how bringing people to an environment they otherwise would not have the opportunity to experience can lend itself to pushing a policy envelope. Talk to us about that image.
SG: The place in the photo is Seahorse National Park in the Bahamas. When I first started snorkelling there, we didn't even know what species of seahorses were there. I met with a scientist, Dr. Heather Masonjones, in 2016, and she went and counted how many seahorses were in there. In this pond that's a kilometre-and-a-half by a kilometre, she counted 800,000 seahorses. At the time there was a proposal to turn it into a marina, and also people taking seahorses to sell for the aquarium trade. We teamed up with conservation organizations to get this place protected. We gave talks at schools and used my photo to show the kids, we held community meetings, went to the government and met with the prime minister. It took almost 10 years but it is now fully protected. It's an example that it takes time and it's hard work, but change can happen and photography can be a big tool in that.
JTV: How do you choose between sharing stunning images of the natural environment and these painful truths of what we're doing to the environment?
SG: A friend of mine did a study for her PhD: she set up a photo gallery using some of my images that showed beautiful pictures with a donation box, then a gallery with hard-to-look-at reality images and a donation box. Then she did a third one that showed both, and a donation box. The first two received about the same amount of donations. It was the third one, showing the balance of the two, that got the most amount of donations. We need and we deserve to see both sides. But we also need to help people to fall in love with the ocean and care about it, and you're going to do that by showing mostly the beauty, in my opinion.
JTV: How do you get to know the creatures you photograph, and how does getting to know them influence your work?
SG: For me as a kid I know when I would go to the school library and take out a book, there were certain pages I would stop on: 'Wow, look at this fish called the royal grandma. It's half purple and half yellow, isn't that amazing?' I know that could happen for somebody else, and inspire them. It's about finding out what it is about the species or habitat you can show in as cool of a light as possible.
Ryan MacDonald: Are there specific issues you want to bring to the forefront in this day and age?
Cristina Mittermeier: Canada is a magnificent country. We can choose to coast and feel lucky that we have these resources, or we can be leaders. When I think of the high seas treaty and the countries that have yet to sign it, people are no longer looking at the United States for leadership, but they're going to be looking at us. So much of that hinges on public support. The work that I do is galvanizing public attention, maybe showing you something that you hadn't thought about before and the next time you read about it you'll know it's important.
RM: Your photo of kelp speaks to relatability, and it also speaks to conservation. Can you tell us why something like kelp matters as much as all the other images of these beautiful creatures?
CM: The ocean is the ecosystem that allows life to exist on planet Earth; it produces half of the oxygen we breathe. Biomes like kelp, like sea grass, are part of this machinery that's absorbing carbon dioxide. The ocean has absorbed 90 per cent of the excess heat on the planet, and now you can see it's no longer able to cope. We were in Indonesia six months ago and the water was 32.5 degrees — just uncomfortable for a human. Imagine what it's like for fish. As a result, we're seeing ecosystems degrade. We need to keep the ocean alive.
RM: Tell us about your foundation, how does that figure into your work?
CM: SeaLegacy was born when my husband (Paul) and I were shooting an assignment for National Geographic on the Pacific blob (mass of warm water) in 2017, and the temperature of the water from California to Alaska was four to seven degrees warmer than it's supposed to be. The fish sunk to deeper, cooler water, so animals like sea lions were starving. There was also an overabundance of some algae. When it gets too warm they over-bloom and produce toxic substances; when animals eat it, they experience full-body paralysis. It was a horrific thing to photograph, just thousands of dead animals. Paul said to me, 'we have to do more.' We decided to leave National Geographic and start a non-profit. The idea was to take our images and ability to communicate and shine light on the beautiful solutions happening and also on the horrors, to give hope and be a reminder.
RM: We're in a fight for truth around the world, so I want to talk a bit about what you're doing to fight against artificial intelligence in image making.
CM: It's such a threat to the work of any creative, and the saddest part of it is that we didn't know. When you start uploading your photos to (social media), the tiny little print said they could use all that data to train their robots. The first defence we have is our reputation, truthfulness and credibility. But the second one is I'm part of a coalition of photographers that started an app that opts images out of AI training. We're trying to turn the tap off.
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