Nina Elder
Artist and researcher Nina Elder creates projects that reveal humanity’s dependence on, and interruption of, the natural world. With a focus on changing cultures and ecologies, Nina advocates for collaboration, fostering relationships between institutions, artists, scientists, and diverse communities. She is the co-founder of the Wheelhouse Institute, a women’s climate leadership initiative. Nina lectures as a visiting artist/scholar at universities, develops publicly engaged programs and consults with organizations that seek to grow through interdisciplinary programming.
Nina’s artwork is widely exhibited and has been featured in Art in America, VICE Magazine, and on PBS. Her research has been supported by the Andy Warhol Foundation, the Rauschenberg Foundation award for Arts & Activism, the Pollock Krasner Foundation, and the Mellon Foundation. She has recently held positions as an Art + Environment Research Fellow at the Nevada Museum of Art, a Polar Lab Research Fellow at the Anchorage Museum, and a Researcher in Residence in the Art and Ecology Program at the University of New Mexico. She is based in Albuquerque, New Mexico.
Elder’s DEW Lines series is featured in The Space(s) Between. During a series of research trips to the Arctic’s far-flung radar sites, Elder traced her father’s path as a Cold War-era government contractor. DEW Lines depicts now-obsolete radar stations that once linked Alaska’s extremes with the lower 48. These drawings explore metaphors of communication and interruption.
Image at right is DEW Lines II, 2017, graphite and pulverized material harvested from DEW Line Site, 10 x 14 inches.
"DEW Lines" composite image
