“I concentrate on disturbing the devices that society imposes on variant communities to keep them ‘ghettoized’ by class, race, sexuality, and gender. It’s important that my work be seductive as a visual language, as I want to keep the viewer engaged. This allows for multiple readings which challenge viewers to consider both people and space in their various complexities.”

Catherine Opie (b. 1961). Untitled #3 (Icehouses), 2001. Chromogenic print, 50 x 40 inches, edition of 5

At first Catherine Opie’s series Icehouses (2001) and Surfers (2003) seem to be departures from her previous work, but with closer examination they hold many of the same interests that she has gravitated to throughout her career.

Icehouses are structures used for ice fishing. They are brought out onto frozen lakes in the beginning of winter and removed before the ice melts at the end of the season. Some are constructed according to detailed plans, while others are thrown together in a more haphazard way. There are lakes with hundreds of icehouses on them each winter, and there are icehouses that stand alone without any other sign of human habitation in sight.

To create Icehouses, Opie traveled to northern Minnesota, braving up to an hour of inclement weather for each exposure. Unlike her previous works focusing on architecture, here, the manmade forms are dominated by the natural landscape. Strewn across the flat surface of the lakes, the tiny shapes of the icehouses reflect the temporary nature of the community and the ever-changing relationships between ice fishers and the passing seasons.

In 2003 Opie once again surveyed California’s physical and cultural landscape. This time her gaze settled on a new subject, the surfers off the coast of Malibu, resulting in the series Surfers. In representing the Malibu surfers, Opie chose to pick up where Icehouses had left off, producing another series of color photographs with a constant horizon line. Once again the natural conditions of the landscape—here the early morning mist and fog rather than blinding snowstorms—frequently obscure the ostensible subjects of the images, rendering some of the photographs almost entirely abstract. More striking, hardly a single wave appears among the fourteen images in Surfers; Opie’s subjects seem forever afloat on a tranquil sea, primed to catch the perfect ride that may never come. Upending the heroic vision of surfers as daredevils suspended on the face of towering breakers, the artist focused on a seemingly marginal aspect of the sport, the long periods between waves that foster the conditions in which surfers bond as a surrogate family.

For Opie the most compelling aspects of surfing, like ice fishing, concern the formation of temporary communities that cut through the social divisions of life on the land.

• Describe each photograph as carefully as possible. What appears to be going on in each image?
• The pastimes of ice fishing and surfing may or may not be familiar to you. What do you know about each activity? What can you learn about them by carefully examining these photographs?
• Compare the two photographs. What do they have in common? What are their differences?
• Describe the relationship between humans and nature in each photograph.
• Imagine yourself in each of these landscapes and write a paragraph from the point of view of one of the surfers bobbing in the water or an inhabitant of one of the icehouses. Share your writing with your classmates. How were their descriptions similar or different from yours?
• Describe how this depiction of surfers differs from how they are usually portrayed.

• We rarely consider how many varied communities we belong to. Catherine Opie is an artist, a teacher, a mother, and an active participant in her community. Some communities require that you pass a test or pay dues to join, while you are a part of some communities the moment you are born. Make a list of all the communities that you belong to, and discuss the commonalities that hold each of these communities together.
  Social Studies


• Opie has frequently photographed communities that she belongs to, but for both Icehouses and Surfers she chose to focus on communities where she was an outsider. All around us are communities that we do not belong to. Choose one of these communities and learn more about them through interviews and research, then decide how you might create a photograph that reflects what you have learned.
  Social Studies


• Catherine Opie created Icehouses during an artist residency at the Walker Art Center. As part of this project people were invited to contribute stories and poetry to the Walker Art Center's Web site focusing on ice fishing experiences. One contributor, Glenn Stimler, recalls his experience of ice fishing as a six year old. Read his story and the accounts of others. Then think about a vivid experience that you have had in nature and write or draw about it.
  
  Watch a brief video of people ice fishing. Is this a pastime that you think you might enjoy? Explain your response.
  English / Language Arts
  
  Visual Arts