Corrie Francis Parks: freeze/thaw

Opening: Wed 19.04., 18.30h

freeze/thaw is a site specific installation by MQ Artist-in-Residence Corrie Francis Parks for the ASIFAKEIL, inspired by rock glaciers, an essential and largely unknown part of alpine environments. Rock glaciers are hidden ice caches protected from warming temperatures by a blanket of rock several meters thick. Due to the seasonal freeze-thaw cycle, these massive rock piles also creep slowly forward, creating striking ripples and furrows in their form. Though they have stronger defenses than ice glaciers, rock glaciers are also receding due to climate change. Austria is home to 5769 rock glaciers, but only 2309 still contain ice and feed their hydrological catchments.

The installation uses sand and sediments collected from two rock glaciers and one glacier in the Austrian alps, all of which are part of the Danube river catchment. During her Fulbright/MQ residency, Parks infused these sediments with water from the Donaukanal, activating them into movement through a freeze/thaw cycle, translating a Deep Time phenomenon into more visible Human Time. Using a technique practiced on economically significant glaciers, the artist wraps these miniature rock glaciers in cozy blankets as a way of protecting them from anthropogenic influence. The resulting videos are placed into a landscape of “city sediment” scavenged from various construction and demolition projects around Vienna. Despite their fragility, these miniature rock glaciers find an uneasy equilibrium in the urban environment, offering viewers a moment to pause and sync their breath with the natural alpine cycles as an antidote to climate anxiety.

Animation and Installation: Corrie Francis Parks

Sound: Maksym Prykhodko