 | South Nation Conservation (SNC) and Bishops Mills Natural History Centre (BMNHC) are pleased to announce: Art and Science in the South Nation Watershed, a survey of local landscapes, with onsite paintings of scenes, plants, and animals. | |
Finch - Oct. 3, 2011 - South Nation Conservation (SNC) and Bishops Mills Natural History Centre (BMNHC) are pleased to announce: Art and Science in the South Nation Watershed, a survey of local landscapes, with onsite paintings of scenes, plants, and animals.
This fall, husband-and-wife team, Dr. Fred Schueler and Aleta Karstad, will undertake an exploration of the South Nation Watershed to raise awareness of the need for conservation and increased knowledge of the watershed. The team will accomplish this goal through collection of scientific data and interpretive landscape paintings of the Watershed.
In this unique project, scientific and artistic interpretation of the watershed landscape occur simultaneously (Fred collects and interprets data as Aleta paints the site).
With 40 years of independently surveying the biology and environment of sites across Canada, and 12 years of working with the SNC, Aleta & Fred will use methods developed for their Thirty Years Later Expedition and document with Daily Paintings their visits to sites to monitor, test hypotheses about sites or species, and sample streams not yet included in their survey of freshwater mussels in the South Nation and its tributaries.
This survey is to be supported by the sale of paintings (rather than by external sources of funding), which frees the team to visit the sites and phenomena they, local people, and the Conservation Authority consider to be important, without external constraints. Everyone is urged to visit Karstad's blog to support the field work by bidding on paintings in advance of the final event.
Local artists are also welcome to join the expedition and paint together with Aleta.
On Thursday 24 November 2011, from 6:00 p.m. to 8:30 p.m., South Nation Conservation will host an evening event to showcase the paintings and research from the expedition, at which Fred and Aleta also plan to have their findings available as a published volume. On the same evening, SNC will screen a one-hour film in celebration of International Year of the Forest.
Aleta and Fred need suggestions for areas of special scientific and/or artistic interest, both aquatic and terrestrial, in the South Nation Watershed. Anyone wishing to have their favourite sites on the river or in the drainage basin considered for a visit, may contact Fred at bckcdb@istar.ca or Aleta at karstad@pinicola.ca, or by phone at (613)258-3107.
Bishops Mills Natural History Centre covers the work of Aleta & Fred, seeking to explore, conserve, and communicate understanding of landscapes, their living communities, and their natural history and biotic diversity, through art, conservation of populations, data, & specimens, publication, and collaboration with individuals & organizations with similar goals. The BMNHC is now transferring its fourth-largest-collection-of freshwater mussels in Canada to the Canadian Museum of Nature. Aleta is one of Canada's leading natural history artists, and author of several natural history books, while Fred is a long-term member of SNC's Fish & Wildlife Committee, as well as numerous issue-oriented conservation organizations such as the Ontario Freshwater Mussel Recovery Team, and the Ontario Road Ecology Group.
The South Nation watershed is the 4,000 square kilometres of eastern Ontario drained by the South Nation River system. It includes naturalized properties, agricultural land and suburban and urban developments. The river flows from tiny headwater streams near Brockville on the watershed's southern boundary. As the South Nation meanders northeast, it gathers water from as far away as Maxville to the east, and the City of Ottawa to the west. By the time the South Nation joins the Ottawa River near Plantagenet, it is a mature, navigable waterway.
South Nation Conservation works closely with its partner municipalities, government, individual landowners and various community groups to maintain and improve the natural resources within the South Nation watershed.
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