Warm Regards
Climate Data and Art, Part 2 - World Without Ice and Daniel Bird Tobin
This episode of Warm Regards, the second of two that explore climate data as art, looks at more immersive and embodied experiences of climate data. First, an exploration of the multimedia installation World Without Ice, from producer Justin Schell, and then a conversation between Jacquelyn and Daniel Bird Tobin, who evocatively utilizes theater to help people imagine sea level rise in their own immediate communities. If you haven’t listened to our first episode climate data as art, which featured conversations with Jill Pelto and the founders of the Tempestry Project, you can find it in our podcast feed or at our website:
https://warmregardspodcast.com/episodes/climate-data-and-art-part-1-the-tempestry-project-s1!2effc
For a full transcript of this episode, please visit our Medium page:
https://ourwarmregards.medium.com/climate-data-and-art-part-2-world-without-ice-and-daniel-bird-tobin-66f2b3e0290c
Show Notes
For more information on American opinion polling on climate change impacts, check out the latest Yale Project on Climate Change Communication surveys from April 2020:
The website for the World Without Ice installation:
https://www.WorldWithoutIceInstallation.com
World Without Ice, the book by Dr. Henry Pollack that inspired the work:
https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/6677106-a-world-without-ice
You can also learn more about the works of the three composer-artists who created the sonic and visual dimensions to the project:
Michael Gould:
https://www.gouldmusic.com/
Stephen Rush:
http://stephenjrushmusic.com/
Marion Tränkle:
http://mariontraenkle.eu/
For much more detail on the dataset used by Rush for the composition, visit the GISS Surface Temperature Analysis (GISTEMP), visit its site on the Godard Institute for Space Studies:
https://data.giss.nasa.gov/gistemp/
Note, the values used in the story to calculate the musical notes are from the meteorological year (December-November), rather than the calendar year (January-December). Calendar year calculations artificially split the coldest months of the year into different seasons, which can result in slightly skewed data.
You can learn more about John Cage at the site run by the John Cage Trust:
https://johncage.org
If you want to start with one of Cage’s books, go with Silence:
https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/765651.Silence
Here are links to the other ice-based art projects mentioned:
Ice Watch:
https://olafureliasson.net/archive/artwork/WEK109190/ice-watch
Luftwerk’s Requiem: A White Wanderer:
http://luftwerk.net/projects/white-wanderer/
Matthew Burtner’s Glacier Music:
https://www.ravellorecords.com/catalog/rr8001/
For more information about potential climate change impacts on sea level rise, this is a nice explainer from the NOAA website:
https://www.climate.gov/news-features/understanding-climate/climate-change-global-sea-level
You can find out more about Daniel Bird Tobin and his work, including Flooding the Beach, at his website:
https://www.danielbirdtobin.com
Center for Communicating Science at Virginia Tech:
https://communicatingscience.isce.vt.edu
You can learn more about Peter Sforza’s work at his website:
https://www.cgit.vt.edu/people/biographies/peter-sforza.html
Finally, Daniel Bird Tobin wanted to make sure he thanked Patty Raun and Carrie Kroehler for their leadership of the Center.
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