Oliver Herring
| Oliver Herring | |
|---|---|
| Born | 1964 Heidelberg, Germany |
| Nationality | German-American |
| Education |
The Ruskin School of Drawing and Fine Art Hunter College |
Oliver Herring (born 1964 in Heidelberg, Germany) is an experimental artist based in Brooklyn, New York. His works include knitting Mylar, participatory performances, styrofoam photo sculptures and video.
Herring as born in Heidelberg Germany in 1964. He earned his BFA at The Ruskin School of Drawing and Fine Art, University of Oxford. He went on to Hunter College in New York where he got his MFA.
Oliver Herring started his art career as a painter with very colorful and expressive works. When Ethyl Eichelberger committed suicide in 1991, Herring started knitting Mylar to pay respect to him. Herring knit the transparent tape into colorless human figures, clothing and furniture. When they were on display, he chose the Mylar clothing to be hung or placed in a way that it looks like the shape they would be if worn.
Herring moved from knitting Mylar to video and participatory performances in 1998. His videos were primarily stop motion. When he was sitting in his knitting chair for hours on end, knitting, his mind would wonder and his stop motion videos expressed his thoughts. In his video Exit, he starts out in his knitting chair, than through stop motion he bounds out of it in a flight of fancy. He flies from his chair into the air in a jerky movement. The next scene he has long white hair, still flying through the air.
In the participatory performances he replaces himself with his friends and strangers to star in the videos. He incorporates stop motion video in these as well. Herring cared more about the process then he did about the medium which is why his video was not high quality and his stop motion was jerky.
Herring does not like the term act or actor because he believes the people end up contributing to his art and it becomes a collaboration. Herring said “I don’t think of the people I work with as models or actors. They are people who are willing to sacrifice their time for me.” [PBS]
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