Ice Shanties: Fishing, People & Culture is an exhibition featuring the structures, people and culture of ice fishing seen through the lens of Vermont-based Colombian photographer Federico Pardo and interviews by Vermont Folklife. Pardo’s large-format color photographs of ice shanties at “The Meadows” in Brattleboro, Vermont, are paired with audio reflections from the shanty owners drawn from interviews conducted by Vermont Folklife.

While Pardo’s shanty portraits provide a visual entrée into the material culture of ice fishing, the shanty owner interviews are an opportunity to engage with the human side—the personal, familial, and recreational culture—of ice fishing.

“The ice shanty towns that spring up on Vermont’s frozen lakes and ponds are markers of the temporary communities they harbor each winter,” says Andrew Kolovos, Associate Director of Vermont Folklife. “Practical and ingenious, shaped by function, happenstance and aesthetics, ice shanties are a window into the personal, familial and local cultures of ice fishing.”

These simple yet intriguing structures captured the attention of Columbian-born photographer and part-time Vermont resident Federico Pardo, who in 2016 began documenting the shanties on a frozen floodplain of the West River in Brattleboro, Vermont.

“The ephemeral characteristics of these shanties and their environment allows us to creative imaginary narratives far from those in the tropics,” explains Pardo. “The night, the absence or presence of the moon, the day and drastic temperature changes, are some of the elements that complement these narratives and push them further from reality.”

Smaller portraits of fish species and ice fishing equipment will be presented along with audio explanations of fishing techniques.

In these conversations the fishers speak of their shanties as structures, remark on the amenities and people they house, detail the practice of ice fishing, and, directly and indirectly, reflect the relationships, connections and community they reinvent each year at the Meadows.

Together, the images and voices give us a chance to connect with the material and human cultures of these ice fishing enclaves.

The exhibition is free, ADA accessible, and open to the public.

This exhibit is made possible with support from the Vermont Folklife Center and by the St. Johnsbury Athenaeum.