Voyage to Polynesia Photograph

Sven Jakubith (born 1964 in Berlin) is a German artist whose work combines photography, collage, printmaking, and painting. His central theme is traces — the marks left by movement, memory, and transience. Jakubith studied physics in Berlin and earned his PhD in 1992. At the same time, he began artistic studies at the Freie Kunstschule Berlin, where he was particularly influenced by the collages of Robert Rauschenberg and the screen prints of Andy Warhol. The combination of scientific precision and artistic freedom became a defining tension in his work. His art is deeply connected to travel and sailing experiences. He crossed Southeast Asia by bicycle (Vietnam, Laos, Burma, Cambodia, Thailand) and traveled through Cuba and New Zealand. Beginning in 2015, he undertook several long-distance voyages on his own sailing yachts — from Mallorca across the Atlantic to the Caribbean, through the Panama Canal to Tahiti, and further across the Pacific. These journeys profoundly shape his visual language: the horizon as a line, the wake on the sea, the fleetingness of the moment. Jakubith works with a mixed-media approach: his own travel photographs are digitally processed, printed in large format, and then reworked with oil paint, collage, and silkscreen. The resulting pieces intertwine digital and analog techniques, making movement, memory, and transformation visible. The central motif is the trace — whether footprints on a beach, the wake of a ship, or trails of light on the horizon. In his images, these signs of impermanence are transformed into layered compositions that feel both documentary and poetic. His works are held in private collections in Europe and the United States and are traded internationally through platforms such as Saatchi Art. Jakubith’s biography makes his art unique: the experience of long journeys and ocean crossings, combined with a solid background in both science and art, leads to works that are intellectually sophisticated yet poetically accessible. His collages, prints, and paintings are visual explorations of movement, memory, and trace, inviting viewers to discover their own horizons.