A Multimedia Installation exhibited at the Attleboro Arts Museum.
← THE MIRROR BOX
The mirror box is made of 4 mirrors facing each other and tapering down to a 27″ television monitor.
I’ve had this idea for over 15 years. But it wasn’t until this installation that I found a suitable vehicle for the mirror box. It tended to be a slick science project rather than a stand-alone art work. But as one element in a bigger concept, it worked.
I used the compounding of refracted light in the mirror box as the cause–the effect being a rupturing of the boundaries between two separate realities, making visible the invisible construct of cyberspace.
This piece began a new idea that I would pursue for years to come. The idea that art can be based on a lie. The lie frees the mind to explore the implausible.
BACKGROUND
This visualization of cyberspace has been a preoccupation of mine since reading William Gibson’s Neuromancer and establishing artnetweb back in 1992.
Turning things inside-out to discover alternate realities runs through much of my work, even going back to works I did in 1978. I remember building a 6-foot diameter sphere covered with a Disney-like toy world, while windows through the globe revealed a troublesome alternative view of the world portrayed in a collage of newspaper clipping. (See Toy Globe)
This installation, although not as simplistic, works in a similar manner. The view through the mirror box looks at the entertainment industry’s view of our changing realities–the video is a series of clips from Internet TV commercials and excepts of sci-fi films like Lawnmover Man and Johnny Mnemonic.
THE RUPTURE →
It’s through the rupture that I reveal my interpretation of an alternative reality–a reality that is on a collision course with our own.
The rupture, in my opinion, will come when cybernetics causes an evolution in the human mind and body that is on a par with the evolution that happened at the dawn of modern humans. The desire to wed the computer with the human body is as natural as using a bone as a club to extend our physical effectiveness.
Incorporating nanotechnology will extend our cognitive effectiveness and lead to a new form of humanity. You can look inside the wall cracks and see glimpses of the new brain, the overexposed montage of neural structures, hydraulic systems, skins and body parts. My intention is to look inside the science of the future–and yes, it is a scary but beautiful place.
