En septembre 2013, des milliers d’oiseaux chanteurs en migration sont attirés comme des papillons de nuit par la torchère de Canaport Liquefied Natural Gas, à Saint-Jean, au Nouveau-Brunswick. C’est l’hécatombe. Le photographe Thaddeus Holownia et le poète Harry Thurston forment alors le projet de commémorer la catastrophe, mais comme un procès a été intenté, les oiseaux morts sont conservés comme autant de pièces à conviction au Musée du Nouveau-Brunswick. Au bout de deux longues années, Holownia et Thurston y ont enfin accès.

Icare, chute d’oiseaux réunit les photographies de Holownia et la poésie de Thurston. Les oiseaux, brisés et brûlés, tombent sans fin d’une page à l’autre, en regard des vers de Thurston qui racontent le voyage tragique de ces migrateurs qui « percent de leurs ailes telles une aiguille à broder / le rideau de brouillard qui s’accroche au littoral », quand « une fausse étoile / brille de mille feux » et les entraîne vers la mort.

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Harry Thurston is the author of several collections of poetry and twelve nonfiction books, including Tidal Life: A Natural History of the Bay of Fundy, winner of three non-fiction prizes in the Atlantic region; The Nature of Shorebirds: Nomads of the Wetlands; and A Place between the Tides: A Naturalist's Reflections on the Salt Marsh, which received the 2005 Sigrid Olson Nature Writing Award in the United States and was shortlisted for the 2005 BC Award for Canadian Non-Fiction. He has also written for such magazines as Audubon, Canadian Geographic, and National Geographic. Thurston lives in Nova Scotia.

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Harry Thurston's profile page

Thaddeus Holownia is a teacher, visual artist, letterpress printer and publisher. Currently he is a professor and head of the Fine Arts Department at Mount Allison University. Holownia’s work has been the subject of numerous exhibitions, including most recently, Thaddeus Holownia: the Terra Nova Suite, a twenty-five-year survey of his Newfoundland and Labrador work presented by the Rooms Provincial Art Gallery in St. John’s. His photographs have been included in numerous group exhibitions, including The Landscape: Eight Canadian Photographers by the McMichael Canadian Art Collection, Klienburg, and Monet’s Legacy: Series. Order and Obsession at the Hamburger Kunsthalle. He has been the recipient of many awards and honours including a Fulbright Fellowship in 2001 and the Paul Paré Medal in 1998 and 2006 from Mount Allison University in recognition of excellence in teaching, creative activity, research and community service. In 2000 Holownia was elected to the Royal Canadian Academy of Arts. In 2015 he was the recipient of the Lieutenant Governor of New Brunswick’s Award for Excellence in the Visual Arts and the Order of New Brunswick.

Thaddeus Holownia's profile page

Sonya Malaborza, établie à Galloway, traduit des œuvres poétiques, romanesques et dramaturgiques. Sa traduction de The Birth House, d’Ami McKay, sous le titre L’accoucheuse de Scots Bay, a été en nomination aux Prix littéraires du Gouverneur général.

Sonya Malaborza's profile page