Antipodes. Ends of the Earth. Ultima Thule. Glaciers, icebergs, shelves of ice, shards of ice. Crystals. Ice in all its mind-bending, element-bending shapes. Magnetic North. Magnetic South. North Pole. South Pole. The poles. Magnetic. And, like all magnets, repelling and attracting—attracting human wonder, resisting human presence. At the North Pole, an ocean of ice. At the South Pole, a continent of ice. For now. The artists I chose to glance at for this essay are only a few of those who actually went to the poles. Artist-adventurers, they took in the new science of the day, science that said the Earth was ever-changing, ever-shifting, that even mountains and glaciers rose and fell, and decided to see for themselves. They sketched and painted in the cold, on location, then returned to…