Rethinking trees

I draw a connection between Socrates' invitation to think and art. Socrates opined that an unexamined life is not worth living. One path to examining life is to force art -- or the art that I wield -- into this process. Art can be uneventful as driving a bus unless one travels with zen (and yes, even driving a bus can be an examination of life, but I am doing art at the moment). Getting up in the morning and looking out into my backyard, a wonder of fog hanging just beyond the fence, the trees waiting for me in their shroud. Up goes my digital infrared camera and snap, snap. But why stop the examination there? Can it be that our eyes render that 'reality' in the only manner of perception? No. That is what the art process we select allows.
We can travel down many paths, pulling and shoving that snap, snap in ways still unthought. A socratic dialogue moves in one direction, photoshop manipulation in another. Both can be in the zen zone. Both make life worth living. Of course, there is the devil in me who just can't resist posing the philistine argument: the individual exists simply for the reproduction of the species. But I'll save that for another blog. This blog is about art and for this moment I will only indulge one illusion at a time.

Blurred Line? Pixels and Pointillism

I'm in the middle of muddling through an article.

I will open the discussion with some thoughts about George Seurat and his pointillist method of painting. By today's software applications, these points are large, but in the context of the 19th century painting, they were discrete objects composed of solid pigment instead of painted lines of pigment. Dots instead of strokes to represent captured light.

With today's technology, we have far smaller objects -- or pieces of light -- the pixel. But even with an image composed of pixels, we perceive a blurred line. Upon magnification, at 700%, we can begin to discern the pixels. Yes, this is difficult to see on this blog, but when I publish the article it should be markedly improved. Okay, you will need to trust me on this observation.

At 3200%, we can barely tell the blurred area; we see pixels. The blurred area are simply pixels with hues that are the same or similar over an area composed of multiple pixels.
Depending on one's distance from the image and the 'objects' (pigmented dots or pixel light), we perceive the intended representation -- which is the edge of the officer's hand and which was somewhat blurred in the 'painted' image to give a more natural appearance. But, this understandable edge of the hand decomposes into pixels -- or, in the older tradition of neo-impressionism, into points of pigment.

For a more detailed exploration of digital art, comparing pigment to pixels, see On the Uniqueness of Digital Art by JD Jarvis.

Motion & Pause

When we press the ‘take picture’ button on a still camera, we are saying ‘now.’ But what is it that we have captured in the framing of the moment? Does ‘motion’ look any different than a ‘pause’?

We can fill in the spaces with what we think will be the next location. We move with the camera looking for perspective, we wait for the moment to still the object.

On its own, the object moves or remains still. We dance together, camera and object, motion and pause.

Beginnings

Conversations can begin with an exchange of ideas or images. These conversations can wander -- meanderings along a wooded trail, along a beach or city streets. Or they can seek some objective, seek a certitude about what is and what is not. Since this is the beginning of the conversation -- or blog -- it is too soon to pick one way or the other.