The Mirrored Sky, 2017

The field is many things. It is the extent of the observable world that is seen at any given moment. In astronomy, the field of view is usually expressed as an area viewed by an instrument. And so the field of view is sight, resolution, and measurement all at once.

In the summer of 2017, Devasher spent 26 days on board the High Trust, an oil tanker, as part of an artist’s residency program called the “Owners Cabin.” The voyage, which took her from Suva (Fiji) to Singapore, via Samoa, brought into sharp focus something the artist has been engaged with for some time. The role of “observation,” the “observer,” and the “field” / “site.” This series of cyanotypes—star charts of the latitudes between 90 and 0 degrees—explore the sky through these prisms.

Bringing together Devasher’s interest in contemporary observational sciences and early scientific observational instruments, the sky appears as a physical field but also as a field of collection and a form of collective perception.