SINKING CITIES

In this next episode of ON CITIES, host Carie Penabad speaks with Anthony Acciavatti on the complex relationship between water, urban development and environmental sustainability. Acciavatti’s work straddles the realms of landscape, history and technology; and his pioneering research offers invaluable insights on how cities have evolved in relation to groundwater extraction. Join us Friday, May 17th at 11:00 AM EST, 8:00 AM PST on the Voice America network as we uncover the fascinating journey of civilizations built on the ebb and flow of water and the urgent challenges they face in an era of unprecedented environmental change. Connect to all previous episodes of ON CITIES on your favorite podcast platform. https://www.voiceamerica.com/show/4119/on-cities

Anthony Acciavatti works at the intersection of landscape and the history of science and technology. He is the author of Ganges Water Machine: Designing New India’s Ancient River (2015), which is the first comprehensive mapping and environmental history of the Ganges River Basin in over half a century. In 2016 Ganges Water Machine was awarded the John Brinckerhoff Jackson Book Prize. His second book, Building a Republic of Villages, will be published next year. His current exhibition, Groundwater Earth: The World Before and After the Tubewell, explores the ways in which cities and farms across the world came to rely on water drawn from aquifers since the early-20th century. The technologies for drawing up groundwater, known as hand pumps and tubewells, have allowed billions of people to thrive, but today threatens to bleed the earth dry. In autumn 2024, he will be a Fellow at the American Academy in Rome, where he will be working on a series of drawings and new book on groundwater extraction. Trained in architecture at the Rhode Island School of Design and Harvard Universityin the history of science at Princeton University, and a Fulbright Scholar in the department of geography and town and country planning at the University of Allahabad, Acciavatti is currently the Diana Balmori Assistant Professor at Yale University. He also leads the Ganges Lab at Collaborative Earth and is a principal of Somatic Collaborative.