Ulrika Sparre

In my work I investigate the mechanisms, behaviors and social pattern that constitute our lives. My practice explores subjects like individuality and the impact of the development towards individualism and consumerism in contemporary society.
I am interested in how non-religious and scientific beliefs are expressed in the secularized western society of today. The perception of nature, a higher truth, and spiritual experiences are central themes in my work and it is often based on notions of the immaterial, the spiritual, and the mythological.

My mission is to create spaces through texts, lights and visuals that offer us all an opportunity to raise our sights and gaze outwards or forwards. The recent work On a clear day I can see forever presented in the exhibition SWIM (Malta 2013) examines how the experiences that we have overlooking the sea or into ourselves functions as a carrier of our individual seeking of truth.
In our contemporary culture nature is regarded as a place of solace and absolute truth, and as the inviolable core of human existence. The Forest Wanderer appears as an example to all sincere seekers of truth, and many described revelations have taken place when people spent time in the natural landscape, overlooking the sea or on a mountaintop.
One possible explanation is that when we move in urban space we keep our gaze closer to us and we are given few opportunities to look at something beyond ourselves. But when we by the ocean lift our gaze to the horizon it affects our brain.
This means that we are given the opportunity to clearer thinking, and that these new thoughts, in turn, are interpreted as logical or more spiritual, harmonious and happy.The sensation of feeling as one with the world has been labelled “peak experience”.
The psychologist Abraham Maslow describes a peak experience as a particularly happy and exciting moment that include feelings of intense happiness, wonder and awe, and an awareness of a larger association with everything.
Maslow argued that all humans are able to experience a peak experience and recommend that these experiences can be studied and evoked. Maslow also maintains the hidden capacity that every human being possesses, something I’d like to evoke in my artistic work.

Throughout the Global Nomadic Art Project in South Africa (2016) I have performed several Field recordings of rocks and stones. I see this way of working with the land as a way to measure the immaterial and ethereal vibrations and recalling the hidden energies of the earth.
I have since many years worked with The Leyline Project where I examine the ancient phenomenon of ley lines and the research includes several aspects of earth energies. In the series of works with rocks and sound I want to bring with the hidden messages of the landscape, the ones we might not catch at first with our senses. With these works I would like to open this infinite stream to you.
In my recent videowork Ear to the ground (2017), I investigate through performance the human relation to stone and land. Stones from all around the world emit energy and are considered by man possessing intrinsic powers. Often, different rocks and minerals are being used for human purposes for higher aims such as healing and transformation. By arranging and placing stones in different formations, the relationship of the stones forms immaterial energy.

Candyland Podcasts interview Ulrika Sparre
https://vimeo.com/50532714
http://candylandpodcasts.tumblr.com/
https://itunes.apple.com/au/podcast/candyland-podcasts/id568948288