Juniper Tremper
Scientific Writing 105-19
Geneseo, NY
~150 words

Comparing Ice Crusts to Pottery to Jack’O’Lanterns
Juniper Tremper

When you step on snow during certain winter months, you step through a defined layer of ice before sinking your foot into a pit of fine, powdery snow. Or in the Antarctic, due to differences in melting point, a pit full of water. The excerpt “The Effect of Summer Sun on Different Varieties of Ice and Snow” describes the occurence of this phenomenon in Antarctica, and the impact that the heat from sunlight has on the thickness of the ice crust.

Sculpture, ceramics especially, is hugely science oriented because there are extremely particular temperatures necessary to adequately fire a pot without shattering it, and different heat requirements for different glazes. This would likely be an easily accessible opportunity for artists to publicize the effects of the heat on Antarctica’s ice, because a pot fired at all the appropriate temperatures would be visibly distinguishable from a pot fired incorrectly, with the glazes evaporating or melting into each other.

(For a little perspective for people unfamiliar with pottery, this would be roughly comparable to a normal Jack’O’lantern sitting next to a pumpkin with lopsided cuts, and visible internal smoldering.)