Elaine Whittaker Ode to a Fervent Sun

Ode to a Fervent Sun is an exhibition that pays homage to the enticing but fraught relationship of our skin with the sun through a series of installations, photographs, paintings, and sculptures. An ever-present necessity for life, the sun is the source for biological processes, the seasons, ocean currents, ecology, and our warming climate. Drawing on memoir, embodied memory, and objects of past sun experiences, the exhibit evokes the remembered pleasure of immersion in the sun’s rays, with the paradoxical sense of vulnerability to the sun’s destructive power to our skin, challenging nostalgic memories of the sun as a life-giving force.