Very much missing Ghost Forest, Maya Lin's new installation of 49 at risk trees from the Pine Barrens installed in Madison Square Park. Lin has a longstanding practice capturing the evanescence of things from her Vietnam War Memorial to her rolling hills in Storm King to her website whatismissing.org which tracks global climate events. Though her practice is theoretically subdivided into art/architecture/memory, to me, her projects all speak to the fleeting nature of life. She helps us to notice things

Lin has just opened her new library at Smith College after a rocky year suddenly losing her very talented husband Daniel Wolf so this theme has particular personal resonance right now. There are many Maya's Ghosts. The trees are there for 6 months so I hope to catch them before they too slip into the climate ether.

Here in California, you only have to drive a slight way out of any city to see the effects of climate change in situ. The blackened glades and forests and the devastation of our recent wildfires-even with new growth peeking out from under-is a constant reminder of what peril we are in.

Image by Andy Romer courtesy Madison Square Park Conservancy