Katie Paterson's art is at once understated and monumental.

Why you should listen

Collaborating with scientists and researchers, Katie Paterson creates artwork that considers our place on Earth in the context of geological time and change. She has broadcast the sounds of a melting glacier, mapped all the dead stars, compiled a slide archive of darkness from the depths of the universe, created a light bulb to simulate the experience of moonlight and sent a recast meteorite back into space. Her works use sophisticated technologies and specialist expertise to stage intimate, poetic and philosophical engagements between people and their natural environment, collapsing the distance between the viewer and the most distant edges of time and the cosmos.

Paterson has exhibited internationally and her works have been included in major exhibitions at galleries including the Hayward Gallery, Tate Britain, MCA Sydney, Guggenheim Museum and The Scottish National Gallery of Modern Art. She was winner of the visual arts category of the South Bank Awards in 2014 and is an honorary fellow of Edinburgh University.

(Photo: James Bennet, 2021)

Katie Paterson’s TED talk

More news and ideas from Katie Paterson

Live from TEDWomen

What Now … for planet Earth? Notes from Session 4 of TEDWomen 2021

December 3, 2021

If we’re going to continue to live, breathe and thrive together on this planet, we’re going to have to answer a couple of very important questions: What now for the Earth? And how do we balance the urgency of the climate crisis while still dreaming of a bright future? With actions and answers, six incredible […]

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