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*SOLD OUT* Speaker Series: “Small Island, Big Picture” with Alexandra de Steiguer
April 18 @ 5:00 pm - 7:00 pm
$35
SOLD OUT – Please join our mailing list to stay up-to-date on when Alex will return for another event!
Speaker Series: “Small Island, Big Picture” with Alexandra de Steiguer
Artist, Author, Isles of Shoals Winter Caretaker
Thursday, April 18th from 5PM to 7PM
Doors open at 4pm for an opportunity to walk the grounds and grab a drink from our cash bar.
For twenty seven years, Alexandra de Steiguer has been the only full-time resident caretaker on the remote Isles of Shoals during the five months of each harsh New England winter. From Star Island, one of nine small islands lying off the coasts of New Hampshire and Maine, she has deepened her relationship to contemplation, photography, the natural elements, and the written word.
What do the Isles of Shoals have to do with death-defying Antarctic expeditions, offset printing, Lord Byron, your most insightful moments, and how birds perceive time? Star Island’s winter caretaker Alexandra de Steiguer has had plenty of time to think about it… twenty-seven years of winter solitude lets you connect a lot of dots. Hear her speak of these and other ideas in a thought-provoking event that includes her work as well as that of other artists, poets and thinkers. She’ll also reflect on how Star Island offered her the opportunity to create her first book, “Small Island, Big Picture”.
About Speaker:
Alexandra de Steiguer is the resident caretaker on the Isles of Shoals during five deserted months of winter, recently returned from her twenty-seventh sojourn on the islands. Her images offer a solitary, naturalist perspective: not only paying tribute to the wild elements that claim those shores and reflecting wider connections within the natural world, but also pointing to the transitory and humbling nature of our residence in such places.
Alex creates her images using medium-format film and personally prints each one in her traditional darkroom. Her work has been exhibited in galleries throughout New England and is in the permanent collections of the deCordova Museum, the North Carolina Museum of Art and the Ogunquit Museum of American Art. Her insightful musings on solitude, connection and the creative process are published in her book “Small Island, Big Picture” and in original music composed and arranged on the Isles of Shoals. Alexandra’s story has been the subject of two internationally distributed short-form documentary films. She is a two-time artist fellow of the New Hampshire State Council on the Arts.
- Author of Small Island, Big Picture: Winters of Solitude Teach an Artist to See (2013, Mid-Tide Press), and contributor (images, prose) to American Impressionist: Childe Hassam and the Isles of Shoals (2016, Yale University Press).
- Her haunting black and white photography has been collected by the DeCordova Museum, the North Carolina Museum of Art, and the Ogunquit Museum of American Art and is represented in New England by the Pucker Gallery, 240 Newbury Street, Boston.
- Past appearances on National Public Radio, Boston Chronicle and NH Chronicle. Profiled by Yankee Magazine, LensWork Magazine, Don’t Take Pictures Magazine, The Square Magazine, The Boston Globe and others, and as the subject of and contributor to the award winning documentary film “Winter’s Watch” (2017).
Refund and Weather Policy
Tickets are non-refundable. Please note that all events at Alnoba are rain or shine. If an event is cancelled due to extreme weather you will receive an email notification. If you do not get an email notifying you that the event is cancelled, that means the event is still going forward as scheduled.
Testimonials
“Alexandra’s well chosen words and thoughts complete and compliment photographs which are things of beauty and reflect the haunting places and spaces wherein she dwells.”
-Paul Caponigro
“We found your photographs and your accompanying words deeply powerful and moving. I felt a wonderful kinship with your beautiful work.”
-Prof. Richard Capobianco
“So seldom in our culture do people have experiences of solitude like yours. It is a great gift for you to share this with others.”
“Your photographs convey stillness and beauty, but they become doubly powerful when paired with your words.”
“It felt like a conversation rather than a presentation.”
“She thinks, explores, writes and photographs with a medium format camera.”
“An experience.”
