|
Project description, by Susan Farnham
During the past two years I have been working with marine scientists Dr. Bodil Bluhm and Dr. Rolf Gradinger of the School of Fisheries and Ocean Sciences at the University of Alaska Fairbanks to create a body of work for an International Polar Year Exhibit to celebrate Arctic Ocean Diversity. Our exhibit which will include photography by ArCOD scientists and my paintings is scheduled for October 2008 in Fairbanks, Alaska at the Well Street Art Company. After the exhibit closes we hope to travel it to other venues in Alaska and as distant as St. Johns, Newfoundland Canada where Bluhm and Gradinger collaborate with other Arctic marine scientists.
In the Arctic series I focused on the sea ice realm, the pelagic realm and the benthic realm of the Arctic Marine System. In Antarctica I would like to paint about the species living in parallel ecosystems as well as birds and marine mammals that live part of the time on the land but interact with or spend half of the time in the ocean. Probably the Palmer Station with its access to open water and variety of birdlife is the most appropriate location for this study, though McMurdo would also have intriguing aspects not the least of which would be the presence at particular times of the year of the Emperor Penguin, a species I find fascinating. I would like to have one to two months at either of these stations.
Though they are informed by the science and the real world, my painting style exists somewhere between representation and abstraction. The subject matter is essentially narrative but takes liberty with size, space, color, form etc. I want to say something that can’t be said with a photograph or a completely representational painting.
- Press release: First Friday exhibit connects art and arctic science: Local painter inspired by UAF researchers
- See the photographs by UAF scientists that inspired these paintings