Tree

Name: Ragnar Digital, LLC
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Roman Verostko

1967

Painting

Watercolor on paper
12.5"x9.5"

NotAComputer

Description

In 1967, while living as a Benedictine monk, Roman Verostko began experimenting with emerging media and electronics. This is one of many watercolors and drawings produced between 1967 and 1968 as part of his Psalms in Sound and Image project. The artist coupled Kodak Carousel slide projectors with a Wollensak Stereo reel-to-reel tape deck, displaying a series of evocative, collaged images set to an atonal soundtrack composed by the musician Daniel Lenz. Described by the artist as “the first step toward programming my art ideas in a coded format,” these electronically synchronized audiovisual presentations were given at numerous US colleges and universities. Their sound-and-image technology was a common feature of experimental art events in the 1960s, preceding the widespread adoption of video the following decade.

_Tree _demonstrates Verostko’s lifelong regard for the natural world, as the artist sought to “magnify” the inherent mystery of everyday experience through sound and visuals. As he explained: “Above all else, the Psalms were a strong affirmation of ordinary life and our relationship to the earth. They draw on the commonplace experience of life as a transforming process.”