Katie Paterson
Katie Paterson’s Afterlife explores the rich history of amulets - small objects made to protect and connect people across cultures and time. These ancient charms are recreated using materials from some of the world’s most fragile and endangered landscapes, linking past and present in a powerful way.
For this work, Katie has recreated nearly 200 amulets from museums all over the world. These come from many cultures, including Mesopotamian, Egyptian, Viking, Islamic, Japanese, Indian, Chinese, Celtic, Greco-Roman, and Pre-Columbian. But instead of using traditional materials, the amulets are made from stones, coral, and other materials collected from endangered and fragile places on Earth.
These materials come from landscapes under threat, such as glaciers losing their ice, coral reefs suffering damage, and islands at risk from rising seas. By using these, Afterlife links the past with the present, reminding us how delicate our natural world is today.
The project asks us to think about the long story of the Earth and what we might leave behind for future generations. It honours the species and environments in danger, blending old cultural traditions with urgent messages about climate change and protecting life on our planet.
Afterlife is both a tribute to what has been lost and a call to look after the natural world before it is too late.
Design by Zeller & Moye.
ᴵⁿᵗᵉʳᶦᵒʳ ᶦᵐᵃᵍᵉ ᵇʸ ᵀʰᶦᵉʳʳʸ ᴮᵃˡ
ᴱˣᵗᵉʳᶦᵒʳ ᶦᵐᵃᵍᵉ ᵇʸ ᴹᵃᵗᵗ ᴿᵒʷᵉ
About the artist
Katie Paterson is known for her poetic and conceptually driven works that explore deep time, the cosmos, and the fragility of our planet. Collaborating with scientists, astronomers and researchers across the globe, her art connects the everyday with the vast and unknowable, from distant galaxies to disappearing glaciers.
Her projects have included broadcasting the sound of a melting glacier live, mapping dead stars, creating a light bulb that replicates moonlight, and sending a recast meteorite back into space. Paterson’s practice is rooted in research and realised with scientific precision, yet her works retain a profound emotional resonance evoking wonder, humility, and the vastness of time.
Paterson has exhibited widely, with solo and group exhibitions at Turner Contemporary, Hayward Gallery, Tate Britain, Kunsthalle Wien, MCA Sydney, the Guggenheim, and the Scottish National Gallery of Modern Art. She is the recipient of the South Bank Award for Visual Art and an Honorary Fellow of Edinburgh University.
Paterson lives and works in Scotland.
With additional support from Goethe Institut.
