Exhibition
Part of OPPORTUNITIES OF ENTANGLEMENTTHE MANNAHATTA PROJECT
THE WILDLIFE CONSERVATION SOCIETY (USA 2007)
Ever wondered what New York looked like before it was a city? After nearly a decade of research, the Mannahatta Project has uncovered the original ecology of Manhattan. The centre of one of the world’s largest and most built-up cities was once a natural landscape, supporting a rich and abundant community of wildlife and sustaining people for perhaps 5000 years before Europeans arrived on the scene in 1609. It turns out that the concrete jungle of New York City was once a vast deciduous forest, home to bears, wolves, songbirds, salamanders… with over 55 different ecological communities.