Nature of Neptune

Understanding Technology: Andrew Neumann's Use of New Media

When defining the purpose of this blog I aimed to "explore ways that objective truths can have meaning and relevance in our actual lives."  These "objective truths" being, specifically, the verified discoveries of modern science.  If you stop to think about that statement, you may wonder why it's a topic worth exploring at all.  Discoveries from science that have relevance in our lives... isn't that called "technology"?  Don't all the devices and machines we see and interact with everyday show exactly how ideas from science have come to influence our lives?

Yet, you may notice that the majority of the posts thus far on Nature of Neptune have focused on artist's use of scientific concepts in their artwork, not on their use of technology.  It is absolutely true that technology brings science to our lives, but the question is how?  When we look at an iPod, do we understand how it works, or how it has come to be in 2008 that this device is able to be manufactured?  Do we know the rules of the natural world that have been discovered that allow this device to work the way it does?

These are the sort of questions that inspired this blog, and are part of the reason that successful examples of making concepts from science relevant to our lives is so difficult and rare.  The art world has certainly not ignored technology however, as the field of New Media has exploded in recent years.  New media artists use modern technology, often computers or digitization, as their artistic medium.  There is some excellent new media artwork out there, but much of it falls victim to novelty for novelty's sake, creating new forms of "art" that, while certainly new, are conceptually empty.  New Media is just another tool for art making; simply using technology does not mean you are helping us understand technology.

One artist whose work does help us understand technology is Andrew Neumann, a Boston-based new media artist.  Neumann's fascinating wall pieces offer a unique glimpse inside electronic and computing devices, baring their insides, and at the same time showing real time interaction between system components.  One piece, titled Quartet (photo to the left, video here), consists of four small lcd screens with their electronics exposed sliding back and forth on two metal tracks.  Two cameras on either side of the tracks are pointed at different components of the moving system; one is focused on the motor driving the screens back and forth, while the other points at a switch mechanism that causes the screens to change direction when they reach the end of the track.  Two other cameras are mounted on the moving lcd screens, pointing down the track back towards the switch and the motor, respectively.  Each of the four camera views are projected on one of the screens, and the entire system is mounted on a wooden plank.

The cameras projecting four different views of the same slowly moving system suggests security cameras inside a computer.  While Neumann's cameras are not for protection, like security cameras they give a coordinated view of multiple aspects of the same system as they change in real time.  Each part of the system is related to each other part, as power and function are transferred from one to another.  Neumann doesn't try to wow the viewer with cutting edge technology, but rather offers a unique and meditative view on the concepts and structure behind modern electronic devices.  This allows the viewer to experience the concepts behind technology, offering understanding rather than function.  His work does not do any physical or even virtual work, but opens a portal to the concepts behind technology.  Neumann's artwork demonstrates that new media art can be startlingly successful when attempting to understand the technology that comprises it.

The first photo is from the Bitforms Gallery website, and the second photo (of Neumann's piece titled Screw) is from the artist's own website.

Metamorphic Metaphors: Brian Knep's Aging Series

Another Boston-based artist taking advantage of the area's rich and extensive scientific community (see Daniel Kohn) is Brian Knep, and ongoing Artist in Residence at the Department of Systems Biology at Harvard Medical School.  Knep, a new media artist whose work is often interactive, has used his residency to develop a series of images and video installations exploring the life cycles of frogs.

To create the video pieces for Aging, Knep took thousands of photos of tadpoles at different stages of development and created a computer program to blend the images together (see an article from the Weekly Dig).  The result (shown in the second half of the video above) is an animal that morphs between tadpole and frog as it attempts to swim across the screen.  Gray lines moving from right to left add a sense of imperative as the frog appears to struggle against an unseen current.  As soon as the amphibian makes it all the way forward, it slips back again, struggling to stay on the screen.

Knep uses the striking changes frogs experience in their development to create a metaphor for human life.  The frog appears to struggle to make forward progress, but the progress never lasts and seems almost fruitless as the frog slips backward to start the struggle forward all over again.  The struggle is the same for all stages of the frog's life, as it constantly morphs back and forth into frog, tadpole, and breathing tadpole, each kick forward echoing through each stage of development.  What could be a frustratingly obvious existential metaphor questioning the meaning to life is elevated to a subtle display of interconnectedness, transformation, and beauty.  Forward progress may not be the right way to gauge our lives; perhaps beauty and satisfaction can be found in the cycles of our species and our lives.

While Daniel Kohn has attempted to develop useful visualization tools to help scientists as well as find an abstract visual language for "genomic space" inside cell nuclei, Knep has gone another route by relating ideas from science to our own lives.  Moments in his work yield a special kind of relevancy that isn't often seen in the art world: cold hard facts of science transformed into metaphors for the human struggle.  In fact, Knep could benefit greatly by including even more scientific concepts in his work that further nuanced his metaphor for human life.  Incorporating the frog's metamorphic changes with incredibly rigorous and precise observation is very compelling, but suggests further questions: Why does the frog go through such a life cycle?  What causes these changes to occur?  How do these changes occur within the frog's body?  While Knep's work would benefit from the inclusion of even more ideas from science, the way he ties scientific concepts and observation to human emotion has made his Aging series a true success.

Read more about Knep's work at Harvard Medical School in an interview at ArtSake and an article from the Boston Globe.  The photo is from Knep's website.

Delicate Boundaries

The further the limits of our scientific knowledge are pushed, the harder it is to relate new discoveries to our everyday experiences.  One frontier where this issue is most evident is in terms of scale, both large and small.  When cosmologists discuss the large scale structure of the universe, or molecular biologists report on the genetic effects of certain protein molecules, the rest of us are left struggling to find any sort of subjective meaning.

New media artist Chris Sugrue brings our knowledge of the microscopic into our realm of experience through an elegant and engaging interactive installation piece.  While the piece, called Delicate Boundaries, doesn't quite tackle life on the cutting-edge molecular level, it does call attention to the ways that tiny single-celled organisms can interact with the human body.  Delicate Boundaries consists of a computer screen, a motion sensor, and a projector.  At first, a dozen or so little outlined microbial forms wiggle around the computer screen.  But when a viewer extends his or her hand and touches the screen, the little forms swarm towards it.  The captivating (or startling) part of the piece happens next, when the forms actually appear to jump the computer screen and flow up the viewer's arm, this time as projected light.  Once on the viewer, the beautifully outlined little microbial shapes wiggle up and down his or her body.

Aside from cleverly addressing very relevant cultural issues about the boundaries between virtual space and real space, Sugrue's piece explores human interaction with microscopic life.  Before the invention of the microscope, nobody knew such life existed, even though it has an enormous impact on human lives, from digesting our food to causing disease.  Now, many people feel squeamish when thinking about the millions of tiny creatures crawling all over our bodies all the time, even though the vast majority of them help us live.  When presented with Sugrue's delicate cartoon-like microbes "crawling" over your body, would you be captivated, repulsed, or a little of both?  This is the question the piece asks that successfully relates scientific discovery with personal experience.

Images from Sugrue's website.