Esther Polak
Illustration — Esther Polak at the RealTime project during the opening of Made in Amsterdam - 100 years in 100 works of art at the Amsterdam Museum. Esther Polak (born 1962) is a Dutch visual artist. She is active in the new media field and was one of the first artists to experiment with GPS. Since 2010, Polak has worked full-time with Ivar van Bekkum as an artist duo PolakVanBekkum.
Esther Polak
Hanno Lans · CC BY 4.0
- Born
- 1962 · Amsterdam.
- Nationality
- Kingdom of the Netherlands
- Occupation
- artist · photographer
- Education
- Rijksakademie van beeldende kunsten
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wikidata · Q19587594 · wikipedia · Esther Polak
In this article
Career
Career
She lives and works in Amsterdam.
Esther Polak studied at Rijksakademie van beeldende kunsten. Places of work recorded in the authority are Amsterdam. Work by Esther Polak is recorded in the collections of CODA Museum, LIMA, ZKM Center for Art and Media Karlsruhe and Collection Vedute.
Esther Polak studied painting at the Royal Academy of Art in The Hague (1981-1986) and then mixed media at the Rijksakademie van Beeldende Kunsten in Amsterdam (1986-1989). Her interest lies in capturing movement in a landscape. Polak gained notoriety with her "locative media" projects, such as Amsterdam RealTime (collaboration with Waag Society and Jeroen Kee), MILKproject (collaboration with researcher Ieva Auzina and RIXC) and NomadicMILK. These projects use GPS to arrive at a contemporary landscape representation. In addition to using GPS, Google Earth as an artistic medium plays a vital role in her video work. Unlike other 3D worlds, Google Earth represents a 1-to-1 relationship with the world as we know it, and this representation also carries a political, social, and economic reality. Video works using Google Earth include A Collision of Sorts (2017), Going To Be/Go Move Be (2018) and The Ride/The Ride (2019).
Works
Works
• 2019 The Ride/The Ride (installation/film) • 2019 Pendulum (Performance) • 2018 Going To Be/Go Move Be (film) • 2017 A Collision of Sorts (short film) • 2016 The Mailman's Bag (installation/film) • 2008-present Spiral Drawing Sunrise (performance) • 2007-2009 NomadicMILK • 2004-2005 MILKproject • 2002 Amsterdam RealTime
Life and career
Dated record
Life and career
The full dated record · 1 entries
1962
Esther Polak born at Amsterdam.
Awards and nominations
• 2017 Nomination Golden Calf for A Collision of Sorts • 2016 Special Mention 2Annas FF • 2016 Expanded Media Preis Network Culture • 2015 Nomination Academy Award for Astronomy and Art • 2005 Golden Nica Interactive Art, Prix Ars Electronica, Linz, Austria • 2004 Gada Balva art prize, Riga, Latvia
Esther Polak bij het project RealTime tijdens de opening van Made in Amsterdam - 100 jaar in 100 kunstwerken in het Amsterdam Museum
Hanno Lans
Esther Polak bij het project RealTime tijdens de opening van Made in Amsterdam - 100 jaar in 100 kunstwerken in het Amsterdam Museum
Hanno Lans
Text attribution
Licensing
Text attribution
Part of the biographical narrative on this page reuses licensed material. Its origin, revision and licence are recorded here.
The biographical narrative on this page is based on the Wikipedia article Esther Polak, revision 1360165871 (EN edition), by its contributors. VALÉORINE has edited that text and built its own documentary record around it. The reused material is available under CC BY-SA 4.0, and this page's reuse of it is offered under the same licence. Everything else on this page — the chronology, the holdings, the evidence, the plates and the connections — is VALÉORINE's own record. Sources and licences.
Notes from the source article
Cited by Wikipedia
Notes from the source article
These works are cited by the source article, in its own numbering. They are recorded as its citations, not as sources VALÉORINE has verified.
- 1.Waag.
- 2.MILK. www.milkproject.net.
- 3.Mediamatic. Esther Polak: kunstenaar.
- 4.PolakVanBekkum www.li-ma.nl. www.li-ma.nl.
- 5.Oberon Amsterdam www.oberon.nl. The Ride IDFA.
- 6.KUNSTBLIJFTEENRAADSEL > Bigart 2019. KUNSTBLIJFTEENRAADSEL. 2019-09-14.
- 7.Gaan om te zijn ⋆ Nederlands Film Festival. Nederlands Film Festival.
- 8.A Collision of Sorts ⋆ Nederlands Film Festival. Nederlands Film Festival.
- 9.The mailman's Bag PolakVanBekkum. EX.
- 10.Spiral Drawing Sunrise.
- 11.nomadicmilk. www.nomadicmilk.net.
- 12.MILK. www.milkproject.net.
- 13.De Waag. Amsterdam RealTime.
- 14.The mailman's Bag PolakVanBekkum. EX.
- 15.Winners of 2ANNAS 2016!. 2 Annas.
- 16.Uitreiking Akademieprijs Astronomie en Kunst — KNAW. www.knaw.nl.
- 17.Esther Polak www.li-ma.nl. www.li-ma.nl.
References
Citations
References
Each reference names the institution holding it, so a reader may go to the document itself.
reference work
Secondary witnessreference work
Secondary witness
The Encyclopedia exists whether or not anything is for sale. Corrections are recorded rather than overwritten, and every version of this record is kept. Published 17 August 2026.
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