Harold Sikkema
Harold is an accomplished artist, educator, and visual communicator, whose creative capacities span many media, technologies and platforms. His code powers websites and art installations, leveraging the logic of mobile devices. He has illustrated children’s books, designed award winning publications, documented events, and crafted effective brands. He maintains artistic practices of photography, community engagement, and critical thinking and writing. Equally at ease with JavaScript and Photoshop, Harold brings poetic zest and cohesive vision to all his work.
Artist’s Statement
A line, a movement, an impression: is mark-making only the privilege of people with palette and paint? The snail’s trail is (of course) silvery. But what about the hoofprints of a thousand buffalo? Or the wingbeats of bats, invisible, but mischievous, and as color-latent as any brushstroke? In the absence of built-in sonar, I rely on other apparatus to see. The camera ascertains traces of living and moving things: their gurgling, and splashing and laughing. Photoshop brings the ritual full circle: like religion, she manipulates. The challenge? Asking her to sing something true. Sometimes, enchanted by a piece of Ontario waterfront, I catch a glimpse of the chorus. It rings a while in my ears, the double-bass insisting like a Calvinist; the soprano shattering the communion glass. There are some patterns so ubiquitous, you can’t escape them. To these, my hermeneutic spirals ever back: as close as I’ll ever be to home.
