Katie Orlinsky • Photographer Profile

The Yupik village of Newtok in western Alaska, population 380, is sinking as the permafrost beneath it thaws. Erosion has already wiped out nearly a mile of Newtok’s land, and it is estimated that in three to five years it could be underwater. The entire village is in the process of moving to Mertarvik, a new village site about nine miles away. Newtok is the first community in Alaska that has already begun relocation as a result of climate change—pioneering a process that many other Alaskan villages may soon undergo.

Scientists call the Alaska “ground zero” for climate change, and last year was the state’s warmest on record. Alaska is at the front line of climate change and what is happening to villages across the region can be seen as early indications for the rest of the world’s future. “Chasing Winter” explores how this reality is transforming the relationship between people, animals, and the land.

Across nine million square miles at the top of the planet, climate change is writing a new chapter. Arctic permafrost is thawing much faster than expected, releasing carbon gases that could reshape the planet and drastically speed up global warming. It is already transforming the landscape and changing the lives of people and animals from Alaska to Siberia.

This series of diptychs were taken in May 2015 and June 2015 during this past year’s abnormally fast spring thaw and are part of a larger work in progress about the impacts of climate change across Alaska.

Over the past three years there has been a 400 percent increase in the number of women imprisoned for federal crimes in Mexico. Ciudad Juárez is the most dangerous city in Mexico, plagued by drug war violence, not to mention poverty and unemployment, which has only escalated after the financial collapse. The rise of women’s involvement in narcotics related crime in Juárez has also escalated, directly linked to poverty and lack of employment opportunities.

When a massive influx of Central American children streamed across the U.S.-Mexican border in 2014, it sparked a political crisis, and a heated debate about the causes of this “surge.” U.S. politicians argued that the children were coming merely for economic reasons (that is, simply to take American jobs), rather than face the complicated reality that we have a refugee crisis on our very own doorstep.