Akeel Khreef reads the epic of Gilgamesh to buffaloes cooling in the depths of the marsh waters. A herder, who cannot read or write, tells him about their dwindling livestock, as the polluted waters cause diseases among the herd. “In the past water was plentiful, now it has become dirty and stagnant. The animals die…

As reeds dry out and die from rising temperatures, Akeel Khreef attempts to save the flora of the marshes by painting the wilting plants green. Khreef is highlighting how pollution and rising temperatures are slowly destroying Iraq’s famed, age-old marshlands, which appear in the epic of Gilgamesh and were named a UNESCO Heritage site in…

The Marshes became a battle ground during the Iran-Iraq war, and Saddam Hussein later drained them to punish the Marsh Arabs for participating in uprisings against him. It took decades for the delicate ecosystem of the marshes to begin to recover, and they were named a UNESCO World Heritage site in 2016. From his studio…

The eastern and western banks of the river Tigris that runs around Baghdad are known as Karkh and Rusafa. They serve as the starting point for the Baghdad-based artist Aqeel Khreef’s exploration into the effects of climate change on Iraq’s southern marshes, which the ancient Tigris river feeds into. In the footage below, Khreef crosses…