My work is inspired by post-industrial landscapes, labor, and experimental animation practices. I explore ideas and images of coal mining/natural resource extraction, acts of disappearing, and labor that is repetitive and unseen. I work primarily in experimental stop motion animation and sound, though my work is rooted in drawing and an ongoing social practice. My conceptual framework grew out of my lived experience and family history in rural northern Appalachia. I grew up playing on coal slag heaps in the Allegheny Mountains. My grandfather was a 5th generation coal miner and my grandma worked in a textile factory as a young woman. My family sold mineral rights to a fracking company when I was a teenager. In addition to these histories, my work comes out of research, materials experimentation, and site-responsive animation in outdoor environments.
Sarah E. Jenkins, Still from Patch Work, 2017, Stop motion animation and Video with sound, HD Video, 00:06:26