Through Time and Taproots: A Studio Visit with Erol Scott Harris
An interview for Sixty Inches From Center
January 2023
Excerpts:
“Erol’s work is best experienced in silence, or in soft whispers, quiet reveals, and patient observations. It’s meant to be savored, relished, and, by doing that, discovered. It’s meant to be re-experienced and interpreted over time, with welcomed and expanded revisions. Should you take up his invitation to sit for a while, whether in his studio or in his canvases, I recommend you approach it gently, but also prepare to receive waves of information, cleverly buried imagery, glimpses of immediate and distant ancestries, and access to sweeping studies of internal worlds and materials.”
Erol Scott Harris: “When it comes to articulating who I am, where I am at as an artist, it always falls outside of just being an artist. I think it’s about how to be a human. I’m always asking that question first, and the artistry is something that I just happen to do. Art gives the closest thing that I can find to an answer when asking myself what it means [to be] human or when tapping into a deeper part of myself.“
Photo Credits:
[1] A black-and-white portrait of Erol looking directly into the camera and sitting among dry flowers outdoors on an elevated train track. Buildings and a cloudy sky can be seen in the background. Photo by Ryan Edmund Thiel.
[2] A black-and-white portrait of Erol sitting among dry flowers outdoors on an elevated train track. Buildings, electricity towers, and a cloudy sky can be seen in the background. Photo by Ryan Edmund Thiel.
