Jess Mountfield – Voices From the Arctic

Pocko Gallery London is proud to announce the solo exhibition of animator and illustrator Jess Mountfield titled ‘Voices from the Arctic’. Central to the exhibition is a single-channel, hand-painted, animated film accompanied by an interactive postcard wall. The exhibition brings together animation, first-person scientific testimony and immersive Arctic soundscapes, to ask a question: how can we know a place in the process of irreversible change?

Having spent 2 summers in Longyearbyen, Svalbard, on artist research residency trips, Jess Mountfield interviewed fifteen scientists in glaciology, geology, biology and microbiology. She then developed a visual language of her observations of the tundra landscapes, rock lichen, the particular quality of Arctic light and the changes the Arctic is experiencing. Deliberately moving away from the iconic Arctic imagery of the lone polar bear and vast white expanses of ice, she instead chooses a personal, relational lens. It foregrounds the tension between professional and emotional registers: the scientific challenge of communicating urgency, set against the very human experience of watching a beloved place transform.

About Jess Mountfield

Jess Mountfield is an animator, illustrator and lecturer based in London, UK.

She has directed documentaries, short films and idents for the BBC, ICA, MTV, FX, scientists, charities, hospitals and agencies. Her films have screened in over 50 festivals internationally, and she has won awards for her animation work including Best Short Form from the Royal Television Society and Best Commissioned Film from the London International Animation Festival.

With degrees in animation and anthropology, Mountfield’s research interests include time, slowness, the Arctic, our relationship with science and multi-species thinking. She has worked across a range of mediums and formats, including film, tapestries, publishing and installation.