Making sand swim

Klaus Weber Sand Fountain (2012)

Klaus Weber's piece Sand Fountain is both transformative and oppositional – encouraging a reconsideration (among other things) of what a fluid is, even if water is wet and sand is dry – if one can be substituted by the other then what exactly is the difference?

The falsification criteria that Malte spoke about is also concerned with being oppositional, exploring where our theories and ideas about the world break down and where they hold their own. 

– Jennifer

Sun, Planet, Moon

The PhET project at the University of Colorado have a huge range of interactive simulations which help to visualise some difficult concepts. Above is a screen shot of 'My Solar System' describing orbits and gravitational pull of massive bodies; of the Moon around the Earth and the Earth and Moon around the Sun. 

Science fiction: Asking questions to the future

Latest since the industrial revolution, the cultural significance of science has become impossible to miss. It has transformed our lives beyond recognition and is continuing to do so at an ever increasing speed. The technologies we create change the way we interact with the world. Through the internet we have created means of communication that are dissolving our traditional notions of time and information. Before we have even come close to understanding its significance for the coming generation, this piece of technology itself has already transformed again and is now delocalised and touchable on a smart phone. How will this development change our view of the world? Will we be able to keep up with our own progress? Through science and technology, we have not only achieved a greater understanding of the world around us, we have also become able to shape it. But what happens when we do it?

Science fiction often attempts to trace out the answers without us even asking. Which way will tomorrow’s technology pave for us? What role will it play in the future of our society? As complex and speculative as these questions are, we cannot hide from them. In many science fiction stories this becomes most strikingly obvious when artificial intelligence enters the stage. We may be able to avoid asking ourselves the question what we want to do with our technology. But should we ever build an intelligent machine, it will do it for us. From ‘Odyssey 2001’ to ‘Blade Runner’ and Isaac Asimov’s short stories, once the future itself asks us how we got there, we better come up with a good answer.

– Malte

Signs of the Fourth Dimension

In this lecture author and professor at the University of Texas, Dr. Linda Dalrymple Henderson, discusses the subject of her book 'The Fourth Dimension and Non-Euclidian Geometry', pictured below. In it, she traces a parallel development between developments in geometry and modern art.

 

Non-euclidian geometry required a shift in how we perceive and understand the space we live in, from assumptions based on immediate perception and human experience to concepts which are no longer derived from human experience and intuition. You can draw two parallel lines on a piece of paper and they will never meet, but draw those two lines across the surface of the spherical Earth and they will curve and meet. Henderson argues that this development, with the possibility of a spatial fourth dimension "encouraged radical innovation by a variety of early twentieth-century artists, ranging from French Cubists, Italian Futurists, and Marcel Duchamp, to Max Weber, Kazimir Malevich, and the artists of De Stijl and Surrealism."



More on Non-Euclidean Geometry: 

Whipple, Wave Machine

A late C19th model to demonstrate how waves move; made by the Elliott Brothers, to a design by Baden Powell ((1796-1860) – the father of Robert, founder of the scout movement). An interactive animation here.

This — and other explanatory scientific models — can be seen at the seemingly wonderful University of Cambridge Whipple Collection. Here — with a linking thought on the 'sculpting' or 'choreography' of sound waves — an unattributed pair of parabolic sound mirrors, again late C19th.

The principles apply through a history of use, from these almost Neolithic, pre-radar wartime sound mirrors (via Web Urbanist) to today's satellite dishes.

Some lovely examples collected by Web Urbanist, for example this Czech 'acoustic detector', c. 1920.

Dimensional Space



Duccio di Buoninsegna, (c1308-11) Christ's entry into Jerusalem, panel from the Maesta, Museo dell'Opera Metropolitana del Duomo, Siena

 In this small panel from the Maesta, Christ and his disciples approach the gate to Jerusalem greeted by a crowd. Some naturalistic depiction of objects and space is employed, though not linear perspective. In the Mediaeval manner Christs's disciples are huddled together because they are a group, similarly the crowd at the gate.

Essentially, Duccio's painting reflects an Aristotelian view of space, in which individual objects contain space, but no universal interconnecting (or abstract) dimensional space exists into which objects may be placed.

For more of my thoughts on dimensional space, see http://criticism-and-interpretation.wikispaces.com/Space+-+dimensional

Invisible Structures

Paul Octavious JFK ✈ SFO

Paul Octavious JFK ✈ SFO

"Visualization is not simply a mediation between an independent world and a human perceiver. An image does not stand between the thing itself and a knowing subject. The selection of specimen, sites, the re-ordering of fields into grids, the operations of tagging, encoding, and marking, these activities reach into the world, arrange it in a pose, and cultivate its accountability. These artifices do not necessarily negate the world's natural accountability, although in some cases they are blamed for distortions and illusions. Instead, they are the very means through which natural order is revealed, ordered, compared, encoded, and quantified. Consequently, in answer to the question of what studies of visualization are about, we can say that they are about the production of scientific reality."

Michael Lynch, "Visual Cultures of Science" (2006)

– Malte 

Jiggling Atoms

Every project we do seems to start with Richard Feynman, and this series, called Fun to Imagine, is where we also derived our name. Feynman was not just a wonderful teacher, but was also a tremendously gifted theoretical physicist; he worked on the atomic bomb, got the Nobel prize in 1965 and also played the bongos (amongst other things). But of course, most importantly for us, it's his incredible gift for explaining physics to non-scientists. All from the seat of his armchair, watch how he reveals with such wonderful poetry and insight about "the unbelievable nature of nature".

Modelmaking: ad-hoc to slick

 

Herzog & De Meuron: Vitrahaus Gingerbread (2010), via Archimodels.

 

From the excellent book, Folding Architecture; Spatial, Structural and Organisational Diagrams (via).

Future Systems, Amanda Levete: Tombstone (2005), via The Smithsonian. The object formed of laser-sintered polyamide (nylon).

From Stina Ekman's Gitter (1985); "an intuitive exploration of the number of sculptures contained within the cube 60 x 60 x 60". She works through three materials: bronze, aluminium and balsa wood, working directly by carving and indirectly by casting.

Bi Four: Superimpositions, Transformations

Ingmar Bergman's Persona (1966).

With Bibi Andersson —

— and —

— Liv Ulmann.

Walt Disney's Pinocchio (1940).

John S. Robertson's Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde (1920), with the magnificent John Barrymore.

Bi Three

Bi Two

Bi One

Luke on crane.tv

Crane.tv paid Luke a studio visit recently. Interesting thoughts on his working roots and balance. And a little tribute to all of you towards the end.

David Hockney's Bigger Picture

David Hockney interview from Royal Academy of Arts on Vimeo.

David Hockney's major new exibition opens at the Royal Academy on January 21st. He is an artist who works within the Renaissance tradition of depiction, with those central concerns of nature, space and time, and, as in this forthcoming show, the tradition of the landscape. But he is also an artist who has embraced new technology; photography, fax, and now the iPad. I have always admired him - his draftsmanship, his thoughtfulness, and even his humour.

 Last week (26 Dec 2011) BBC Radio 4 devoted a Start the Week programme to Hockney, discussing his latest work. The in-depth interview by Andrew Marr was both revealing and fascinating. He spoke about drawing, about observation of nature, the benefit and the excitement of seeing consecutive springtimes at the same place over a number of years. It showed the depth of his engagement with his subject.


He had a lot to say about technology, and it is apparent that the use of computer technology has become integrated into his process of picture making, even when the result is painting. David Hockney has always been interested in technology,  not for its own sake, but in furthering his picture making.

The camera is one example of his embracing of technology and investigation of picture making. 'Photography is not a final reaching of reality. Technology is opening something up, we are able to alter pictures.' He also noted that 'Cameras give you a certain type of view, but it’s not the human view.'

David Hockney (1983). Walking In The Zen Garden, Ryoanji Temple, Kyoto 1983
photographic collage, 40 x 62 1/2 in. http://www.hockneypictures.com/photos/photos_collages_06.php

The photomontage works he has produced over many years (see the example above) are, he said, a type of drawing with the camera. (Hockney is perhaps unusual in appreciating that we have not yet exhausted cubism any more than we have exhausted Renaissance perspective).

David Hockney (2011) The arrival of spring in Woldgate, East Yorkshire in 2011
ipad drawing printed on paper
144.4 x 108.3 cm

© David Hockney
 http://wwwimg.bbc.co.uk/programmes/i/512xn/f11b28a2e586a3017ad932e490ddc80eb46f1fc5.jpg

His latest work uses the iPad, both as a part of the process and as an end in itself - 'the luminous screen' - and the RA exhibition will feature some of his iPad drawings (see above). He is also showing film of this English landscape shot with an array of 18 cameras.

For me Hockney's approach encapsulates the paradoxical relationship with the world which we can now enjoy (and I do mean enjoy) - he embraces the latest technology whilst, at the same time, acknowledging the importance of craft and of  'the hand'. He cited a Chinese saying: 'In drawing you need the hand, the eye and the heart. Two won’t do!'. And he spoke about the importance of craft in the work of the artist. 'I would say the hand counts, there’s a whole group of other people who say it doesn’t, it’s a little bit insulting to craftsmen isn’t it?' And this aspect of craft has an importance for pedagogy, he maintained:

'I used to point out, in an art school, you can teach the craft. It’s the poetry you can’t teach, but now they try and teach the poetry and forget the craft. It’s craft that can be taught.'

Food for thought... perhaps, to some extent, one can teach, or at least encourage and facilitate, the poetry (not forgetting of course that there is also a 'craft' to poetry). But Hockney poses here the interesting question of just where that balance lies between the poetry and the craft in the teaching of art.

He related a story about his Mother coming to his exhibition at which there was a sculptural piece by Barry Flannagan whichcontained a large rope. 'Did he make the rope?' his Mother asked...

Bibliography
Start the week: David Hockney Special (2011). BBC Radio 4. Monday 26 December. 45 minutes. Available at http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b018g2yz (Accessed 4 Jan 2012)
Royal Academy of Arts (2011). David Hockney RA: a bigger picture. Interview. Royal Academy of Arts Video online. http://www.royalacademy.org.uk/exhibitions/hockney/ (Accessed 4 Jan 2012)

Links & information

•  You can listen to the BBC interview with David Hockney at http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b018g2yz
• David Hockney RA: A Bigger Picture can be seen at the Royal Academy from 21 January to 9 April 2012. Advance booking is recommended. http://www.royalacademy.org.uk/exhibitions/hockney/
• http://www.hockneypictures.com/home.php
• See also Peter Nencini's reflections on the handmade and the digital in this earlier post on Camberwell Illustration  

Further publications
Wroe, N (2012) David Hockney: a life in art. The Guardian (Review), Jan 14, <Available online at> http://www.guardian.co.uk/culture/2012/jan/13/david-hockney-life-in-art (Accessed 14 Jan 2012)

'The iPad is like an endless piece of paper that perfectly fitted the feeling I had that painting should be big'says Hockney in this Guardian interview.