Executive Director of Vermont Studio Center Elyzabeth Holford (e) interviewed Sarah Schorr (sgs) in her studio just outside of Aarhus, Denmark (via Zoom). See the original or read below:
e.: Let’s start with your current work which as a lifelong swimmer, I absolutely love. Tell me about your practice and how your current processes evolved.
sgs: Right now, my practice is all about pigment and water – tiny explosions of color that are there for a few seconds, then gone. I mix that micro moment in paint with different photographic fragments and I envision swimming. When I swim, I experience the color of the light and how it reflects different emotional states. I’m fascinated with that visually arresting, fleeting moment of breaking the surface.
e.: Breaking the surface… hmmmm, like a moment of transition?
sgs: Exactly, and there are so many aspects to that. For instance, I’ve observed people who are awkward on land but when they enter water they are transformed, they move like dancers. Or, there’s a subtle but dynamic change that occurs with one breath taken, followed by submersion and then the vibrance of a person made momentarily weightless – a form of suspended animation that captivates me.
e.: Why did you start swimming?
sgs: I started swimming when I lived in Vermont, of all places! 12 years ago, I was pregnant with my first daughter, I was teaching a J term course at Middlebury College and somebody recommended that I swim. Then I started swimming again when I struggled with the endless writing and editing in my dissertation. Swimming helped me clarify my ideas. I’ve discovered that I experience clear, really lucid thinking when I’m in water. I feel more free. Being in and moving through water takes me to a different state. It’s a place where I fully release pain, both physical and emotional. I’m relaxed in water. I’m even learning to dive now.
e.: I find your work to be extremely emotive: tender, vulnerable, angry, elated, explosive… Is that part of conveying that “sense of the full experience”?
sgs: Yes, all those emotions create energy. For me, emotions are like an engine. They are generative. It’s hard for me to precisely describe with words. Actually this is not unlike the freedom that i get while swimming, i prefer to get messy with the paint and try to capture a fleeting, micro experience of the way color changes.
e.: I’ve seen you in action and you really are unstoppable. How do you stay so productive?
sgs: I believe that if you have a creative practice in life, you can handle just about anything: anger, sadness, grief. Whatever the medium is, I’ve found that giving form to those emotions helps to navigate life. These emotions impact the way color is experienced. In 1744, Abraham Gottlob Werner first published his nomenclature where he organized colors around minerals to make a "standard." Through extending his charts to include metallic colors, I’ve been building on his beautiful charts to include fluctuations of emotion and the fleeting quality of light. My charts are kinda meant to open the charts to the infinite, impermanent nature of color: colors are always changing.
e.: I know your work pretty well and I know that grief, the loss of your father and then your uncle, has driven some of your projects. Can you talk about that?
sgs: I find myself weaving the influences of my father, Mark, and my uncle, David, into my work. They were life mentors for me. My father was a poet, a gentle and loving man. He always found a way to engage with people, often introducing them to poetry. David was a printmaker and a painter whose life and work were
shaped by the AIDS epidemic. He always seemed shocked and a little shadowed by the fact that he survived the epidemic when so many didn’t. He taught me that it is okay to bring emotion into my visual work. Life. Love. Loss. He modeled bringing it all into the studio. More importantly, they both demonstrated a sheer, unshakeable love for their work. It seemed like a wonderful way to live, a way for me to process the vastness of our human experience.
e.: And you started out as a painter, didn’t you?
sgs: I did. I started as a painter and I was so very serious about it that I didn’t really give photography much of a chance. But, actually, when I did discover photography I loved it all, from the images appearing in the liquids of the darkroom and to the images of my friends in water. So, maybe it’s not a surprise that I’ve made the digital wet.
e.: You mentioned learning the “practice of photography”, do you mean traditional or digital?
sgs: (smiling) There’s quite a few people now that would say digital photography is traditional. But, yes, I first learned in the darkroom and, initially, I missed the slowness of that process. Now, I use both. Frankly, the advent of smartphones has opened things up in so many ways. Now, I think I get the best of both worlds. In my current project, the Color of Water, I find myself working with paint and digital imagery in much the same way that I would focus in the darkroom. Sometimes, I still miss the wetness of photography and the mystery of the darkroom. Yet, it is the speed of digital photography that allows me to capture that wetness and the blurring of pigment in a single drop of water.
e.: I want to stay with the digital discussion for a moment because I’m aware of an interesting project about color that you’ve started with some programmers.
sgs: Yes, thank you for bringing it up. It’s a project about color subjectivities. Do you remember how Joseph Albers wrote that 50 people in a room looking at a “red” CocaCola can would see the color differently? With water, we often default to thinking of it as blue, but I’ve witnessed it as green, gray, blue, white, silver, golden, pink, black and even red. For the last year, I’ve been collaborating with two Brazilian artist/programmers, Gabriel Pereira and Carlos de Oliveira. Our project reveals how the computer “sees” the colors that we “see”. This is, primarily, an art-based installation but there are rippling effects. Color bias has always impacted every aspect of social photography. For instance, we know that Kodak systems were calibrated to white skin. We also know that Google “sees” color differently than Microsoft, but these algorithmic flaws go far beyond aesthetics and are embedded in facial recognition software and other surveillance programs. So while our digital worlds are dynamic and often enjoyable, I believe this project can be a part of reminding us of our responsibility to address the bias and prejudice that exists in our emerging technologies.
e.: Thank you. Your project highlights biased practices that, so very often, remain firmly in place and totally unexamined. Let’s move back in time again, for a moment. As I recall, you went to SVA and you still stay connected there, don’t you?
sgs: The SVA department of Photo, Video and Related Media is one of the best places in the world for discovering what photography has been and can be in the future.
e.: Wait a minute, didn’t you mean to say the Vermont Studio Center?
sgs: (Laughing) Of course. But seriously, my experience at SVA was unparalleled. Charles Traub and his team have created a safe haven for mentoring photographic artists. His love for the photographic life and his deep understanding of how the practice evolves keeps that program highly relevant. Even living abroad, I return to that supportive and creative community. This is such a difficult time for so many. Preserving the time and the space to work is essential. Places like the Vermont Studio Center are life changing havens for artists and writers.
e.: Hmmmm, well, no surprise, you won’t hear any argument from me on that. Now, I know everyone hates this question, but here we go: what’s next for you?
sgs: You are right about that question yet, it feels so much bigger than “what’s next for me”. The one certainty right now is that everything has changed, everywhere. COVID-19 -- the ramifications are massive. And, we all share the imperative to keep the racial and social justice awakening in the forefront of what we do. It is essential that we come together to keep creativity and inclusion alive and well at places like the Vermont Studio Center.
e.: Yes! Sarah, you have my gratitude. First, thanks for calling this out. Second, thank you for spending your Saturday afternoon with me on Zoom. And, finally, let me close out our interview by thanking you for “diving in” to support VSC by donating five signed, unframed 18” x 24” prints of the image below (click here for details):
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Executive Director of Vermont Studio Center Elyzabeth Holford (e) interviewed Sarah Schorr (sgs) in her studio just outside of Aarhus, Denmark (via Zoom). See the original or read below:
e.: Let’s start with your current work which as a lifelong swimmer, I absolutely love. Tell me about your practice and how your current processes evolved.
sgs: Right now, my practice is all about pigment and water – tiny explosions of color that are there for a few seconds, then gone. I mix that micro moment in paint with different photographic fragments and I envision swimming. When I swim, I experience the color of the light and how it reflects different emotional states. I’m fascinated with that visually arresting, fleeting moment of breaking the surface.
e.: Breaking the surface… hmmmm, like a moment of transition?
sgs: Exactly, and there are so many aspects to that. For instance, I’ve observed people who are awkward on land but when they enter water they are transformed, they move like dancers. Or, there’s a subtle but dynamic change that occurs with one breath taken, followed by submersion and then the vibrance of a person made momentarily weightless – a form of suspended animation that captivates me.
e.: Why did you start swimming?
sgs: I started swimming when I lived in Vermont, of all places! 12 years ago, I was pregnant with my first daughter, I was teaching a J term course at Middlebury College and somebody recommended that I swim. Then I started swimming again when I struggled with the endless writing and editing in my dissertation. Swimming helped me clarify my ideas. I’ve discovered that I experience clear, really lucid thinking when I’m in water. I feel more free. Being in and moving through water takes me to a different state. It’s a place where I fully release pain, both physical and emotional. I’m relaxed in water. I’m even learning to dive now.
e.: I find your work to be extremely emotive: tender, vulnerable, angry, elated, explosive… Is that part of conveying that “sense of the full experience”?
sgs: Yes, all those emotions create energy. For me, emotions are like an engine. They are generative. It’s hard for me to precisely describe with words. Actually this is not unlike the freedom that i get while swimming, i prefer to get messy with the paint and try to capture a fleeting, micro experience of the way color changes.
e.: I’ve seen you in action and you really are unstoppable. How do you stay so productive?
sgs: I believe that if you have a creative practice in life, you can handle just about anything: anger, sadness, grief. Whatever the medium is, I’ve found that giving form to those emotions helps to navigate life. These emotions impact the way color is experienced. In 1744, Abraham Gottlob Werner first published his nomenclature where he organized colors around minerals to make a "standard." Through extending his charts to include metallic colors, I’ve been building on his beautiful charts to include fluctuations of emotion and the fleeting quality of light. My charts are kinda meant to open the charts to the infinite, impermanent nature of color: colors are always changing.
e.: I know your work pretty well and I know that grief, the loss of your father and then your uncle, has driven some of your projects. Can you talk about that?
sgs: I find myself weaving the influences of my father, Mark, and my uncle, David, into my work. They were life mentors for me. My father was a poet, a gentle and loving man. He always found a way to engage with people, often introducing them to poetry. David was a printmaker and a painter whose life and work were
shaped by the AIDS epidemic. He always seemed shocked and a little shadowed by the fact that he survived the epidemic when so many didn’t. He taught me that it is okay to bring emotion into my visual work. Life. Love. Loss. He modeled bringing it all into the studio. More importantly, they both demonstrated a sheer, unshakeable love for their work. It seemed like a wonderful way to live, a way for me to process the vastness of our human experience.
e.: And you started out as a painter, didn’t you?
sgs: I did. I started as a painter and I was so very serious about it that I didn’t really give photography much of a chance. But, actually, when I did discover photography I loved it all, from the images appearing in the liquids of the darkroom and to the images of my friends in water. So, maybe it’s not a surprise that I’ve made the digital wet.
e.: You mentioned learning the “practice of photography”, do you mean traditional or digital?
sgs: (smiling) There’s quite a few people now that would say digital photography is traditional. But, yes, I first learned in the darkroom and, initially, I missed the slowness of that process. Now, I use both. Frankly, the advent of smartphones has opened things up in so many ways. Now, I think I get the best of both worlds. In my current project, the Color of Water, I find myself working with paint and digital imagery in much the same way that I would focus in the darkroom. Sometimes, I still miss the wetness of photography and the mystery of the darkroom. Yet, it is the speed of digital photography that allows me to capture that wetness and the blurring of pigment in a single drop of water.
e.: I want to stay with the digital discussion for a moment because I’m aware of an interesting project about color that you’ve started with some programmers.
sgs: Yes, thank you for bringing it up. It’s a project about color subjectivities. Do you remember how Joseph Albers wrote that 50 people in a room looking at a “red” CocaCola can would see the color differently? With water, we often default to thinking of it as blue, but I’ve witnessed it as green, gray, blue, white, silver, golden, pink, black and even red. For the last year, I’ve been collaborating with two Brazilian artist/programmers, Gabriel Pereira and Carlos de Oliveira. Our project reveals how the computer “sees” the colors that we “see”. This is, primarily, an art-based installation but there are rippling effects. Color bias has always impacted every aspect of social photography. For instance, we know that Kodak systems were calibrated to white skin. We also know that Google “sees” color differently than Microsoft, but these algorithmic flaws go far beyond aesthetics and are embedded in facial recognition software and other surveillance programs. So while our digital worlds are dynamic and often enjoyable, I believe this project can be a part of reminding us of our responsibility to address the bias and prejudice that exists in our emerging technologies.
e.: Thank you. Your project highlights biased practices that, so very often, remain firmly in place and totally unexamined. Let’s move back in time again, for a moment. As I recall, you went to SVA and you still stay connected there, don’t you?
sgs: The SVA department of Photo, Video and Related Media is one of the best places in the world for discovering what photography has been and can be in the future.
e.: Wait a minute, didn’t you mean to say the Vermont Studio Center?
sgs: (Laughing) Of course. But seriously, my experience at SVA was unparalleled. Charles Traub and his team have created a safe haven for mentoring photographic artists. His love for the photographic life and his deep understanding of how the practice evolves keeps that program highly relevant. Even living abroad, I return to that supportive and creative community. This is such a difficult time for so many. Preserving the time and the space to work is essential. Places like the Vermont Studio Center are life changing havens for artists and writers.
e.: Hmmmm, well, no surprise, you won’t hear any argument from me on that. Now, I know everyone hates this question, but here we go: what’s next for you?
sgs: You are right about that question yet, it feels so much bigger than “what’s next for me”. The one certainty right now is that everything has changed, everywhere. COVID-19 -- the ramifications are massive. And, we all share the imperative to keep the racial and social justice awakening in the forefront of what we do. It is essential that we come together to keep creativity and inclusion alive and well at places like the Vermont Studio Center.
e.: Yes! Sarah, you have my gratitude. First, thanks for calling this out. Second, thank you for spending your Saturday afternoon with me on Zoom. And, finally, let me close out our interview by thanking you for “diving in” to support VSC by donating five signed, unframed 18” x 24” prints of the image below (click here for details):
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