In Assessment 1, my work was difficult to understand due to its presentation. I presented the poster as two seemingly separate and disjointed works. This made the work confusing and so for this assessment, I wanted to present the physical and digital binaries as mediums that can work together cohesively in one coherent work.
As technology rapidly evolves, new ways of exploring ideas in art emerge. What I was concerned with was whether something can be better represented digitally or physically.
I was hugely inspired by Joseph Kosuth’s One and Three Chairs (1965). In this work, he represents the chair in three ways: as a physical chair, as a photograph, and as a copy of a dictionary entry for the word “chair”. He turns a simple chair into a catalyst for debate as we wonder which representation is the most ‘accurate’. Or even if one representation is more accurate than the other at all? I applied a similar concept to my work as I ask: is the physical representation of paint more accurate than and superior to the digital? Or is the digital better? Or are they equally good representations of paint?
I was also inspired by the aesthetics of and the concepts behind teamLab’s art. They believe that digital art are free from the constraints of physical objects such as canvas and paint. They believe technology allows human expression to be free from physical constraints which enables digital art to exist independently and evolve freely. Through their use of projections, their artworks can also interact with one another and are changing constantly. But many of their works are inspired and derived from traditional Japanese art so perhaps digital art is built upon the foundation that physical art created. I explored this idea through the projections of secondary colours that encircle the primary colours that created them.
teamLab, The Way of the Sea, Transcending Space - Colors of Life (2018)
Most people, when they think of art, think of paintings, sculptures and architecture which is why I decided to use paint as a medium to explore my concept and I also wanted my work to be simple but thought-provoking like Kosuth’s One and Three Chairs. Initially, I experimented with creating the same painting using digital paint and physical paint. However, this created two separate works and as stated before, I wanted to have one cohesive piece, not a pair or series of works. So I decided to combine the physical and the digital by projecting the digital paint around the physical paint. The incorporation of colour theory was inspired by one of the previous studio exercises we did in class where we had to teach something through art.
Week 2 Studio Exercise TEACH ME SOMETHING: Colour Theory
MoMA, ‘Joseph Kosuth One and Three Chairs 1965’, MoMALearning [website], <https://www.moma.org>, accessed 28 Aug 2018
teamLab, ‘Digital Art’, teamLab [website], <https://www.teamlab.art>, accessed 14 September 2018
teamLab, ‘The Way of the Sea, Transcending Space - Colors of Life’, teamLab [website], <https://www.teamlab.art>, accessed 18 September 2018
