Dayna Leavitt
& Meredith Starr
Are You There? is a transatlantic collaboration between former roommates Meredith Starr and Dayna Leavitt. They studied at New York University in the late 90s and had their first show together, “Objects of Desire”, in 2000. Dayna is a photographer based in London who also works in fashion. Her independent practice reflects an evolution of a theme in observations and voyeurism, collections, and repetition. Meredith is an interdisciplinary artist who lives and works in NY as a professor. Meredith’s practice explores collections of materials, and incorporates analog processes such as assemblages and incorporates technology such as VR. Together, their collaborative work incorporates digital photography and collage, and they have recently had work featured at the Target Gallery in Virginia and Gallery 440 in Brooklyn, NY, along with several virtual exhibitions, including the Holy Art Gallery in London, and also print publication Art Seen: The Curator’s Salon Magazine. Their most recent work has begun to incorporate sound and motion, which has been integral to the creation of their newly launched VR project “You Are Here”, an interactive and immersive experience of intertwined imagined spaces.
You Are Here
"You Are Here” is an interactive art experience, created in virtual reality and designed for Google Cardboard/smart glasses. It simulates the experience of a day passing, with five surreal environments representative of different times of day, marking shifts in light, mood, and tempo; waking up in the early morning, late morning, afternoon, evening, going to sleep and entering the dream state at night. Engaging with an object through direct, sustained gaze in each room will transport you to the next room. The project is a transatlantic collaboration between former roommates Meredith Starr, an interdisciplinary artist in New York, and Dayna Leavitt, a photographer in London. As the artists navigate forced distance and a time difference, exploration of these themes create a constructed alternate reality; a rusty motorbike abandoned in the woods, a stuffed toy lion tucked into a brick wall, a tired piano in a sleepy ghost town. In their process, the artists are changing their mundane observations into an escapist narrative. Their manipulated photographs reflect fabricated moments that simulate a shared experience, an imagined space where the artists co-exist. Audio also plays a prominent part in the experience, with layered sounds that disrupt and delight - mixing soft whispers and chirps with abrupt clashes and crashes to simulate the hushes and crescendos heard over the course of a day. Drifting in and out of sleep, and between scenes of both natural and urban landscapes, the artists’ layering of imagery and sound creates an ambiguous reflection of observations that blur where one ends and the other begins.