Ida Arentoft

Constantly documenting, Arentoft juxtaposes small human moments with the immensity of the natural world.  Photographing in Scotland and Denmark, the artist investigates time and memory, often making strange her subjects, evoking a push and pull between human traces and the landscape.

View of rocky cliffs and green foliage overhanging water.
Eroded cliff face with sparse vegetation and visible soil layers.
Cutting board with fruit peels and slices, sunlight and shadows
Sunlit room with white curtains on windows overlooking a lake and trees.
Person with blonde hair and tan coat standing by a railing, overlooking a body of water and distant landscape under a partly cloudy sky.

  • Cliff and Tree, 2018

    Island Edge, 2020

    White Flowers, 2018

    Summer Fruits, 2020

    Bothy Shadow, 2017

    Summer Light, 2020

    Marie, 2018

    By the Trees, 2018

    Birds, 2018

Ida Arentoft is a Danish visual artist with a degree in Fine Art Photography from Glasgow School of Art in 2010. Arentoft has exhibited at Street Level Photoworks (UK), Photographer’s Gallery (UK), Harbourfront Art Centre (CA), Art Foundation Metamatic: Taf (GR), Fotografisk Center (DK), Copenhagen Photo Festival (DK) and Code Art Fair (DK). Danish Women’s Library has commissioned her photographs for publication and Arentoft participated in the book ‘The Year’ published by Blankt Papir Press (2018). In 2017 she completed a residency with Bothy Project in Scotland funded by Danish Arts Council. Arentoft also teaches photography and in 2023 she will undertake a residency at Fanø Island with Danish Visual Artists.

The photographs of Ida Arentoft construct individual and collective memories of the land and are often inspired by navigating in remote locations. Arentoft is interested in creating a visual archive by recording the passing of time, and transient moments that all connect to a sense of place. The motifs are often allusions, placed somewhere in between fiction and reality.