Dr Joanne Johnson
Follow Joanne on Twitter @geologicalJo
To find out more see:
https://www.theguardian.com/world/2019/jul/09/glacial-melting-in-antarctica-may-become-irreversible
I am delighted to have been afforded the opportunity to team up with Dr Joanne Johnson at British Antarctic Survey, to produce contemporary art inspired by her scientific work in relation to climate change.
Joanne is a geochemist and is the UK lead on one of the International Thwaites Glacier Collaboration projects – Geological History Constraints on the magnitude of grounding line retreat in the Thwaites Glacier system (GHC). The mighty Thwaites Glacier is part of the West Antarctic Ice Sheet (WAIS) and has been in the news recently due to its potential to significantly increase global sea levels through ice loss triggered by rising temperatures.
Our collaboration centres around the notions of absence and presence and of looking to the past to determine the probability of our future. It brings together geology, time, process and materiality and is underpinned by the philosophical idea that all is interconnected. By bringing a different perspective to this hugely important scientific work we hope it will engender wider discussion and new understanding. Our objective is to illuminate and to educate and I can’t wait to see what we are able to produce together.
See the introduction to our project, then follow work in progress and my research interests in the blog.
ice scape - frozen water, glaciomarine sediment and pigment
art meets science
The idea behind our collaboration is to contribute to bringing the science of climate change to the fore in new and exciting ways. Joining forces, to combine science with contemporary art through innovation and process, will help to inspire thought in ways that statistics and photographs are simply not able to do. My aim is to bring prominence and tangibility to those aspects of global warming which, due to their imperceptibility, hide in plain site and go largely unseen. With education about climate change of increasing importance, Jo and I share an enthusiasm for taking our work into the classroom to generate conversation. Additionally, we hope to raise awareness and encourage engagement in a more interesting way amongst the wider population, by staging informative exhibitions as our collaboration develops.