Jon Haddock

Walt Disney Productions v. The Air Pirates, 581 F.2d 751 (9th Cir. 1978) (RGB Grid)

Haddock creates images that are made up of numeric values that represent the levels of red, green, and blue in each pixel of the source image. The values run from 0 (black) to 255 (white), since the value of black takes up less physical space than the value of white, the source image would still be visible in a matrix of values.

This work is an example of appropriation to open source in new media art. Artist have always been influenced by other art, so much so that some artist will imitate one another, but in new media art appropriation of sources transform from coping to sampling, emerging as an alternative creative piece. Permitted by technologies of mechanical reproduction, artists start to use found images like Haddock, but changes the status of artistic originality in the face of mass-produced culture. Hancock does this by altering the image of a Walt Disney Production into an inverse image and columns of numbers.

The simple breakdown of the image into numeric values reminds me of the elementary elements one needs to build from to create art. Having an understanding of the image as values, change the way the viewer looks at the work. It is no longer viewed as a recognizable image, but now is compared to its source image and slowly read to see the connection between the two.

Danny Rozin

Interactive artist, Danny Rozin works in very particular artistic surroundings, making mirrors from unreflective surfaces. He accomplishes this by using a tiny camera that gathers light and shape data, before sending it to a computer that processes it and uses hundreds of tiny electric motors to shift tiny blocks of material into the image in front of the device. In Wood Mirror, Rozin uses blocks of wood to compose this ghostly image, imprinted upon the wooden pixels like a haunted trace and just like a real mirror, subtle gradations of shade are achieved by both the natural grain of the wood and the angle at which they are displayed, casting shadow. Since building the wooden mirror Rozin has experimented with a number of other materials.

The main concept of this project and others like it was the idea of everything around us acts as a mirror, or perhaps more precisely making everything around us into a mirror onto the world. By using a naturally unreflective surface to create reflections, Rozin highlights human beings interest in technical accomplishment, but the fact that every object can reflect in some sense the image of those who have crafted, used, or sold it.

“The nature of reflective surfaces and reflections is what is at stake here - but what’s more, it’s a stunningly impressive piece of craftsmanship in its own right and if anything can be said to reflect the image of those that created it, then this surely reflects well on Rozin(http://www.environmentalgraffiti.com/featured/the-amazing-wooden-mirror/1425.)”

In Wood Mirror, Rozin proves visual feedback by the creation of the viewer’s reflection though the visual input of the camera, much similar to the idea of our current text animation project. The projects reflect the artists who created them as well as the viewer’s that participate in the interactive animation through input text and visual feedback by moving objects around the page.

Nam June Paik

Examining the clips from Young Hae Chang Heavy Industries, I made a connection with Nam June Paiks’ installation at the Smithsonian American Art Museum titled Electronic Superhighway continental U.S, Alaska, and Hawaii in the way it’s viewed and the mood it can provoke.

In 1995 Paiks’ piece Electronic Superhighway was a stunning example of his cultural criticism. With this installation, Paik offers commentary about an American culture obsessed with television, the moving image and bright shiny things. Paik argues that the flashing images “seen as though from a passing car” with audio chips from The Wizard of Oz, Oklahoma, Martin Luther King Jr. and other screen shots, expressing that our picture of America has always been influenced by film and television. Walking along the piece suggests the enormous scale of the nation and reminds us that individual states have distinct identities and culture, even in today’s information age.

Much like Young Hae Chang Heavy Industries, “Dakota” the viewer is drawn into the work trying to read every word or hear every sound.

“[…] it was amazing! my favorite thing in the whole museum. So bright and u get sucked into it. I stood there for 20 minutes just looking at this trying to catch all the clips.”missbananasplit121 (comment from youtube.com)

Also, both artists heavily control how the viewer reads the text or sees a clip by the way it’s displayed. For instances, Chang’s animations emphasize some text over others with sound or speed that they appear on screen. The same can be said for Paiks’ piece because the audio and visual clips were specially picked and blended together so that a viewer will acquire the artist understanding of the work.

In creating my version of a Young Hae Chang Heavy Industries animation, I will take into consideration the methods both artists used to successful guide their audiences.

Links

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4rdeB_VsYIE (Video of the installation)
http://americanart.si.edu/collections/interact/zoom/paik.cfm (interactive picture of the installation)