Arnøya: The Land Remembers

"Humans' spiritual and physical connection to the area they live in contains more than what the eye can see. It contains the landscape itself, the sky above, that which is below the earth, and everything which contains all of this."

The quote above lives on a placard at a Sàmi cultural exhibit at the Davvi Álbmogiid Guovddas (Center for Northern Peoples) in Sápmi, Norway.
These words about relation to place capture an abstract and vital aspect of northern life. The concept of a transcendent "everything" is common across the northern regions—it led me to consider the interconnectedness of northern peoples and the kinship we hold to the lands we live on.
During an artist residency on the arctic island of Arnøya, I embroidered found seaweed while meditating on the similarities and differences between Alaska's Arctic and Norway's, the impermanent installations carrying these musings into the sea.