B.C. artist blown away to see her work featured in new Metallica video

Never in her wildest dreams did Kelly Richardson think her work would one day become the backdrop to the epic musical stylings of Metallica. 

But three of the B.C. artist’s pieces are featured prominently in the metal group’s new music video for 72 Seasons, the new single off their upcoming album of the same name.

“I’m still trying to wrap my head around it,” Richardson, a visual arts professor at the University of Victoria, told As It Happens host Nil Köksal.

“I was a big fan of Metallica in my early twenties, and my early twenties self is quite pleased that the work is being used in this way.”

WATCH | Music video for Metallica’s 72 Seasons: 

The opportunity began about six weeks ago when director Tim Saccenti and artist/curator Dina Chang reached out about using some of Richardson’s art in a music video.

At first, she says, it was all very hush-hush.

“I wasn’t allowed to know who the band was,” she said. “I had a feeling that it might be Metallica because I follow the director and I saw that he had produced a video for Metallica — so I had my fingers crossed.”

Art that ‘cuts to your core’

Saccenti and Chang, who run a creative studio called Setta out of New York City and L.A., thought Richardson’s art resonated with what they were trying to accomplish.

“Aside from being longtime fans of her work, we both felt Kelly’s pieces had a particular kind of monumental grandeur, a sense of awe, that mirrored the sonically heavy sound of Metallica,” Saccenti said in an email.

“There’s a primal unease to her pieces that cuts to your core.”

The video features the band rocking out, surrounded by swirling, almost fire-like visual effects, against a massive digital projection of imagery.

Included in that imagery are three of Richardson’s pieces — Origin Stories, and Origin Stories (AR), which she described as looking like “a big field of stars,” and Halo, which depicts an eclipse.

“At one point you actually see James Hetfield inside the eclipse,” Richardson said. “That’s my favourite moment in the video.”

Work projected on video wall

While filming the video, Saccenti says they installed the Origin series on a massive Volume screen — a kind of high-definition video wall that displays computer-generated backdrops. 

Richardson’s work is made to be projected on screens in galleries and museums, but this was far more massive than her usual exhibitions.

When Origin was displayed, Saccenti says “the 100-person strong crew of bustling technicians and creatives went silent in respect.

“It was a perfect mix of spectacle and emotion, creating a near mythological environment to capture the band in,” he said.

Richardson describes the piece as “a debris field made up of crystals or diamonds, and they’re floating in space.” The diamonds, she said, represent extinct species. 

“In my practice, I’ve explored many ideas which illustrate anxieties about where we’re heading as a species, really, in relation to climate change. And in this work in particular, I’m trying to visualise the extinction crisis that we’re currently in the midst of,” she said.

“Ultimately, I’m trying to engage people, or all of us really, in conversation, asking us to really ask ourselves what it is that we truly value.”

Despite the repeating lyrics of “the wrath of man,” Richardson’s not sure that 72 Seasons explores the same environmental themes as her work.

“But that’s OK,” she said. “As long as the work is resonating on some level with people and it’s in the public consciousness on some level, then there is the potential for more complex dialogue to come from that.”

Impressing her students and her son

The video has already been viewed more than three million times since it launched last week. Her students, she says, are “simultaneously confused and impressed.”

Her son is also a fan.

“My teenager actually plays guitar and he knows more songs by Metallica than any other band, so I couldn’t personally wait to tell him, just to gain a bit of street cred with my son,” she said. “He thinks it’s really cool and he’s told me he’s really proud of me, so that’s awesome.”

The 72 Seasons album comes out April 24. And the film version of the album — which includes Richardson’s art — debuts as part of a listening party at select theatres worldwide on April 13.

“I’m going to be at one in Victoria. Absolutely. I can’t miss that,” she said. “It’s a really huge honour.”