Emergency! What Was Is

Casey, Sarah (2025) Emergency! What Was Is. [Artefact]

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Image (Credit: Rob Harris Henry Moore Institute Sarah Casey Emergency What was is)
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Abstract

Emergency! What Was  are large suspended drawings made from wax, paper, and glacial flour – the fine rock sediment left behind as glaciers retreat. These translucent works subtly move with air currents, allowing light to pass through in ever-changing ways, echoing the landscapes that inspired them.  The work is the outcome of research about how the languages of drawing and sculpture can be fused to articulate the ineffable sense of absent presence presented in glacial archaeology. Emergency! What Was Is is a development of the works made with wax, depicting objects of glacial archaeology . Vulnerable to heat, they embody the same fragility as the glaciers and the archaeology . Two drawings  5.5 metres long and hang from near the ceiling cascading to the floor where the paper is crumpled up. . The surface is pierced through with tiny pin pricks, creating outline image fragments of glacial archaeology. The pin pricks let light into the room. As you move towards the work, the light will change and different parts of the image will be illuminated in dialogue with the viewer in the room and changing with the light outside. Nestled into the crevices made by the waxed paper are some tiny paper objects and traces of dust made with glacial flour – the sediment that is deposited as the glacier retreats. ​This work develops research initiated during residency at Musée d’art du Valais (2023) and is part of the wider Emergency! project responding to glacial archaeology in Switzerland. ​