Nature may look chaotic, but it is, in fact, very well organized. So says artist Dee McLean. 

“We mess with it at our peril,” she says.

A scientific illustrator, painter, children’s book author, exhibit curator and former cricket coach, McLean uses art as a vehicle to engage her audience with science and the climate crisis.

She lives in London, UK, but her daughter is a Rockies resident. However, it was McLean’s time in Canada’s north, watching polar bears wait for late-forming sea ice on the shores of Hudson Bay, which led her to reflect on climate change more deeply.

“What effect was it having on places where I have significant emotional connections?” she asked in her 2023 exhibition Water, Wilderness and Wildfires.

That was, of course, before 36,000 hectares of forest and a third of the town where her daughter lives, burned. From London, she could only watch Jasper’s peril and hope.

“Those were four horrible days,” she recalls. “There was nothing I could do.”

Then came the pyronema omphalodes: a bright orange, lumpy, crust-like fungus which fruits on burned soil and the ashes of woody debris. The fluorescent fungi is occasionally seen in outdoor fire pits, but in the aftermath of Jasper’s high-intensity, high-severity burn, the short-lived mycelia was widespread. Other photogenic fire phenomena had occurred: sprung-open and scorched lodgepole pinecones; small, vibrant mosses; and ancient, persistent liverworts—absorbing nutrients where only mineral soil remained.

Knowing she’d like to paint the natural spectacle, McLean’s son-in-law—a Jasper National Park trail crew member seconded during the incident to put out spot fires—sent her photos from the field. 

“The growth immediately after the fire was absolutely extraordinary,” McLean said. “I had to paint it.”

She did. Soon after, the town’s iconic local ski shop, Totem, got word of her project. 

Staff there had an idea: to commemorate Jasper’s regeneration from the fire, and to help reduce barriers for youth sport and education, they wanted to immortalize McLean’s art not in a gallery, but on the slopes.

Now, with the help of ski manufacturer Armada, Totem has produced a special run of skis which, via the topsheets of 106 pairs of the company’s best-selling ARV series, debut McLean’s vibrant illustrations. Available in 172 or 179 cm, the ski’s waist is a park-to-pow poppin’ 100mm.

“We initially wanted the skis a little more hooky, and had the option of 94 mm, but we were going to lose some of the integrity of the art,” Totem’s Victor Vassallo said. 

Despite their freeride potential, don’t expect all of the From the Ashes skis to see snow.

“Many people who bought them aren’t going to ski on them,” Vassallo said.

For those who want to preserve the art in a different format, there are prints available of her works, the sale of which will benefit the Jasper Community Team’s Child and Youth Participation Fund.

McLean, who as an artist is interested in how the environment informs the way societies develop, hopes the project helps skiers connect not just their turns, but the dots between communities and the climate crisis.

She has seen that in Jasper, wildfire prevention and recovery begins with togetherness.

“Jasper has shown extraordinarily resilience to get back on its feet,” she says. “It seems that being connected as neighbours has a lot to do with that.”

Bob Covey // bob@thejasperlocal.com