Matthew López-Jensen: The Work and the Water: Labor and Landscapes along the Erie Canal

Beil, Kim, Lopez-Jensen, Matthew

For the Erie Canal’s 200th anniversary, López-Jensen’s series centers the unseen labor that keeps the waterway operational The debut photobook The Work and the Water: Labor and Landscapes along the Erie Canal by Matthew López-Jensen (born 1980) is a work of environmental social practice centering the unseen labor required to keep the Erie Canal, a 524-mile inland waterway in upstate New York, operational. Over 40 photographs are accompanied by commentary from the more than 400 employees who work on the canal year-round, often out of view and in hazardous conditions. As the first artist-in-residence with the canal in its 200-year history, López-Jensen visited every lock in the system from Buffalo to Albany, from Whitehall to Seneca Falls. The archive of images he created helps communicate the potentials of the canal as a site for environmental restoration while also conveying the scale of this colossal piece of infrastructure that transformed the region in ways that are still felt today.

EAN

9781941753774

Publisher

Inventory Press LLC

Published

11 December 2025

Pages

96