Whether through proximity, osmosis, telepathy or serendipity, Lebbeus and I independently desired to manifest a similar situation in Lapland. Given the enormous range of possibilities, it still somehow occurred to both of us to make

something that lies in the land,

a mirror to the sky,

an illumination,

a murky pool,

an observatory,

a magic well,

a hole, a sunken treasure,

a starscape,

a light drawing,

quiet, dangerous,

an open cavity that makes itself apparent for a time then erases itself back into the land.

– Kiki Smith

Pools of ice, geometric in the ground, with figures – human and not – frozen and suspended in them.

You walk, skate on the ice pools.

You look down into the ice.

You see, or almost see, the figures.

Snow blows across the ice pools, covering edges and the figures, too.

By day, the figures are shadows in the dark ice.

By night, the ice glows and the figures are illuminated, through darkly.

they have been there forever.

Waiting.

Now the ice is melting.

The ice pools are melting, the figures are revealed. Little by little, they emerge from the melting ice.

In the end, there are only empty pools, empty of ice and of water.

The figures rest on the bottom of the empty pools.

Then the pools are filled with earth.

– Lebbeus Woods