Pali Lookout

Artist Kerry Skarbakka American, born 1970

Date2004

MediumChromogenic print

Dimensions72 x 60 in. (182.9 x 152.4 cm)
Frame: 74 x 62 x 2 in. (188 x 157.5 x 5.1 cm)

ClassificationsPhotography

Credit LineGift of Joe Davy in honor of Lawrence J. Wheeler

Object number2015.4

On View

Not on view

Label TextThese works are from a series of self-portraits by Kerry Skarbakka titled The Struggle to Right Oneself. The photographs document elaborately staged performances in which Skarbakka uses climbing equipment—cables, pulleys, and harnesses—to suspend himself in extremely precarious positions: perched on the edge of a railroad trestle or cliff, falling into a canyon or off the side of a building, floating above his bed. He then uses a computer to edit out the staging equipment before he prints the final image, so that he appears to be magically levitating or dramatically leaping to an unknown end.

Skarbakka says this series “questions what it means to resist the struggle, to simply let go, and the consequences of holding on. The images stand as reminders that we are all vulnerable to losing our footing and grasp, symbolizing the precarious balancing act between the struggle against our desire to survive and our fantasy to transcend our humanness.”
[L. Dougherty]ProvenanceCreated 2004, collection of the artist. Allen G. Thomas Jr., Wilson, NC, 2005; [Art of the Auction, North Carolina Museum of Art, 2013]; Joe Davy; given to NCMA, 2015.
Exhibition HistoryRaleigh, NC, North Carolina Museum of Art, “Director’s Cut: Recent Photography Gifts to the NCMA,” April 4–September 13, 2015.
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