Obi Kaufmann - The State of Water

About The State of Water: Understanding California’s Most Precious Resource:

Obi Kaufmann, author of the best-selling California Field Atlas, turns his artful yet analytical attention to the Golden State’s single most complex and controversial resource: water.

In this new book, full-color maps unravel the braided knot of California’s water infrastructure and ecosystems, exposing a history of unlimited growth in spite of finite natural resources–a history that has led to its current precarious circumstances.

Yet this built world depends upon the biosphere, and in The State of Water Kaufmann argues that environmental conservation and restoration efforts are necessary not only for ethical reasons but also as a matter of human survival.

Offering nine perspectives to illustrate the most pressing challenges facing California’s water infrastructure, from dams to species revitalization, Kaufmann reveals pragmatic yet inspiring solutions to how water in the West can continue to support agriculture, municipalities, and the environment.

Interspersed throughout with trail paintings of animals that might yet survive under a caring and careful water ethic, Kaufmann shows how California can usher in a new era of responsible water conservation, and–perhaps most importantly–how we may do so together.

About Obi Kaufmann:
For Poet, painter and naturalist Obi Kaufmann, California is a magic network of living systems that connect in a grand, quilted array of ecology and beauty. An avid conservationist, Obi Kaufmann regularly travels around the state, speaking on issues of ecological restoration and preservation to such groups as the Klamath-Siskiyou Wildland center, the Mojave Desert Land Trust, The Anza Borrego Foundation, The Mono Lake Committee, the Peninsula Open Space Trust and Friends of the River in Coloma. He is an illustrator for Bay Nature Magazine, the Berkeley Times and Premium Arts, as well as a long-term collaborator with the men’s apparel brand Indigofera. A life-long resident of California, Obi Kaufmann makes his home base in Oakland and is currently working on Field Atlases to come.