FIRE AND ICE
In keeping with Robins' interest in land and natural resources in the context of the ecological crisis, the Four Buckets project and Fire and Ice work that she completed as part of the Arteles Residency is a reflection on water as a scarce natural resource. Harking from Cape Town, where there is currently (2018) a severe drought, Robins engaged with water in its many states, using an alchemical process that investigated how humans interact with our surrounding resources and how stories and histories are tied up in natural materials. By subjecting water to different processes of freezing, melting, and saving, questions of displacement and transient yet meaningful human connection to place through natural materials arose. The project is part of Robins' continual investigation of the interconnectedness of personal, collective, and natural histories that seeks to challenge the environmental and social crises of the current moment.