[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=04KQydlJ-qc]
This art piece is located in the Performing Arts Center at Western Washington University.
Video By: Blancaflor Sanchez
About Claude Zervas
Claude Zervas was born in 1963. He was raised on 40 acres in Deming in the 1970’s. Since he did live in a nature filled environment he incorporated nature into some of his work. Claude attended Western Washington University. After college, he moved to Paris for a while and then came back to Washington to live in Seattle. In 2002, he won the Artist Trust King County Arts Commission Fellowship Award and he was a finalist for the 2014 Neddy at Cornish Award in Painting. His art is displayed in multiple locations, but the majority is in Washington. In the exhibition “Forest 3.5” Zervas presented “Skagit,” which is a sculpture similar to “Nooksack Middle Fork”. Zervas used fluorescent lights and other props to trace the river’s flow. His most recent exhibition “Quasicrystals” features abstract art that varies in colors. They are very bright and have crystal-like formations. His work is being showed all around Washington.
By: Blancaflor Sanchez
About “Nooksack Middle Fork” by Claude Zervas
Claude Zervas’ original intent was to make a representation of his childhood by creating the Nooksack Middle Fork sculpture. Since he grew up near the forested area the digital representation of the Nooksack Middle Fork reminds him of when he would explore the river and its surroundings. Change is evident in the mini video clip he used in the four panels. The looping video clips represent how much it has changed since he was a child.
“Having grown up there, it just has such a deep connection that I can’t help but be influenced by it,” Zervas says, “Maybe those memories, and just the sensibility of the places creep through. And maybe because of the change I see in it every time I come back to visit, there’s a little bit of sadness involved in it.”
The sculpture was made in early 2016. The time period it was created in should tell us about how the current world has influenced the art and the artist. In this era our society is highly technological and machine-based. Society has influenced the artist through new technologies and through the ways our world is shaping by the advancement of the machine and the things we can do with them. We can make wonderful art by using new electronics which will express our thoughts and feelings.
The sculpture is expensive based on the quality of the work because we have four high-quality TV screens all connected that display a short, looped video of the Nooksack river that was captured by quality video cameras that are connected to drones. Also, it speaks a lot about how connected the artist is to our mother nature because even though he is living in an advanced, technological world he doesn’t want to forget about the land we live on and the one that our ancestors lived on. He likes change but he doesn’t forget about the root. And he used that idea to create the Nooksack river sculpture by using technology to create an image of our mother nature.
By: Blancaflor Sanchez & Issam Khouri
Credit
Video by: Blancaflor Sanchez
About Claude Zervas: Blancaflor Sanchez
About Nooksack Middle Fork by Claude Zervas: Blancaflor Sanchez & Issam Khouri
Sources
http://blog.seattlepi.com/art/2008/07/08/the-highs-and-lows-of-claude-zervas/
http://www.gregkucera.com/zervas.htm
http://www.bellinghamherald.com/entertainment/article51370735.html
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