Art in the Arctic Circle
Arctic Circle Gallery Exhibition promotional sign. Ava Kaloz '25
To start of the 2023-2024 school year, Steel Plant recently opened the doors to its gallery space once more, highlighting the work of Matt Frieburghaus, Professor of Digital Media at Marist College. The work that Friedburghaus has recently displayed is a reflection of the art and research he did while taking part in an artist residency this past year in the Arctic Circle.
An artist residency is when an artist applies to take part in a residential program where they can explore new artistic practices and experiment with the environment around them. Why does someone choose to partake in a residency in the Arctic Circle, considering the low temperatures and lack of accessibility to technology and many traditional forms of artistic media.
“After visiting Iceland a few times, I was really interested in going further North and kind of really understanding more about the high Arctic,” said Frieburghaus. He had planned to make this voyage earlier, but as a result of the COVID-19 pandemic, his acceptance into the program was later pushed off until just this past year.
When Frieburghaus was notified that he could partake in the 2023 expedition, he became excited to interact more with the aspects of nature that particularly fascinated him, namely icebergs.
When referring to the visibility of such icebergs in today’s climate, he noted that “Unless you are there in certain [parts] of the year when they happen to be coming out from Greenland, [the icebergs will not be visible], so going to Svalbard gave me a bigger opportunity to investigate and do a lot more video capturing of the icebergs that we see today.”
As a result of climate change and how it has impacted the Arctic Circle in the modern day, Frieburghaus claimed that “Over time my interest in climate change has changed, [and] has become greater.” This concern about climate change not only is a mindset for him but such interests also manifested themselves through his work with Freiburghaus saying “My work aesthetically isn’t one thing, it is working with the Arctic and climate change that is changing my work.”
When referring to climate change overall, he recalls how he has never considered himself to be “a sort of political artist but I definitely think that it has made its imprint in my work and I am kind of happy about that.”
Not only did his experience within the Arctic Circle shape the meaning behind his work, but it also had ramifications on the styles with which he created.
“For the longest time I was doing a lot of videos… and then in 2014 that changed greatly when I went to Iceland because I was noticing differences in the landscape with this idea of vastness and kind of layers, [which] was really intriguing,” said Friburghhaus. “[And so] when I went on Sabbatical they gave me a chance to work with watercolor again and I immediately knew this is like what I need to be doing with the icebergs.”
Although the discreet message of climate change and its broader impact on the world around us has come to take shape in Frieberghaus’ work, he mentions how “It’s still about aesthetics and my biggest interests, I don’t go out and record things because I have a very specific purpose about why I want to do that, it's more about the experience and bringing that experience back to the studio.”
Friburghaus added, “I am going to go back to the Arctic next August, so I definitely think this is kind of a long-term sort of thing for me to investigate and do more about it,” said Friburghhaus.