Emma Stibbon RA: Melting Ice | Rising Tides

When: 10 May 2025 to 05 July 2025
Where: The Burton At Bideford, Kingsley Road, Bideford EX39 2QQ
Time: 10:00 - 17:00
Cost: FREE
Suitable for: Any age

In Melting Ice | Rising Tides Emma Stibbon considers how the warming environment of the polar regions is impacting on the changing UK coastline, and makes connections between the remote extremes of our planet and our more familiar local landscapes.

The exhibition includes a selection of Emma’s large-scale drawings and prints made in response to field trips to Svalbard in the High Arctic, and the Weddell Sea, Antarctica. These will be presented alongside a new body of drawings and site-specific work about erosion on the North Devon coast.

Emma’s work is provoked by the wonder and drama of nature but underpinned by contemporary anxieties about our precarious future. Often working on location in some of the world’s most isolated regions, she draws environments that are undergoing dynamic change, using the physical materials of sites such as earth pigments, carbon, and sea water.

As part of her work for this exhibition Emma has been exploring erosion on this diverse coastline, working with the local pigment Bideford Black to position the impacts within a global context of climate change.

The exhibition will be accompanied by a film, drawing workshops and a symposium on art and the environment in June 2025. Keep an eye on our website for details.

Image: Sea Ice, Svalbard by Emma Stibbon, watercolour, 153cm x 224cm