Visualizing Climate Change Data

"Back door disaster"

The Backdoor Disaster Is showing how much an everyday city can affect the climate. The main message of The Backdoor Disaster is how  Gasses, and fossil fuels, admit carbon dioxide in the atmosphere, what causes it, and what we can do to fix it. We named it the back door disaster because you can see the disaster behind the city. We added a hope aspect in the bottom left corner of people from the city protesting. We used the color red to demonstrate carbon dioxide so you had a clear picture of what the city was doing to its environment. We used a sharpie and yellow colored pencil for the city, and water color for their glacier, sun, and the red aura.We included a data set that shows cumulative glacier mass balance (meters of water) through the black outline of the glacier. We also included a bar chart which we incorporated as the city. The data set shows the difference from 20th century average temperature (celcius). We incorporated these two data sets because we see  that the glacier mass decreased tremendously, and the temperature slowly increased.These are connected because when temperature increases glaciers mass melts and decreases. We hope that something you take away from our artwork is that things you are doing in your everyday life can be affecting the world for the worst, and think of ways you can be helpful to saving the planet.

By Clayton, Emma, Rose

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Is Climate Change Bugging You? 

Our artwork is showing the rise in tick population that correlates with the rise in temperature in the winter. The population of ticks is growing because less and less of them die each winter due to winters having become warmer. Our data is incorporated in the top of the mountains where the lyme disease graph is, and also in the tree line whose graph shows the rising winter temperature. We hope that viewing our artwork invites you to think about how you can be more climate-friendly to stop global warming. We also hope that you walk away from our work with a sense of hope for the future shown in the people walking up the trail, symbolizing walking the trail of climate friendly choices.

By Nina and Solia

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"Not so snowy mountains"

Our art is trying to show how the snow cover and the unfrozen days are becoming less and less because of climate change. On the bottom of the artwork you can see that there is a graph. This graph shows the number of unfrozen days compared to the average. Under the graph represents snow. You can see towards the right of the snow, It starts to get more grassy and less snowy. This shows that when the graph is going down there are less unfrozen days meaning there will be more rain then snow. At the top of the artwork there is another graph that shows the snow cover. On top of that there is a sunset that keeps getting more red and red. This shows how the climate is getting hotter and hotter. We added trees because trees can get affected by this harsh and new climate. We added skiers because some people depend on skiing as their jobs. If there is no snow then they can’t do it, meaning they will lose their jobs. 

By Kenzie and Ryan

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"What has winter warming done?"

In this artwork, we wanted to show how the winters in the US have been warming. Not only have they warmed, the snow is melting and many native animals are being put at risk. The data from the first graph is the map in the background, which shows how much the winters have warmed in each state. The data from the third graph is the ice in the front, which is a line showing how the duration of the snow season has changed in the US over the years. We incorporated skiers and animals to show that this not only affects the environment, but also us and the animals around us. We hope that people think about the effect climate change has on them and on the animals in the US, and how the snow affects many other parts of our lives. We also wanted people to think about the connections between snow, winter and the greenhouse effect, and how it is rapidly changing our everyday lives. People like to ski, build snowmen, and play outside in the snow, so we thought incorporating a bit of that into our art might help people connect more personally to this.

By Kalea and Ingrid

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"The Effects of Unfortunate Fires"

Our artwork is trying to show the effects of wildfires. Using the graph about wildfires and the graph about droughts we show the connection and effect between the two. The data about the wildfires is the top of the fire where it is flair penned and the drought data is the top of the trees. We hope when people view our artwork they realize what happens to forests and how they are unable to grow after fires and droughts.

By Abby, Ayla, Kody

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In our art piece we tried to show the different effects that the rising sea level temperature and precipitation amounts has on communities. Our data is hidden in our artwork because there are two graphs and they are on both sides of the sand. One of the graphs is drawn out in raindrops and increase in size and move closer together to show that the amount of rainfall has significantly increased as time has gone on. While people are looking at our artwork we hope that they notice the small hidden details such as the fact that there are three houses, the first one is perfect, the second one has some broken parts and the third house is completely destroyed. The cause of these houses being destroyed is from the rising sea levels that are caused by a large increase in precipitation causing flooding. And to also notice the amount of fish is a lot less on the right side than the left side because we are trying to show that the fish cannot survive in higher sea temperatures so their population is decreasing. We also hope people notice the amount of hard work we put into this project such as pouring real sand where the coastal line is. 

Reine, Bryce, Ellie

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“Tropical Chill: A Slippery Slope”

We are trying to show how because of the CO2 there have become more unfrozen days. We showed this by making the warmer side where the graph is above average. We have palm trees and the sky being red to show the hot weather and the colder side below average having a lot of snow and the blue sky to symbolize cold weather. To show some of the effects of rising CO2  levels, the ski mountain we drew is also the rising CO2  graph. And as the graph gets higher it gets warmer in the painting and the skiers are not able to ski anymore because there is not enough snow at the top of the mountain. The palm trees and icicles are a part of a bar graph showing the changing level of unfrozen days in the United States Of America. 

By Annie, Andrei and Madison

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“Sea Ice Deplete Ice”

Our piece of artwork shows the depletion of sea ice in the Arctic. Our artwork shows a zoom in on a small piece of the ocean near the Arctic, and how the amount of sea ice is getting smaller and smaller. At the beginning of the timeline, around 1990, the pieces of ice are big with a small crack in them. As the timeline continues, the crack gets bigger and the ice gets smaller. There are two cracks in the art. The increasing graph shows the carbon dioxide in the atmosphere, and the decreasing one shows the sea ice in the Arctic. Both of these graphs are shown as cracks in the ice, then get bigger over time. We hope that you notice how in the beginning of the timeline, there is a family of polar bears, and near the end of the timeline, there is only one polar bear. As the amount of sea ice in the arctic depletes, polar bears have less space to live and therefore have a decreasing population.

By Liam, Grant and Gabe

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Our art is a representation of the population of birds migrating north. With our art we are trying to show the major issue of birds migrating. We believe people look over this issue and don’t necessarily believe that birds are important in our world. We created this art as a way to bring light to this issue and we hope you see it. Our data is included in this art by making the lines on the mountain match it, it looks very similar to mountains if you were perceiving them from a distance. The mountains also help as a way to show temperature by showing more elevation throughout it. Another way we showed data was the line that’s under the trees, we decided to use it as a surface to show how the trees are actually there. We hope that people will think deeply about the temperature in our art by seeing the signs. For example, the trees change to ones of more colder biomes the higher the elevation goes, the sky changes color to match the feel of the temperature, red is hot and blue is cold. Overall, we just want this issue to be made known to people who don’t know about it.

By Anthony, Luke

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"The Arrow of Change"

The Arrow of Change is our artwork, which attempts to show the impact of climate change on the growth and development of crops and other plants, some of which may be pests. The name is meant to show how initially the changes are positive, such as lower prices from industrialization and higher crop yields from longer growing seasons. However, an arrow will always fall back down and possibly fall lower than before launch. 

We incorporated three sets of data, hidden in the outlines of the physical structures and conforming to natural shapes. There is a set of years at the bottom for keeping track of time (1980-2020), while next to each graph there are measurements of data for specific time periods in increments of 10 years, based on the form of measurement of each data set.

As the path moves further along in time, the concentration of both crops and weeds becomes higher, and the glaciers begin to melt. This is meant to show how rising temperatures have lengthened the growing season while melting the glaciers, with mixed effects.

We hope the Arrow of Change will inspire people to avoid unnecessary waste of resources and explore the lasting impacts of pollution and ecological damage.

By Lawrence and Benjamin

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"Rising Temperatures Lead to Increasing Length of Pollen Season"

Our artwork is showing the change in days of the length of ragweed pollen season from the past 20 years. The graph going across the paper shows the difference of days frozen as an average throughout the United States. Our art is showing that the days of allergies have overall been increasing, which is not a good thing. Seasonal allergies affect more than 1 in 4 people in the United States.  Hopefully, when you look at this, you are able to see that the length of allergy season is reflected in the way humans interact with the environment, and that there are ways to stop climate change. While some people are using these ways many are not and ragweed season will get longer and allergies are going to get worse so we are hoping this graph shows you what you need to do.

By Lihi and Talia

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We created our art piece in order to show the disadvantages of the leaves blooming earlier or later than they used to. Due to the leaves blooming earlier than expected, there has been a vast uptick in pollen counts, and because of this 80 million have moderate to severe pollen allergies, suffer from said allergies at an ever increasing rate. Not only this, but 10% of the people in the US suffer from asthma and are continuing to face greater risk of health liabilities such as asthma attacks. In our artwork, you will see how we measured the first leaf date of spring, the tree line, and the average winter temperatures compared to the 20th century average, the mountains. We hope that people think about the disadvantages of the change in the first leaf date coming earlier on. We want people to notice that due to the first leaf date varying, many people who are prone to these pollen allergies will have to refrain from doing everyday tasks and often have to not go outdoors at all. The majority of the US is having first leaf dates up to 8 days earlier. Though this may not seem like much, it is important to know that small changes like that is what’s causing your friends to stay inside on a nice day in spring.

By Jude and Sam

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"More CO2 in the atmosphere increases flood risk"

Our artwork is trying to show how an increase in the temperature of the ocean causes an increase in flood days. You can see how the east coast of the United States is blue, and the west coast is red, showing how the west coast has had less flooding recently but the east coast has had a lot more. We also are trying to show how the reason for this is that 1)the glaciers are melting, causing an uptick in the sea level around the world, and 2) because of thermal expansion and once again, the oceans to expand. We chose to put the sea level temperature data in the middle of the map, so it looks like the United States is going underwater. We chose to do this so people would understand that this is a serious and real issue. We hope that from this, people will understand that if we don’t change something now, people’s lives will be affected, as you can see from the houses that look like they're going underwater. We also hope that people will think about the effects that larger amounts of CO2  in the atmosphere have on people’s lives.

By Soraya and Francesca

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Tornadoes Tumbling Overtime

Our artwork is trying to convey the true realism of tornadoes over time. One piece of data included  in our artwork is in the grass. The grass contains a graph for precipitation. We wonder if there could be a connection between precipitation and the rise of tornadoes. One of the graphs outlining the tornado is the graph that indicates the amount of tornadoes in the US each year. The second tornado being outlined by the graph is to show the earth’s surface temperature each year compared to the average from 1860-2020. The other part of the graph is showing the amount of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere each year. Through these two graphs, we were trying to find a connection between the rise of tornadoes and global warming. Something that people should remember when viewing our artwork is that we hope that we help you receive the main message that tornadoes are very powerful and they can become very harmful to people and the environment.

Mateo, Hudson

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Our artwork shows us the effect of temperature and CO2 in the atmosphere over the years and how it impacts people across the states. Our graph can help show the differences, because we included different trend lines that show the sea levels rising from temperature changes by heat. The other trend line is meant to be a ski slope showing the daily highs in 1910-2020. The red background is supposed to represent the heat waves caused by rapidly increasing temperatures and the blue ocean rising is also caused by CO2 temperatures. We tried to include what the states are each famous for in each state box that shows how the increasing temperature is causing an effect on everyone globally. We are the main cause of this because we are constantly burning coal, producing too much energy, and this can happen from natural gas. The effect on temperatures increasing is that it melts glaciers that are still here which produces water when it melts which causes rising sea levels. We hope that you can see how the reason sea levels and heat waves are happening is being caused by us and we need to make a change.

By Logan and Kareem

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We wanted our artpiece to show how climate change is impacting on the increase of ocean acidity and then hurting our ecosystem in the ocean. By doing that we used graphs showing  ocean acidity increase from tropical places around the world and traced it onto our artwork. We also added corals and fish to show the negative impact on our ecosystem because of the increase of ocean acidity caused by things like greenhouse gasses, human activities, and global warming.

By Kris and Mason

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This artwork is trying to show a glacier that is slowly melting. Behind it are mountains and some buildings lie next to the glacier. The numerous data in my artwork are shown through the mountains above, the glacier, and the buildings. There are two graphs shown in the mountains. The spiky one at the top is the average sea surface temperature, and the lower one shows the overall average temperature. The glacier outline shows another graph of the extent of ice sheets measured every september. Inside the glacier is a map of where the ice sheets were over time. The last data in my artwork are the buildings. They show the average volume of ice sheets during three different periods. I hope that you will learn how important protecting the planet is.

By Daryn

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