Above the Treeline

Climbing above the treeline, into the alpine environment of tundra, snow, ice and rock is how I commune with nature. The mountains being nature's greatest sculptures their testimonies of its power are all the more evident as elevation rises. Here the formation of the mountain ranges becomes conceivable through the tilt and fold of the rocks and the remnants of valley-carving glaciers, while the changing color of tundra and the come-and-go of snow signifies that nature's still at work. An ongoing study that has taken years and over a thousand miles underfoot to date, “Above the Treeline” is my effort to examine the natural world from a different perspective in attempts to better understand our relationship with it. “Nature as a poet, an enthusiastic workingman, becomes more and more visible the farther and higher we go; for the mountains are fountains – beginning places, however related to sources beyond mortal ken.” – John Muir, My First Summer in the Sierra, 1911