Some people like to have a plan. German-Greek sculptor and painter Artemis Herber is comfortable without one.
“I don’t know yet, exactly, but that’s fine,” she said when asked what she’ll be working on during her Pine Meadow Ranch Center for Arts and Agriculture residency.
“It really depends on what I’m going to find, so I imagine that I’ll be working on a site-responsive project,” she continued. “I’ll probably go for hikes or field trips, look around, try to meet people — like rangers or members of the Indigenous community — hoping to listen to some of their stories, and maybe their stories connect with my findings.”
That’s the kind of go-with-the-flow approach you develop when you spend your life working within the concept of “deep time” — a term used by scientists and others to describe the immense timescale of Earth’s history, far beyond ordinary human experience.
“Deep time is everything that is rooted in geological time … but it is also our stories,” Herber said, “and Mother Earth is not just a planet of matter, but also a living organism, and everything is connected with each other.”
Herber uses her sculpture and painting process to explore the complex relationships between man and the land throughout deep time, with a special focus on today’s landscape. She creates what she calls “hybrid configurations” by fusing physical materials — her favorite is corrugated cardboard — with different concepts to illuminate how humans and their activities have become a danger to ourselves, to others and to Earth itself.
She has created works at the Salzlandmuseum in Germany and Harvard University’s Center in Washington D.C.; exhibited in the United States, Germany, the United Kingdom, Italy, Portugal, Spain and Greece; and been featured in publications such as LandEscape Now!, Studio Visit Magazine and Mapping Meaning Journal. She is curator for Transatlantic Cultural Projects and a former president of the Washington Sculptors Group.
Herber has also participated in several residencies, where she learned not to over-plan and over-prepare.
“When I went to Italy, there was this extremely complex proposal about the history of the land,” she said. “And then suddenly I had this encounter with this one olive tree that was 1,000 years old, and I decided I’m going to center around this one tree and stop exploring the whole area. Because the tree itself was the answer.”
And so, she will come to her residency with very basic tools: Paper, charcoal, pencils, plus a keen eye and an interest in how nature has adapted to humans in the region.
“It’s good to slow down and observe,” she said. “That is something so elementary for every artist: To take time out, trust your own eyes and understand your surroundings.”
Artemis Herber will lead a workshop, “Tracing the Landscape,” on Thursday, July 30 from 1-5 p.m. at The Ranch. Attendees will participate in guided outdoor exercises and use drawing and simple mapping to record multisensory experiences and build layers of observation over time. Registration costs $90.
Herber will also participate in the Studio Tour alongside fellow residents Christine Adame and Jessica Elena Aquino on Tuesday, July 28 from 5-6:30 p.m. at The Ranch.
