‘It’s cold Eeee!’ – The Joy and Importance of Ice Observation Through Art
Earlier this month, Fresh Eyes on Ice, a freshwater ice observation network, held an opening reception for their art show. The show, on display through May at the Morris Thompson Cultural Center, features local professional artists, as well as youth art from students of all ages engaged in the program.
Fresh Eyes on Ice relies on everyday Alaskans to improve the collective understanding of river and lake ice dynamics with the ultimate goal of making travel, recreation and subsistence safer. The project relies on satellites, cameras, buoys and historical data, but most of all it relies on a network of observers made up of students and community members across the state. The program’s citizen scientists are the eyes and ears on the ground, collecting information about ice conditions such as depths and hazards, and the Alaska Climate Adaptation Science Center is partnering with Fresh Eyes on Ice to help build those connections.
For many of the project’s observers, who are used to living in frozen temperatures up to 8 months of the year, ice is a way of life. The art show reflects that, asking artists to portray their connections to the ice around them, resulting in beautiful depictions of crystalline structures, colorful reflections, crisp blues and whites, and myriad examples of how ice and life interact.
“The participating artists are careful observers, and their work reflects a deep respect for and connection to nature … often extending beyond art into other ways of knowing and engaging with the environment,” wrote John Smelter, an art and science integration researcher, in his curatorial statement.
As Smelter addressed the crowd at the opening reception, he thanked the artists for working so diligently to create new pieces over the last couple of months, many of them venturing outdoors in frigid temperatures to observe, be inspired and in some cases, produce the art.
The show comes at the end of a particularly cold winter in Interior Alaska. Fairbanks experienced 31 consecutive days of -40 degree Fahrenheit or below temperatures in December, persistent colder-than-normal temperatures through February, and record cold again in March.
Hannah Perrine Mode, a cyanotype artist and PhD candidate at the University of Alaska Fairbanks, pointed out a circular constellation of blues and whites across her canvas. The cyanotype liquid depends on UV rays to develop its rich blue color, and outside in the cold, as she used the overflow of the Chena River and the suns rays to create the complex pattern, the water froze, leaving a crystalline ice imprint. “I’ve never made them in a cold enough environment for the water to freeze on the fabric. It was a new method for me,” she said. “Now, I’m excited for it to get cold again.”
The artists captured intricacies of life on ice and in the Interior. A painting by Jessie Hedden depicted snow-covered branches, reflecting spectrums of color, as they poked out of an icy wetland. A photograph by Seth Beaudreault caught a yellow-billed loon surfacing through a frosty lake, wearing a small hat of frost atop his head. And a series of watercolors by Jill Richie depicted methane bubbles trapped beneath the ice.
The show also displays K-12 student art alongside the work of the professionals. Part of the Fresh Eyes on Ice observer and classroom curriculum is an emphasis on observation methods of all kinds, including artistic observations.
“At its core, this exhibition is about connection,” said Smelter. “Ice is not an isolated phenomena; it is an expression of relationships.”
But while ice may be a way of life, it is also a matter of life and death. Across Alaska, people rely on “ice highways,” rivers and lakes that connect villages to hubs, hubs to hunting and fishing spots, trails to cabins, or friends and families to each other. While traveling, often by snow machine, across frozen rivers and lakes, patches of open water or thin ice can quickly become deadly.
At one point during the show’s opening reception, Katie Spellman, a UAF researcher and head scientist with Fresh Eyes on Ice, led a group outside to the banks of the Chena River to teach them how to complete and submit an ice observation. The newly minted observers noted the fresh snow machine tracks that led across the river, as well as the patches of overflow or open water along the bank.
Just two weeks earlier, a woman had fallen through the ice on the same bend of the Chena River and was rescued by the Fairbanks Fire Department. Despite the unusually cold winter, the area has also seen a high amount of snow, which can insulate the river ice from the deep cold, making it thin faster when temperatures begin to rise. Variability in temperature and snow pack can make monitoring and predictions difficult, particularly as the climate becomes less predictable, even to those who have spent their winters travelling over ice. Artists, students, citizens – with enough fresh eyes on the changing ice conditions – hope to combat this problem.
IF YOU GO: Visitors can view the exhibit at the Morris Thompson Cultural and Visitors Center every day from 8 a.m. – 5 p.m. in Fairbanks at 101 Dunkel Street through the end of May.