Ice (St)Ages 3: Play with Senses - Aesthetic Communication with Ice

Extreme cold, sublime glow and a tremendous soundscape make up the sensual dimensions of ice, and have equally inspired science, art and technology since the 19th century. They generated the fantastic character of cosmological models used to explain the world, such as Hanns Hörbiger's 1913 "Welteislehre" (‘World Ice Theory’), which was largely inspired by the conquest of the North Pole. These entered the history of science and popular culture through a sophisticated, broadly-effective communication reaching out to experts and a broad audience alike. To this day, events such as the “Antarctic Biennale” of 2017 – which aimed to bring together a hundred "artists, scientists and visionaries" on an expedition ship – bear witness to the close intertwining of polar regions, environmental research and arts.
The climate-critical communication of urgency thus goes hand-in-hand with attempts to generate and stage aesthetical evidence. The resulting proximity of art and science and its historical roots are central to this online symposium and will be examined with a focus on mediating environmental knowledge in scientific and artistic performances as well as popular entertainment and media – comics and animated film in particular.

PROGRAM

WEDNESDAY, 29 September 2021

8.00-8.15am CEST / 4.00-4.15pm AEST
Curtain Up – Welcome!
Dr Anne Hemkendreis & Dr Anna-Sophie Jürgens

8.15-8.45am CEST / 4.15-4.45pm AEST
Explorations in the Icy North: How Travel Narratives Shaped Arctic Science in the Nineteenth Century
Dr Nanna Katrine Lüders Kaalund

8.45-9.15am CEST / 4.45-5.15pm AEST
Icy Peregrinations and Polar Panoramas in the Arctic
Dr Isabelle Gapp

9.15-9.35am CEST / 5.15-5.35pm AEST
Discussion

9.35-9.50am CEST / 5.35-5.50pm AEST
Break (online)

9.50-10.20am CEST / 5.50-6.20pm AEST
Comics on Ice
Prof Laurence Grove

10.20-10.50am CEST / 6.20-6.50pm AEST
Frozen-Ground Cartoons: Revealing the Invisible Ice
Dr Frédéric Bouchard & Dr Ylva Sjöberg

THURSDAY, 30 September 2021

8.00-8.10am CEST / 4.00-4.10pm AEST
Short welcome
Dr Anne Hemkendreis, Dr Anna-Sophie Jürgens and Rishika Nair Prabhakaran

8.10-8.40am CEST / 4.10-4.40pm AEST
Feelings of Queer Ice: The Cultural Technology of Snow and the Cold in Popular Entertainment
Dr Ben Nickl

8.40-9.10am CEST / 4.40-5.10pm AEST
“Some People Are Worth Melting For”: Digital CG-Ice as Plasmatic Resistance in Disney’s Frozen (2013)
Dr Chris Holliday

9.10-9.30am CEST / 5.10-5.30pm AEST
Discussion

9.30am-9.40am CEST / 5.30-5.40pm AEST
Break (online)

9.40-10.10am CEST / 5.40-6.10pm AEST
Frozen Fiends: Cold-themed Villains in Mainstream Comics
Prof Stefan Buchenberger

10.10-10.40am CEST / 6.10-6.40pm AEST
Communicating the Invisible
Virtual roundtable discussion with artists and scientists on the artistic and scientific interpretation and communication of ice on different stages
(speakers will be confirmed shortly)

10.40-11.00am CEST / 6.40-7.00pm AEST
Discussion and Wrap Up of the Ice (St)Ages series