Nature of Neptune

Abstracting Nature, Literally

In one of the first posts to this blog I looked at the winning photographs in the 2007 Olympus BioScapes competition, a photography contest for biologists, and pondered whether they could be considered "art".  It is an interesting question, and looking through the 2008 winners from the same competition, I couldn't help but notice how much some of the photographs reminded me of images and sculpture from contemporary visual art. 

Great science photography has always fascinated the mind and the eye, whether through the exquisitely detailed frozen moments of Harold Edgerton, the spellbinding symmetry and patterning of Felice Frankel, or the sweeping, vibrant, glowing space-scapes from the Hubble Space Telescope.  Part of the fascination with these images is believing in their objectivity; they show something real about the world, something nobody can disagree with.  Yet take these connotations away from the images, and you'll find that they don't quite stand up on their own as artwork.  Or to put it another way, if an artist had made them, we just wouldn't like them as much.

What strikes me about some of these BioScapes images is that they almost look like they were made by artists, not rigorously objective photographic recordings made by scientists.  The image to the left, by Michael Franklin, bubbles with layers of structure, ordered almost haphazardly and shining as though made of jeweler's wire, yet calling to mind a plant cell, or a tiny tree rings.  The fascinating patterning, large scale structure with small scale complexity, stunning focus and contrast, and subtle but very effective coloring all distract from the fact that this really is the cross section image of a tiny plant stem.  Below are two other images from the BioScapes competition: Volvox cell colonies by Gerd Gunther on the left, and a wild cucumber by Victor Sykora to the right.

 

We see some very similar aesthetic trends being explored in contemporary visual art.  Anna Hepler's fragile but tension-filled wire sculptures and drawings (seen to the left) explore non-repeating geometries in ways very reminiscent of biological structures or the moments right after an explosion.  Roland Flexner's drawings (example on the right) with ink bubbles tackle similar ideas by literally recording tiny explosions on paper.  Frances Richardson's delicate graphite drawings (below, with detail) create organic, subtle forms from a dizzying complexity of meticulous marks.

The work of each of these contemporary visual artists refers strongly to images from science (Flexner certainly owes much to Edgerton, for example), and quite possibly also refer to, or are inspired by, current research trends in nonlinear dynamics, complex systems, and emergent behavior that attempt to tease some sense out of chaotic structures and behavior.

Artists can use scientific concepts to add further dimension to their work, which is arguably the real key to making good artwork.  When a painting or sculpture not only captures the eye but also suggests that the forms abstractly relate to natural systems, the viewing experience is deepened.  In fact, the crux here may be how "abstractly" this connotation is formed.  A literal explanation of a scientific concept can be interesting and quite dazzling, but a Hubble photograph of a galaxy is not the same as the artwork above, no matter how glowing, swirling, or colorful it is.  Some of these BioScapes images are much closer to artwork because they are so abstracted.  They almost become something other than the actual objects that have been photographed, by only loosely suggesting a connection.  This is precisely where we find exciting combinations of science and art: in works that strike a nimble balance between the literal and the abstract.

Anna Hepler's image "Spheres" comes from her website, and Roland Flexner's "#1" and Frances Richardson's "060307" come from their respective websites.

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 while also 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.

Sculpted by Larvae: The Experiments of Hubert Duprat

As the effects of human industry threaten our planet with pollution, climate change, and existential crises, both the science and art worlds have begun looking to nature for more efficient and environmentally friendly ways to create technology, as well as ways to rediscover the beauty in natural systems.  A growing number of scientists and engineers study natural processes to guide their design, while a corresponding number of artists and architects such as Andy Goldsworthy and Benjamin Aranda and Chris Lasch create work that brings direct attention to the beauty and complexity of natural systems.

French artist Herbert Duprat turns this idea of using natural processes in engineering and art on its head in his work with caddisfly larvae (Trichoptera).  Duprat took several caddisflies from their natural habitat and placed them in tanks filled with gold flakes and precious stones.  Caddisflies, who are often found in stream beds, are known for the protective cases they form around their bodies from pebbles, twigs, or sand.  When placed in a tank with flakes of gold and gemstones, the caddis flies simply created their protective sheaths from these materials instead.

The resulting structures are strikingly gorgeous, but confounding to see surrounding a hairy water bug.  Who, in fact, is the artist?  Is it Duprat, or is it the fly?  Is this even art?  Duprat brilliantly exploits a natural process, showing both the complexity of nature as well as questioning how we judge beauty.  And this is exactly why Duprat's work is art, because it challenges our ideas about the man made and the natural not through a chain of reasoning, but by our personal reaction to his images.

Both images are from Cabinet Magazine, where you can read more about Duprat's work with caddisflies.  Also see Genetologic Research and Leonardo On-Line for an interview with Duprat and more information on Trichoptera.

Anne Lilly's Purity of Motion

In the history of science, images and words have dominated the way concepts are conveyed to colleagues, students, and the public.  Books, prints, photographs, graphs, and diagrams have been the easiest way to portray profound ideas in scientific disciplines for centuries. 

What can often fall by the wayside in science education is how things move.  In science we see dazzling images of swirling galaxies, intricate cells, and dashing animals, but it is very hard to get a sense of the real motion of these objects.  What causes different types of motion?  Why do objects move the way they do?  Why do some movements seem graceful while others appear clunky?  And most importantly, rather than conceptualizing the motion of an object, how does the motion relate to our own bodies?

Artist Anne Lilly builds exquisite stainless steel sculptures that directly explore these issues of motion.  The pieces created by the Boston-based artist (and friend of Arthur Ganson) are propelled by the viewer's hand, giving a direct cause and effect experience for each viewer.  Once set in motion, Lilly's sculptures demonstrate how beautiful and simple motion can arise from simple rules of physics and mechanics.  While Newton's laws describe how objects move, Lilly's sculptures describe how these motions can appear to a human observer.  In her piece Parietals (see a video here), Lilly uses conservation of angular momentum to beautifully transform steel rods into both a science demonstration as well as a mesmerizing display of pure, graceful motion.  By presenting a graceful motion in such a simple way, the artist allows the viewer to contemplate each moment of cause and effect that causes the motion.

Because the motion in Lilly's sculptures is so simple and so pure, it is not hard to relate it to motion found in nature.  In her recent series of spinning steel rod pieces, specifically "There's a Certain Slant of Light", "Polaris", and "Parting" (click each to see a video), the motion of emergent flocking is suggested, such as the mesmerizing movement of starling flocks (also see Richard Barnes' photographs of the same subject).  The long, thin rods in Lilly's sculptures appear to move independently one moment, and then form a coherent motion the next.  They expand and contract, cohere and dissolve, much like many forms of natural flocking.

On another level, the same series of sculptures call to mind electrons swirling around an atomic nucleus.  Lilly's pieces are specifically geared so that none of the rods will ever touch another, which strongly parallels the Pauli exclusion principle forbidding any two electrons from simultaneously occupying the same quantum state.  In quantum theory, the enormous empty space surrounding an atomic nucleus is filled by a cloud of electrons that never "touch".  While the exact paths of the electrons can never be known (see the Heisenberg uncertaintly principle), the regions that they are most likely to be found can form very interesting geometric shapes.  Lilly's sculptures seem to provide an impossible view of how electrons would move through their probability regions if we could actually follow their individual motions.  Always surrounding an invisible nucleus, they never touch, sometimes appear random, but nonetheless form coherent patterns from simple underlying principles.  Form is created not by objects or images, but by pure motion itself.

All images and videos are from Anne Lilly's personal website, and the Arden Gallery website.

Vigorous Simplicity: Conrad Shawcross's Spinning Machines

Though they approach the question differently, both scientists and artists have long been concerned with the relationship between the simple and the complex.  Scientists strive to find simple, elegant mechanisms and equations that describe the complexity seen on our planet and the universe beyond, while many artists explore the ways that simple forms can create complex emotions, or how complex patterns and designs can cohere into unified visions.

English sculptor Conrad Shawcross addresses this age-old concern with a series of intriguing light-based kinetic sculptures.  One set of pieces, called Loop System Quintet, consists of five large wooden contraptions that rotate around their base, and each hold an arm with a bright light attached that spins independently of the base.  The effect is a long row of complex and intimidating wooden machines that trace elegant patterns of light in the air at an unnervingly fast speed.  Shawcross has determined the motion of these machines using specially chosen gear ratios, resulting in movements that continue to repeat themselves.

The jarring speed of these complex contraptions convey the vigor of some unfathomable industrial machinery, while also clearly showing the rigor of a carefully planned, and ultimately simple, repeating process.  The work brings to mind several topics from contemporary science.  As the artist himself admits, the sculptures reference string theory by the way they repeat their motions in "harmonic" patterns, creating three dimensional light traces from a one dimensional point of light (string theory proposes that all physical particles in the universe are actually created by strings that vibrate at different resonant frequencies - like the specific notes created by plucking a guitar string).  Shawcross' use of harmonics is intriguing in the way his machines seem complex but continue to follow very elegant lines of motion.  However, the beautiful long exposure photographs of the three dimensional light traces (shown above) are not actually visible when viewing the sculpture.

What can be seen watching the sculptures is how the path of the light changes from moment to moment.  The simplicity of this motion contrasted with the almost ugly jerkiness of the machines calls to mind the elegant motions of the planets, the paths of electrons around nuclei, or the dance between a binary stars.  Rather than show the simplicity in a complex system, as scientists strive for, Shawcross explores the complexity behind simple systems.  By using complex wooden machinery to create simple harmonic forms, the artist suggests that there may be more layers below the surface of simple forms and motions.  And yet, the complexity of Shawcross' machinery is ultimately deterministic -- the forms repeat themselves; nothing is left to chance.  This is another aspect where the piece does not successfully address the quantum nature of string theory, but still stands up to larger scale metaphors such as planetary motion.

The photo above was taken by Jonathan Shaw, and can be found at London's Walker Art Gallery website.  See more about Shawcross' work at Pixelsumo.

Measuring Reality: Spencer Finch's Light Installations

As a philosophy, the scientific method holds one axiom above all others: objectivity.  Unbiased observation of measurable evidence forms the basis for reproducible experiments that seek to uncover fundamental truths about nature.  The objectivity of this method has helped push the frontiers of our knowledge to incredible limits.

However, the proliferation and success of the scientific method has led us to sometimes assume that objectivity equals truth.  Artist Spencer Finch demonstrates the precariousness of this assumption through large scale, thought-provoking installations.  In these installations, Finch takes of careful, studied observations of certain characteristics of scene, such as hue and luminosity of light, and recreates them in a new context.

Recently exhibited at MASS MoCA in North Adams, Massachusetts, CIE 529/418 (Candlelight) consists of an entire wall of stained glass windows that reproduce the exact same color profile as candlelight (photo by srdaly11).  Finch used a colorimeter to precisely measure the RGB values of the light eight inches from a burning candle.  The room is beautiful and hypnotizing to stand in, and asks the viewer how similar and how different the experience really is to the illumination from a room full of candles.  He has broken candlelight into window panes of different color that vary in luminosity with the strength of the sunlight.  If the light in the room is precisely the same hue as the light from a candle, is it the same light?  Finch shows how important context is to the meaning of objective measurements.

The photo to the right is of another piece by Finch that uses similar ideas as Candlelight (photo by Spor).  This piece, called Shade (At the Grave of Walt Whitman, October 19, 2006, 10:15 am), recreates the hue and luminosity of the light at an exact place and an exact time.  Again, Finch is asking the viewer what exactly these objective measurements have to do with the emotions and feelings associated with a scene.  Is any emotion conveyed?  And if so, is it due to the precise measurement of light, or to the stylistic way Finch has broken the light up into overlapping colored ovals?

The MASS MoCA restrospective also included the piece to the left, called Night Sky, Over the Painted Desert, Arizona, January 9, 2004 (photo from Finch's website).  In this installation, Finch mixed colors of pigment to achieve the precise hue of the sky described in the title.  He then created light bulb models of each of the pigment's molecular structures.  By hanging these from the ceiling, Finch compares the hanging lights to the way the actual sky would have looked.  In doing so, he asks how well scientific models can recreate reality.  The beautiful installation does seem to convey a sense of the original Arizona night sky, but only to a point.  The piece occupies a middle ground between abstracted concepts and recreating an actual scene, asking the viewer how closely objective measurement really brings us to the truth.

Read more about Finch's work in the Boston Globe and the New York Times.

Patricia Piccinini's Synthetic Organisms

With the dizzying number of groundbreaking advancements in biological sciences in the past few decades, questions of their use and morality keep challenging our society.  As mentioned in regard to Eduardo Kac's genetically modified rabbit, scientists (and artists) who "play God" by manipulating the genetic material of living creatures are not always well received by the public.

Australian artist Patricia Piccinini continues this debate by creating stunningly realistic silicone-based sculptures of genetically hybrid organisms that raise a number of questions about current advances in biotechnology.  Piccinini's piece, The Young Family (shown above), initially shocks the viewer with its grotesquely realistic portrayal of genetic modification gone disturbingly wrong.  Yet the almost-human features of the creatures also induce empathy within us, especially the incredibly realistic emotion on the face of the mother.  It is not the expression of suffering, but rather of the all-too-realistic weariness of child rearing.

Are these creatures abominations resulting from our society's scientific hubris, or do they show basic human/animal domestic tenderness?  Are we disturbed by the photo because it blurs the line between human and animal?  It is rare to find works of art so repulsive, yet so captivating.

The piece above, called Still Life with Stem Cells, tackles the swarm of issues surrounding another biological issue: stem cell research.  An incredibly realistic little girl sits on the floor, joyfully playing with an array of blob-like fleshy creatures.  The sculpture serves as a metaphor for stem cells and emphasizes their malleability.  Are these happy blobs of flesh a welcome modification, or a disturbing alternative to the human embryos they came from?

The Blog Blog discusses Piccinini's thoughts on her own work, and you can read an interview with her here.  Ron Mueck is another interesting artist who makes sculptures in a very similar way, but with a different focus.  Both photos in this post are from Piccinini's website.

Articulating the Wind: The Architectural Facades of Ned Kahn

One of my favorite trends in contemporary urban architecture, a simple pleasure really, is the lining of buildings with enormous mirrored windows that reflect the city and sky around them.  This melds the buildings to their surroundings, and draws attention to the physical space between them.

Artist Ned Kahn takes this visual trick to another level.  He has created a number of architectural facades and monuments that consist entirely of small mirrored or semi-mirrored squares, each hanging from low friction joints.  Each of these small squares dangles independently, responding only to the wind.  When viewed from a distance, they outline the shapes of the wind gusts ripping across the sides of the buildings (the photo is of the facade for the Technorama science center in Switzerland, taken by Christopher Stumm).  Not only do these squares reflect the surroundings, the sky, and the sunlight, but they show the actual shape of the air around the buildings.  The video below shows the Technorama facade in motion, and I also highly recommend this video of Kahn's Articulated Cloud facade at the Pittsburgh Children's Museum.

The wind, which you can usually only feel and hear, is visualized in Kahn's facades.  Kahn and others have described his work as "digitizing" the wind and the air, but I feel that this trendy allusion misses the point.  First of all, the squares have a range of motion, not just "up" or "down", meaning they are not purely digitized into 0's and 1's.  They can look dark or light, or many grays in between.  Secondly, there is no intrinsic reason to "digitize" the wind around a building.  To do so would introduce postmodern concepts of cultural juxtaposition that are completely unnecessary here.

"Quantization" is a much better way to describe what these pieces are showing.  The small squares each represent a "quantized" unit of space, each moving independently of each other.  When acted upon by the wind, they form the shapes of moving waves, each square being excited individually.  This provides a wonderful metaphor for the structure of air itself, which is made up of tiny "quantized" molecules that bump around, giving rise to the gusts of wind we can feel and hear.  It is also a stunning analogy for modern physics, especially in the realm of quantum field theory, where forces are described as both fields and quantized particles at the same time.  That is what Kahn's facades are: a bunch of individual squares, and a pattern of propagating waves and ripples, existing simultaneously.

Andy Goldsworthy and his use of time scale

Andy Goldsworthy was that kid who loved to play in streams and forests for hours and hours.  Lucky for us, the world-renowned British artist never grew out of it.

Much has been written about Goldsworthy's breathtaking nature-based sculptures and outdoor installations, but I would like to draw specific attention to the temporal aspects of his work.  I discussed the notion of "time scale" in artwork in reference to Arthur Ganson's sculptures, and Goldsworthy puts this concept to use better than anyone I have ever seen.  With his outdoor installations, Goldsworthy builds structures out of natural local materials and then gives them up to the environment.  This method allows him to explore the transience of both natural materials and environmental cycles at the same time.  The pieces are created specifically to "decay" in a way that will expose underlying features of the local environment.

The clip above, from the essential film documentary of Goldsworthy's work, Rivers and Tides, provides a perfect example of this transience.  Ever so slowly, the log structure he builds becomes surrounded and then lifted by the rising tide of the ocean.  The structure spins according to the water flow around it, and slowly loses its logs as it is carried out into open water. 

Everybody knows what tides are, and it is no mystery as to when they occur.  What Goldsworthy has done here is draw attention to the time scale it takes for the tide to act on the environment.  It is a slow, meditative pace, but steady and inevitable.  This piece, and others, make you aware of the intrinsic cycles in our environments, such as ebbs and flows, sunlight and darkness, freezing and melting, etc.  Many of these cycles occur in extremely quick or imperceptibly slow time scales, that we, as humans, rarely notice.  Goldsworthy brings them to our attention, subjectively.  Cycles between order and entropy, and life and death, are absolutely intrinsic not only to the environment, but to each of our lives.

The videos below show more film clips of his creations.  In his profound curiosity of the natural world, Goldsworthy speaks for both artists and scientists at the same time:

“You feel as if you’ve touched the heart of a place.  That’s a way of understanding; seeing something you never saw before, that was always there, but you were blind to it.”

Bubble Machines

Artist James Ossi builds ceiling-high machines, powered by numerous motors, hundreds of circuits, and a system of pipes, for one single purpose: to make bubbles. 

His bubble machines consist of two huge planes of glass set a few inches apart, with soap bubbles traveling slowly upward between them.  The bubbles are big enough that you can only see their edges, which form a beautiful honeycomb pattern that most efficiently fills the space (the photos here were taken by .Leili, where you can find more excellent soap film shots).

The honeycomb pattern of close-packed spheres is not the only scientific principle on display in these sculptures.  As the bubbles rise, they slowly lose liquid to the panes of glass and become thinner.  As they thin, their thickness reaches a point that causes interference among reflected light waves, creating the effect called iridescence.  This interference can favor wavelengths of visible light, creating vibrant sheens of color which swirl and mix on the edges of the soap bubbles.  This is the same principle that causes color in butterfly wings and opals.

The network of slowly changing slices of vivid swirling colors is quite a sight to behold.  It is one thing to explain the principle of interference, it is quite another the show it, especially in such a beautifully simple way.  Rather than just showing you a bubble, Ossi's machines show you the life of a bubble, and how its form and color come to be.  Like Arthur Ganson's sculptures, the bubble machines are pieces that anyone can enjoy and learn from, from young to old.

Below is a segment from The Smithsonian Institution's show "Inventions", where Ossi talks about his machines.  He has made several of them, which are on display around the world.  The photos here are from the machine at MIT's Physics Department, located in Cambridge, Massachusetts.