Rebecca Gleeson

Rebecca Gleeson is an artist and printmaker who primarily works across drawing and etching.

Her project this year has focused on the final expedition of Captain Robert Falcon Scott, who travelled to Antarctica in an attempt to reach the South Pole and died on the return journey. His widely documented death, and the extensive records of the expedition, have been a key inspiration for this body of work.

Much of this documentation comes from diaries, which contain conflicting narratives and differing priorities in the recording of events, resulting in vast volumes of written material.

She has been using printmaking processes, as their slow and laborious nature echoes the conditions of polar exploration: man-hauling, battling frostbite, and snow blindness.

Gleeson’s work is centred on how such iconic historical narratives are constructed in the moment, how documentation produces bias, and how these stories are ultimately told.