“The Apprehension of Simple Forces” by Jason Salavon
Photo from salavon.com
Title:
- The Apprehension of Simple Forces
Artist(s) and People Involved:
Exhibiting Artist(s):
Symposium:
Artist Statement:
When does the perception of an individual element dissolve into the perception a larger whole? When does that whole become just another component in a greater form? Every particle or organism, any form defined as an individual element, also serves as a part of a larger element. The question of identity is revealed to be a matter of perspective: I am at once an individual human, a collection of differentiated cells, an incredible mass of atoms, an incomprehensible gathering of subatomic particles. I am also a part of a family, a community, a social class, a race, a gender, a species, a phylum. I am all these things simultaneously and the distinctions are only a matter of point of view. The simultaneous representation of the whole and the element is, among others, a principal intent of this work. The arrangement and representation of large structures is not a trivial task. There are no ready-made tools that design and arrange a simple social structure as in Diagram for the Apprehension of Simple Forces. So, the task is divided between myself and software I compose. The process becomes a hybrid of traditional art practice and software design. I design the architecture, figures and forms and write software to handle the minutiae of laying out a population of 2600 male figures in a social system. Though I designed the world in its entirety, I give up specific control to algorithms of my design.
