Melanie Challenger
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Young British Poet Heads to Antarctica
The British Antartic Survey has appointed Melanie Challenger as Artist in Residence for International Polar Year 2007-8. She will work alongside the scientists in the regions of Antarctica and Chile, and stay on board RSS James Clark Ross.
She will be writing a prose book Extinction which will narrate her voyage alongside the cycles of extinction affecting human society and culture and the equilibrium of our planet. Antarctica's physical and emotional power has inspired generations of artists and she will set forth the sights of this awesome and dangerous backdrop.
The Route
- 24 October 2007 - Depart Stanley, Falkland Islands on RRS James Clark Ross (during the ship voyage we will visit Bird Island, Hound bay, King Edward Point on South Georgia, also Signy Island)
- 22 November - Return Stanley
- 24 November - Depart Stanley on RRS James Clark Ross for Rothera (during voyage we will visit Damoy and Vernadsky)
- 8 December - Arrive Rothera
- 5 January 2008 - Depart Rothera (Dash 7 aircraft) to Punta Arenas
- 5-20 January - Visit Rodrigo Hucke-Gaete at the Blue Whale centre near Cape Corcovado, Chile
Melanie Challenger is a poet. She won the Eric Gregory Award for poetry in 2005. Her recently published first collection, Galatea, has been nominated for the Forward Poetry Prize for Best First Collection.
She is affiliated with the Centre for the Evolution of Cultural Diversity at University College London, a world leader in its field, with an international programme of research projects that advance understanding of human cultural diversity. As well as working on cycles of extinction, Melanie will be part of the Centre's major outreach programme to convey the importance of this work to academic and non-academic audiences. The Centre runs until 2010. She also collaborates with Tom Oppenheim and Nina Capelli on New York's Harold Clurman Center for Poetry, Poetic Language and the Spoken Word, and divides her time between Penzance, Cornwall and New York.
She became involved in social activism and education the year she graduated from Oxford University (2000) and has collaborated on creative projects with individuals such as Zlata Filipovic, Barry van Driel, James Whitbourn, and Tarik O'Regan, and organisations like Jewish Music Institute, Amnesty International, Royal Philharmonic Orchestra, and UNICEF. She and Filipovic have spoken together in numerous institutes across the USA, from high schools and universities to United Nations and United States Institute for Peace.
She worked in opera for a number of years and is still closely involved in music.
Current research areas: English language and English poetry; history of science, particularly computing science; theories of materialism; information theories; nationalism; globalism; history of conflict; authenticity; subjectivity and postmodernism.
