American artistic duo Robert and Shana ParkeHarrison have established themselves as pioneering figures in contemporary fine art photography, creating a distinctive body of work that combines surreal imagery with powerful environmental themes. Their collaborative photographs, featuring Robert as the main character, present visual narratives that explore humanity's complex relationship with the natural world through symbolic and often haunting imagery.
The ParkeHarrisons have achieved remarkable international recognition, with their work displayed in over 45 solo exhibitions and more than 100 group shows worldwide. Their photographs are housed in prestigious collections at over 35 institutions, including the National Museum of American Art at the Smithsonian Institution, The George Eastman House, The Whitney Museum, the Los Angeles County Museum of Art (LACMA), and the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art (SFMOMA). Their acclaimed book "The Architect's Brother" earned distinction as one of the ten best photography books of the year in 2000 according to The New York Times.
"Our photographs offer visual poems of loss, human struggle and personal exploration with landscapes scarred by technology and overuse," the artists explain. "As collaborative artists, we strive to link laborious actions, idiosyncratic rituals, and strangely crude machines metaphorically and poetically into tales about our contemporary experiences." Their creative process involves constructing elaborate sets from found objects and combining real and constructed landscapes to create scenes that balance determination with irony while addressing humanity's responsibility to heal environmental damage.
The artists emphasize the importance of viewer interpretation in their work, noting that "staged images offer endless possibilities for exploration while offering viewers personal interpretation." By allowing audiences to complete the stories presented before them, the ParkeHarrisons create what they describe as "layers of duality, hope and despair, success and failure, desire and disdain, destruction, and stewardship." Their work explores the fragile human condition against the overarching shadow of environmental destruction, suggesting that "perhaps the only true hope for the world and our human spirit rests in our ability to imagine."
In a detailed interview with Patricia Lanza, the couple discussed how their focus on the Anthropocene—the human impact on Earth—evolved organically during their graduate studies in New Mexico in the early 1990s. At that time, terms like "Global Warming," "Climate Change," and "The End of Days" were not yet part of mainstream media or popular culture discussions. "We were two naive kids from suburban Midwestern families," they recall. "Beyond being sent to our rooms for failing to turn off the lights during the Energy Crisis, we had never even thought about Climate Change."
Their artistic vision was profoundly shaped by their exposure to New Mexico's stunning raw beauty, the compelling religious practices and worldview of the Hopi and other indigenous peoples, and the overwhelming presence of the U.S. military-industrial complex, including Los Alamos National Labs and White Sands/Trinity Site. These diverse influences, combined with their natural tendencies toward performance-based photography and desire to create purposeful art, merged into imagery focused on humanity's behavior toward Earth.
The ParkeHarrisons' collaboration developed organically over many years through extensive conversations about art while both were pursuing graduate studies in creative fields. What began as mutual assistance gradually evolved into a merged artistic practice that combined their interests and technical skills. Their creative process is highly layered, involving research, contemplation, and experimentation across multiple disciplines including politics, human behavior, theater, dance, religion, literature, film, environmental topics, science, and metaphysics.
Their methodology typically begins by reviewing previous work to assess how ideas succeeded or failed to embody their intentions. This analysis combines with current topics of interest to launch research that follows what they describe as "a butterfly effect sort of process," where ideas lead them down unexpected paths of discovery. This searching phase leads to drawings, which then inform the integration of props often based on discarded materials and obsolete devices. They experiment with these objects, frequently inventing new purposes for old machines, before testing images in landscapes and exploring possibilities beyond their initial concepts.
The final photographic process involves combining images either in the traditional darkroom or through digital manipulation in Photoshop. Even after printing, their works may not be complete, as they often apply paint to enhance or encase the final images. The artists draw inspiration from a wide range of cultural and environmental sources, citing influences including writer Bill McKibben, author Gabriel García Márquez, theater director Robert Wilson, artist Joseph Beuys, filmmaker Andrei Tarkovsky, director Wim Wenders, sculptor Louise Bourgeois, choreographer Pina Bausch, and dancer Ohad Naharin.
Regarding art's potential impact on important issues, the ParkeHarrisons follow the philosophy of Joseph Beuys, who believed art has the ability to promote change. They create work that asks questions and allows viewers to enter and form their own stories and personal meanings. "Visual art often involves the individual viewer forming his/her/their own interpretation of the artwork they are engaging," they explain. By allowing viewers to engage freely within the worlds they create, audiences can find their own purpose and response to the topics addressed, most notably environmental action.
Their most recent work includes a series of photo-lithographs titled "RED SUN," which features relatively simple construction compared to much of their previous work. Each print contains an isolated figure—the protagonist—engaging in actions with red interventions. While originally conceived as a small suite of images, the artists were inspired to continue developing this intervention-based work and are currently experimenting with ideas that combine photographic imagery with sculptural components, suggesting continued evolution in their artistic practice.
