First Tuesday: North Cascades Glacier Climate Project
When: Tuesday, February 3, at 7pm.
Where: TBD
Join us in February for a collaborative event presented by the Methow Conservancy, North Cascades Glacier Climate Project, and TwispWorks.
Jill Pelto will speak about her work as the Art Director of the North Cascade Glacier Climate Project (NCGCP), which she co-leads with her dad, Science Director Mauri Pelto. For 17 consecutive years Jill has joined Mauri and a small team to measure changes to the glaciers of the North Cascades. Jill will share stories of change through the lens of her watercolor paintings about glaciers, watersheds, and ecosystems. As Art Director, Jill also brings other artists/creatives into the fold each summer for a backpacking and glacier travel art residency. Two of these artists live in the Methow Valley (Margaret Kingston and Cal Waichler) and will join the event in person. Jill will be tuning in virtually from Bellingham.
Margaret Kingston received a grant in 2025 from the TwispWorks Mary Kiesau Community Fellowship Fund to help support her work with the NCGCP. After Jill's talk, Margaret will give a short overview of her work on the Glacier Climate Project and its connections to both TwispWorks and Confluence Gallery in Twisp.
This event is free and open to the public. Reach out to Bridger with any questions about the event.
About Jill
Jill Pelto is an artist and science communicator whose work focuses on communicating human-environment connections. She is the Art Director of the North Cascade Glacier Climate Project and creates opportunities to bring artists onto glaciers every summer. Jill incorporates scientific data directly into her paintings to engage broad audiences around environmental science in ways that are emotionally relevant and thought-provoking. Exhibiting in multiple states, her work has been featured on the cover of TIME, and in 2024 she served as artist in residence on a scientific expedition off the coast of Chile. She uses artwork extensively in education and outreach, and has worked with more than 150 K-12 classrooms to bring her data-art curriculum to students.
Jill’s art work builds on and bridges her academic training in both art and science. She completed a Masters of Science in August 2018, which focused on studying the sensitivity of the Antarctic Ice Sheet to changes in our Earth-Climate system. She earned this degree at the University of Maine, where she also completed B.A. degrees in Studio Art and Earth Science. She has conducted research on the mountain glaciers of Washington and British Columbia, in the Dry Valleys and Transantarctic Mountains of Antarctica, in the Falkland Islands, and in New Zealand.
Photo by Chris Morgan