A, 2002
Still: Courtesy the artist
Still: Courtesy the artist
Still: Courtesy the artist
Still: Courtesy the artist
Still: Courtesy the artist
Collection
Single-channel video installation, color, sound
22 min
Commissioned by Public Art Development Trust, London
Gliding along the margins where the snowy expanse of Antarctica meets the freezing sea, Darren Almond's beautiful, unsettling film A presents a world of infinite whites empty of human presence. Almond's trip was made possible when Mission Antarctica invited him to take the role of ship artist on their expedition to clear ecological waste from Antarctica's shores in early 2002. It was the ideal opportunity for Almond to explore his fascination with, as he puts it, a "landscape simply made up of air, liquid and gas in different states". Almond´s camera lingers over Antarctica's visible geology, revealing the translucency and delicacy of the lumbering ice floes, tracing their crystalline surfaces, skimming the margin where ocean meets ice and air in a fringe of turquoise channels. A reveals the curious subtleties of this minimal color world. In collaboration with Lyle Perkins, the artist has composed a soundtrack combining synthetic harmonics reminiscent of early nautical films like The Fog, and percussive elements made from the real sounds Almond recorded in Antarctica – sounds of the cracks and rips of sheet-ice fissuring. To the ear, the near-silence of Antarctica is amplified, flooding the listener's body with blood-thumping menace at one moment, dreamy serenity the next. A offers a territory outside time, outside place, and ultimately outside the self.
* 1971 Wigan, U.K. | Living and working in London, U.K.
22 min
Commissioned by Public Art Development Trust, London
Gliding along the margins where the snowy expanse of Antarctica meets the freezing sea, Darren Almond's beautiful, unsettling film A presents a world of infinite whites empty of human presence. Almond's trip was made possible when Mission Antarctica invited him to take the role of ship artist on their expedition to clear ecological waste from Antarctica's shores in early 2002. It was the ideal opportunity for Almond to explore his fascination with, as he puts it, a "landscape simply made up of air, liquid and gas in different states". Almond´s camera lingers over Antarctica's visible geology, revealing the translucency and delicacy of the lumbering ice floes, tracing their crystalline surfaces, skimming the margin where ocean meets ice and air in a fringe of turquoise channels. A reveals the curious subtleties of this minimal color world. In collaboration with Lyle Perkins, the artist has composed a soundtrack combining synthetic harmonics reminiscent of early nautical films like The Fog, and percussive elements made from the real sounds Almond recorded in Antarctica – sounds of the cracks and rips of sheet-ice fissuring. To the ear, the near-silence of Antarctica is amplified, flooding the listener's body with blood-thumping menace at one moment, dreamy serenity the next. A offers a territory outside time, outside place, and ultimately outside the self.
* 1971 Wigan, U.K. | Living and working in London, U.K.
Darren Almond was born in 1971 in Wigan, UK. He lives and works in London. His solo exhibitions include MUDAM Luxembourg (2015), Neu Galerie Graz Joanneum Quarter (2015), Bloomberg Space, London (2014), Art Tower Mito, Japan (2013), Sala Alcalá 31, Madrid, Château Gallery, Domaine Régional de Chaumont-sur-Loire (2012); The High Line, New York, Villa Merkel, Esslingen, L'Abbaye de la Chaise Dieu, Chaise Dieu; Frac Haute-Normandie, Rouen and FRAC Auvergne, Clermont Ferrand (2011); Parasol Unit, London (2008), SITE, Santa Fe (2007); Museum Folkwang, Essen (2006); K21, Düsseldorf (2005), Lentos Kunstmuseum Linz (2004), Kunsthalle Zürich (2001), Tate Britain, London (2001), De Appel, Amsterdam (2001) and The Renaissance Society, Chicago (1999). He has also participated in numerous important group exhibitions including Kunsthaus Graz (2015); Lenbachhause, Munich (2014); Louisiana Museum of Modern Art, Denmark (2013); Helmhaus, Zurich, 6th Biennale da Curitiba, Brazil and Miami Art Museum (2011); MAC/VAL, Vitry-sûr-Seine, (2010); 'Tate Triennial', Tate Britain, London and Frac Lorraine, Metz (2009); Moscow Biennale (2007), 'The Turner Prize', Tate Britain, London (2005); The Busan Biennale (2004); Venice Biennale (2003); Berlin Biennale (2001); 'Apocalypse', Royal Academy of Arts, London (2000); ‘Sensation’, Royal Academy of Arts, London (1997).