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Helen Glazer

@helenglazer

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I photograph and 3D-scan landscapes, from Antarctica to the Arctic, from the sublime to the quirky. See link in bio for current events and projects.

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On view through the end of the month at Oregon State University's PRAx Center for the Visual Arts: one of my photographs in a lightbox display of photographs of scientists taken by past participants in the Antarctic Artists and Writers Program. My contribution shows ornithologist Katie Dugger making field notes at the Cape Royds penguin colony, a long-term research study monitoring the Adelie penguin population. (Installation photo by Natalia Bueno.)

#walkinginantarctica #antarctica #penguin #adeliepenguin @oregonstateprax by @helenglazer

Almost exactly 85 years ago, on Sept. 29, 1941, 32 airmen and civilian construction workers set sail on a military transport ship from Brooklyn Navy Yard. Their mission was top secret and they had no idea where they were going until they had crossed the Arctic Circle and for the first time met their commander, Bernt Balchen. He told them they were headed to Kangerlussuaq, Greenland, (then called Sondrestrom Fjord) to build a US air base in a hurry, in order to protect Greenland from Nazi invasion and ferry fighter planes to Britain. Last week, I was going through Balchen's papers at the Library of Congress, looking for material for my book project about Kangerlussuaq's unusual history. That's him, center, surrounded by the airmen in fall 1941, making this the earliest photo of the base I know of.

#greenland #worldwar2history #kangerlussuaq #usmilitarygreenland #usandgreenland #sondrestromairbase by @helenglazer

"Polar," the fifth installment in British publisher Dorling Kindersley's "Earth's Incredible Habitats" series for elementary/middle school kids, was just released, featuring a lively design and facts about every aspect of the Arctic and Antarctica. Illustrations and photographs appear on every page, including my photograph of one of the more eccentric sights I encountered in Antarctica, wind-eroded rocks called ventifacts. (You may now turn to pages 118-119.)

I photographed this particular group on a plateau in the Dry Valleys of Antarctica from many angles and included two of those photos in my traveling "Walking in Antarctica" exhibition in the section of the exhibition called "In the Surrealist Sculpture Garden." As the book's text explains, the rocks there have been sandblasted by powerful winds over the centuries, resulting in some very strange shapes.

#walkinginantarctica #ventifacts #antarctica #rockformations #artandgeology #artscience by @helenglazer

I'm happy to participate for the third year in a row in the annual group exhibition at the Gascoine Gallery in Monson, Maine (@monsonpottery). This year's edition, "Naiad: Flow," runs through the end of 2026, with works by 21 artists on the theme of rivers. The two photographs of mine come from opposite ends of the world — Greenland and New Zealand.

From Kangerlussuaq, Greenland, where I've been working on a long-term project, is a photograph of the outflow from a waterfall that gallups down a river carrying meltwater from the Greenland ice sheet in midsummer. The other photograph, which I've never exhibited before, was taken during austral summer in New Zealand in January 2016, while hiking a Milford Track, an encounter with a pair of rarely seen ducks, an endangered species known as Whio. Sometimes called Blue Ducks, they are a beloved bird in New Zealand.

#greenlandwaterfall #whio #blueduck #milfordtrack #riverlandscapes by @helenglazer

❄️ This exhibition idea is pretty cool. 🧊

When "Walking in Antarctica" arrived at @sanjacsouthcampusgallery, curator Bradly Brown had a simple goal: help people slow down.

The team transformed the space with blue lighting, shipping crates, 3D-printed icebergs, and frozen treats (away from the artwork, of course!). The result wasn't expensive or complicated, but it was memorable. Folks lingered and spent more time with @helenglazer's art.

As Bradly says, "People are used to scrolling past things. Attention spans are short now. You have to give people a reason to stay."

That's exactly the kind of thinking we love to see from Exhibits USA® host venues—taking inspiration from an exhibition and creating an experience that feels unique.

💡 Ask yourself, what would help visitors step into the world of this exhibition? by @helenglazer

In the blink of a hummingbird's eye: A little male ruby-throated hummingbird regularly visits our son and daughter-in-law's backyard and has found a favorite spot to perch. In one of the photos I took at 1/640th of a second, I inadvertently caught it in mid blink. Birds don't have eyelids; they're called nictitating membranes.

#hummingbird #nictatingmembrane #blinkingbird #rubythroatedhummingbird #blinkofaneye by @helenglazer

A frog relaxes beside a water strider in Edna St. Vincent Millay's former backyard swimming pool, on the grounds of the Millay Arts Center in upstate New York, which I photographed during my 2023 residency there. Long disused since the era when Millay threw clothing-optional swimming parties there for her writer and artist friends in the 1930s, it is filled with rainwater and has been taken over by wood frogs and salamanders as habitat. There's a scientific term for animals that do that: synanthrope — there's your vocabulary word of the day.

@millayarts #woodfrog #froginpool #synanthrope #millayartscenter by @helenglazer

With highs over 100°F predicted for today and tomorrow, what better time to post a photograph of ice from my Antarctica project? This odd structure was cantilevered over the sea ice and somehow had not yet collapsed. The process by which this occurs is called ablation, where the ice on the surface simply vanishes, going from solid to gas without passing through a liquid phase, but sometimes leaving a detached layer of ice above it. I saw these mini-pavilions in the Dry Valleys on lake ice, though this is multi-year sea ice in New Harbor on McMurdo Sound aka Explorers Cove. I like how from the vantage point in the first photo, the form echoes the mountains behind it. (Photo: Nov. 2015)

#walkinginantarctica #antarctica #seaice #iceformation #artscience by @helenglazer

Duck on Dock. Looking back to July 4th holiday vacations in years past. Love that one peeking out from the water, which I think makes the photo :-). Wilmington, Vermont, 2019.

#ducks #vermontwildlife #wilmingtonvt #duckondock #lakevacation by @helenglazer

The Return of the White Deer: This piebald deer showed up in our yard again. The first time I saw it last October, at first glance I thought it was a goat (see second photo)! It's grown a lot and become unmistakably doe-like in eight months.

#whitedeer #piebalddeer #backyardwildlife #whitedoe #marylandwildlife by @helenglazer

In the latest episode of “Women Living the Questions”, I’m in conversation with Helen Glazer, an artist whose work bridges art, science, and the natural world.

Helen reflects on her value for curiosity, from painted constellation murals and sculptural reliefs, to tactile public artwork for blind children, to photography and 3D work inspired by complex natural forms.

She also shares a formative cross-country trip at sixteen that opened her eyes to very different ways of living across the U.S., deeply informing her understanding of resilience and privilege.

More recently, she talks about her work in Antarctica and Greenland, where she documents landscapes reformed by ice, time, and climate change.

This is a conversation about curiosity and following questions across a lifetime.

New episode out now. 🎙️ “Women Living the Questions” is available on Spotify, Apple Podcasts, and wherever you listen. ♥️

Spotify
https://tinyurl.com/WLTQsSpotifyHelen

Apple Podcasts
https://tinyurl.com/WLTQsApplePodHelen

To learn more about Helen Glazer and explore her beautiful artwork, visit helenglazer.com, follow @HelenGlazer on Instagram, or find Helen Glazer, Artist on Facebook.

#womenlivingthequestions by @helenglazer

Cops in niches, 1930 and 1988, from my trip to Yale University for a reunion. I revisited the humorous stone carvings I used to walk past when I was student that decorate street level windows of the Yale Law School building. Then I stopped into the Yale University Art Gallery, where I saw this spirited painting, "La Vida," by the late Martin Wong, where among the various New Yorkers filling every window are a pair of policemen. Scroll to see the other details and full images of the window and painting.

#policeofficer #yaleuniversitylawschool #stonecarving #martinwong yaleuniversityartgallery #yalelawschoolbuilding by @helenglazer