ARGENTINA: Artists from around the world gather in southern Argentina for art exposition meant to coincide with the start of the Polar Ice Cap Year

An awkward metal sunflower stands atop a windswept hill in the world's southernmost city, Ushuaia -- gauging climate change near the ends of the earth. Icebergs are melting and sea levels rising at the north and south poles due to global warming, and artists from both hemispheres are installing and performing works that dissect the process. "Sunflower: Sentinel of Climate Change" is just one of the pieces displayed at the so-called End of the World Biennial in Argentina. But with its solar-panelled petals, thermometers and cameras, it is probably the most functional. In one corner of the biennial's main exhibition centre, a Canadian group installed a mess of melted ice cream cones, while elsewhere a Paraguayan woman built a crooked stream out of filled drinking glasses. An Argentine woman ran a video, accompanied by fierce wind sounds, of a piece called "Methane" performed on the frozen continent of Antarctica. Two people wrap themselves in fluttering blue and red banners, which represent toxic gases. The biennial is meant to complement the International Polar Year, a research drive launched in March by more than 60 countries to study the effect of climate change on animals, people and the polar environment. "Ecological emergencies have a great deal to do with the relationship between the poles and the concept of the end of the world, because the question arises: 'At the end of the world, what other worlds are possible?'" said Corinne Sacca Abadi, one of the show's curators, echoing the biennial's slogan. Daniel Trama set up a series of portable heaters, glowing bright-orange and melting nearby blue blocks of wax. He "drew" pictures of icebergs on the wall with blue cables, and ran them down toward the hot pools forming on the floor. "This is something beautiful which aims to seduce but also act as a warning because the landscape is generated by a source of energy that we humans created, but which destroys its surroundings," the Argentine artist said. Global warming is stoked by human use of fossil fuels, such as crude oil. Although Argentina and Brazil were the biennial's main organizers, the Canadian government also contributed. Canada was a natural ally as a home to Arctic regions and the single-largest participant in Polar Year studies. On the fringes of the contemporary art show was a small exhibit called "Sacred: the two ends of the world." It compares the amulets used by the Inuit in the Arctic to tap spiritual powers with the mystical body painting of the Selknam culture in Argentina's Tierra del Fuego province, where Ushuaia lies, more than 1,850 miles (3,000 km) south of Buenos Aires. The Inuit artefacts, dating back as much as 800 years, were on loan from the Canadian Museum of Civilization. David Morrison, the museum's director of archaeology and history, said in his native country the Polar Year was being conducted strictly as a scientific enterprise. "To look at it through the lens of art is I think a very good idea that broadens the whole thing and makes it more accessible to the general public, makes it something that's easier to communicate," he said.

ITN Source | April 6, 2007

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