As Ice

<p dir="ltr">Research Background </p><p dir="ltr">As Ice is the second in a trilogy of exhibitions curated by Castel Belasi – Contemporary Art Center for Eco Thought, exploring elemental forces and their cultural, ecological, and symbolic meanings. Set within a sixteenth-century alpine castle and presented during UNESCO's International Year for the Conservation of Glaciers, the exhibition addresses climate change, fragility, and ecological loss through contemporary art. Conceived in response to accelerating glacial retreat, the project positions ice as both subject and medium through which to investigate broader environmental and existential concerns. It brings together fourteen international artists whose works reveal the entanglement of natural systems and human narratives. </p><p dir="ltr">Research Significance </p><p dir="ltr">The exhibition intervenes in dominant environmental discourses by fostering exchanges between artistic practice and scientific research. Artworks act as speculative responses to climate collapse, glacial time, and cultural mythologies, using sound, video, sculpture, and installation to express themes of impermanence and transformation. Philip Samartzis’s Antarctic field recordings offer a key contribution, capturing the complex geophysical and acoustic behaviour of ice. These recordings reveal dynamic processes—fracturing, melting, compression—that are typically inaccessible, making audible the shifting thresholds of climate systems. </p><p dir="ltr">Research Contribution </p><p dir="ltr">As Ice contributes new interdisciplinary knowledge to the eco-humanities by reframing glaciers as cultural, political, and spiritual agents. The exhibition models a curatorial methodology that is site-responsive and ethically attuned to environmental futures. Realised in collaboration with MUSE Science Museum Trento—part of a multi-year partnership with Castel Belasi—it demonstrates how long-term institutional collaboration can generate sustained, public-facing dialogue between contemporary art and scientific inquiry into sustainability.</p>