My Nonprofit Reviews

In October 2018, I traveled to the Northern Jaguar Reserve with NJP leaders. While the reserve landscape was sublime in its own right, I want to highlight the human element of this organization. On the way, we stopped in Sahuaripa for the annual Viviendo con Felinos festival. Here, I experienced first hand NJP’s important connection with the local community. This organization values and practices environmental justice in their support of local tradition and economy in tandem with restoring habitat and protecting wildlife. Watching a whole town support jaguars (and other species) was heartening, inspiring. The Northern Jaguar Project epitomizes greatness, in every sense of the word.

As an eco-political artist, I collaborate with NJP on various creative public projects and I’m continually amazed at the work they do. In May 2017, NJP and I presented “Un-Fragmenting / Des-Fragmendando” a public projection work in Douglas, Arizona and Agua Prieta, Sonora. I projected trail camera images of wildlife from the Northern Jaguar Reserve directly onto the US-Mexico border wall to raise awareness of the wall’s threat to native species and borderland ecology. We even spent time with children in both communities, teaching them about jaguars and their environment through science games and art projects! With NJP, I’ve learned to adapt to communities on both sides of the border and how to connect locals to their wildlife systems in mutually beneficial ways. This fall I will travel with NJP to do installations in Sahuaripa before spending a few days on the reserve. The Northern Jaguar Project is a non-profit that benefits humans and wildlife alike and I am honored to call them my friends.