Ackroyd & Harvey

 

 

Ackroyd & Harvey are visual artists who have collaborated since 1990.

Ecology, architecture, sculpture, and photography are some of the disciplines that intersect in Ackroyd & Harvey’s work, revealing an intrinsic bias towards process and event. Their artwork makes explicit connections with urban political ecologies by highlighting the temporal nature of processes of growth and decay in sites of architectural and ecological interest as well as contemporary art galleries and museums worldwide. Often working outside the gallery space and in diverse contexts, they are acclaimed for large-scale architectural interventions where they grow landmark buildings with seedling grass.

In 2003 they grew the entire vertical interior space of a disused church in South London; the following year contributed to European Space 9th Sculpture Quadrennial in Riga, Latvia; and in 2007 realised their largest temporary living public artwork FlyTower on the exterior of London’s National Theatre. They have received the NESTA Pioneer award and Wellcome Sci-Art award for their work utilizing the light-sensitivity of the pigment chlorophyll in making complex living photographs in grass, and have exhibited this work worldwide including the Andalusian Centre for Contemporary Art, (Seville), Musee de l’Elysee, Lausanne (Switzerland), SF Camerawork, San Francisco (USA), Santa Barbara Museum of Art (California), Exit Art (NY), Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum, Boston (USA), Rice Gallery, Houston (USA) and Big Chill (UK).