Jacklyn Brickman — Ablation
Reviewed by Lauren Levato Coyne

Of her short video Ablation, Jacklyn Brickman writes it is “an experimental video filmed with a macro lens inside a vintage icebox; a conflation of the loss of ice and snow from a glacier system with that of a common domestic microclimate.” The result is a pale, mesmerizing kaleidoscope. It’s a reminder that each microcosm relates to the macro world; roughly 10% of global CO2 emissions come from the cooling industry, which includes air conditioning, shipping containers, industrial and at-home refrigeration units, etc. It’s a classic catch-22: we need the cool to preserve our food, vaccines, and our own delicate bodies, but our need for preservation is also contributing to rapid planetary decline. Brickman’s Ablation is an attempt to capture the conundrum using water in its different states as an emblem of change.

The title made me curious as I know the word in its surgical use, in relation to the human body. But what I learned in post-viewing research is that it also relates to the removal of snow and ice, typically from a glacier. This short film is her medium but it is actually her language choice, the work’s title, that draws the line between the intimacies of our personal iceboxes and the abstract reality of melting glaciers, a shrinking connection point between our kitchens and many rising tides.