Art Review Project 2
Jeffery Bennett and I went to the Ulrich museum to see what was new there. Opposed to the last time, I was at the museum we entered the gallery from the front entrance. As we got the elevator, one piece in the dark corner took our attention. We spoke about this piece for a good thirty minutes to an hour. The piece was called Automata Studies by john F. Simon Jr. and I really feel like it was the most effective piece for me to study.
The piece was constructed from an LCD monitor and parts of a laptop. On the screen were six rectangular sections. Each section had a distinct routine and pattern that it would follow and gradually change or vary over time. The primary colors of the piece over the time we observed it were blue and green. This seems to make sense to me as an electrical engineer as the primary colors of the video display are red green and blue. I am not sure if this was intended for a cool look, if it changed over time, or perhaps these colors were easiest for the artist to manipulate logistically or to achieve the most intended color scheme in a random program. The program did seem to have either a random pattern or a pattern that was too long term to contemplate over the period we observed it.
The upper left hand section was the most organic section. A figure constructed of connected obtuse triangle shifted its way across the space. The segments seem to squirm as the artist allowed the angles of the triangle to vary as the shifted one at a time. As the body segments cam the rest it look as though a trail of tangent lines were printed on the area both looking like creatures legs and a residue trail that the creature left. The body segments seemed to be subtractive as the area they passed was cleared the background blue color. This seemed to embody both that the creature was eating the trail and also a balance between the colors as elements were working to both create and destroy color leaving the space in a constant state of equilibrium. These seem like more natural themes, which is interesting because of its embodiment in such a technical and geometric piece.
The next segment below it seems to have some parallel themes. This segment created random square patterns of two different shades place like a checkerboard but with no pattern. Then the algorithm sorts the two types of squares by moving one square of each color at the same time each covering a square of the opposite color. The routine would eventually sort the squares until all the squares of each color were sorted the opposite side of the screen section. This again embodied another type of balance as the routine always started with the same number of squares of two colors, only one subtractive of the other. Jeffery and I discussed this pattern quite a while. I believe that the program that does this pattern it recursive (it would be the most efficient but not the only way) function that probably changes a matrix of values corresponding to two square types and their position.
The section in the bottom middle was interesting. It was a complicated algorithm of Tetris that was used to continuously change the form and pattern of the screen. Random quadrilateral shapes would fall from the top of the screen. The falling shapes would change color after a certain number of shapes had fallen. If the falling shape was the same at the shape that was beneath it, it would stop on top of that shape and stack. If they were different colors, the falling piece would fall to the bottom or until it hit a shape of the same color. Some times a color would be subtractive and erase all the different color shapes it fell over, revealing the blue background behind it. This process again seems to embody a balance of color and the artist will to control his space with a building and a frequent renewal process. This renewal process seems to be akin to the easer to a chalkboard or the advent of winter to nature. How cluttered would a space be if it was never renewed and how would it look if too many colors were present at one time?
The upper middle and right hand section seemed the most enigmatic sections. At times it looked like they did the same thing but in a different way. Some times they look like a solid color. Then what looked like raster line patterns would scroll up from the bottom of these sections. These lines were at times one pixel in width. This would create an interesting effect as the pixel lines scrolled up the screen because this area would then fade in contrast at about two hertz, according to the rate of the scrolling pattern. At other times there would be fractal pattern based on triangles. The different of the two sections was that the middle section seemed to be based on a level horizontal line and the other was based on a diagonal. I was not sure what these section really meant to me and I also was not sure why they were so close together other than an obvious similarity or a message perhaps that was supposed to be derived from their fundamental differences.
The last lower right section was the easiest to understand. A triangular shape racked back and forth on anther triangle like a seesaw at a constant rate. At the end of each oscillation a sequence of square would fill or become hollow. It seemed obvious at the time that these squares were counting the oscillation with a non-standard number system. At first I thought the number system was binary but actually the system was exponentially weighted. Instead of each significant digit being able to count from a set zero to X (such as base ten 0-9 or binary 0-1), this system each digit as it becomes more significant can count from zero to two to the power of its significance. This makes a third order number much more significant that a standard number. There was also another non-standardization as the numbers filled left to right and bottom to top. The most significant row contained sixteen digits. This process was interesting to me. It signified that all the programs here were based of a clock and were synconized and it made me ponder the process in which it worked. Jeffery also mentioned that the piece was to “run its course” and eventually die. I pondered if maybe this was a count down or a system that only the artist could read. I did some work on a chalkboard right now. I don’t know if I quite got the right mathematical express for this but if there were 2^16×2^8×2^4×2^2 combinations then this clock could count 1,073,741,824 second. That is roughly 34 years. Perhaps that is the lifetime of the piece?
Over this entire piece was very effective in it’s execution, particularly to my scholastic expertise and me. I enjoyed talking about this piece with Jeffery and we seemed to have a very good fusion in conversation within our two disciplines with this piece. I think it will be interesting to see how art will harness these new mediums more and more to make more poignant and precise expression or how they may be muralized or institutionalize in future spaces and architecture. This pieces are very interesting to me because I can contemplate how they work and how I personally could make my own pieces, much like listening to the trombone is closer to me because it emulates emotions that I have, can, and want to express. This piece has given me some ideas for future personal pieces with this medium such a satire to the time with my laptop screen was cracked and the adaptively I had to create in my use to the computer by moving and resizing all my applications to a small corner of the screen.
As far as a critique for this piece, the only thing I didn’t like was how the screen was mounted on the outside of the frame, allowing the mounting bracket show on the outside of the screen. The unused metal fittings reminded me of the painstaking procedures of replacing my own laptop monitor and their inoperability in the piece seems to detract from the over all fusion of the piece and the relationship between the LCD component and the framing. It seems to be a less intentional piece then the two are together this way than being a uniform piece with no previous intentions. It just didn’t seem to say to me “this used to be a computer” but rather ” this is a complete electronic art form” and I my opinion, needed to be one uniform component executing it’s function.