Cloud Album — At the Intersection of Science and Art — Karen Henry

[Fall 2022]

Central Press Photos, View of a large storm system taken from Apollo 9 about 1,209 miles due north of Hawaii, 1961, gelatin silver print / épreuve à la gélatine argentique

By Karen Henry
[Excerpt]

We humans project a great deal onto clouds, as they oat loftily above or gather and settle in around us. They represent the grandeur and mutability of nature but are also intimate to our everyday experience and the subject of idle contemplation – to have one’s “head in the clouds” is to be a dreamer. Clouds are everywhere, but they are also inconstant and often associated with emotion: the dark clouds of foreboding, their migrations illustrating the winds of change, or the comforting soft puffs of cloud in a sunny sky. Popular poetic references include the childhood favourite by William Wordsworth that begins “I wandered lonely as a cloud,” and the more recent meditation on clouds, love, and life by Joni Mitchell: “Rows and floes of angel hair and ice cream castles in the air, and feather canyons everywhere… but now they only block the sun; they rain and snow on everyone… and still somehow it’s cloud illusions I recall…”¹

1 Joni Mitchell,“Both Sides Now,” https://genius.com/Joni-mitchell-both-sides-now-lyrics.

[ Complete issue, in print and digital version, available here: Ciel variable 121 – WANDERINGS ]
[ Complete article and more images, in digital version, available here: Cloud Album — At the Intersection of Science and Art, Karen Henry ]