Dominic Harris is based in London and works from his Notting Hill studio. Harris has often remarked that his artworks are well beyond what any one individual can create, and instead he creates his artwork within a team environment comprising a mixture of talented individuals of diverse skills and backgrounds working together to achieve his vision.
Dominic Harris is grateful to his team for the incredible ongoing work:
Operations Manager: Holly Brearley
Creative Assistant and Researcher: Claire Lewis-Smith
Physical Design and Production Heads: Ben Gander, Anna Jagiello
Software Team Heads: Guy Boxall, Gorka Mendoza
Software and 3D: Ahmed Salem, Can Sahin, Rajan Jalem, Craig Moyses, Dana Sterea, Gavin Grant, Ryan Gilbert
Electronics and Embedded Systems: Scott Reynolds, Will Parry
Physical Design and Production: Naomi Branch, Rachel Irons, Neil Kite, Noah Kelsey, Sinead Killoran, Sacha Molyneux, Will Hardy
Studio Assistant: Elena Campbell
Experimentation is at the core of how Harris develops his artworks. This will often mean taking inspiration (be it from the environment, nature, or perhaps a moment in time past) and then developing his own narrative and working to find the appropriate medium through which to investigate and depict it.
Much of the development of the interactive video-based artworks originate in 'the cave'. Here Harris spends time working with his team of 3d and software teams testing new concepts and developing the artworks.
Many people have commented on the resemblance of the cave to that of a NASA mission control room -- with all the video walls and strange equipment everywhere. Dominic simply calls it his 'playground'.
As Dominic Harris persistently advances his digital canvas, his artworks and unique commissions grow in size and aspiration, continuously stretching the boundaries of performance. The impressive scale of today's physical simulation systems and graphic capabilities stems from adopting technologies from related fields and subsequently tailoring and constructing new performance and computational engines to elevate them further.
Harris operates a mock-up gallery space in which he tests early prototypes of the new artworks he is working on. It is a space that at times can be somewhat unpredictable as you never know what to expect!
The London studio has a large immersive mock-up space that is rigged with 4K projectors, complete volume skeleton and movement tracking, and laser rangefinders. It is a space where Dominic Harris and his development team are able to test out and preview new immersive concepts.
Dominic Harris has structured his studio as a series of interlinked ateliers in which the multiple disciplines and the specialized teams operate. On site facilities include the design studios, the 'cave' where the software code is developed, the 'dirty' workshop for messy activities, the 'clean' workshop for assembly, the electronics lab, the spray room, a motion capture suite, and various mock-up and testing areas.
Fabrication and production of artworks occurs at the artist studio, with external collaborators involved for the specialist materials and processes such as the carbon fibre or laser cutting/folding of the larger components.
All artworks are assembled and tested at the artists' own studio. Harris is directly involved in every stage, and performs the final calibrations and inspection.
Dominic Harris and his team work closely with the Halcyon Gallery to coordinate with the art collector a seamless delivery and installation of the artworks, from the small and simple through to the more involved larger commissions.
All artworks come with a warranty for hardware, and an undertaking to ensure that any future parts, updates and hardware changes that may be required are handled directly by the Artists' studio during his lifetime, and then through the Artist's Foundation after that. All artwork code is fully controlled, maintained and authenticated, and held in secure archives.
