Mainers take pride in the natural beauty of our state, making environmental issues all the more threatening to our way of life.

One of the top threats to Maine’s environment is the rapid warming of the Gulf of Maine. In fact, the Gulf of Maine is heating up faster than 96% of the oceans on Planet Earth. The past century of global warming has reversed 900 years of cooling in the Gulf of Maine. And the steady increase in water temperature is in large part because of the marine heat waves brought about by man-made climate change.

Not only is the Gulf of Maine a rich ecosystem – famous for salt marshes, seagrass beds, and tidal mud flats – but its watershed is home to millions of people. Over 10 million people live in the area between the eastern tip of Massachusetts to the southwest and Cape Sable Island at the southern tip of Nova Scotia to the northeast. Their lives are directly threatened by climate change. Even worse, many of the residents who call the Gulf of Maine home are unaware of the problem or feel helpless against it, which makes solving it even more challenging.

Public awareness is key. To address America’s climate crisis, there is still a substantial amount of public education that needs to take place. Those of us who see it firsthand must play a pivotal role in not only explaining the consequences of climate change, but also proposing viable pathways to undoing the damage.

One example of education in action is at the Maine Maritime Museum in Bath, which recently opened a year-long immersive arts installation, SeaChange: Darkness and Light in the Gulf of Maine. An art and natural science exhibition offered in tandem with Gulf of Maine EcoArts, SeaChange immerses visitors in the rich ecosystem of Cashes Ledge in the Gulf of Maine to explore the collective human impact on our shared oceans.

Visitors are able to dive into Cashes Ledge, a mountain range lying just under the surface of the sea 100 miles off the coast of Portland. Sheltering a treasure trove of marine life, Cashes Ledge has been called “the Yellowstone of the North Atlantic” by renowned oceanographer Sylvia Earle. By partnering with Maine Maritime Museum, the exhibit will reach more than 50,000 in-person visitors and hundreds of thousands more online.

Environmental action needs to be collective in order for it to be effective, and that requires more and more people being educated about the climate crisis. Watching a documentary or reading a book about environmental issues is a step in the right direction, but I believe that immersive art like SeaChange can drive the point home even more viscerally.

SeaChange is a good example of collective, cohesive action – the sort of action that we need to enact broader change and achieve significant progress. Numerous artists, educators, scientists and nonprofit organizations were involved in the exhibit’s creation. And they combined paintings, sculptures, light effects, video projection and sound compositions to capture visitors’ imaginations.

By seeing exhibits like SeaChange, visitors will gain a greater understanding of the Gulf of Maine and the threats facing it. But they will also gain something more: hope, enthusiasm and initiative. After awareness and education come the purpose, resolve and determination to make reform a reality.

People who feel more connected to the world around them are more likely to make it a better place. Life under the waves of the Gulf of Maine is our common wealth. To become truer stewards of it is our common concern as Mainers.

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