Swift Current Museum hosts travelling exhibition about Canada in a changing climate
The latest travelling exhibition on display at the Swift Current Museum provides a visual perspective on climate change in Canada and how Canadians are already adapting to this new reality.
The exhibition is titled To What Degree? Canada in a Changing Climate. It was created by the Canada Science and Technology Museum in partnership with the Government of Canada and Canadian Geographic.
“I think it’s important that we have travelling exhibitions, because it gives a different perspective on the subject,” Swift Current Museum Collections Officer William Shepherd said. “This one in particular is about adaptations regarding people, the environment and animals, and how they’re dealing with climate change. It’s able to tap into resources that we wouldn’t necessarily have locally and it provides that different perspective.”
He noted that the exhibition’s approach to the issue of climate change is interesting, because it is more about how Canadians are dealing with it.
“It’s talking more about how we are currently handling what we’re going through,” he said. “It’s everything from the changing climate and extreme event, heat and wildfires and storms, and how habitat is shifting and how humans and animals and the environment are adapting.”
The exhibition includes 18 large photo panels and each image includes some descriptive text to highlight the visual story.
“It is a little bit different than what we expect in a museum, but I think it’s almost as powerful or more powerful having those images, because it really enforces that this isn’t a hypothetical thing,” he said. “Here’s a photograph of something that is happening or that someone is going through and yes, the text does supplement and give the background, but the focus is definitely on the imagery and the photographs that get the message across.”
An image of a valley of charred trees with regrowth of colourful wildflowers reflects on the occurrence of more severe wildland fires as a result of climate change. An image of a Quebec vineyard highlights the potential expansion of Canada’s wine regions due to a warming climate.
A photograph of seawall infrastructure at Vancouver makes a reference to the increased risk of coastal flooding due to future rising sea levels as a result of a warming climate. Other images refer to the need for adaptations by indigenous communities to a changing climate and the need to develop green infrastructure.
Shepherd noted that all the photographs in the exhibition are striking, but a closeup image of a deer tick on human skin tends to attract attention. In addition to the yuck factor of this image, the text informs readers that a warming climate will cause the spreading of ticks to Canada.
“It’s not something that people growing up maybe had to deal with, but it’s something that we have to deal with more and more as habitats change,” he said. “They definitely have a negative stigma. Nobody wants one and that kind of creates a reaction, just the size of it and what it means in our daily lives.”
The Swift Current Museum added two interactive pieces to the exhibition that provides access to climate change related information. One computer allows users to play the educational game Reset Earth, which raises awareness about protecting the earth’s ozone layer.
The other computer provides a link to the NASA website about climate change, where exhibition visitors can take various quizzes to test their own knowledge about different aspects of climate change.
This is the third travelling exhibition hosted by the Swift Current Museum since January. Another one is scheduled for the final part of the year.
“These travelling exhibits have access to different information and perspectives,” he said. “So it can give a different tone and maybe explore things in a way that we wouldn’t necessarily do so here.”
The current exhibition about climate change will be on display at the Swift Current Museum until the end of September. Admission to the museum is free.
The museum is open on weekdays from 9 a.m. to 5 p.m. and Saturdays from 1-5 p.m. For more information about activities at the museum, call 306-778-2775 or watch for updates on their Facebook page (@SwiftCurrentMuseum).