Still / in motion
This outdoor exhibit immerses visitors in some of the great spectacles of nature—playing out across the skies. Still / in motion juxtaposes the photographic artworks of Kathryn Cooper and Camille Seaman, two photographers demonstrating unique views of the fluidity of time and nature. Traveling in one direction, Camille Seaman showcases icebergs in the dramatic light of the Antarctic solstice. The darkening skies amplify the specter of disappearing ice in our rapidly changing polar regions. In the other direction, Kathryn Cooper combines multiple high resolution frames to capture the fluid-like movement of migrating starlings in rural England. Murmurations throughout the sky are transformed into dynamic patterns that reveal behaviours invisible to the naked eye. Together, these series of images inspire us to see the magnificent phenomena that is nature.
Curated by Rhonda Rubinstein, Still / in motion is produced by the Biosphère in partnership with the California Academy of Sciences (San Francisco).
California Academy of Sciences
The California Academy of Sciences is a renowned scientific and educational institution with a mission to regenerate the natural world through science, learning, and collaboration. Based in San Francisco’s Golden Gate Park, it is home to a world-class aquarium, planetarium, and natural history museum, as well as innovative programs in biodiversity science, environmental learning, and collaborative engagement—all under one living roof.
Kathryn Cooper is a photographer and scientist interested in capturing the beauty of complex natural systems. With a background in physics and bioinformatics (data science applied to biological systems) she has studied the structure and dynamics of complex networks. Her photography focuses on the fluid-like movement of starling murmurations that occur between November and March, when tens of thousands of starlings migrate to a local roost. She’s refined a modern approach to a 19th century technique called chronophotography: assembling a sequence of images to study motion. To illustrate a particular piece of murmuration choreography, Cooper films the starlings in 4K resolution, then designs algorithms to splice together a compelling set of frames. An exhibiting photographer, Kathryn's work has been featured in numerous publications, including bioGraphic, the independent online magazine produced by the California Academy of Sciences.
For more than two decades, Camille Seaman has documented the rapidly changing landscapes of Earth’s polar regions through the lens of portraiture rather than landscape. Camille’s perspective is entwined with her Shinnecock tribal identity, which taught her from an early age to recognize all living beings—trees, spiders, fish, and even ice—as individual members of one, enormous family. Her dynamic images embed her subjects in an enduring, nourishing, but increasingly strained relationship with their environment—of which humans are an integral part. She is a National Geographic Contributing Photographer, TED Senior Fellow, Stanford Knight Fellow, and CIR Filmmaker in Residence Fellow. Her photographs have won many awards including the Daniel Pearl Award for Outstanding Reporting. Camille has been a BigPicture judge and a portfolio of her work will be featured in the BigPicture/California Academy of Sciences book, Seeing It All, to be published in the fall of 2023.
Rhonda Rubinstein is a Canadian creative director and curator based in San Francisco, where she combines her passions for nature, photography, storytelling and design to produce transformative moments in all media. As the Creative Director of the California Academy of Sciences— a purpose-based museum and research institution renowned for its aquarium, planetarium, rainforest, and architecture— she orchestrates how design, photography, typography and information converge in the public experience as exhibitions, environmental graphics, and print, digital and interactive communications. At the Academy, Rhonda co-founded the BigPicture Natural World Photography initiative, an acclaimed annual international competition focused on wildlife and conservation photography, currently in its 10th year. Her second book, Seeing It All: Women Photographers Expose Our Planet will be published in the fall of 2023 by Goff Books. Rhonda grew up in Montreal where Expo 67 and its legacy influenced her worldview on humanity, media, and the potential of collective culture.