Tag Archive for 'Ecology'

Crossing 66˚

Published on 22, February, 2009 in Antarctica. 0 Comments Tags: , , , , , , , , , , , , , .
Iceberg beyond the Antarctic Circle

Iceberg just north of the Antarctic Circle

Day 31; February 22, 2009; Southern Ocean, Antarctic Circle
Average Daily Temperature: 33.88˚ F
Average Daily Wind Speed: 10.82 mph
Feels Like: 17.65˚ F

One doesn’t forget the first glimpse of an albatross. With wingspans up to ten feet, they are stunning in flight—ever graceful in the thick ocean wind. Albatross are known for their gliding, and hardly need flap their wings. By using the updraft of the wind off the ocean’s surface and the shape of their long elegant wings they can glide endlessly. I was quite fortunate to see five species today: the majestic wandering albatross, the sooty albatross, the light-mantled sooty albatross, the black-browed albatross and the grey-hooded albatross.

Sitting on up on the monkey deck with birder Dennis Weir, I learned a great many things about the albatross, as well as the many other birds that were emerging as we traversed the latitudes northward. It is quite amazing, these birds that live out here in the middle of the ocean, with only the restless sea to land on! Albatross can go periods of years wandering the sea before returning to the South Atlantic islands where they were born in order to mate.

Several times through the day we also saw Humpback Whales, sometimes in pairs, sometimes in pods, and often near the lone icebergs that still persisted along the horizon. I was thrilled to witness one in the distance leap completely out of the water, and caught glimpses of others waving their fins or tails above the water. These graceful marine mammals had migrated here with their young for the austral summer.

Although we are now far from their origin, the ice shelf, the icebergs endure the distance. The gray and misty day displayed their ghost-like silhouettes along the horizon. Their forms emerged and dissipated as if memories, yet in their fortitude they persevered despite the warming waters that now surround them. I cannot help but wonder at the their fate, and at the fate of Antarctica itself, as well as the Arctic, as ocean waters in general continue to increase in temperature and as Earth’s climate changes. How can we reconcile the loss of these lands and their unique phenomena? How can we bear their possible extinction by what may be our own hand? Can we make the changes necessary to save these environments, these pieces of our natural heritage?

Just after noon, we crossed latitude 66 degrees and 29 minutes, and I left the Antarctic Circle behind. I have spent 26 days in Antarctica, 22 on the continent and four in the Antarctic Ocean. I have been opened to a world that I will not soon relinquish to memory, wanting to carry this experience afresh with me in every moment until I go back. This journey has strengthened my intent with my project, and impassioned me with the courage to accomplish it.
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Edge of the Ice

Published on 20, February, 2009 in Antarctica. 0 Comments Tags: , , , , , , , , , , , , .
Newly formed icebergs in the waning sunlight

Newly formed icebergs in the waning sunlight

Day 29; February 20, 2009; Penguin Bukta, Fimbul Ice Shelf, Southern Ocean, Antarctica
Average Daily Temperature: 19.14˚ F
Average Daily Wind Speed: 18.91 mph
Feels Like: -9.23˚ F

The first day on the SA Agulhas was spent acquainting myself with my new territory. This would be my first time on a sea voyage and there was much to comprehend, not the least of which was being atop a thing which never ceases to move about below you. The seawater around the ice shelf was relatively calm, but a certain finesse was still required in getting about the ship.

My cabin, which I would eventually share with three other women, was on the upper deck. Small but workable, the best feature was the portal view. The bunks were cozy, if a bit cramped, and I remarked at the support along the outer edge, which I imagined was to keep you from falling out of bed in rough seas. As I set about unpacking my things, I began to settle into the reality that this ship would be home for the two-week journey back to Cape Town.

Having missed breakfast—sure to be a daily occurrence given that it starts at 7:30 am—I was relieved to find that the heli deck was endowed with a rather elaborate espresso machine. For all its glamour, it was undoubtedly in need of a tune-up, as it arrived at a decent brew only after a bit of perseverance and fortuity. Alas, with veritable coffee in hand, I went about setting up my studio in one of the science labs at the back of the ship where Thomas, 1stborn and I had been given space to work.

Lunch came and went, the meals here being nothing more than tolerable sustenance. The bowl of pears was rather a treat—anything resembling “fresh” is always a high commodity—and I grabbed one on my way out of the dinning room. The food on the ship is really not something I wanted to spend too much time thinking about, given that most of it was packed into containers back in early December 2008. The same, of course, was true at SANAE, but the chef at the base was somehow more adept at preparing enjoyable meals. Alas, one learns to adapt.

I spent the rest of the day up on the monkey deck, a wind-protected bench at the very top of the boat which offers a 360-degree view. It was quite cold, but the fresh air was revitalizing, and with most of my body sheltered from the wind, I was able to sit and watch the environs for hours. There was much to take in as we lingered in front of the ice shelf waiting for the rest of the flights from the base—the sea was abundant with birds!

Snow and Antarctic Petrels darted around the ship, riding the potent air currents. These little birds, indigenous to Antarctica, are quite spirited. Flitting around the boat, they sometimes gain fast altitude and then hang in the air against the wind, as if suspended, and other times race past towards the tips of the waves. The Giant Southern Petrels are quite a bit larger, and have more elongated movements, languidly making wide circles around the ship.

All the while, the horizon was dotted with floating ice castles. As the ship made its way through and around them, our ever-changing angle of view showed one façade’s contours slowly shifting into others, creating vastly different shapes from a single iceberg. On approach, an iceberg would look entirely different than once we had passed it by.

The day parted with a waning crescent moon rising over the continent, half a mile away. The early twilight barely illuminated the edge of the ice shelf, the sun having left the sky blushing.
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Bidding Farewell

Published on 19, February, 2009 in Antarctica. 0 Comments Tags: , , , , , , , , , , , , , , .
Ice berg floating off the Ice Shelf

Iceberg floating off the Ice Shelf

Day 28; February 19, 2009; Penguin Bukta, Fimbul Ice Shelf, Southern Ocean, Antarctica
Average Daily Temperature: 20.93˚ F
Average Daily Wind Speed: 35.1 mph
Feels Like: -31.72˚ F

Dawn both elated my soul and dimmed my heart, as this sunrise marked my last day on the continent of Antarctica for this journey. I had been up all night, again, attempting to observe and capture the ever-changing nature around me. The base was completely silent, deep in the arms of Morpheus. I, bundled in all of my gear, took the video camera outside to record the light from our massive star, which was proclaiming the day on the southern horizon.

Facing east into 30-knot winds, I sat on the ground in the tumult of wailing wind and fiercely blowing ice crystals. My body swayed in the chaotic pulsing of the wind’s force while I anchored the camera as best I could and began my 30-minute recording. The strong morning light refracted off each frozen water crystal and magnified itself throughout the snowy distance. The world around me was almost painfully radiant—as if the ice itself was ablaze. What a sublime and ethereal world Antarctica is!

This was the same phenomenon I had experienced my first day arriving at SANAE, and now on my last it seemed somehow fitting to be experiencing it again; a full circle. Cycles are the hidden breath of our being—the innate rhythm of traversing time. The closing of one cycle always denotes the opening of another, and as I looked out across the luminous layer of snow that hovered almost two feet from the ground, my own body seemingly suspended in its westerly flow, I surrendered to the cold, the wind, and my last moments on the Ice. Antarctica has shown me so much of its magnificence—I’m ever stunned and awed by its force and sovereignty.

Upon my return from outside, I rushed to put the remaining things into my bags and joined Thomas and 1stborn, and headed off to the heli-pad. It would take three days to transport everyone from the base to the ship, save the ten people remaining for the winter, and we had been scheduled to depart on the very first flight to the ship. Having secured the sole window seat in advance so I could photograph the landscape during our hour-long journey to the sea, I peered out of the bulbous aperture and watched as the helicopter leapt upward into the air currents. Neall and Kevin, our pilots, were generous with our flight, and we had a great tour of the nunataks and their wind scoops en route to the ice shelf. Beyond the mountain range, we passed over massive geometries of crevasses, and the elongated patterns of cloud shadows stretching, as if lines, across the snow-covered landscape.

With my eyes lost on the horizon, my mind turned inward, and before long emotion overtook me. I was leaving Antarctica, and the deep feeling of loss that emerged surprised me. My affinity for this land had been immediate and absolute, and my departure from the ice continent filled me with enormous sorrow. Tears flowed in gratitude for the pure beauty and grace of my experience here, and for the gifts Antarctica had bestowed. It is, indeed, a privilege to come to this land and experience its phenomenal nature. Antarctica shall never leave me.

My melancholy transformed instantly as the ice shelf became visible below, revealing the birthplace of icebergs. From this vantage point, I could see clearly where staggeringly large areas of the shelf had just broken off, and where others would soon follow. These ice islands, entirely unmoored, drift freely northward on their lonely voyage out to sea, where they continue to break down and melt as they traverse the latitudes toward warmer waters.

The sight was literally breathtaking—hundreds of colossal icebergs floated effortlessly along the coast, despite their sheer mass. Tiny air bubbles caught in the ice layers make the icebergs particularly buoyant, causing them to rise even higher than the surface of the shelf itself once they are freed from it. Amazingly, the visible area of an iceberg—above the ocean’s surface—displays only 30 percent of its actual size. The remaining 70 percent lies hidden under the sea.

It is a wondrous experience to see these remarkable forms scattered across the horizon, appearing as impossible mountains. Their surreal, luminous grandeur seemed in stark contrast to the grey-bronze sea. As I marveled at their amorphous shapes, the sun streaked golden light behind the thick clouds, painting the dark water with a warm shimmer.

We had begun our descent, and quickly the red deck of the SA Agulhas Research Vessel appeared below. We landed with the ship at sea, the watercraft rocking in the waves as I stepped off the helicopter. Finding my balance, and attuning my body to what would be two weeks aboard this ship, I looked back toward the continent. The icebergs, which I had seen from the air, were now towering around us, their presence insistent and hypnotic. The ice shelf behind them glowed brightly in the now midmorning sun.
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Packing ICEPAC

Published on 16, February, 2009 in Antarctica. 0 Comments Tags: , , , , , , , , , , , , , .
ICEPAC (right), the Goundhog automatic weather station (left), and Umthombo Womlilo wind/solor generator (center)

Goundhog automatic weather station (left), the Umthombo Womlilo wind/solar generator (center), and the ICEPAC mobile base(right)

Day 25; February 16, 2009; Vesleskaervet, Dronning Maud Land, Antarctica
Average Daily Temperature: 
Average Daily Wind Speed: 
Feels Like: 

The last three days were entirely given over to the completion of the ITASC expedition, and all of our work in the field.

After shooting the interior photographs of ICEPAC for the exhibition catalogue, and finishing each of our individual art projects, we began the complete removal of the mobile base—an exhaustive experience that took 30 consecutive hours of hard manual labor in the freezing cold.

It was a significant moment, as it marked the successful end of ITASC’s four-year undertaking. It also held the distinct poignancy, that subtle sorrow, that comes with seeing such a huge project come to fruition.

In honor of our mobile base:

Inside the ICEPAC, view of living quarters with our sub-zero sleeping bags, room lighting and video projector--all wind and solor powered!

Inside the ICEPAC, view of living quarters with our sub-zero sleeping bags, room lighting and video projector--all wind and solor powered!

blumenfeld_antarctica_2708

Erika, still confounded by Merleau-Ponty’s "Phenomenology of Perception"

Thomas, sipping morning coffee in the hammock

Thomas, sipping morning coffee in the hammock

Erika and 1stborn lounging around at ICEPAC

Erika and 1stborn lounging around at ICEPAC

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Keeping it Real

Published on 12, February, 2009 in Antarctica. 0 Comments Tags: , , , , , , , , , , , , .
Thomas Mulcaire entering ICEPAC in the windy snow mist

Thomas Mulcaire entering ICEPAC in the windy snow mist

Day 21; February 12, 2009; Vesleskaervet, Dronning Maud Land, Antarctica
Average Daily Temperature:  
Average Daily Wind Speed:   
Feels Like:  

Tonight would be my last night sleeping in ICEPAC on this trip. The wind had picked up, and while ICEPAC remained calm and firmly poised against the 20+ knot winds, it was not impervious to the cold air. Deeply inside two sleeping bags, I was still tensely chilled in the biting temperature.

There are few things quite as humbling and centering like sleeping in a tent in Antarctica. Out in these harsh elements, one is called to be completely present with the force of this icy, windy continent—one must stay mindful, or face severe risks. Thomas, 1stborn and I have been remarking that living in ICEPAC, verses at the main base, puts one in this mindset. It has been aligning us with the reality of where we are on the earth. Our new motto for ICEPAC: Keeping it real in Antarctica…

One of my goals here in Antarctica this expedition season was to explore the possibility of the ICEPAC structure, in tandem with its wind/solar power, as the living space for my proposed 30-day field expedition for the production of The Polar Project. I need a structure that can house 6-8 team members, store our provisions for the potential month-long recording time, and provide workspace for monitoring the equipment, footage and audio. When Thomas and I first spoke, the intent was to come and see it work in the field first hand. The experiment was to live in the space for as long as we could once it was in operational order.

Although shorter than we had originally hoped, the time I spent in ICEPAC gave me ample opportunity to consider its potential for The Polar Project’s field structure. I believe the structure itself is a genius design in many ways. For example, the geodesic skeleton and the ovular shape made it completely feasible in strong winds. The harder the wind blew, the stronger its grip of the earth—even in the fiercest winds we had on this trip, the core structure didn’t even so much as vibrate in the wind!

There are several key things that I have been considering which would help regulate the temperature better from day to night, as well as keep it generally warmer. With a bit of innovation, the 2.0 version of this extreme weather habitat should be the perfect home for The Polar Project.
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Light Recordings

Published on 9, February, 2009 in Antarctica. 0 Comments Tags: , , , , , , , , , , , , .
Sun Pillar at Sunset

Fleeting Sun Pillar at Sunset

Day 18; February 9, 2009; Vesleskaervet, Dronning Maud Land, Antarctica
Average Daily Temperature: 9.86˚ F
Average Daily Wind Speed: 18.12 mph
Feels Like: -17.32˚ F

Today was quiet, and rather wonderfully subdued. I spent a good deal of the afternoon gazing out the window of my studio, meditating on the changing luminosity across the horizon to the south. The mountains appeared and disappeared behind think low clouds, and it was snowing heavily in the distance, leaving the farthest mountains obscured completely in gray opacity.

As the sun aligned itself on the horizon, there was another intense sun pillar. Rising like a flame above the rocks on the edge of our mountaintop, the beam glimmered outward a fiery pink from its golden core. Then, as if merely a chimera, it was gone, its floating crystalline form having vanished into the wind.

At 9:18pm, the exact moment of moonrise, I began a 24-hour light recording piece with the video camera. Tonight is the full moon, and its light shines in unison with that of the dimming sun. I will continue documenting the natural light for 15-minute durations every hour for 24 hours. The final piece will be my first multi-paneled screen video installation. For now, that is all I will say of it.
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Bienal del Fin del Mundo

Published on 2, February, 2009 in Antarctica. 5 Comments Tags: , , , , , , , , , , , , .

Left: Construction of ICEPAC Site-Specific Installation, Vesleskaervet, Antarctica, 2009. PHOTO: ITASC/Ntsikelelo Ntshengila. Right: South African Base SANAE IV, Vesleskaervet, Dronning Maud Land, Antarctica, PHOTO: ITASC/Adam Hyde

Day 11; February 2, 2009; Vesleskaervet, Dronning Maud Land, Antarctica
Average Daily Temperature: 17.24˚ F
Average Daily Wind Speed: 16.78 mph
Feels Like: -7.93˚ F

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE:

Announcing the opening of the Antarctic portion of Intemperie: the 2nd Bienal del Fin del Mundo, a collection of site specific installations produced during the project ITASC at SANAE IV (71 ° 40.433’ S 002 ° 48.700’ W) and ICEPAC (71 ° 40.433’ S 002 ° 48.700’ W) in Vesleskaervet, Dronning Maud Land, Antarctica. The exhibition focuses on weather, climate and Antarctica. The main venue of the Bienal del Fin del Mundo is in Ushuaia (Tierra del Fuego, Argentina, April 23 – May 25, 2009) with satellite exhibitions taking place at Centro Cultural Oi Futuro, Rio de Janeiro, Brazil (Jan 19 – March 1, 2009), SANAE IV, Antarctica (Feb 3 – 17 2009), and OCA, Sao Paulo, Brazil (March 7 – April 12 2009).

Exhibition Dates: February 3 – 17, 2009, 12am-12pm
Opening Reception: February 2, 8pm

Artists:
ARQZE
Erika Blumenfeld
Adam Hyde
Rebecca Mattos
Thomas Mulcaire
Siphiwe Ngwenya
Ntsikelelo Ntshingila
Amanda Rodrigues Alves
Manuel Sanfuentes
Pol Taylor

Curator:
Alfons Hug

Realized with the support of the South African National Antarctic Program, Goethe Institut and Oi Futuro, Rio de Janeiro.

Intemperie
by Alfons Hug

In Antiquity, philosophers believed that for reasons of symmetry the southern hemisphere must contain a counterweight to the landmass of the northern hemisphere. Mercator’s 16th century maps also claim the presence of a “large southern continent” (Terra Australis Incognita), which was regarded as a tropical paradise.

The intensive search for the real Antarctic during the 19th century was guided by the conviction that contact with the end of the world would unearth new insights for the human spirit. Not until 1820 did the Baltic German captain Fabian Bellingshausen (who was in Russian service) and the American seal hunter Nathaniel Palmer both finally discover the white continent at the same time.

Even so, highly respected contemporary personalities, including Edgar Allan Poe, still subscribed to the superstitious belief that there was an opening in the globe at the South Pole through which travelers could reach a civilized world, which they suspected within the Earth’s crust.

Today, 4000 scientists committed to peaceful research from all over the world (1000 in the winter) work in 80 stations scattered all over the Antarctic, which is about as big as Brazil and Europe together (almost 14 million square kilometers). The sparse tourism is still ecologically defensible – so far.

The Antarctic Treaty (1959), which was signed at the peak of the Cold War and froze all territorial demands until further notice, was an exemplary agreement which still maintains a key status in global environmental and peace policy today.

The Antarctic is therefore the only continent with no military weapons, no economic exploitation, and no land ownership; not even the plentiful mineral resources may be exploited: Utopian conditions indeed. While the rest of the world wears itself out in endless conflicts, a destructive exploitation of resources, and ownership claims of all kinds, the Antarctic, that classic no-man’s-land, has a higher calling: it belongs to no one and therefore to everyone.

Its natural cycles are certainly very closely interwoven with our own, and its fragile ecosystem reacts sensitively even to disturbances caused in other areas of the world. It functions as the Earth’s “measuring instrument.”

Although affected by the environmental sins committed by the rest of the world, the southern continent is largely still in a state of sublime innocence. It is the land before the Fall, perhaps the final great promise to mankind since the Tropics lost some of their paradisal beauty. The icy ground of this mythical region resembles an enormous archive in which the climatic history of the Earth is stored. The Antarctic is frozen time.

This zero point of culture is well suited for intellectual and artistic reflections on the world: emptiness, silence and seclusion, but also purity, clarity, peace and spirituality are some the existential categories that will be discussed in the transcendental Antarctic. The artists begin where the scientists and their measurements cannot reach, thus allowing a new and fresh perspective on this neuralgic point of the Earth.

The artists will also have to come to terms with the color white, which was regarded by the impressionists as a non-color, yet in the eyes of Kandinsky was an “insurmountable, indestructible, almost infinite cold wall,” a silence that can suddenly be understood. “It is a void that is juvenile or, more precisely, a void that is before the beginning, before birth” (Kandinsky, Concerning the Spiritual in Art).

And just as the “white cube” of the modern art galleries, in its complete neutrality, mercilessly reveals the weaknesses of a work of art, so the naked, white expanse of the Antarctic exposes the inadequacies of human activity.

Websites:
ITASC http://www.icepac.org
IPY http://www.ipy.org
The Polar Project http://www.thepolarproject.com

Photo Credits for Images at Top of Post: Left: Construction of ICEPAC Site-Specific Installation, Vesleskaervet, Antarctica, 2009. PHOTO: ITASC/Ntsikelelo Ntshengila. Right: South African Base SANAE IV, Vesleskaervet, Dronning Maud Land, Antarctica, PHOTO: ITASC/Adam Hyde

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