experiment no.4
This is becoming a mini series of playful experiments!
by Marja-Leena
by Marja-Leena the little moth
As I sat down at my desk yesterday morning, my eye was distracted by some movement in the window next to me – a tiny pale moth fluttering between the screen and the closed casement window. It must have become trapped there the previous night when I closed the window against the cool night breeze.
I’m amazed to find so much detail captured by the camera, in spite of the screen in between lens and moth. Not such a plain Jane cousin of the butterfly after all. After posing quietly for the camera, it happily flew away when I opened the window.
Interesting how just using the camera resulted in such a lovely encounter, when otherwise I might have ignored the little moth. It stayed in my thoughts all day.
by Marja-Leena visualizer
While we were watching Brian Eno’s 77 Million Paintings the other day, the mesmerizing images he’d been able to produce made me think of the wonderful hypnotic dancing colours, lines, dots, shapes that the ‘visualizer’ produces on this screen in response to music played in iTunes on my Mac. it’s fascinating to watch these visual effects in time to the music and I really should be playing it more often.
I don’t understand the technology behind the visualizer but wonder if it’s similar to what Eno uses.
Today I was going through some of my photo files and came across a group of photos that my husband had taken a few years ago of some of these images on the screen. These few stills just don’t begin to capture the constantly evolving patterns, but I felt like posting some of them here, just for fun.
And just because I’d been thinking about the visualizer. And just because I still wish I knew how to create something like this.
by Marja-Leena about Photoworks
Two months ago I wrote about my desire to organize my best photos into their own corner or archive on this blog. I’ve been thinking a lot about:
– what do I consider my best or most interesting photos
– recognizing their importance as art works in their own right
– how to organize the new photo archives
– using the blog as archives of my art AND photos
– knowing the benefit is more for me than for readers
– how some photos were used in my art works in the past
– knowing that some may be used in future prints
– and some may be printed as art photos
– taking time to go backwards over past posts to select the best
– pausing to read some of them, like looking into a diary, reviving memories
So, I finally bit the bullet and did it this weekend! Erika, my new tech assistant (thank you!) set up Photoworks up in the left bar, with subcategories below. Sifting through three-and-a-half years of posts (over 900) one by one, I tried making selections with a critical eye. It was interesting for me to note that in the first year I did not post many photos (except of my art work), and when I did they were small and conservative. In time, I began to take more interesting photos (the SLR digital camera helped) with the blog and sometimes possible future artworks in mind. I also began playing with the scanner more. Now that there’s a place to park them, I look forward to putting up many more photos, old and new. Feel free to have a browse through Photoworks and let me know what you think.
by Marja-Leena 77 Million Paintings
Saturday evening, yesterday, felt like a fall evening, so dark so early with rain thundering on the skylights. Desiring some cocooning, we set up our favourite game of Liverpool Rummy on the table, with hot cups of gen-mai cha (roasted rice green tea) beside us, and the laptop playing Brian Eno’s 77 Million Paintings for the first time.
I mentioned this piece by prolific electronic music and video artist Brian Eno many months ago, and was lent the DVD and book some time ago, but only now made the time to view it. The program is installed on the computer from the DVD in order to utilize the computer’s unique capacity as a generating processor to produce original visual compounds out of a large quantity of hand-painted elements.
Our gazes were mesmerized by the slow transformations of the images set to the gentle electronic music, very meditative and calming as we played our game. I think we would have found it too slow to watch with full attention, though I believe there is a way to speed it up. From time to time I read out loud some passages from the accompanying little book. First came the introduction by Nick Robertson Painting by Numbers. It’s too long to quote, but it’s about how each viewing is unique, never the same for each viewer. Some excerpts:
The audio is processed in a similar way, containing layers of sound, ensuring you never hear exactly the same thing twice, even if running 24 hours a day, 365 days of the year. The title “77 Million Paintings” reflects the possible permutations of the piece.
The original in art is no longer solely bound up in the physical object, but rather in the way the piece lives and grows. It is moving in time and each moment is an original. As a fluid fusion of traditional painting techniques and computer coding, this is truly painting by numbers.
My Light Years, Brian Eno’s own story of how this work came about from his explorations into light as an artist’s medium makes for interesting reading along with the printed images, which I’m still slowly savouring my way through. There’s also a DVD with an interview of Eno that I look forward to viewing.
This is very inspiring! I wish I had the skill and the equipment to set up my own generating software so that I could use my own artwork to create something like this! I know some other artists are doing this kind of work nowadays, hmmm….
Eno has had many museum shows of his projects including this one. Recently when checking out a few Second Life blogs, I learned that Brian Eno also had an opening tour of his multi-installation/collaboration of 77 Million Paintings with them. This is all very new and a bit incomprehensible for me at the moment.
(Image from 77 Million Paintings)
by Marja-Leena experiment no.3
continuing play with materials and textures
still not sure where these are going
See also experiment no.1, no.2, and no.4
by Marja-Leena colours of music
Can music have colour? David Hockney thought so, as filmmaker Maryte Kavaliauskas shows in her profile for PBS’s American Masters, David Hockney: The Colors of Music.
Hockney designed sets for perfomances of some of the world’s great operas for more than 30 years, surreal backdrops of “purple forests, spacey blues, giant blocks and mad silhouettes.” Kavaliauskas’ film features excerpts from operas by Mozart, Stravinsky, Ravel and Puccini, and the result is a mesmerizing, occasionally dizzying scherzo of sound and colour.
Ironically, Hockney suffered from gradual but steadily deteriorating hearing loss late in life – a decline documented in the program. “I have always said how a hearing loss makes you aware of space, visually,” Hockney says in the film. “I became aware of that…I am aware.” And how. David Hockney: The Colors of Music is a feast for the eyes. (PBS – 10 p.m.)
– Alex Strachan, The Vancouver Sun, Page C6 (print only), July 18, 2007. (Links added by me.)
A TV program on my favourite subjects, visual art and opera, and a famous artist as well!
I read the above in our paper this morning and was happy to note that the program is available on one of our basic cable channels (unlike another art program). I rarely watch TV because I don’t often know when something really good is on. I detest skimming through pages of tiny uninformative print in the TV listings for over a hundred channels, most of which we don’t receive. So, I’m pleased when I see something like this written up to alert me. I’ll be watching it this evening, and hopefully will update later on as to what I think of it. Some readers may have seen this film already as it is a couple of years old. If not, check your local PBS listings (Canada and US).
Meanwhile, there are interesting links at David Hockney: The Colors of Music website for more information, such as about the people involved like Lithuanian born Maryte Kavaliauskas and the lovely photos of stage sets (above is the performance still from Die Frau Ohne Schatten.) This production reminds me a little of Visual Music.
UPDATE July 19th 10:00 am: I enjoyed the film very much and I’m glad I taped it to view again. It was very interesting to listen to Hockney talk about the challenges of working in a new area that is very 3D instead of his usual 2D and working with light, and how stage design is a collaboration with compromises. I loved the snippets of music and dress rehearsals, such as Erik Satie’s Parade. Hockney says music is heightened poetry and heightened experience. His comments on slowly going deaf were enlightening; he doesn’t like background music, only foreground music – when you just listen to it! Amazing how many times I nodded in agreement. Oh, there’s more but you will just have to see it for yourself!
by Marja-Leena fairies in the garden
Oh my, it’s been hot here. Last week we had a record breaking heat wave all over BC. It was about 36C (about 97F) in our neighbourhood! As someone who totally wilts, swells up and gets cranky when it gets to 24C (75F), it’s been a struggle to cope with the very basics of living. Like most homes in Vancouver, we do not have air-conditioning. Our house was designed to capture a lot of light during long rainy seasons, but it also captures the heat from the sun with its many east and west facing windows and skylights, sigh.
This week is a little less hot, in the mid 20’s, with some cloudy periods and a few showers in the forecast. I’m still hot and lacking energy. It seems like we went from cold rainy weather straight to the dog days of summer. Complain, complain.
Watering the garden, and myself
Cooling salads, summer fruits, herbal iced teas
Reading and sleeping in the cooler downstairs
The unexpected pleasure of an overnight visitor
Picking up family returning from England
How the darling little ones have grown!
Looking for the fairies at the bottom of our garden
Summer’s blossoms, riot of colours and scents
Captured by the camera’s eye for you
Enjoy summer wherever you are!
by Marja-Leena Tina Schliessler
Vancouver artist and a friend, Tina Schliessler, has her series Living Portraits on exhibition at the Seymour Art Gallery in North Vancouver. I was very happy to attend her opening the other evening (Tuesday) and see her exciting new work. Here’s the short statement in the Vancouver Sun’s arts Calendar:
The local photographer uses a motor drive on her still camera to capture multiple images of her subject. She hand paints each photograph and then, using a computer video program, melds the images together – animating the portraits to bring them to life again.
Beautiful portraits of her children, family and friends, using a fascinating process and framing! Congratulations, Tina!
If you are in the area, you may see her work at the Seymour Art Gallery, in beautiful Deep Cove, daily 10 to 5 until August 5th. Two of the portraits can also be viewed at Tina’s website (still under development I think).
