a one-year photographic survey of alaska for wilderness conservation and culture preservation.
The Great Alaska Project is a year long documentary and fine art photography project being undertaken by Joshua Klein to create a visual record of Alaska at a critical moment of its ecological and cultural history.
Spurred by the accelerating effects of climate change and the recent opening of the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge to oil exploration, the project aims to create a large body of photographs that will function both as a work of fine art and as a catalyst for wilderness conservation & cultural preservation.
The project will engage the power of photography — as it has from Carleton Watkins to Ansel Adams to Sebastião Salgado — to forge an emotional connection to the nature and people of Alaska.
THE PROJECT
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One year | Four seasons
Twenty weeks on the ground covering all four seasons over the course of one year. The project will begin during the long days of summer and continue through the dark Arctic winter— allowing time for deep engagement and the understanding needed for documentary work.
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Monochrome Photography
The project will be photographed on a specialized monochrome digital camera system, capturing luminosity, texture, and tonal range beyond that of conventional camera systems. The mural-scale prints will be master printed for both subtle nuance and emotional impact.
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FACES OF ALASKA
The subjects will include the faces of Alaska's people — from the Gwich'in people of the North Slope, whose culture is tied to the caribou migration, to the commercial fishermen of Bristol Bay. Photography of Indigenous peoples will be conducted in partnership with tribal consultants.
THE URGENCY OF NOW
“We are confronted with the fierce urgency of now.
In this unfolding conundrum of life and history,
there “is” such a thing as being too late.
This is no time for apathy or complacency.
This is a time for vigorous and positive action.”
Martin Luther King, jr
April 4, 1967
positive action
Dear Friends -
In 1967, Martin Luther King spoke about the urgency of now and the necessity of taking positive action. With him that day was his friend, Civil Rights photographer Benedict Fernandez. I met Ben as a young photographer, and he mentored me through my education at Parsons where he often spoke of his time together with Dr. King and the power of photography to effect change. At graduation — and by stroke of fate — in the same New York church where his friend had spoken those words years before, Ben gave me a hug, a diploma, and a responsibility to use the camera as a tool for taking action.
Today climate change has become the existential threat, and I am called to take positive action.
Twice I have experienced wildfires sweep through my hometown and seen firsthand the environmental destruction as well as the human cost which continues well after the fire is extinguished. This is why I choose to go to Alaska. To photograph at the frontline of climate change, to document a landscape being reshaped, and to learn what this portends for the planet.
However, it is not a project I can do alone. I will need the support of friends & benefactors to bring this endeavor to fruition.
Joshua
creative visions foundation
The Great Alaska Project is fiscally sponsored by Creative Visions, a 501(c)3 nonprofit organization that supports creative activists, those that use the arts and media to ignite social change.
PROJECT objectives
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Monograph
The centerpiece of this project will be the publication of a large-format photographic book presenting the work in full — including narration and documentation of the Indigenous communities and landscapes photographed. The book will be both an homage to Alaska and a tool for action.
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EXHIBITION
Large-format, meticulously printed black-and-white prints, curated for exhibition at museums, galleries, and cultural institutions throughout Alaska, the lower 48, and abroad, ensuring this urgent record of a changing land reaches the widest possible audience.
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PUBLIC DIGITAL ARCHIVE
A freely accessible digital archive of images and supporting documentation, made available for educational and research use. The archive ensures that the project’s visual record remains a resource for scientists, educators, policymakers, and future generations.
Destinations & subjects
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NEWTOK|MERTARVIK
One of the stories to be told is that of the Yup'ik villages of Newtok and Mertarvik. Located along the Bering Sea, Newtok is the first Alaskan community forced to relocate due to rising waters and melting permafrost. Plans are underway to photograph both the abandoned homes sinking into the earth and the residents whose lives and ancient traditions are adapting to their newly built community.
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the arctic
When drilling was approved in the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge — undoing decades of effort to protect it — it became the spark that launched this project. Spanning from the Brooks Range to the Arctic Ocean, it remains one of the last great expanses of untouched wilderness, and home to the Gwich’in people, whose lives are deeply intertwined with the migration of the Porcupine caribou herd.
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The Inside Passage
The ancient glaciers of Alaska's Inside Passage are retreating at a pace visible within a single lifetime. Tidewater glaciers that once calved dramatically into the sea have pulled back miles from where they stood a century ago. Left behind are raw glacial valleys, newly exposed shoreline, and the unmistakable signature of a warming world. It is a landscape in dramatic transformation, at once beautiful and tragic.
alaska : frontline of climate change
While we imagine Alaska to be a vast and indomitable land, it is in fact the canary in the coal mine for our planet. An effect known as Arctic amplification is warming Alaska at rates far higher than the rest of the world. The result is receding glaciers, melting permafrost, wildlife habitat destroyed, and the Inuit villages that have endured for millennia are being forced to relocate due to coastal erosion. At the same time, the recent opening of the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge to oil drilling places one of the last great tracts of pristine American wilderness in jeopardy.
A failed Arctic ecosystem will have dire effects on the whole planet. Yet when we sound the alarm by speaking in degrees of warming, of increments of sea level rise, and use terms like feedback loops, we become overwhelmed. We tune out rather than take action.
What moves minds is a visceral, emotional connection to the land and the people directly affected by the these climatic changes. Photography can do this. It can transcend the politics to push the needle towards the conservation of nature. It can inspire us to protect far away peoples & cultures.
The Great Alaska Project is designed to do this; to document the people and lands of the last great American frontier.
“I have witnessed the scarred land and the scarred community.”
joshua klein – malibu, california 2025the photographer : joshua klein
SUPPORT THE PROJECT
The Great Alaska Project requires support because the work it demands, and the scale at which it must be done to matter, cannot be accomplished without significant financial resources.
Twenty weeks of fieldwork across one of the most remote and logistically challenging landscapes on Earth requires bush flights into roadless wilderness, ferry passages through the Inside Passage, and guides & Indigenous consultants who can open doors that no outsider can open alone. This is not a project that can be executed from a distance or on a modest budget, it demands full immersion across four seasons, in conditions that range from the frozen Arctic winter to the midnight sun of the Alaskan summer.
I am delighted to be partnering with the Creative Visions Foundation who will be acting as the fiscal sponsor* allowing all donations to be fully tax deductible. Creative Visions supports creative media projects working at the intersection of art, environmental action, and social change.
individual donations
Donations up to $1,500 can be made online through the Creative Visions link below.
sponsorship | foundations | gifts in kind
For larger contributions or gifts in kind, please contact alaska@joshuatreestudio.com.
A grant proposal with budget narrative is available.
All donations are tax deductible.
*Fiscal sponsorship allows an independent project to accept tax-deductible donations by partnering with an established nonprofit. The Great Alaska Project is an Alaskan limited liability company.