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In his current show, “Frozen in Time,” running through December 12 in the Radio Room, Ari Friedlaender has transformed his academic research in Antarctica into a lyrical photographic journey offering a rare glimpse of the snowbound continent’s landscape and coastal waters, animal life and environment.
A doctoral candidate in ecology at Duke University in North Carolina, Friedlaender has made 10 trips to Antarctica since 1997 to pursue research focusing on the foraging behavior, distribution and abundance of humpback whales off the Antarctic coast. His studies of the whale population have led him to seek a broader understanding of the Antarctic marine ecosystem and the impact of climate change on the integrity and health of the ecosystem.
“Initially, I used photography simply to augment my work with whales,” Friedlaender observed. “Over time, my understanding, appreciation and sense of responsibility for the Antarctic ecosystem has grown enormously, as has my desire and need to convey this information, beauty and ethic of Antarctica. As a scientist, my means are through research and literature, but more and more I am trying to relate these messages through the camera lens.”
In addition to his wide-ranging research interests in humpback, right and fin whales, bottlenose dolphins and harbor porpoises, Friedlaender has devoted considerable time to lectures and workshops designed to raise environmental and conservation awareness in the general public. Precisely because Antarctica is “more distant in place and mind than anywhere on Earth,” he said, it is especially important to document the dramatic environmental changes that pose significant long-term risks to the Antarctic ecosystem.
“One means of generating a necessary emotional investment is to experience such a place,” Friedlaender said. “In lieu of floating among icebergs, hearing the eclectic symphony of a penguin rookery, feeling the cold blast of an albatross overhead, or freezing to the bone to catch a glimpse of a mighty leveiathan, I hope that my images will invoke some simple and basic empathy toward Antarctica—a unique, spectacular, vulnerable and threatened corner of our fragile planet.”
Previous exhibitions of Friedlaender’s photographs have been mounted at the Rabinowitz Gallery at Yale University, the International Fund for Animal Welfare, the National Marine Fisheries Service, and other locations in Connecticut and North Carolina.
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