Justin Brice Guariglia

(2019) "Artists Need to Create on the Same Scale that Society Has the Capacity to Destroy: Mare Nostrum" curated by Phong Bui and Francesca Pietropaolo, is an official collateral event of the 58th International Art Exhibition—La Biennale di Venezia. The exhibition is located at the Chiesa di Santa Maria delle Penitenti in the Cannaregio section of Venice during the run of the Biennale Arte, from 11 May – 24 November 2019. Guariglia's contribution included a 2-meter neon artwork, "EXXTINCTION," a play on the classic ExxonMobil logo.

"Artists Need to Create..." includes the work of 73 artists of international backgrounds whose works are in response to environmental crisis in the age of climate change, including Rirkrit Tiravanija, Jack Whitten, Dorothea Rockburne, Amy Sillman, Chuck Close, and others.[10]

Installation of "REDUCE SPEED NOW!," Somerset House, London

(2019) Commissioned by Somerset House,[11] "Reduce Speed Now!" brings together international perspectives on the world's ecological crisis. Using a series of large solar-powered LED signs usually seen on motorways, Guariglia foregrounds the voices of poets, philosophers, thinkers, activists, and global indigenous elders addressing our climate change, global warming, and extinction.

Contributors include 16-year-old Swedish political activist, Greta Thunberg, whose protests over the past year have mobilized students across the world and inspired thousands of young people across the UK to protest against political inaction on climate change. The text of her speech sits alongside the voices of global indigenous elders, whose lives are deeply connected to nature and the preservation of ancient human wisdom. Another sign displays the poem "Rise: From One Island to Another" by Kathy Jetnil-Kijiner and Aka Niviâna, from the Marshall Islands and Kalaallit Nunaat (Greenland) respectively. The islanders’ poem demonstrates the interdependency of the world and forms a call for action to city dwellers in the face of an environmental crisis.

Other writing includes excerpts from French philosopher and sociologist Bruno Latour’s provocative publications; aphorisms written by eco-theorist Timothy Morton; and Guariglia’s compiled list of 200 years of extinct species.[12]

(2018–present) Guariglia's "WE ARE THE ASTEROID," a series of solar-powered LED message boards that flash eco-aphorisms, debuted at Storm King Art Center in the 2018 exhibition entitled "Indicators: Artists on Climate Change."[13] The project is part of an ongoing collaboration with eco-theorist Timothy Morton, who wrote the text for the work. Iterations of the project have appeared as public art installations in San Francisco,[14] New York City,[15] Chicago,[16] Aspen,[17] Houston.[18]

(2018) Guariglia's citywide public art installation "Climate Signals" debuted September, 2018 in ten locations across the five boroughs of New York City. The project, which was presented by the Climate Museum, in conjunction with the New York City Mayor's Office, and the New York City Department of Parks and Recreation, and was designed to encourage dialogue on the issue of climate change.[19]

Climate Signals was reviewed by The New Yorker, The New York Times, The Washington Post, and The Guardian, among others.[20][21][22][23]

Justin Brice Guariglia with Ai Weiwei (L) and Walter Meyer (R) in Puerto Rico

(2017) In 2018, NBC News aired a six-minute segment documenting a trip taken by Guariglia and Ai Weiwei to Puerto Rico in December 2017. The artists traveled to the island to learn first hand about the mass migration and humanitarian crisis caused by hurricanes Irma and Maria, help install solar panels, and meet local survivors of the storms. They were guided by landscape architects Walter Meyer and Jennifer Bolstad of the firm, Local Office Landscape Architecture.[24][25]

(2017–present) On Earth Day 2017, Guariglia launched "After Ice", a free iOS app visualizing sea-level rise based on projections from the IPCC and NASA. Featured by Apple on the iTunes home page for Earth Day, the app received 13 million impressions in its first week. "After Ice" was created by a team of award-winning volunteers, including programming by Strange Flavour, and published by Ian Lynch Smith of SecondVerse with design support by artist Frances Segismundo.[26][27][28][29]

(2017–present) Guariglia's solo exhibition "EARTH WORKS: Mapping the Anthropocene" debuted at the Norton Museum of Art[30] in September 2017. The museum was forced closed within hours of the show opening due to hurricane Irma, the irony of which was written about by The Washington Post. The exhibition has since traveled to the USC Fisher Museum of Art in conjunction with the Natural History Museum of Los Angeles County. The show contains works derived from source materials collected on flights with NASA, in addition to other aerial topographic images Guariglia took of agriculture and mining in the landscape.[31][32][33]

(2017) New York City fashion designers Abasi Rosborough collaborated with Guariglia to create "Hyperobject," a collection based on Guariglia's work, and named after Timothy Morton's book and neologism "Hyperobjects". The clothing is cut from organic and/or deadstock fabrics that feature Guariglia's art work.[34]

Guariglia has frequently collaborated with scientists, philosophers, and journalists in order to forge a deeper understanding of human impact on the planet. Notably, this includes a series of seven earth science missions he flew with NASA's Operation Ice Bridge scientists beginning in 2015, documenting Greenland's rapidly changing ice sheets and sea ice. The images became source material for work that debuted in Earth Works: Mapping the Anthropocene.[35]

Beginning in 2016, Guariglia joined with NASA Jet Propulsion Laboratory scientist and OMG mission principal investigator Josh Willis as an artist collaborator.[36][37]