“Flow of Reflectivity” is curated by professors of arts and sciences, bringing together these unique disciplines through recent and historic photos and time-lapse videos of glaciers. The exhibition explores glacier changes, focusing on understanding reflectivity (the ability of ice to restore incoming light to the atmosphere), by exploring the artistic dimensions of vision and the scientific concept of albedo (a portion of the sunlight reflects on the surface). It investigates the question “How do we see?” And explore how humans perceive changes in the natural world. For Patricia Maurides, curator and practice professor of the art department at Stony Brook University, “See Seey” itself may be an act of imagination and connection.
The show is on display at the Simmons Center Gallery at Stony Brook University in New York, which includes photos and videos from Maurides and Karina Yager, associate professor at the School of Ocean and Atmospheric Sciences at Stony Brook University. It also shows time-lapse videos by James Balog, as well as replicas of historical photographs by geologist and pilot Robert Shippee, and Navy Lieutenant and aerial photographer George Johnson.
The exhibition uses its interdisciplinary perspective to sneak into the albedo phenomenon. Boron ice, borneol and snow cover the ground reflect the highest part of the earth, and ice albedo is a key element in regulating the global climate. The work in the show is individually and as a coherent whole, inviting viewers to view perception as a dynamic and explanatory process.
The “Flow of Reflectivity” focuses on the connection between ecological transformation between landscape and artwork and human perceptions in various times. The collaboration between its curators established a crucial connection between art and science, and bridged life experience with scientific observations in the natural world.
In one example, the curator placed the recent photos on the latest one with historical images to invite reflection on the couple. “Apu” (2019) by Yager is located across the gallery of Glacier Aerial Photos in Cordillera Vilcanota, Peru, as part of a 1931 expedition to take place in Shippee-Johnson aerial photography expedition. During Yager’s expedition to Peru, she reconstructs glaciers and archive aerial images after the original flight path of the historical expedition.
The title “apu” comes from Quechua’s “mountain god”. Yager’s work reflects her collaboration with indigenous communities in Peru to participate in the spiritual and cultural significance of glacial landscapes. While tracing historic flight routes and reshooting the same glaciers, she stressed that for many indigenous communities, glaciers are potential creatures that make glacier retreats change the meaning of cosmology. Rather than copying independent shots of scientific documents, Jagre invites viewers to understand “apu” through intimate observations, which are intimate and rooted in life experiences.
While the art that depicts landscapes is nothing new, Julie Reiss, an art historian who teaches in Columbia’s Sustainability Management Program, told Glacierhub: “We can look back at the relationship between these early landscapes, even what land is. Reiss added.
More than 80 years later, audiences of “APU” not only evaluating glacier retreats in Peru’s Cordillera Vilcanota, but also estimate how people experience this transformation of the landscape. Yagge explained that Appus is the spiritual caregiver and protector of the community, and the indigenous community “has a relationship with Apus.” This view has changed how people view glaciers. It shows that seeing is not only experience, but custom shaped by imagination, connection, experience and relationships.
Scientific photography records specific transformations, and “the art method is an open space for inquiry, imagination and the embodiment of experience.” This deeper inquiry is how we see natural landscapes spread throughout “flow of reflectivity.”
Another work on the relationship between art and science is “The Alchemy of Light”. In this image, Maurides uses prisms, magnifying glasses and reflective polyester films to explore the behavior of light to shape the reflectivity of the natural world. Maurides attempts to invite viewers to see human eyes and techniques in different ways. Maurides’ photography attempts to condense these “optical experiments” film streams into single images. She approaches photography “not as a tool for documents, but as a living space for inquiries, experiments and games.”
Morrides sees photography as a portal, “a space that respects human experience and cultivates a sense of belonging within the natural world, allowing people to see things that are usually invisible, strange, or overlooked.” In “Flow of Reflectivity,” visitors are invited to the portal and consider how perceptions shape their relationship with the world around them, and how photography and art reveal and change that relationship.
Until July 11, 2025, “Reflectivity” is on display at Stoney Brook University’s Simmons Center Gallery.
