X-CHANGE

Holly Veselka

The Rig, 2023, 4K video, courtesy of the artist

Holly Veselka is a conceptual artist who uses emerging technologies as both medium and subject to highlight issues of land, biodiversity, and climate change. She is one of the two artists selected for XCHANGE, a residency and exchange opportunity exploring the extraction economy and the environment, developed by Shetland Arts and The McNay Art Museum in Texas.

Veselka visited Shetland in May 2022 and became interested in the decommissioning of the Ninian Northern offshore platform at Dales Voe and the marine life that had grown on the rig during its 40 years of operation. Surprised by the amount of life that had lived on the structure, she found a symbol of hope. Visually, petrochemical infrastructure is often used as a symbol of human ingenuity, energy demand, climate change, or environmental degradation. But to Veselka, the ecosystem living on the rig was a different type of symbol—one that represents life’s resilience.

Thinking about the opposing themes of energy, environmental destruction, and resilience, Veselka created this 3D animated video to experimentally represent the many possible functions and metaphors of an oil rig. She eventually hopes to reuse an offshore platform as a public artwork that intentionally creates habitat for pelagic birds and marine life.

To hear more about the artist’s experience in Shetland, please listen to her interview with Chris Bonfiglioli on the Coastal Knowledge Podcast of the Young Academy of Scotland: youngacademyofscotland.org.uk/news/podcast-episode-9-coastal-climate-change-art

XCHANGE is funded by The British Council and Creative Scotland with support from Art Fund (UK) and Association of Art Museum Curators (US). More information on the project can be found on the Shetland Arts website.

The two selected artists selected for X-CHANGE are Shetland based filmmaker and writer Shona Main, and Texas-based conceptual artist, Holly Veselka - read more here.

X-CHANGE is a partnership between Shetland Arts and McNay Art Museum in San Antonio, Texas.

It is an artist residency / exchange opportunity exploring the extraction economy and the environment, funded by The British Council and Creative Scotland with support from Art Fund (UK) and Association of Art Museum Curators (US).

The two diverse geographies of Texas and Shetland have been heavily exploited for their natural resources. Shetland - the archipelago at the most northerly tip of the UK – was made rich by the oil and gas processing industry in the 1970s and thrives off the oil and gas fields that skirt it. It now looks to renewables for its future with construction underway on what will be the largest onshore wind farm in the UK. The oil-rich state of Texas has a longstanding and complex relationship between its natural reserves and the gargantuan industry built around it. It also has the largest onshore windfarm in the world.

Shetland Arts is thrilled to have to the opportunity to build a partnership with The McNay Art Museum in San Antonio, Texas and connect our two artistic communities. Shetland - the archipelago at the most northerly tip of the UK - thrives off the oil and gas fields that skirt it, but now looks to renewables for its future. With the industrialisation and oil-rich economies of our two distinct geographies as the creative catalyst, we hope to inspire new work that will spark and arc locally, nationally and internationally, addressing questions of sustainability and climate change.

(Jane Matthews, Exhibition Manager at Shetland Arts)