IT'S FREEZING IN LA - ISSUE 11 - KNOWLEDGE
An independent magazine about climate change.
The typographic visuals that run throughout Issue 11 of It’s Freezing in LA! explore different ways of knowing the natural world. We begin with depictions of a patch of Indonesian rainforest. Constructed from simplistic language, these graphics depict the landscape through the reductionist lens of satellite and sensor imaging technology. We then transition to a richer, more complex typographic exploration, representing how forests are deeply entwined with the livelihoods and cultures of Indigenous and local communities.
Cartography has long been intertwined with colonial enterprise. Classifying, measuring, and assessing newly colonised landscapes was necessary for conducting colonial science and resource extraction alike. The two enterprises complimented each other – for example, new strides in scientific forestry enabled optimised planting and harvesting for ever-higher timber yields. But the nature of the scientific endeavour in the long 19th century remained close to the ground. Foresters and ecologists walked and sailed and camped and wrote and drew in situ.
The gold standard of ecosystem monitoring is now based on Earth observation data – knowing from above with the help of satellites and sensors orbiting the planet. It differs from older, more hands-on ways of knowing the natural world by orders of magnitude.
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The graphics that run throughout every issue of It's Freezing in LA! are constructed from environmental data, which is then explored in more detail in a special graphics-related feature. In Issue 11: Knowledge, we worked with researcher Madhuri Karak to put together typographic visuals that compare top-down satellite models of forests to Indigenous understandings of forests on the ground. For the first time, we're reinterpreting the original spreads so they can be accessed online. Words and research by Madhuri Karak. Research, design and typographic illustration by Matthew Lewis. For sharing your ways of the forest, gratitude to villagers of MR; Cindy Julianty and Dian Ekowati for interpretation and translation support.