Sophie Davis is an accomplished violist and member of Halcyon, an ensemble dedicated to using music and the arts to cultivate environmental stewardship.

“Music and art can be a really powerful way to share an environmental message without being really dogmatic.

Sophie discusses how music helps define her way of being in the world, in terms of collaboration and environmental stewardship. Sophie with her sister Josie, also a violinist, along with their friends Colin Wheatley, violist, and Ju Young Lee, cellist, formed the ensemble Halcyon. “The four of us inspire each other musically in ways that feel meaningful and unique. Halcyon is an outlet for creative and diverse communication between us as musicians and our audiences. That meaningful communication also connects Sophie to the environment and her love of the ocean. “I strive to incorporate my scientific background into my work with Halcyon with the goal of using music and art to create a new context for scientific data and the realities of the changing environment.

Halcyon’s collaborations focus on climate change awareness. They have collaborated with climate change artist Jill Pelto to paint a watercolor depicting sea level rise in Maine. The collaboration was inspired by Samuel Barber’s musical piece Adagio for Strings. Such collaborations are important to Sophie and the other ensemble members because they “believe that climate change is one of the most pressing challenges and greatest opportunities our generation faces and that it is our responsibility to respond to it imaginatively. Our goal as a quartet is to use music, art and story to inspire our communities to engage with the natural world in ways that celebrate stewardship and respect.”

www.halcyonstringquartet.com

Yustina Salnikova is a designer/sculptor who creates large scale creations meant to encourage environmental awareness and social change. Yustina was instrumental in the creation of Ethyl, an 82-foot-long Blue Whale made from steel and plastic waste.  Yustina and her co-designer Joel Stockdill are the current Guinness Record Holders for creating Ethyl, heralded as the World’s largest recycled plastic sculpture.

Yustina describes herself as a recycled waste nerd. Based in the San Francisco Bay Area, the designer/sculptor talks about how she came to design and build large scale creations using recycled plastic waste. In collaboration with Joel Stockdill, she designed Ethyl, an 82-foot-long Blue Whale made from steel and plastic waste. Yustina and Joel Stockdill are Guinness Record Holders for Ethyl who is heralded as the World’s largest recycled plastic sculpture. Yustina shares photographs and explains the work that went into collecting and transforming the recycled plastic into the behemoth Ethyl. Her creations are meant to encourage environmental awareness and social change.

https://building180.com/ethyl

Rose McAdoo has worked in NYC managing a restaurant and a chocolate factory and learned cake designing on the job at Nine Cakes in Brooklyn. Rose says that her brain formats anything she learns into cakes. She has gathered first-hand knowledge about Antarctica after two summer and one winter stint there. She created a seven cake series about her time at the National Science Foundation McMurdo Station. The pièce de résistance was the 5-tier ice breaker cake that included a representation of our nation’s only heavy icebreaker the USCGC Polar Star Polar Star, a vessel needed to clear channels through pack ice surrounding the research facility.

Rose talks about the variety of experiences she’s had in food service prior to seizing the opportunity to work in Antarctica. She left NYC because “You have to take an opportunity like that.” Rose took advantage of the varied work and learning opportunities while she was at McMurdo Station. She used her skills as a visual artist whose medium is cakes to transform what she saw and learned from the research scientists to create a series of cakes. “Whatever I fall in love with most is what I want to share with people” is Rose’s inspiration for her cakes. Rose discusses the creation of the ice breaker cake and shares what’s next for her.

Yustina Salnikova is a designer/sculptor who creates large scale creations meant to encourage environmental awareness and social change. Yustina was instrumental in the creation of Ethyl, an 82-foot-long Blue Whale made from steel and plastic waste. Yustina and her co-designer Joel Stockdill are Guinness Record Holders for creating Ethyl, heralded as the World’s largest recycled plastic sculpture.

Polly Dawson, fashion designer, diver, and photographer, discusses her photographic process and how her work is affected by her experience with the ocean. Polly currently takes underwater photographs of brides and brides-to-be. Her mermaid proposal photograph went viral. It was taken in a cenote in the area of Playa del Carmen, Yucatan Peninsula, Mexico.

Lisa Blanchard grew up along the coast of Maine and has lived in Norway and Valdez, Alaska. Since she took her first glassmaking class in 1984, Lisa has enjoyed exploring, creating and teaching the art of glass making. In 2020, she created an ode to the ocean and Rachel Carson with her Edge of the Sea, a multidimensional construction using a variety of glass making techniques.

Liz Ames is a consummate art educator. Her own artwork is influenced by living along the coast of Maine. She creates castings of sea creatures found along the shore. Liz is proud that the materials she uses are natural and biodegradable or recyclable.

Jess Newley is an environmental educator who has a passion for underwater photography and videography. Although she has experienced such diverse underwater environments as those in Egypt and Polynesia, Jess says the best is what she is diving into now. She is creating a virtual reality education program of the nearshore waters surrounding the San Juan Islands in Washington State.