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Judit Hersko's portrait of Anna
Schwartz - transparent silicone cast with sea butterflies. |
Report by Patricia Frischer
Judit
Hersko creates historical fiction. When you
first experience her performance, you think you are listening to a factual commentary
but it turns out that she has created and then inserted characters based on her
mother and herself into her otherwise well-researched fact-based stories. She
does this with a certain amount of glee and wonderful imagination. Her
character Anna Schwartz is interested in the documentation of the sea angel and
the sea butterfly, two pelagic snails that are the canaries in the coalmine
when it comes to ocean acidification. The shell of the sea butterfly dissolves
under acidity levels already present in some parts of the oceans and since the
sea angel’s only food source is the sea butterfly they are both threatened. Decay
and time are a big part of Hersko’s ephemeral pieces as she acknowledges that
things change and pass. Threads of personal and collective memory run through
the work.
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Jeanne Baret disguised as a man on
an exploratory voyage around the earth, 1766-1769 |
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Judit Hersko who depicts herself as Anna Schwartz's daughter
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Hersko creates photographs,
collages, and sculptures to support her narrative and she inserts these into
existing materials. Finding magical connections in historical facts inspires
her and she weaves further relationships by inserting her characters. She works
in the intersection of art and science as well as fact and fiction.
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Antarctic explorer Robert Falcon Scott with his wife
Kathleen Scott -
Quail Island in
Lyttelton Harbour, NZ, 1910
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Sculptor Kathleen Scott working in her studio with her son Peter
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Judit Hersko - Installation “400 Parts Per
Million” |
Hersko’s story focuses mainly on climate
change science as well as important and undervalued women in the history of
science and culture. One example is Ellen Browning Scripps who made her own
money from journalism, never married and gave masses to charity in the San
Diego region. Most of us, including Hersko, just assumed she had inherited or
married into her money. There has always been a society of women who supported as
well as practiced science and Hersko imagines her character Anna Schwartz
interacting with those active in her era in both social and laboratory
settings.
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Collage format invented by women of
the Victorian era. |
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Judit
Hersko - collage “Anna Schwartz: Self-Portrait with Diatoms”
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Judit Hersko working with light, transparency, time, performance
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| Judit Hersko - Installation “Pages from the Book
of the Unknown Explorer” |
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Judit Hersko detail
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Judit Hersko works in close
collaboration with scientists. She says she has a miniaturist approach and
likes to get close to her subjects. However, creating the narrative allows her
to zoom out and provide a wider perspective. Does the art benefit the
science? Her art is inspired by the science and helps to convey the
science. But collaboration between artists and scientists is a two-way street
as the scientists can do better and different work by having a new perspective.
Artists have a different way of looking at things and the scientists in her
sphere are inspired by her.
Judit Hersko is
currently Chair of the Department of Art, Media, and Design at California State
University San Marcos.
Note:
Scripps Institution of Oceanography now has an art collection focused on art
and science collaborations. Works from “The Weather on Steroids” exhibition on
climate change (2017) are the first pieces in this collection. Thanks to
Margaret Leinen of Scripps Institute of Oceanography and Amy Adler Visual Arts
UCSD for supporting this performance presentation.
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