Ezekiel Series

The following extract is from Chaotic digital scripts as sacred art

Each work is an illuminated glyphic script generated by parameter driven chaotic procedures written by the artist. Just as the medieval monk transformed the written word with intricate design and precious gold so here, in a digital scriptorium, chaotic scripts are transformed into precious objects. Illuminated with gold or silver leaf each page assumes the quality of a "precious object". Hours of work with valuable materials have been lavished to embroider randomly cast "digital scripts" or "glyphs" as sacred or holy subjects worthy of being preserved and valued in and of themselves

The illuminations play with code driven improvisations based on the initiating stroke which illuminated with precious metal. The randomly cast control points which generate this stroke, control the distribution of strokes in the illumination. Parameter adjustments allow both controlled and randomly selected improvisations including mirror strokes on either or both axes or none at all. The glyph-like "scripts", analogous to manuscript headers and initials, are derived algorithmically from the same set of control points; thus a "self-similarity" permeates the whole. The algorithm generating the "texts" on Sapphire and The Vision employ a syntax with varying degrees of user control.

These works may be viewed as visual analogues to the coded procedures with which they are made. The essential character of the finished work is derived from the "form-generating-procedure" acting as genotype (Note 1). For this reason one could say that the finished work is an epiphany (manifestation) of its code. As a precious object each work celebrates its code, especially the recursive routines which shaped its character.

These illuminations invite us to savor both the beauty and the mystery of their coded procedures - not so much for their stark logic as for the grace and poetry they yield. The procedures provide a window on unseen processes shaping mind and matter. By doing so they become icons illuminating the mysterious nature of Earth and Cosmos.

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