Bits and Pieces

source: nilsvoelker
Nils Völker is a media artist based in Berlin whose creative path led from communication design to the use of physical computing. His artistic practice embraces electronics and programming, combined with a fascination for everyday objects and carefully selected fragile materials.

Völker realizes large-scale sculptures and site-specific kinetic installations to investigate mechanical rhythm – such as wavelike animation – in prepared systems and to create a conflict between natural and unnatural phenomena. Incorporating sound and simple components such as plastic bags, computer cooling fans, and lights, his minimalistic artworks carry poetic and emotional depth, constantly changing the setting of the exhibition space.

Since 2010 the artist has been working on a series of “choreographed breathing” installations – mostly consisting of a matrix of cushions of different sizes and materials which inflate and deflate in controlled rhythms – as a development of his highly acknowledged and widely exhibited piece One Hundred and Eight.

The largest of these, made from 252 silver cushions for the exhibition Captured (2012) in collaboration with Sven Völker, was followed by further site specific commissions for the Birmingham Museum and Art Gallery, Kuandu Museum of Fine Arts in Taipei, Gewerbemuseum Wintertur, MUDAC Lausanne, Kunstmuseum Celle, and the OÖ Kulturquartier, Linz. Recent works include Nineteen (2015), the artist’s largest installation to date, consisting of 19 enormous golden cushions of mylar foil hanging from the ceiling, in the temporary art pavilion M0Bi in Groningen (The Netherlands); and Fountains (2012), his first public interactive artwork which has remained as part of the permanent collection of Xixi Wetland Park in Hangzhou, China.