With the help of so many wonderful people in Aussie the Sydney Ice Bear was a HUGE success. It was very well received by the crowds as well as the media… and global media as well. The Purves Environmental Fund jumped in with both feet leading the way, to Rob Purves Ice Bear owes a huge thank you.
Sydney has fuelled our tanks… lets see where else we go… will keep you posted!
Mark
Posts Tagged ‘Polar bears’
Sydney
Friday, June 10th, 2011Sydney Ice Bear
Friday, June 3rd, 2011What a wonderfully fulfilling experience this has been, Sydney seems to have embraced Ice Bear with arms wide open… thank you Sydney. Sydney’s Home Team have ensured that people know about us and what we are doing. The Bear has been well received not only on the environmental level but also from the sculptural point of view. Last night with the extraordinary Vivid Light festival as a back drop we had had a day to remember… boy oh boy I was tired… but very happy.
Well done to all concerned for taking the Ice Bear from the High Arctic to the other side of the world, its message is spreading and long may continue to do so.
Thanks.
Mark
Sydney Ice Bear
Tuesday, May 3rd, 2011The momentum is growing in a very satisfying way in the very opposite side of the world from where the Ice Bear was conceived… To me the very fact that the Sydney team has enabled its message to cross the world and to speak again in such an important city and to such an audience is wonderful.
Let us now bring it on else where… lets aim at getting a bear in the US… Washington DC… join us and make it happen.
Manchester Ice Bear
Thursday, April 7th, 2011It may be that we are getting more accustomed to making the bears or more relaxed in our approach or that the team with the addition of my 2 elder off spring worked slickly …but we had a WONDERFUL time with the Manchester Bear. THANK YOU Manchester for such a lovely welcome. The bear went down incredibly well with the public many of whom had never seen art in this form… interaction was fantastic… there were more than a few occasions when comments form people, especially the hard up, made me realise how utterly valuable a project it was and at times sent a lunp to ones throat.
The melt was perfect and powerful. The skeleton will now spend the summer out side the Museum, continuing its good work!
Manchester Ice Bear
Tuesday, March 8th, 2011Hello All… How exciting and busy life is turning out to be. The Tiger project is potentially very exciting… ‘Tiger Count’ as a project will soon be on my web site markcoreth.com … SO no more tigers on Ice Bear because Ice Bear has work to do!!!
We are still set ready to hit Sydney in April all being well and no last minute hitches. BUT before then we will be creating an Ice Bear at Manchester University in front of the Victoria Memorial in Piccadilly Gardens between 0800 and 1400 on 31st March … so quite soon!!! This will be part of the Museums launch of its new exhibition so DO join us!
More on all soon.
Now back to work!
Tigers
Tuesday, January 18th, 2011I know we are the Ice Bear Project and I know we set our selves up to sculpt awareness into the plight of the Polar Bear and its environment and indeed that is precisely what the Project is doing. Easter will with a fair wind bring us and our block of ice to Sydney to carve the bear for Earth Week. It is looking VERY favourable that we are going to be asked to do another very prominent bear here in the UK in early April… SO Ice Bear has by no means lost its voice.
In the mean time however I am setting forth to create another work which will talk of the plight of the Tiger… I am travelling to Delhi and then on to Kanha National Park where I will be joining a dynamic team lead by Latika Nath Rana. Latika invited me to join her for her Art Week where artists from across the world will be joining up to create work aimed at raising funds and awareness to protect tiger and its habitat.
My mind is a blur of ideas… all yet to be formed and solidified… but I hope next time to report on my findings with enthusiasm and excitement. I intend to use sculpture to unite people both in India and all over the world with the one aim of conserving that iconic cat and its habitat.
More to follow… I get back from this recce on 4th Feb… so till then!
Mark
15th Dec
Wednesday, December 15th, 2010Julian Bickesteth has been running a very well oiled machine in Sydney. The Ice Bear has arrived in fine order having travelled by ship via Singapore… it now lives in its natural habitat in a freezer.
But as with projects of this complexity and distance Julians team very wisely decided that because of tight time frames both logistically and on the funding front we would postpone the carve until April 17th… ie during Earth Week. Easter in Sydney will be wonderful and the time frame perfect for Ice Bear to work its magic.
I hope that by having a bear in Australia we will be able to cruise it through the Far East… as I would hope the bear in Canada might do the Americas and the one in UK Europe… Let’s keep the message flowing through sculpture.
24th Oct
Sunday, October 24th, 2010Paddling hard below the surface the Ice Bear Team (with Julian Bickersteth from International Conservation Services in Sydney) is getting ready the bear prepared to do its magic on the steps of the Sydney Opera House on 19th December this year. This is an enormously exciting prospect as it shows that this work of art not only has life but has an exciting future continuing the mission it started at COP15 last year.
How far have we got…??? The UK team has prepared a bear in the freezer… amongst the broad beans and sent it to Felixtow to catch its passage over the high seas. Julian is doing an amazing job of preparing for its import to Australia and its sponsorship. There is a long way to go in every respect but the excitement and tension grows.
Stand by for another revamp of the website… THE SYDNEY ICE BEAR…
5th July
Monday, July 5th, 2010I do hope you all like the Toronto Ice Bear… I was, dare I say it SO pleased with the outcome. Sculpturally it really worked… the melt was quick… the message punchy and although the footfall was not as high as I would have liked it (G20 Summit ensured that Toronto was akin to a police state… understandably!)
We will post up the end of day pictures as soon as we can…
Other exciting news from the team is that we have been asked to create a sculpture to talk to the world about the plight of the Tiger… This time I intend to bring the bones of the tiger to life… hey ho … keep watching!
Toronto and the G20
Friday, June 25th, 2010Ice Bear has arrived at the G20 Summit in Toronto and given us some wonderful sculptural challenges not least of all being that the temperature is about 28c and boy does ice not melt quickly!
We have created the Toronto bear in partnership with Equiterre and WWF Canada, a partnership that has worked really well… as before and as will happen hopefully in the future. We used Equiterre’s skeleton , the one that was originally created for Quebec City and subsequently travelled to Ottawa and Montreal… it is a skeleton that has now become very Canadian and is enjoying the fact that it has migrated permanently across the Atlantic!
The sculpting home team of myself, Duncan and Jamie Hamilton with Toby Sherborne as the amazing Mr Fixer was joined again by Peter Boy and his brother Jack both highly talented Inuit sculptors. Jack and Peter did a very successful pre-carve in Montreal taking off several tonnes of ice and thereby lightening the load both for the transporter and for the somewhat hot days worth sculpting of sculpting ahead.
Toronto in at the moment teaming with security surrounding the G20 as one might expect. My first concern was not so much that the ice would melt faster than we could carve it but that to get to the block of ice we had to wiggle our way through a police force that out numbered the Canadian population a thousand fold with what could be seen as a trunk full of lethal weapons! It was funny when somewhat later in the day we were visited by a dozen or so scary cops who swooned over Ice Bear and just loved having their pictures taken, spikes, chisels, daggers, sculptors and all…
The Carve went so smoothly and the bear looked wonderful, Equiterre and WWF were chuffed with all that they had, the not so many (securitied out) passers by loved it and with fingers crossed the press will appear later this morning to watch the melt and see the bear as a skeleton and a pool of water.
I will report further at the end of the day and will now attempt to upload a flip for you… standby!
Mark