Artists, Scientists and Sense of Place in Long Term Ecological Research Sites of Interior Alaska

Keywords: Science, Humanities, Place, Alaska, North
Session Type: Virtual Paper Abstract
Day: Friday
Session Start / End Time: 2/25/2022 05:20 PM (Eastern Time (US & Canada)) - 2/25/2022 06:40 PM (Eastern Time (US & Canada))
Room: Virtual 28

Abstract

Microbials Worlds, the Art of Fire and Boreal Stories are three of a series of successive projects known as 'In a Time of Change' (ITOC) that joins artists and scientists in the contact zones that are the Long Term Ecological Research (LTER) sites of interior Alaska, where the focus is on improving understanding of the long-term consequences of changing climate and disturbance regimes in the Alaskan boreal forest. Field trip encounters between scientists, artists and the LTER sites produce a variegated sense of place where each group's orientation to and perspectives of the land seeped into the others via the experience of working alongside one another. On one trip to drill core samples and count leaves on small birch trees emerging in the aftermath of a wildfire, the scientists very analytical approach to the task at hand was disrupted by the artists who looked at the exact same thing in a very different kind of way which 'blew the scientists minds.' Another project entailed the fashioning of a dress out of leaves and other organic matter and then digging up the garment in successive years as a way of encountering the work of microbes in the soil. The ITOC projects produce new knowledge and perceptions of place on both sides at the intersection of science and humanities. This paper will consider the insights ITOC has produced to date and the promise of such collaborations for the future of transdisciplinary encounters with place.