A Science-Minded Artist Shrinks the Universe to Human Scale
Katie Paterson's work has always been about Earth, and the great vastness beyond.
A Scottish multidisciplinary artist, she has worked with scientists across the globe on exhaustively researched projects, including The Future Library, an anthology of 100 previously unpublished books written by some of the 21st century's most celebrated writers.
In 2022, astronomers helped her count the times the sun has risen since the Earth was formed — to the most accurate level scientists can — for a piece titled '—there lay the Days between—.' Years earlier, she had worked with scientists specializing in light at the firm Osram to develop lightbulbs that simulate the lunar glow.
And yet, 'I never want to go into space,' Paterson said in a video interview. Asked whether her works are portraits of Earth or of us, she said, 'It's going to be us.'
'If all those cosmic sequences hadn't happened, we wouldn't be here breathing and talking together,' she explained.
Ultimately, she said, in all her work, she has always been trying to 'get a little bit closer to that understanding of quite how precious life is.' That lifetime pursuit underpins three current projects: a series of paintings on view in an exhibition in Cumbria, England, and 'Afterlife,' which will soon be installed at the Folkestone Triennial 2025 in Kent, England; and 'True North,' which has taken Paterson from Japan to the Norwegian archipelago of Svalbard, where she has just completed a residency.
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