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Truth - Art exhibition on Feral File

Curator’s Note

Adam Berninger avatar

Adam Berninger

12 October 2023

Unique Visions of a Common Reality

In the short film Powers of Ten by Charles and Ray Eames, the building blocks of our existence are shown across different orders of magnitude, from the cosmic to the cellular. One comes away from the film with not just an understanding of the vastness of our universe, but also the way our perception is affected by the experience of viewing our universe at these different scales. We find formal similarities across them, and we feel the tension of a single small screen depicting both the massive and the molecular within an instant. It leaves us with an uneasiness, which might only be satisfied by the conclusion that the true contents of these different scales — from galaxies to the human body — are actually not so different.

This impression of sameness across scales might appear antithetical to the precision of scientific research. But in fact there is a scientific area of study, known as Psychophysical Scaling, that is dedicated to understanding, defining, and quantifying ranges in subjective perceptions – using various research methods to mathematically measure them. Artists, on the other hand, are perfectly comfortable with not quantifying their perceived experiences, even the ones who use mathematically rigid algorithms to create their art.

Specifically, the artists in this exhibition, titled Truth, are dedicated to the code-based craft of generative art, pushing the boundaries of how it is made and what it can be, and delving deeply into the nature of their algorithms to uncover something new. Each of the artists — Tyler Boswell, Presstube + bzor, Ella Hoeppner, Charlotte Dann, David Seven, HAL09999, and Lisa Orth — were invited to express their existing abstract tendencies in ways that tap into their intuition. They were asked to use the short, immersive period of creation for this exhibition to encourage a harnessing of their own “inner truth.” The works in this exhibition portray the different types of universal building blocks that each artist uses — cells, threads, light, and forces — and, taken together, they abstract the range and scale of what’s possible. The interpretation of these differences in scale attempt to obscure the separateness between the minute and the enormous in ways that ultimately unite them.

“Art is a lie that makes us realize the truth.” — Pablo Picasso

While the works in this show may seem cosmic or tactile or data-driven or microscopic, the abstraction of each series hides what they are behind their very lack of definition. Each project simply showcases the uniqueness of its own artistic and generative existence, while remaining contained within the essence of its identifiable character. Through the cross-section of these abstract works — by viewing them in sets — we then magnify and embrace the difficulty in naming what something is, as a “truth.” The resulting varieties and commonalities within and among each series is itself a reflection of the universe’s infinite self-similarity. That each work’s formal devices blur the scales, references, and relationships between abstract elements is our shortcut, and unifying approach, to the greater intention of artmaking: truth-finding beyond definition.

Cuneiform thumbnail

Presstube x bzor

Cuneiform

Series of 128 works

Vitreous thumbnail

Charlotte Dann

Vitreous

Series of 128 works

Metamosaic thumbnail

Tyler Boswell

Metamosaic

Series of 128 works

A broken symmetry — the cat's parabola thumbnail

HAL09999

A broken symmetry — the cat's parabola

Series of 128 works

inter/sections thumbnail

Lisa Orth

inter/sections

Series of 128 works

filum by Ella Hoeppner

Ella Hoeppner

filum

Series of 128 works

Dactylogram thumbnail

David Seven

Dactylogram

Series of 128 works

Presstube x bzor avatar

bzor

From his cockpit in the Blue Ridge Mountains, K.C. Austin (aka bzor) spends his days shaping realtime software art systems of all stripes. With his passions spanning artificial life, modular synths, virtual reality, and consciousness research, K.C. crafts shaders and fashions creative pipelines like a spider spins webs.

Presstube

Montreal-based artist James Paterson (@presstube) has been exploring his unmistakable synthesis of drawing, animation and code online since 1997. An avid meditator, Paterson’s work is informed by a first-person fascination with the workings of the human mind, combined with an appreciation of the intricate wonders of nature being revealed by contemporary science. His solo and collaborative works have been shown in galleries and museums worldwide.

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Charlotte Dann avatar

LocationBrighton, England

Charlotte Dann is a creative technologist and maker based in Brighton, England. She holds an MA in Computational Arts from Goldsmiths, University of London. Informed by a background in silversmithing and the pursuit of all forms of craft, her primary artistic theme is materiality. Her generative art explores how the essence of physical materials can be synthesized and translated to screen, and plays with the urge to touch. Dann’s work holds a tension between the stark digital code that facilitates the creation of her multifarious imagery, and the raw tangible materials it seeks to represent. Her work has been featured on Art Blocks Curated and as a Tender Icon.

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Tyler Boswell avatar

Tyler Boswell is a creative coder and web developer currently based in Las Vegas, Nevada. He has a BS in computer science from Drexel University in Philadelphia. He creates geometric and organic abstract generative art using code, focusing on layers of colors and simple shapes to create complex and sometimes chaotic systems. He is heavily inspired by the beauty of math found in nature. Tyler's work has been showcased on fx(hash), as a Tender Icon, and at Art Basel Miami Beach.

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HAL09999 avatar

Artist

HAL09999

LocationFrance, Europe, Internet

HAL09999 uses codes and custom algorithms to create digital artworks.

Inspired by a strong interest for topics stemming from nature and sciences, HAL09999 combines curiosity, technology and chaos to explore aesthetics spaces and reveal or discover novel structures. In parallel with teaching computer sciences, electronics, physics and digital arts, the artist also worked as scientific and technical advisor for other contemporary artists and international art galleries.

HAL09999's productions have been internationally shown in New-York (USA), London (GB), Tokyo (JP), Paris (FR), Zurich (CH), Valencia (SP), and on multiple platforms on the Internet.

Currently lives and works in France, sharing time between Paris and the seaside.

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Lisa Orth avatar

Artist

Lisa Orth

LocationUnited States

Lisa Orth is a multidisciplinary artist based in Seattle, Washington, known for her work in the fields of generative art, graphic design, and tattooing. She was previously the art director of Sub Pop Records, notable for designing Nirvana’s first records and their iconic logo. While leveraging her traditional art and design background into the new digital art space, her abstract generative work explores the intersection of color, movement, textural collisions, and the connection between generative randomness and intuition. Her work has been included in exhibitions at Art Basel Paris + par, Vellum LA, NFT Show Europe, Seattle NFT Museum, Seattle Art Fair, Unit.London, Vertical Crypto Art, and Tannhäuser Generative Art Museum.

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Ella Hoeppner avatar

LocationVirginia, US

Ella Hoeppner is a generative artist based in Virginia. She is known for her work with particle systems, her focus on real-time and interactive pieces, and her vivid abstract textural imagery. She draws inspiration from biology, physics, and mathematics. With a passion for novel and experimental algorithms, Ella seeks to break new aesthetic ground with each piece and discover new directions for code-based generative art. Her work has previously been exhibited at Art Basel Miami, Bright Moments in Berlin, and the Non Fungible Conference in Lisbon.

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David Seven avatar

David Seven is a conceptual artist based in The Netherlands. Award-winning architect by day and algorithmic artist by night, David’s work explores both the duality of human nature and the social condition. His visual work, created in partnership with a computer, is a performative dance of randomization and curation, whereby the artist interacts in real-time with an autonomous generative system. Passionate about emerging technologies, his work retains a romantic outlook on the traditional approach to medium. His digital work often has a counterpart in the physical realm, where large-scale prints can connect with the observer and encourage moments of reflection through intricate details and articulated narrative on canvas.

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