Gnarled, wild and majestic: these two very different trees in California form part of Mitch Epstein鈥檚 quest to photograph ancient forests across the US.
The photographer鈥檚 Old Growth project took shape in the summer of 2020, when he learned that there were rare pockets of old-growth forests in Western Massachusetts 鈥� those that have grown for hundreds, or even thousands, of years. One-third of the world鈥檚 forests today are old-growth, but since 1990, their range has decreased by .
Over the next four years, Epstein travelled to remote locations across the US to find ancient native trees and document what we stand to lose through climate change. He captured firs, oaks, birches and maples, including this denizen of the Ancient Bristlecone Pine Forest (top), taken in California鈥檚 White Mountains in 2022, and this towering sequoia (pictured below), snapped on the Congress Trail in 2021 in the state鈥檚 Sequoia National Park.
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The photographer said the project was a departure for him. 鈥淚 didn鈥檛 think that I could bring something new to so-called nature photography,鈥� he said in an interview included in his new book , which brings together photographs of his work. 鈥淢aybe part of my decision to photograph Old Growth was this realisation: that there is now no wilderness that hasn鈥檛 been touched by humans in some way, even if it鈥檚 not immediately obvious.鈥�
