Glacier’s Lament

Glaciers are sentinels of climate change. They are the most visible evidence of global warming today. This series of works embodies the stunning beauty, rapid change, fragility, destructive power, and magnificence of glaciers. At the same time, they challenge the audience with the dramatic, irreversible ecological damages from climate change.

In Glacier’s Lament, we used data from glacier melting in the past 60 years to compose music and dance with local musicians who have witnessed the recession of the Mendenhall glacier over their lifetimes in Juneau, Alaska. Each note is one season in a year. In the winter, the glacier is frozen, so the pitch is low. In the summer, the melting rate rises, so the pitch is high. Towards the end, the melting overflows into spring and autumn, and the melting in the summer becomes faster. We filmed the artists performing the piece on the glacier, collaborating with the glacier’s own sounds.

Anchorage Museum, Alaska, 2021

Alaska State Museum, 2021

Donghu Shan Art Museum, China, Jul–Nov 2020

Global Just Recovery Gathering, Apr 2021

Broto Art-Climate-Science, Nov–Dec 2020

Artists in Nature International Network, Dynamic natural connections, 2021

STARTS Prize, 2021

Fast Company World Changing Ideas Award, 2021

Webby Award, 2022

SIGGRAPH, Vancouver, 2022

ISEA, Barcelona, 2022

A’ Design Award, 2022

IEEE VIS AP, 2021

The Disappearing Blue

There are four color cards in PANTONE for glacier blue. However, in real glaciers, this blue color is variable and dynamic. As glaciers are disappearing, this unique blue is also disappearing. We sampled and blended the blue color from glaciers in Alaska and hung them in recycled glass vials. When one glacier calving happened, one color vial fell down. At the end of the exhibition, all 60 vials fell down, forming a painting on the canvas beneath.

冰川蓝，在PANTONE色卡里有四种色号。然而在真实的冰川里，这种蓝色变幻多样。随着冰川的消失，这种独有的蓝色也正在消失。悬挂的比色管里的蓝色由艺术家从阿拉斯加的冰川采样调和而成。每当世界上有冰川倒塌，就会有一个比色管跌落下来，60个比色管在展览的最终全部下落，在下方的画布上形成一幅画。

CRYOSPHERE is inspired by the Matanuska Glacier in Alaska. The climate crisis has caused ice forms in Alaska to disappear at a faster rate than other glacierized regions on Earth. These arctic areas play a crucial role in regulating the planet’s atmosphere and have been called “ground zero” for environmental collapse, as rising temperatures and melting sea ice impact local communities and the global destabilization of weather precipitation. The Matanuska Glacier has lost over 84 million tons of ice since 2002.

In June, the entirety of the CRYOSPHERE exhibition will be released as a singular NFT containing a compilation of artworks by participating artists and will be minted on Algorand which is a sustainable and green blockchain. A portion of the proceeds will go to support Cook Inletkeeper, an Alaskan non-profit organization which engages with local communities, Indigenous-led movements, and a strong coalition of groups working to build a bridge to the future by protecting wild salmon landscapes and addressing the climate emergency.

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