Posts: 5

1. About Art in Antarctica

   12.Apr.07, 16:28 EDT
   
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   Miami artist Xavier Cortada, a recipient of the 2006-2007 National Science Foundation's Antarctic Artists and Writers Program, traveled to Antarctica during December 28, 2006 - January 12, 2007 to implement various art projects. Cortada planted 51 flags --and an ice replica of a mangrove seedling-- on a moving glacier to mark the passage of time; created a collaborative mural with scientists who work there; painted a portrait of Sir Ernest Shackleton for the South Pole (permanently placing the famed explorer in the place that eluded him in life); and placed flags for endangered animals from each time zone around the South Pole. Cortada also used 12 pairs of black shoes to create an installation at the South Pole expressing the environmental concerns of people living in the world above The purpose of the NSF Antarctic Artists and Writers Program is to enable serious writings and works of art that exemplify the Antarctic heritage of humankind. In particular, the program seeks to increase public understanding of the Antarctic region, including the continent and the surrounding oceans, as well as the associated research and education endeavors. Through his fellowship in Antarctica, Cortada strived to create art in Antarctica to demonstrate how interconnected we as people are to each other and to our planet. As such, the artist's explorations included environmental concerns and how time passes through us. He created site-specific installations, sketched, and painted, photographed and videotaped, as well as conducted interviews and documented scientist's work in Antarctica. Art in Antarctica involved the creation, installation and documentation of several site-specific series of projects in the McMurdo Station and South Pole Amundsen-Scott Station, including: The 150,000-year Journey, The Markers, The Longitudinal Installation, Endangered World Antarctic Mural Project, and the Ice Paintings Composer and sound-artist Juan Carlos Espinosa will accompany the artist to assist with the mural/installations at the stations, set-up and document the conceptual art pieces, and create a musical pieces using the recorded samplings of sound from all processes. Dr. Espinosa's music, along with Cortada's digital video, photographs, sketches, and writings will be displayed at the project exhibit.

2. The Longitudinal Installation

   12.Apr.07, 16:17 EDT
   
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   The Longitudinal Installation Making a point where the Earth's longitudes converge I will place 12 pairs of shoes in a circle around the ceremonial South Pole as a temporary installation. Placing the shoes next to each other as a proxy for people across the globe, I aim to conceptually diminish the distance between them. -- Xavier Cortada Miami artist Xavier Cortada purchased 12 identical pairs of black shoes and shipped them to Antarctica. Cortada also captured newspaper quotes from people across the 24 time zones about the impact of climate change on their lives. (Please scroll down to read them). In Antarctica, Cortada painted the approximate longitudes of the country in which the quote originated inside 24 shoes (so that in the South Pole each could be aligned with the longitude corresponding to the location on Earth where the voices originated). To paint the shoes, Cortada mixed acrylic paint with soil samples from the Dry Valleys in Antarctica, one of the places on Earth most susceptible to climate change. Cortada then flew to the South Pole and placed the 24 shoes inches apart in a circle along the South Pole, each aligned with its corresponding longitude as it converged on the South Pole. The artist then walked to the 0 degree longitude, the prime meridian, and walked clockwise around the pole, stopping at each shoe to recite each of the following quotes : 0 “There may be a move of wineries into the Pyrenees in the future.” --- Xavier Sort, technical director of Miguel Torres Wineries. 15E Switzerland: “Losses to insurers from environmental events have risen exponentially over the past 30 years, and are expected to rise even more rapidly still.” --- Pamela Heck, Insurance Industry Expert. 30E Zimbabwe: “We used to be able to grow everything we want but that has all changed.” --- Matsapi Nyathi, Grandmother. 45E Turkey: “We are helpless. We're trying to rescue trapped people while also trying to evacuate flood waters that have inundated hundreds of houses.” --- Muharrem Ergul, Mayor, Beykoz district of Istanbul. 60E Iran: “More than 90 percent of our wetlands have completely dried up.” --- Alamdar Alamdari, environmental researcher, Fars Province. 75E Maldives: “In the worst case scenario, we'll have to move.” --- Foreign Ministry spokesman Ahmed Shaheed. 90E Tibet (China): “The Sherpas of Khumbu may not know everything, but they are suffering the consequences of the people's greed. We mountain people should be careful and take precautions. If we don't save Khumbu today our fresh water will dry up and the problem will be impossible to solve in the future.” --- Ngawang Tenzing Jangpo, the Abbot of Tengboche monastery. 105E Borneo (Indonesia): “There's been no rain, it's horrible. The governor's office has instructed schools and offices to close until further notice.” --- Hidayat, government official. 120E Philippines: “The disaster covered almost every corner of this province - rampaging floods, falling trees, damaged houses. It happened very rapidly and many people did not expect this because they haven't experienced mud flows in those areas before.” --- Fernando Gonzalez, governor of Albay province. 135E Japan: “It's no exaggeration to say that Japan faces a critical situation when describing the rapid decline of marine supply in its domestic waters that is linked to seaweed loss. Tengusa (seaweed) provides food for marine species.” --- Tomohiro Takase, head of the fisheries department at the Hachijojima municipality. 150E (Great Barrier Reef) Australia: “In 20 years’ time, bleaching is highly likely to be annual and that will cause shallow-water corals to be in decline. We need to start working out how we can help people who rely on it for their income. It's really quite a stunning fact.” --- Ove Hoegh-Guldberg, director of the Centre for Marine Studies at the University of Queensland. 165E Micronesia: “We have nowhere to go.” --- Ben Namakin, Environmental Educator. 180 Tuvalu: “Tuvalu is the first victim of global warming.” --- Koloa Talake, former prime minister. OR 165W Niue: “Yesterday morning we woke up to a scene of so much devastation, it was just unbelievable. Cyclone Heta was just so fast, furious and ruthless.” --- Cecelia Talagi, Government Secretary. (180) 150W Alaska: “We are at a crossroads. . . Is it practical to stand and fight our Mother Ocean? Or do we surrender and move?” --- Shishmaref Mayor Edith Vorderstrasse. 135W Yukon (Canada): “The weather is really unpredictable and the ice freezes much later and breaks up earlier. There are more incidents of hunters falling through the ice.” --- Kik Shappa, Hunter, Griese Fiord, Canada. 120 W Nunavut (Canada): “Our cultural heritage is at stake here. We are an adaptable people. We have over the millennium been able to adapt to incredible circumstances. But I think adaptability has its limits. If the ice is not forming, how else does one adapt to seasons that are not as they used to be when the whole environment is changing underneath our feet, literally?” --- Sheila Watt-Cloutier, president of the circumpolar conference. 105W Colorado (USA): “In Colorado, climate change means less snow, less water, more wildfires, less biodiversity and less economic opportunity, as there is less water available for development.” --- Stephen Saunders, president, Rocky Mountain Climate Organization. 90W Nicaragua: “I closed my eyes and prayed to God.” --- Hurricane Mitch survivor Mariana González. 75W Peru: “I tell my wife the day that mountain loses its snow, we will have to move out of the valley.” --- Jose Ignacio Lambarri, farmer, Urubamba Valley 60W Argentina: “The flooding has forced us to redesign routes. We thought it would be for a short period of time, but it has been almost six years.” --- Carlos Avellaneda, manager of a trucking company. 45W Brazil: “I am very frightened. One thing goes wrong, and the entire system follows.” --- Jair Souto, Mayor of Manaquiri. 30W Greenland: “They tell us that we must not eat mattak [whale blubber], but this is all we know. Eating Inughuit food makes us who we are, and anyway we have nothing else to eat!” --- Tekummeq, Town of Qaanaaq. 15W Maurtitania: “We are only eating one meal a day. When there is not enough food, it is the young and the old that get fed first.” --- Fatimitu Mint Eletou, Bouchamo. Placing the shoes next to each other as a proxy for people across the globe, I conceptually diminish the distance between them. We are one global community. Creating this installation in a continent with no borders, the artist aims to diminish the man-made barriers in the world above it. Voices simultaneously stand in their place (longitude) around the world and inches away from one another.

3. Endangered World

   12.Apr.07, 16:15 EDT
   
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   Endangered World Cortada planted 24 flags around the South Pole to warn of the imminent threat to Earth's biodiversity. Using melted sea ice and acrylic paint, he wrote the scientific name of an endangered species on each flag, as well as the longitude of the habitat in which it struggles for survival. In January 2007, National Science Foundation Antarctic Artists and Writers Program award recipient Xavier Cortada traveled to the South Pole. Using acrylic paint diluted with Antarctic sea water, the Miami artist painted 24 flags with the scientific name of species across Earth whose habitats are being destroyed by man (see list below). Cortada also painted the habitat's longitude on each of the 24 flags (e.g., Gorilla at 30°East, Panda Bear at 105° East, Leatherback Turtle at 120° East, Siberian Tiger at 135° East, etc.). Cortada then planted the flags 15 degrees from one another in a circle around the South Pole, aligning each with its corresponding longitudinal line as it converges on the planet's southernmost point. The twenty-four animals Cortada selected for the flags are endangered because their habitats are environmentally threatened by man and/or because they have been hunted to the brink of extinction. In his Endangered World installation, the artist situates these animals on the driest, coldest and most inhospitable of continents to highlight the point that numerous species across the globe are losing their habitat. Half of the planet's biodiversity is threatened. Unless we act to address issues of global climate change and ecosystem destruction, many of these banners will soon bear the name of extinct species. 0° European Sea Sturgeon (Acipenser sturio) 15° E Black Rhinoceros (Diceros bicornis) 30° E Eastern Gorilla (Gorilla beringei) 45° E Ring-tailed Lemur (Lemur catta) 60° E Imperial Eagle (Aquila heliaca) 75° E Asian Elephant (Elephas maximus) 90° E Asian Buffalo (Bubalus bubalis) 105° E Giant Panda (Ailuropoda melanoleuca) 120° E Leatherback Turtle (Dermochelys coriacea) 135° E Tiger (Panthera tigris) 150° E Koala (Phascolarctos cinereus) 165° E Yellow-eyed Penguin (Megadyptes antipodes) 180° Steller's Sea Lion (Eumetopias jubatus) 165° W Swordfish (Xiphias gladius) 150° W Blue Whale (Balaenoptera musculus) 135° W Sea Otter (Enhydra lutris) 120° W Peary Caribou (Rangifer tarandus ssp. pearyi) 105° W Wolverine (Gulo gulo) 90° W American Crocodile (Crocodylus acutus) 75° W Red Wolf (Canis rufus) 60° W Amazonian Manatee (Trichechus inunguis) 45° W Maned Three-toed Sloth (Bradypus torquatus) 30° W Polar Bear (Ursus maritimus) 15° W Chimpanzee (Pan troglodytes)

4. The Markers

   12.Apr.07, 16:14 EDT
   
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   The Markers Cortada planted 51different colored flags on the moving ice sheet that covers the South Pole, each 10 meters apart and marking where the South Pole stood during each of the past 50 years (when humans first inhabited the South Pole). Each flag also displayed the coordinates of the location on the world above where an important event that took place during that year. Please click on image to read the list of historic events that have moved the world forward during the past five decades. National Science Foundation (NSF) Antarctic Artist and Writers Program awardee Xavier Cortada marks the passage of time by exploring important world events that have moved the world forward during the past 50 years. The South Pole On December 14, 1911, Norwegian Roald Amundsen was first to reach the South Pole. The geographic South Pole is located near the center of the Antarctic ice sheet at an altitude of 2800 meters. The ice sheet covering the Pole is moving at about 10 m per year toward the Weddell Sea (along the 60 degree West meridian). Each year, staff at the South Pole station reposition the South Pole marker to compensate for the movement of the ice. On October 31, 1956, Lt. Shinn landed the first plane, "Que Sera Sera," at the South Pole. Three weeks later, on November 20, 1956, the first South Pole station construction crew arrived. On January 4, 1957, the Navt Seabees crew turned the completed station over to a team of nine scientists, nine support professionals (e.g.: a doctor, a cook) and a dog who wintered over and officially opened the base to scientific exploration. The Installation On January 4, 2007, on the 50th anniversary of the opening of the South Pole station, Miami artist Xavier Cortada arrived at the South Pole and planted 51 differently-colored flags along a 500-meter stretch of a moving ice sheet. The last flag was planted where South Pole stood in 1956, when the Pole became permanently inhabited. The first, where the South Pole stands fifty years later. Each flag is marked with its respective year, and with the coordinates of a place on Earth the artist selected as important in "moving the world forward" during that year (e.g.: 1957 is Sputnik, 1963 is the March on Washington, 1969 is the Lunar Landing, 1997 is the Kyoto Accord) while scientists worked in the South Pole. The Marker flags were exhibited at the Miami Museum of Science and Planetarium prior to being installed in the South Pole .For more information visit http://www.miamisci.org/www/exhibits/markers/ Cortada's Markers Xavier Cortada selected the following events to mark how the world has moved forward in the past fifty years: 1956 90°S Antarctica Construction crews arrive at the South Pole 1957 47°50'N 66°03'E Soviet Union Sputnik, the first satellite to orbit Earth, is launched into space from Baikonur, USSR 1958 48°52'N 02°20'E France Pan Am's transatlantic 707 flight lands in Paris, jet age begins 1959 32°47'N 96°48'W United States Microchip is invented 1960 11°21'N 142°12'E Pacific Ocean Trieste dives to the bottom of the Mariana Trench: 35,813 feet 1961 47°50'N 66°03'E Soviet Union Yuri Gagarin is first man in space (launched from Baikonur) 1962 42°22'N 71°04'W United States Rachel Carson's Silent Spring is published 1963 38°53'N 77°02'W United States March on Washington for Civil Rights 1964 40°43'N 74°00'W United States Beatlemania sweeps America 1965 23°08'N 82°22'W Cuba Freedom Flights for Cuban refugees begin 1966 28°40'N 77°13'E India Indira Gandhi elected first woman prime minister of India, the world's largest democracy 1967 33°55'S 18°22'E South Africa First human heart transplant 1968 55°45'N 37°35'E Soviet Union Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty signed in Moscow, London and Washington, D.C. 1969 28°24'N 80°36'W United States The Eagle lands on the moon (launched from Cape Canaveral) 1970 13°06'N 59°37'W Barbados Ra II crosses Atlantic in 57 days 1971 37°21'N 121°16'W United States Microprocessor is invented 1972 39°55'N 116°25'E China Nixon visits China 1973 33°86'S 151°22'E Australia Sydney Opera House is built 1974 08°59'N 40°10'E Ethiopia Skeleton of "Lucy," our 3.2 million year old ancestor, is discovered 1975 19°24'N 99°09'W Mexico United Nations convenes First World Conference on Women 1976 28°24'N 80°36'W United States Viking I and II land on Mars (launched from Cape Canaveral) 1977 01°43'N 44°53'E Somalia Smallpox eradicated from Earth 1978 53°33N 02°07'W England First test tube baby born 1979 40°01'N 105°16'W United States Ten independent living centers were founded across the US for persons with disabilities 1980 54°23'N 18°40'E Poland Solidarity strikes across Poland 1981 41°08N 73°42'W United States IBM launches personal computer 1982 50°50'N 0°08'W England Whale hunting moratorium enacted 1983 41°54'N 12°27'E Vatican City Pope John Paul II retracts the ban on Galileo 1984 37°19'N 122°02'W United States Apple Macintosh launched 1985 09°02'N 38°42'E Ethiopia Live Aid concerts raise millions to reduce famine 1986 14°37'N 121°00'E Philippines Corazon Aquino leads People Power to end Marcos regime in the Philippines 1987 39°46'N 86°09'W United States Anti-depressant Prozac is introduced 1988 33°27'S 70°40'W Chile Chile plebiscite ends dictatorship, ushers in democracy across South America 1989 52°30'N 13°25'E Germany Berlin Wall is knocked down 1990 51°04'N 01°51'E English Channel Tunnel links UK and Europe 1991 55°45'N 37°35'E Russia Russia becomes "independent" as the Soviet Union collapses 1992 22°53'S 43°06'W Brazil First Earth Summit's Rio Declaration has 153 countries focus on sustainable development 1993 15°46'S 47°55'E United States World Wide Web browser is created, distributed 1994 25°45'S 28°10'E South Africa Apartheid ends in South Africa, Mandela elected president 1995 44°40'N 111°06'W United States Grey wolves return to the American West 1996 76°43'S 159°40'E Antarctica NASA announces that the Antarctic's ALH 84001meteorite points to existence of life on Mars 1997 35°00'N 135°45'E Japan Kyoto Protocol enacted 1998 03°10'N 101°42'E Malaysia Petronas Towers topped at 1483 ft., the tallest building at that time 1999 09°32'N 21°72'E Egypt Breitling Orbiter 3 hot air balloon sails non-stop around the world 2000 33°52'S 151°13'E Australia Cathy Freeman, the Aboriginal runner, wins Olympic gold 2001 12°03'S 77°03'W Peru A 4,000-year-old site yielded the remains of the oldest known city in the New World 2002 15°46'S 47°55'W Brazil Brazil Soccer wins 5th World Cup 2003 52°13N 00°08'W England Human Genome Project completed 2004 37°23'N 122°05'W United States Google, digital music, wireless technologies and blogs boomed 2005 20°24'N 03°41'W Spain Spain ends all discrimination based on sexual orientation 2006 TBA 0°0'N Easter Island Scientists discover new species 2007: 25°46'N 80°12'W Geographic South Pole The beginning of a 150,000-year Journey The beginning of a 150,000-year Journey At the location of the 2007 Geographic South Pole marker, the artist planted a mangrove seedling from Miami's Biscayne Bay, 25°46'N 80°12'W. ( Cortada's "150,000-year Journey" project also addresses the passage of time, asking us to see time in geologic instead of human time frames.

5. The 150,000-year Journey

   12.Apr.07, 16:11 EDT
   
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   The 150,000-year Journey Cortada planted an ice replica of a mangrove seedling on the moving ice sheet that blankets the South Pole. Embedded in the ice, the seedling will move 10 meters a year in the direction of the Weddell Sea, 1400 km away. In 150,000 years, the seedling will arrive at the coastline and theoretically set its roots. Miami artist Xavier Cortada planted a replica of a mangrove seedling in the South Pole.* The mangrove "seedling" was be planted on the 3 km thick glacial ice sheet that blankets the South Pole. Embedded in the moving glacier, the "seedling" is now begin sliding downhill (9.9 meters every year) in the direction of the Weddell Sea, 1,400 km away. The "seedling" has thus begun its 150,000 year journey towards the seashore, where it can eventually (theoretically) set its roots. The 150,000 Year Journey uses the terrain of the South Pole to address a sociological concern of the artist: the travails of an immigrant's journey --- the displacement, the solitude, the struggle to simply integrate oneself into society. In a more universal way, the 150,000 Year Journey explores humankind as it evolves through time. It will take almost 150,000 years for this art piece to be completed. What will our world look like then? Will humans still be focused on race and ethnicity by the time this mangrove seedling lands in the sea? Will our world be dramatically different, will the polar caps have melted? How much will such melting shorten the journey? Through the 150,000 Year Journey, the artist also invites viewers to reflect on our role as humans on this planet. Juxtaposing Antarctic time frames with human time frames (see The Markers project) reaffirms the notion that we are simply custodians of the planet who should learn to live in harmony with nature. (* The seedling will be a replica because exotic species can not be introduced into the continent. As such, the artist will create an ice sculpture made using a mold made from an actual Miami mangrove seedling. Water from a deep South Pole well --that makes water by melting ice created back when Shakespeare was writing Hamlet-- will be poured into the mold, where it will freeze into ice.)