Emma Stibbon: Fire and Ice

Alan Cristea Gallery will be mounting an exhibition of field sketches, new studio drawings and prints by Emma Stibbon, entitled Fire and Ice, to celebrate the release of a book of the same name published by the Royal Academy of Arts, London.

Emma Stibbon is fascinated by environments in flux, and her work explores the impact of natural forces and human activity on some of the most inhospitable and environmentally vulnerable parts of the world. This exhibition and book document Stibbon’s fieldwork and journeys that have led her from the frozen extremes of Antarctica to volatile landscapes, such as Hawai’i, which have been shaped by volcanic activity. Sketches made during her travels and ephemera will be displayed alongside drawings and prints made in Stibbon’s studio.

Stibbon engages with her subject through drawing from observation out in the field. Concerned with immediately recording the information or experience, Stibbon uses wet media for speed such as watercolour or Indian ink. She varies her drawing tools between brushes, dip pens, and found media and pig-ment, including volcanic ash. The sketches have the immediacy of work made at speed using materials to hand and produced in difficult circumstances and often frozen conditions.

At the opening and book launch Emma Stibbon will be in conversation about her work with director of the gallery, Helen Waters.