The creaks and groans of glaciers pushing through freezing seas on an unknown journey through the arctic are more reminiscent of sounds made by living beings than that of natural phenomena.
At the New Bedford Art Museum, the sounds of these multi-thousand-pound icy giants mingle with the music of vocal group “Moving Star” in Betsey Biggs’s “MELT (topographic remix),” a two-hour “invitation to sit bedside in communion with our earth’s body melting and spilling through climate change,” according to the artist.
These sounds are the backdrop of “Arctic Voices,” an exhibition that celebrates and engages with the arctic region from viewpoints ranging from that of 19th century explorer and painter William Bradford who catalogued the arctic in writings, photographs and paintings, to the world- wide community that calls the arctic home to this day.
For New Bedford Art Museum Executive Director Suzanne de Vegh, this show couldn’t be more timely — and she’s right. The brisk, yet still unseasonably warm, December weather that joined me on the walk to the museum was a reminder of that.
Climate change “is one of the most urgent issues of our time,” said de Vegh, who put this show together with New Bedford Art Museum’s Assistant Curator, Alison Borges, and New Bedford Public Library Art Curator, Alexandra Copeland. “So having an exhibition that creates conversation around climate change and global warming is my duty… to have the museum serve as a forum for those ideas,” continued de Vegh.