Photographer Chris Jordan works to capture the contrast between beauty and horror, and manages to confront humanities arrogance and neglect, just as I am trying to capture the beautiful against the ugly. Jordan produced a series titled 'Midway' in which he documented to carcasses of dead albatrosses from islands in the North Pacific, filled with plastic that was mistaken for food, which eventually killed them.
Like the albatross, we first-world humans find ourselves lacking the ability to discern anymore what is nourishing from what is toxic to our lives and our spirits. Choked to death on our waste, the mythical albatross calls upon us to recognize that our greatest challenge lies not out there, but in here.
Jordan, C. 2011