The Rijksmuseum holds a collection of prints found on Nova Zembla, the Russian island in the arctic where a Dutch expedition to the Far East stranded in 1596. Extraordinary for having lain frozen in the Arctic for three centuries, this collection will be used as a stimulus for a project hosted by the Rijksmuseum in which Bowen will investigate the relationship between the materiality of drawing and the ephemerality of museum objects on paper. An installation of her new works will be shown alongside her personal selection of the Nova Zembla prints at the Rijksmuseum in 2011.

During the preparation of the exhibition Siân Bowen writes a weblog, which can be found here: http://bowenatrijksmuseum.wordpress.com/