Making Art in the Land of Polar Bears and Lemmings: Art and Science Expeditions in the Arctic (original) (raw)
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Bridging science, art, and community in the new Arctic
The Polar Journal, 2020
Although an increasing number of researchers focus on environmental, infrastructural and cultural dimensions of the Arctic, few efforts have been made to address how these various dimensions coalesce and may be changing in concert. 1 Transdisciplinary models of research are critical to address the complexity and magnitude of issues many Arctic communities face-especially due to the impacts of climate change, urbanisation and economic transformation-that a single discipline alone cannot solve. 2 Additionally, the various disciplinary or cultural contexts in which research is undertaken value different ways of knowing. 3 Therefore, recognising and communicating the 'epistemological plurality' inherent in any collective, community-based research is an important first step towards the study and management of socio-ecological systems in the Arctic. 4 In order to further the development of convergent research practice frameworks that can mutually benefit Arctic communities and scholars conducting transdisciplinary research, a three-day symposium entitled Bridging Science, Art, and Community in the New Arctic was held in September 2019 at the University of Virginia (Figure 1). 5 The symposium aimed to develop a network for Arctic residents and researchers pursuing similar goals, facilitate knowledge exchange, and outline research practices that can generate mutual understanding and benefit. It further aimed to catalyse creative forms of communicating knowledge across multiple sectors and disciplines by integrating diverse voices and presentation formats into the symposium structure such as storytelling by Alaskan and indigenous youths, recommended in recent Arctic-focused gatherings. 6 Organised by the University of Virginia (UVA) Arctic Collaboration Lab (Arctic CoLab), within the UVA Environmental Resilience Institute, the symposium convened twenty
Climate Change and the New Polar Aesthetics: Artists Reimagine the Arctic and Antarctic, 2022
I’m excited to announce that the introduction to my new book 'Climate Change and the New Polar Aesthetics: Artists Reimagine the Arctic and Antarctic' is now available online for free to download from Duke University Press. The ebook will be available in October and the paperback version of the book will be out one month later in mid November 2022. Two of the book’s chapters were written with Elena Glasberg, who is the author of 'Antarctica as Cultural Critique: The Gendered Politics of Scientific Exploration and Climate Change.' In 'Climate Change and the New Polar Aesthetics,' Lisa E. Bloom considers the ways artists, filmmakers, and activists engaged with the Arctic and Antarctic to represent our current environmental crises and reconstruct public understandings of them. Bloom engages feminist, Black, Indigenous, and non-Western perspectives to address the exigencies of the experience of the Anthropocene and its attendant ecosystem failures, rising sea levels, and climate-led migrations. As opposed to mainstream media depictions of climate change that feature apocalyptic spectacles of distant melting ice and desperate polar bears, artists such as Katja Aglert, Subhankar Banerjee, Joyce Campbell, Judit Hersko, Roni Horn, Isaac Julien, Zacharias Kunuk, Connie Samaras, and activist art collectives take a more complex poetic and political approach. In their films and visual and conceptual art, these artists link climate change to its social roots in colonialism and capitalism while challenging the suppression of information about environmental destruction and critiquing Western art institutions for their complicity. Bloom’s examination and contextualization of new polar aesthetics makes environmental degradation more legible while demonstrating that our own political agency is central to imagining and constructing a better world.
Artists in the face of threats of climate change
Oceanologia, 2020
In contemporary visual culture, the subject of climate change and the need for commitment to counteract it (Demos, 2016; Körber et al., 2017; Tsing et al., 2017) are increas- ingly being addressed. The artists’ observation concerns not only the natural effects of climate change but also their impact on the social and cultural heritage of the inhabitants of regions of the most endangered areas. Areas most vulnerable to destruction: oceans, coral reefs and po- lar regions are becoming a particular subject of interest for artists. A reflection of this interest can be the increasing number of exhibitions devoted to the current state of the environment (i.e. the project Plasticity of the Planet presented in 2019 in Ujazdowski Castle Centre for Contemporary Art in Warsaw). In the article selected artistic strategies to publicize the problems of ecology will be indicated. The first strategy is the exhibition of the beauty of the natural environment and the melancholy associated with its disappearance. An example of this can be Art of the Arctic by environmental photographer Kerry Koeping who focuses the audience’s attention on ocean literacy by means of affecting landscapes of the Arctic or the artistic residence in PAN Hornsund Polar Station of Janusz Oleksa. The second way is to indicate the physical and biological effects of climate change. An example would be the work of Kelly Jazvac who, in collaboration with an oceanog- rapher Charles Moore and a geologist Patricia Corcoran, presents plastiglomerate by Agnieszka Kurant —new forms of fossils, resulting from the combination of shells and stones with plastics or artificial compounds. The third method is the presentation of the residents’ experience. The examples are works of Subhankar Banerjee, who draws inspiration from ethnographic research and documentary films and Jakub Witek’s documentary about Polish emigrants living in Iceland. The artist presents the consequences of climate change for the inhabitants of the polar regions. The fourth way is to build a metaphor for the presence of a ‘stranger’ — a traveller, an explorer or a scientist. An example is a photographic performance entitled Polaris Summer by Kuba Bąkowski conducted during a scientific expedition to Spitsbergen, or three-screen projection by John Akomfrah’s showing the relationship between man and oceans in the context of exploitation of natural and human resources. For the artistic practices described in the article, I use the theoretical framework of environmental art that binds together aesthetics, ethics and politics. The purpose of the article is to check whether such a connection can be attractive to the audience.
The Lure of Lapland: A Handbook of Arctic Art and Design
2018
's research profile places emphasis on the dynamic interrelationship of art, design, scientific research and the environment. In the faculty of art and design, these areas figure strongly and our portfolio of degree programmes are in harmony with the strategic aims of the university as a whole. Community-based and environmental art, service design and context sensitive research form key components of the masters' degree that is the subject of this book; Arctic Art and Design. This is an innovative degree that blends art and design studio practice with 'real life' projects that take place in the special environment of Arctic. This book contains chapters by the professors and short essays, or 'vignettes' , by students about Arctic Art and Design. It provides the reader with first-hand accounts of the kinds of creative practice that students have carried out in communities, with companies or a combination of both. Richly illustrated, the book offers an insight to the ways that art and design can contribute to the sociocultural and economic well-being of the region. Art-based action research has been developed at the University of Lapland's Faculty of Arts, primarily in development projects, where the challenges of peripheral villages, such as population ageing, the isolation of young people, and undeveloped creative-industries and cultural services have been in the background (Hiltunen, 2009; Jokela, Hiltunen, & Härkönen, 2015a, 2015b; Jokela, Huhmarniemi, & Hiltunen, upcoming). Long term art-based action research projects are also being conducted on winter art in collaboration with cold climate engineering and tourism (Jokela, 2014) and on cultural sustainability (Härkönen, Huhmarniemi, & Jokela, 2018). The working methods of art education and community art have been applied in these projects as methods of regional development and well-being work. The projects have included place-based and community projects, which both village and school communities, as well as small and medium-sized companies have participated in. The development tasks have been defined in teamwork and with the community members. One of the starting points for art-based action research is that stakeholders and members of the community participate in the research and development process.
Arctic art education in changing nature and culture
Education in the North, 2022
The interconnection between the ecological and the cultural is evident in the Arctic. Thus, we propose the term ecoculture to highlight the connection of communities to places. Ecological knowledge, Indigenous knowledge, tacit knowledge and local knowledge are some of the concepts that highlight diverse ways of knowing in rural communities living close to nature. We use the terms northern knowledge, Arctic art education and new genre Arctic art, to discuss how art in North and the Arctic can foster education for sustainability and revitalisation of ecoculture. The long-term art-based action research to develop Arctic art education at winter circumstances is presented in this article. The research has included a number of winter art projects in Northern Scandinavia and NorthWest Russia. Three winter art projects, carried out in remote villages together with communities and schools, are reflected and theorized in this article. Artists, teachers and participants of winter art projects have transformed northern knowledge to respond to needs of contemporary society. As a result of the action research, wintery ecoculture has been revitalized and knowing with nature has been fostered as response to decolonisation needs. Research shows that new genre Arctic art and Arctic art education can revitalise ecoculture and northern knowledge.
Arctic Arts with Pride: Discourses on Arctic Arts, Culture and Sustainability
Sustainability, 2020
There has been growing interest in Arctic arts and culture as well as in sustainability among artists, researchers, and policy makers. However, until recently, the comprehension of Arctic arts and culture within the framework of sustainable development has remained vague. In this study, by analysing diverse debates from the Arctic Arts Summit 2019 in Rovaniemi, we investigate how the arts and culture sector promotes Arctic sustainability. An analysis of abstracts, conclusions, blogs and newspaper articles reflecting the presentations, art events, exhibitions and dialogues showed that the discourse on sustainability is organised around five themes: (1) global politics and ecological crises as part of the cultural politics of the Arctic; (2) indigenous and non-indigenous Arctic arts and culture; (3) 'handmade' and the material culture of the Arctic; (4) place-making, revitalisation and regional development; and (5) economy and sustainability. These partly interlinked themes have relevance for policy making, defining principles for arts and culture funding, artistic practice and research on the Arctic. In addition, education and artistic training are important for all of the five themes; therefore, resources for educational institutions are crucial for the sustainable future of the Arctic. Arts, culture and education have the potential to empower people in the Arctic, increase cultural pride, educate and inform global audiences and create connectedness between the past, present and future. Arts, culture and education contribute to Arctic sustainability.
Journal of Ecohumanism , 2023
This review critically examines Lisa E. Bloom's Climate Change and the New Polar Aesthetics (2022) by studying the book’s key methodological and analytical approaches to contemporary visual art on the poles. I locate Bloom's work as part of a larger discourse on Ice Humanities and highlight her own contribution to the field by focusing on the book's reconfiguration of critical environmentalism through intersectional feminist, indigenous, and transnational frameworks. The review also discusses the dual role of aesthetics in both shaping hegemonic perceptions of the poles and in articulating strategies for their subversion.
Title: The connection of Art and Science to Nature and Culture in Past and Present times
In 2008 Lorna, association of electronic arts, became a member of the project Arctic Perspective Initiative. As a memeber of API, Lorna organized the meeting of a judging panel in an international design competition for a mobile work unit, which took place at Hotel Glymur in Hvalfjörður in 15-18 September 2009. The judging panel consisted of Andreas Müller, Franscescu Ferguson, Juhan Berte, Michael Bravo, Marko Peljhan, Inke Arns, Nicola Triscott and Matthew Biederman. I got to attend meetings as an audience member. The three winners’ propositions were presented at the Iceland Academy of the Arts. A year later I was asked to give a lecture about artists and travels in relation to an exhibition on at Dalir and Hólar. I chose to talk about the voyage of Marko Peljhan and Matthew Biderman to Nunavut and the following article is based on the lecture which was given on August 7th 2010 in Ólafsdalur.