Interview With Eve Morgenstern, Founder and Director of Soon is Now

Eve Morgenstern was born on Long Island and raised in Brooklyn, NY. She received an MFA in Photography from the San Francisco Art Institute and a BA in Art History from Vassar College. Eve has been awarded artist residencies at MacDowell, Lower Manhattan Cultural Council Workspace and grants from Chicken and Egg Pictures, New York State Council on the Arts, the Anthony Radziwill Documentary Fund, the George Gund Foundation, the Park Foundation, and nextPix/firstPix.

She is founder and director of Soon Is Now, a climate and eco live performance, art and activism project at Scenic Hudson's Long Dock Park on the Hudson River in Beacon, NY. Recent press: Beaconites! podcast, "Embracing the Trend Towards Climate Optimism and Joy," Hudson Valley Viewfinder Magazine, and "Art as Activism" in Chronogram.

She is well known for her documentary film, Cheshire, Ohio about the buyout of a town by a coal fired polluting power plant has screened in festivals in the US, Canada and South Korea. The film is distributed by Bullfrog Films, the leading US publisher of independently-produced documentaries on environmental and related social justice issues (link) and ovid.tv (link).

Her photographic project Facades of Crises produced during years of making commissioned videos for the government on the housing crises, had its solo show Museum premiere at Bildmuseet in Umeå, Sweden. The project was also exhibited at the Midwest Center for Photography and published in a special Le Monde magazine issue on America during the Obama administration.

By Selva Ozelli Esq, CPA, Author of Sustainably Investing in Digital Assets Globally

 

1. Tell us about your educational and professional journey that led you to founding Here is Now (it's Soon is Now).

I went to Vassar College for my BA in Art History and the San Francisco Art Institute for my MFA in Photography. After college I worked for various arts institutions and eventually became interested in documentary film. I worked as a producer for documentary film companies in NYC and eventually made my own film about a town in Ohio that was bought out and bulldozed by a polluting coal-fired power plant, titled "Cheshire, Ohio: An American Coal Story in 3 Acts." Making the film opened my eyes to climate change and the tremendous harms of coal on local communities and workers, as well as the complex history of coal in the US.

Over time, I became interested in starting an environmental arts project. When I moved from Brooklyn, NY to Beacon, NY on the Hudson River/Muhheakantuck, I found my way to starting Soon is Now, a climate arts organization that produces site-specific multidisciplinary work. 

2. Tell us about your exhibition opening on May 22.

Museum of Fishes and Greens developed out of two trips I made to India in 2024 and 2025 where I met the curator Sayantan Maitra Boka. I admired his approach to curation and we started talking about bringing a project to the US. He proposed a project based in the Sundarbans. Sayantan had previously worked on a project there supported by (EUNIC), Brussels with The Rangabelia Mahila Industrial Cooperative Society, a women led co-op that tackles poverty and empowers women through training in handicrafts, weaving, and textile design. They also train women in climate adaptive fishing, gardening and agriculture. This new project for Soon is Now is a collaboration between the Food Studio Collective, social practice artists from Kolkata, and women involved with the cooperative. Through an exchange of dialogue on how climate is impacting their food sources, they produced batik pattern designs for saris, handmade paper from plants, handcrafted books that include their recipes, and new videos. This work will be installed in Scenic Hudson's River Center, Beacon, NY for view May 22-June 28th. Opening on May 22, 4-7pm. We are also an Upstate Art Weekend Participant.

3. May 22 is also the United Nations International Day for Biodiversity (IDB) which has a theme of Action Locally for Global impact. How does your exhibition fit this theme?

The Sundarbans, a UNESCO World Heritage Site, has incredibly rich biodiversity as the largest contiguous mangrove forest in the world supporting numerous species, including the Bengal tiger, Ganges river dolphin, saltwater crocodile, and hundreds of bird and fish species. However, the area faces significant challenges due to human activities such as fishing, logging, and agriculture, as well as climate-related threats like cyclones and rising sea levels. (source: EBSCO, Friess, Daniel A.;Kit, Lee Wei). 

As part of this project, the Food Studio Collective made a film told from the voices of the women on the threats to biodiversity in the Sundarbans. It will screen as part of the exhibition. In addition, the batik sari patterns made by the women of the fishes and greens threatened by climate's impacts will be on display in a textile, shelter-like installation in the space. Museum of Fishes & Greens heightens awareness around the challenges to biodiversity in the Sundarbans and the necessity to restore the mangrove forest, regulate resource extraction, and adopt climate resilient sustainable fishing and farming practices. 

4. The 17th meeting of the Conference of the Parties (COP 17) to the Convention on Biological Diversity will be held in Yerevan, Armenia, from October 19–30, 2026. Under the theme "Taking Action for Nature," this conference will focus on the first global review of progress towards the Kunming-Montreal Global Biodiversity Framework (KMGBF), aiming to accelerate implementation of its 23 targets.  Will you exhibit your work at this event?

I would love to exhibit the work at this event so I will look into it! I didn't know about this.  

5. Tell us about the venue of your exhibition at Scenic Hudson's River Center.

Scenic Hudson's Long Dock Park is a climate resilient, ecologically sustainable landscape restored from a former industrial site and brownfield by Scenic Hudson, Reed Hilderbrand Landscape Architectects, and other partners. The River Center is a former barn turned into a beautiful green-renovated art space in the park designed by Architecture Research Office (ARO).

6. Tell us about your festival Soon is Now an annual immersive climate and eco-art experience held at Scenic Hudson's Long Dock Park in Beacon, New York.

Soon is Now's festival features a walking tour through the landscape of Scenic Hudson's Long Dock Park, on the Hudson River/Muhheakantuck, where audiences experience experimental works in dance, poetry, theater, sculpture, and sound that engages with climate and the environment. Based on the belief that art can reach the hearts and minds of audiences on this most urgent and overwhelming challenge of our time, Soon is Now invites the public into this space of natural beauty and art to inspire deeper awareness of the state of our planet, the history that brought us to this place, and the future we can imagine. 

7. Why did you pick Scenic Hudson's Long Dock Park in Beacon for your festival and your exhibition?

Scenic Hudson's Long Dock Park is on the unceded land of the Lenni Lenape, Wappinger and Munsee, in a region with a vital history of environmentalism rooted in Scenic Hudson’s fight to save Storm King Mountain from industry and Pete Seeger’s fight for an unpolluted Hudson River. The story of how it turned from a toxic waste site into a gorgeous climate resilient landscape serves as a source of inspiration for the site-specific works we support and curate into our programming.

8. Tell us about Climate Reality and the activities of the Hudson Valley Chapter.

The Climate Reality Project was founded by former US Vice President Al Gore. "It trains activists to push for solutions that cut fossil fuel pollution, accelerate the transition to clean energy, and secure a sustainable future." I trained to become a Climate Reality Leader in 2020 and eventually became co-chair of the Hudson Valley & Catskills chapter. This chapter is engaged in a range of activism in NY state  - one of which was pushing to pass the Climate Leadership and Community Protection Act (CLCPA), New York State's landmark 2019 law, aimed at achieving net-zero emissions by 2050.

9. Are you planning on producing any other documentaries?

Not in the near future, Soon is Now is my current focus.  

10. How can people reach you and get involved?

Please follow us @soon_isnow or visit our website and sign up for our newsletter www.soonisnow.org. My email is eve@soonisnow.org.

soonisnow.org or follow us @soon_isnow.

http://www.evemorgenstern.com

646-285-5937