Juliette Dumas creates conceptual artworks that address our strained relationship with nature. Dumas uses the physical properties of her materials and the dynamics of their interaction, to create poignant metaphors for humanity’s struggle to control the effects of environmental degradation. In one work, Dumas burns materials and then attempts to sew the brittle, charred remnants back together. In her “Fire Paintings,” Dumas tries to manage an unpredictable fire on the surface of her work, an undertaking that prevents her from controlling the outcome of the painting. Dumas equates these “desperate actions” to the challenge of managing climate change, suggesting that the belief in our ability to rectify adverse outcomes after-the-fact is a troubling leap of faith. In many of her works, Dumas portrays the tension between the natural world and humanity’s obsession with petroleum-based products. In her series entitled “Strategies of Resistance,” Dumas depicts natural materials, such as stone and wood, held in a state of suspension by plastic materials that are stretched and stressed by the relationship. These works portend a failure of the plastic, resulting in a free fall of the natural elements in the work. Similarly, in a work entitled “A Brief History of Oil and Ice,” Dumas encases crude oil inside of a block of ice, but inevitably cannot contain it as it seeps through and drips like tears down the surface of the ice. In this poetic work, Dumas depicts our inability to contain the effects of fossil fuel consumption, relying on melting ice — the quintessential symbol of climate change — to express the futility of our efforts and the accompanying guilt we experience as we continue to consume. In all of these works, Dumas asks us to consider whether our collective approach to managing environmental outcomes is any less futile than the strategies she employs to control the outcomes of her artistic process.