Craig Cundiff says he knows the effects of climate change all too well. The New Orleans native relocated to Seattle a few years after Hurricane Katrina devastated his hometown. Part of Seattle’s appeal was the ability to live in the city without owning a car. For the visual artist, ditching the automobile was more of a money saver than exhibition of environmental wokeness. Still, there’s a slight hint of pride in his voice when he mentions being car-free for more than a decade.

Cundiff’s work never has never been especially politically, often dealing in abstract portraiture instead. (His “hipsters” series, in particular, is a colorful blast.) But something clicked at the end of this summer.

Hurricane Harvey had just rocked Houston, while Irma and Maria were circling in the Caribbean. The wildfires roiling across the Northwest left Seattle blanketed in a smoke thicker than the soot that accumulates on Cundiff’s windows from Rainier Avenue traffic.

“It’s definitely something we have to live with every day, cleaning this soot and the smog off our windows,” he says.

The 32-year-old was already mulling ideas for a mural contest held by Coltura, a Seattle-based organization aimed at weaning America off gasoline, when his son asked to go to the beach. Because of the wildfires, Seattle was under an air quality watch and Cundiff had the challenge of explaining climate change to a 4-year-old who just wanted to play at the beach.