Items Similar to Mean Weather
Want more images or videos?
Request additional images or videos from the seller
1 of 5
Jessica HoustonMean Weather2015
2015
About the Item
In Jessica Houston’s Afterward, Silence (Franklin’s Crewmen’s Grave, Beechey Island) a single pale gravestone stands on an otherwise desolate ashen shore – a relic of Sir John Franklin’s ill-fated 1845 expedition in search of the Northwest Passage. Here, at the polar horizon is where colonial explorers once thought the populated world dropped off. Instead, they were confronted with the presence of established, living, breathing communities. It is also here that scars are most visible.
Many of the works in Horizon Felt began as part of Houston’s own Arctic voyage retracing Franklin’s journey, with the starkly different intention of surveying the effects of climate change and taking visual stock of the traces of colonization. In many of the photographs, polar landscapes are nearly engulfed by luminous colour fields in bright red, magenta, aquamarine and yellow. These hazy demarcations were made by obstructing part of the camera lens with colourful felt, giving the effect of a manual sunset or imposed horizon. They can be by turns meditative – as in Perceptible Changes Over Time (Iceberg, Baffin Bay), wherein a bleached sky and the tip of an iceberg meet a stretch of misty blue – and menacing – as in We’ve Crossed the Line, which similarly features a lonely iceberg, this time interrupted by a blood-red expanse.
Like her photographs, Houston’s paintings employ a logic of division. Sheets of pigment inspired by an Arctic palette of natural elements (moss, berries, stone) are cleanly spliced, segmenting each canvas. They recall the neatly partitioned geometric surfaces of Minimalist paintings, while also evoking territorial boundaries. With titles like Taking Possession and Unnavigated Passage, these visually abstract works are straightforward in their critique of the colonial and environmental damage precipitated by false entitlement. In the latter, two canvases hang side by side; the space between them is illuminated by a placid blue emanating from a strip of paint applied to one side of the smaller painting. Here, the Felt in the series’ title evaporates into a less tangible sense of touch achieved by the effects of light and colour. Boundaries appear less clear-cut – dividing lines evanesce, nearly disappear.
In our flawed human effort to reverse what we’ve done wrong, it can feel like we are chasing a constantly diminishing horizon; night falls slowly on certain species, certain natural resources, certain ways of living, like a final curtain. While Houston’s glowing horizons can be ominous or obscuring, they can also be utopian. The mystery of what lies beyond the horizon motivates the chase, and its luminosity – those slivers of light you might see as an immense late summer sun creeps behind a skyscraper – naturally provide a swell of hope, a sense of expectant fullness. Like the slices of light and colour that delimit Houston’s landscapes, every sunset and every radiant horizon begs to be deeply felt.
- Creator:Jessica Houston (1970, American)
- Creation Year:2015
- Dimensions:Height: 22 in (55.88 cm)Width: 33 in (83.82 cm)Depth: 2 in (5.08 cm)
- More Editions & Sizes:Edition of 10Price: $2,500
- Medium:
- Movement & Style:
- Period:
- Condition:
- Gallery Location:Montreal, CA
- Reference Number:1stDibs: LU476666392
Jessica Houston
Jessica Houston (MA, Columbia University) has traveled from pole to pole, using color and light to entangle and provoke questions related to our changing natural world, and our nature within it. She has created site-specific works for the NJ MOCA (NJ); the Castello di Corigliano (Puglia, Italy); and The Albany Airport (Albany, NY). Select exhibitions include Art Mûr Gallery, Montréal, Canada; The Hyde Collection Museum, Glens Falls, NY; and The Latimer House Museum, New York, NY. She has been invited to residencies at The Albers Foundation and CAMAC Center for Art, Science and Technology in France. Her works are funded by The Canada Council for the Arts and are in the collections of La collection Prêt d’œuvres d’art, Musée National Des Beaux-Arts du Quebec; Bibliothèque et Archives nationales du Québec (BAnQ), Montréal, Québec; Bank of Montréal, Toronto; and the Consulate General of Monaco, Montréal. She has lectured at The Art Institute of Florence; Columbia University; Concordia University; and OCAD University.
About the Seller
5.0
Vetted Seller
These experienced sellers undergo a comprehensive evaluation by our team of in-house experts.
Established in 1996
1stDibs seller since 2014
96 sales on 1stDibs
- ShippingRetrieving quote...Ships From: Montreal, Canada
- Return PolicyA return for this item may be initiated within 7 days of delivery.
More From This SellerView All
- WiccaBy Dina GoldsteinLocated in Montreal, QuebecDina Goldstein is known for her conceptual and complex photographic work in a pop surrealist style. Her first major projects, In the Dollhouse and Fallen Princesses, were very succes...Category
2010s Contemporary Figurative Photography
MaterialsPhotographic Paper
- Perceptible Changes Over TimeBy Jessica HoustonLocated in Montreal, QuebecIn Jessica Houston’s Afterward, Silence (Franklin’s Crewmen’s Grave, Beechey Island) a single pale gravestone stands on an otherwise desolate ashen shore – a relic of Sir John Frankl...Category
21st Century and Contemporary Contemporary Photography
MaterialsPhotographic Paper
- SatanBy Dina GoldsteinLocated in Montreal, QuebecDina Goldstein is known for her conceptual and complex photographic work in a pop surrealist style. Her first major projects, In the Dollhouse and Fallen Princesses, were very succes...Category
2010s Contemporary Figurative Photography
MaterialsPhotographic Paper
- BuddhaBy Dina GoldsteinLocated in Montreal, QuebecDina Goldstein is known for her conceptual and complex photographic work in a pop surrealist style. Her first major projects, In the Dollhouse and Fallen Princesses, were very succes...Category
2010s Contemporary Figurative Photography
MaterialsPhotographic Paper
- for intérieur – sang 2By Patrick BeaulieuLocated in Montreal, QuebecPatrick Beaulieu’s multi-disciplined practice creates finely tuned and subtle gestures that aim to re-focus our attention on the physical world that we see and experience. In convers...Category
21st Century and Contemporary Contemporary Still-life Photography
MaterialsPhotographic Paper
- Chalk ShorelineBy Holly KingLocated in Montreal, QuebecKing creates large format photographic landscapes in her studio with sculptural props and painted backdrops. She is interested in the tension between artifice and constructed realiti...Category
21st Century and Contemporary Contemporary Landscape Photography
MaterialsPhotographic Paper
You May Also Like
- ScarfaceLocated in New York, NYInspired by her love for nature, Griet Van Malderen (Belgium, 1970), a self-taught wildlife photographer from Flanders in Belgium, has been exploring Africa’s wild places for the pas...Category
2010s Contemporary Black and White Photography
MaterialsPhotographic Film, Photographic Paper, Pigment, Archival Pigment, Digita...
- The LandlordBy David YarrowLocated in Denver, CODavid Yarrow has built an unrivaled reputation for capturing the beauty of the planet’s remote landscapes, cultures and endangered animals. Born in Glasgow, Scotland in 1966, he is n...Category
2010s Contemporary Black and White Photography
MaterialsPhotographic Paper
- Cindy's Shotgun WeddingBy David YarrowLocated in Denver, CODavid Yarrow has built an unrivaled reputation for capturing the beauty of the planet’s remote landscapes, cultures and endangered animals. Born in Glasgow, Scotland in 1966, he is now an internationally acclaimed fine art photographer and Europe’s best selling wildlife photographer. "You don't get a second chance to work withCindy Crawford, so there was obviously a little pressure. I took her to a place I know well -the ghost town of Nevada City,Montana as I hoped familiarity with the light and the angles would help me. I needed as many variables under my control as possible on an ambitious story line. The one thing we could not manage or predict was the weather and last week it was cold.If Cindy was outside her comfort zone with the temperatures so low and a big wolf as a companion, she did not flinch. She is professional, stoic and game and it was an honour to work with a true American idol. She sets a high bar on so many levels.It was a big effort for her to fly from LA to hang out with me and my team whom she had never met before and then work in freezing temperatures with some big wolves. She never complained and took no fee at all. Quite amazing.Proceeds from the sales of this image -Cindy’s Shotgun Wedding...Category
2010s Contemporary Black and White Photography
MaterialsPhotographic Paper
- Golden Gate Bridge ( 58 x 110" )By Frank SchottLocated in San Francisco, CAGOLDEN GATE by Frank Schott an epic scale photograph of iconic Golden Gate Bridge and San Francisco skyline in Northern California's atmospheric morning light 58 x 110 inches ( 147 ...Category
21st Century and Contemporary Contemporary Color Photography
MaterialsPhotographic Paper, Archival Pigment, Archival Paper, Giclée
- Coal Tit by Mark Harvey 30" x 30" C-type Photograph Print OnlyLocated in Coltishall, GBCoal Tit is part of the In Flight collection, a series of portraits of the wild birds taken in the gardens of Mark Harvey's home in Norfolk, England. At a me...Category
21st Century and Contemporary Contemporary Color Photography
MaterialsC Print, Photographic Paper
- Spring Blue Tit by Mark Harvey 30" x 30" C-type Photographic Print OnlyLocated in Coltishall, GBTaken at the beginning of the breeding season in March, this male Blue Tit is showing off his pristine breeding plumage. Spring Blue Tit is part of the In Flight collection, a serie...Category
21st Century and Contemporary Contemporary Color Photography
MaterialsC Print, Photographic Paper
Recently Viewed
View AllMore Ways To Browse
Relic Art
Night Sky Photography
Photography Iceberg
Northwest Passage
Moss Aquamarine
Pool Photographs and Photography
Summer Photography
Slim Aarons Photography Black And White
Photography Of Oceans
Female Portrait Prints
Pink Photography Art
Vintage Paper Embosser
Vintage Us Military
Black And White Photo Series
Photography Musicians
Vintage American Pictures
Henri Robert
Photography Gold