Name | Sven Humphrey & Robyn Voshardt

Country | USA

DOB |

Email | studio@voshardthumphrey.com

Web | www.voshardthumphrey.com

Curriculum Vitae | Click Here

Statement | Sven Humphrey & Robyn Voshardt

Robyn Voshardt and Sven Humphrey are collaborative artists working in video, sound, photography, and drawing. Recent projects explore issues of control and intent on an environmental and personal scale: such as controlled growth in urban planning, natural decay and regeneration, and the surrender of control over to chance in their selection of materials and process for making art. Rather than work from a script, their video derives from spontaneous digital footage they gather on location combined with multi-layered sound recordings of their own voices, natural and electronic sounds. They are interested in video’s ability to transform and occupy physical space (in a non-theater environment) and layered sound is an integral component of their projects. The artists do their own video/audio recording and editing and are now starting to work in HD.

Cloudland, 2004
Cloudland opens with an ominous sky and the phrase “Soon we must worry about time...but not for almost a day,” spoken by the artists at various speeds and on multiple tracks. It’s a visual and verbal conundrum that seems pressing – yet begs procrastination – while the viewer is transported through stills of dissolving clouds and vapor trails. The accompanying soundtrack descends into silence, creating a feeling of suspension and temporary weightlessness before intensifying once again.

The Fall, 2006
This meditative yet ominous footage came from a month-long trip to a rural area in Nova Scotia that stands on the brink of overdevelopment. A branch from a 150 year old apple tree is the focus of this extreme view of nature and the elements. As apples get whipped around in the wind and rain, the autumnal process of decay and regeneration takes hold. Though it shows an isolated view, the title of the work suggests civilization’s broader impact on the environment.

When I Look Up, I Fall Down, 2006
This short loop was inspired by footage gathered from an old-growth Oregon forest during an artist residency. Seen from a disorienting spin, the lush tree canopy no longer offers a sense of shelter, but creates a vortex suggestive of a larger ecological and personal conundrum.