Polar Soundscapes: Cheryl E. Leonard & Oona Stern: January 11, 2017

• Main Author: Augustana College, Rock Island Illinois
• Format: Text
• Language: unknown
• Published: Augustana Digital Commons 2017
• Subjects: Augustana College; Polar Studies; Art and Design; Earth Sciences; Glaciology; Other Music; Antarctic; Antarctic Peninsula; Augustana; Austral; Oona; The Antarctic; Antarc*; Antarctica
• Online Access: https://digitalcommons.augustana.edu/artmuseumabove/13; https://digitalcommons.augustana.edu/context/artmuseumabove/article/1011/type/native/viewcontent

Cheryl E. Leonard and Oona Stern traveled to the Antarctic Peninsula in the austral summer of 2008-2009. They lived and worked at the Palmer Research Station on individual grants from the NSF Antarctic Artists and Writers Program. Leonard searched out and recorded natural soundscapes featuring ice, animals, weather, and the sea. She also collected stones, shells, and penguin bones to use as musical instruments. From these elements, she developed "Antarctica: Music from Ice," a set of compositions about the peninsula's environments and ecosystems. Stern conducted a study of structure and pattern in Antarctic ice, which became the foundation for drawings, photographs, sculptures, and installations (some of which are on view in Centennial Galleries, as part of the exhibition Art above 66° 33'). Their collaboration, Polar Soundscapes, is a series of multimedia pieces which collectively form portraits of the wild, remote, and increasingly endangered polar regions. All photos courtesy of the Augustana Photo Bureau https://digitalcommons.augustana.edu/artmuseumabove/1011/thumbnail.jpg