Factitious Reservoirs

Simulated brines in centrifuge vials, pure silicon, videos, LED lights, electrical cords

Brine recipes of the moon Europa, the moon Enceladus, and the dwarf planet Ceres courtesy of Mark Fox-Powell (astrobiologist and planetary scientist at Open University, UK); in addition to the base recipes more speculative recipes were also developed. Video source material generated from a custom model/image data set—around the theme of alien oceans using—StyleGAN2. Developed as a site specific installation in dialogue with exhibition curator, Arkadiusz Półtorak.

Produced with the support of the Mondriaan Fonds.









Geological Evidences (Exhibition at Skala)









Island Attunements






Factitious Earths

Infused aluminum prints of scanning electron microscope images, glass vial with “factitious earths” custom mixture, glass vial with platinum capsule of “factitious earths” experiment.

Working with experimental geologist Geoffrey Bromiley, a new planet’s geology was modeled on: archival research into the use of carbonic acid as a restorative gas by steam engine inventor James Watt to heal his invalid geologist son; deep earth carbon processes; runaway hot-house earth scenarios, and the speculative geology of a hypothetical exoplanet.









curatorial/pedagogical

Curatorial and Pedagogical programs






Videos

Work in progress

Supported by Forecast






A Projection of the Colonial Imaginary

This body of work approaches the Canary Islands as a site which attracts agents that explore, claim, colonize and transform worlds. Christopher Columbus departed from the Canary Islands on his journeys to claim whatever he “found,” helping inaugurate Modernity — a transformation structured on lasting social inequalities, set in motion with great loss of life and freedom to colonized people. The night sky by which early explorers navigated is now mapped by the gaze of optical/infrared telescopes that dot the peaks of the islands — islands once at edge of ancient Greek maps. While colonial ships required captain and crew, autonomous planetary rovers are currently being tested on Canarian volcanic terrain standing in for alien landscapes. Lichen are colonizers of barren rocks like volcanic landforms; the organism’s ability to withstand radiation makes them prime candidates to terraform other planets. When intelligent robots and lichen become the first colonizers of other planets, then what?









Within the Temple Without

Official selection of IFFR - International Film Festival Rotterdam

“Within the Temple Without” is a journey into the economic unconscious—which is now collective and digital. This journey takes the structure of a dream. The pathway to the Temple of Apollo in Delphi is lined with treasuries for the gods; the alchemical symbol of the caduceus, carried by Hermes, was created from the expulsion of serpents at the Temple of Apollo. The caduceus and other alchemical symbols can be found all over the Bank of England, which drew on alchemical ideas to develop a credit based currency; it became the template of central banks. The Bank for International Settlements in Basel Switzerland is the central bank of the central banks and largely exists outside of any governmental jurisdiction. Handheld video has been algorithmically stabilized, creating an unstable frame and uncanny, convulsing images. Carl Jung’s work with alchemy and the unconscious—both individual and collective—further informs the work. The narrative itself is delivered by a computer application rather than a human. Manipulated and composed sounds from ATMs provide the soundtrack.

“Within the Temple Without” is a journey into the economic unconscious—which is now collective and digital. This journey takes the structure of a dream. The pathway to the Temple of Apollo in Delphi is lined with treasuries for the gods; the alchemical symbol of the caduceus, carried by Hermes, was created from the expulsion of serpents at the Temple of Apollo. The caduceus and other alchemical symbols can be found all over the Bank of England, which drew on alchemical ideas to develop a credit based currency; it became the template of central banks. The Bank for International Settlements in Basel Switzerland is the central bank of the central banks and largely exists outside of any governmental jurisdiction. Handheld video has been algorithmically stabilized, creating an unstable frame and uncanny, convulsing images. Carl Jung’s work with alchemy and the unconscious—both individual and collective—further informs the work. The narrative itself is delivered by a computer application rather than a human. Manipulated and composed sounds from ATMs provide the soundtrack.

 

 






Metabolization Sequence / Disarticulation Sequence / Propagation Sequence

These three “sequences” were developed from working in archaeological contexts—in collections, laboratories, and excavation sites. The works pursues an archeology that eschews the centrality of humans and instead engages with the entanglements of an anthropos—from metabolic to ecological—ensnared in deep time’s surreal dimensions. The work is oriented around 3 archeology sites: a pre-Homo sapiens lower Paleolithic site more than 335,000 years old; a 40-50,000 year old middle Paleolithic site with Neanderthal and Homo sapiens layers; and a Neolithic site from approximately 5,500 years ago. Taken together the installation uses the ancient past to offer views on how the momentum of the present propels us towards the future.

Funding provided by the European Commission/NEARCH









A well-functioning bank is the Elixir or Philosophers Stone

Excerpt of 4k Video for projection

The subject of this video are the doors of the bank of England, which are covered in alchemical symbols including snakes and caduceus in various forms; the caduceus is the symbol of Hermes—the patron of alchemists, merchants, and thieves. In 17th century Britain, the Hartlib Circle, a group of London alchemists centered around Samuel Hartlib, developed a political economy to solve the money shortage in England. When their attempted alchemical transmutation to turn base metal to gold failed, they eventually turned to an infinitely expandable credit based currency. The same alchemical philosophy informed both pursuits. Eventually this philosophy would inspire the creation of the Bank of England, which forms the model for most of the world’s central banks today.

The handheld footage is stabilized with software. The algorithm tracks points and modifies the image in response, suggestive of the computational space and algorithmic operations in the market. Within this algorithmically abstracted image space, frame become unreliable and unpredictable while the images convulse in uncanny, unstable dream-like waves.

 

 






Palyphony

Working with a palynologist, I filmed pollen from 10,000 year old oasis settlements in Saudi Arabia. The pollen sample contains information about the environment as it existed at the end of the last major period of glaciation. The seemingly cosmic process of unfolding occurs against a sound track developed from tones used by scientists to measure changes in sea temperature.

 

 






When this conjurers trick has been performed…

When this conjurer's trick has been performed, the same theories are transferred back again from organic nature into history and it is now claimed that their validity as eternal laws of human society has been proved.

Site specific action

I created a pattern based on the tropical scene on the Bank of England's 10 pound note; this pattern was then used to create a “camouflage” suit which I wore in the Tijuca Forest in Brazil. This is where Darwin spent a significant time developing his theories in which he applied ideas from political economy—he was reading not just Malthus, but Adam Smith—to nature. The site specific actions included looking at water marks of animals in Brazilian currency, photographing, and reading passages from Adam Smith. The title is take from one of Friedrich Engels's letters.









The dream elaborates on the relationship but does not identify the things that are related

Produced by Ramdom, Progetto GAP, 2015









Short clips






Heirs of the Royal Art

Heirs of the Royal Art casts a constellation including intoxicating water lilies used in elite funeral rites in ancient Egypt, Claude Monet’s Giverny water lily gardens; a wealth Management company called Giverny Capital; the collusion of art and economy through JPMorgan Chase’s wealth management arm “ Chase Private Client”; the Chase Bank corporate collection started by then Chase President David Rockefeller at the same time as his involvement in the Museum of Modern Art; Rockefeller’s personal acquisition of some of Monet’s near abstract water lily canvases; and the role of JP Morgan and other financiers in the founding of the Egyptian collection at the Metropolitan museum in 1906 which features items from their private collections depicting the sacred and intoxicating blue water lilies.









Medicine Men

Medicine Men examines cyclical patterns, a web of relations, and genealogies in relation to medicine, economy, and power (following the Rockefeller Family) on the one hand and to cosmic and psychic forces (following myths of snakes/serpents) on the other hand. I present photographs, video, objects, books, and various historic material in a sculptural installation which shifts between workshop, lab, office, and museum.









Photographic Works






Flat Works






Hazel Hazel Hazel Hut

For Hazel, Hazel, Hazel, Hut I captured a spider from the grave of Paracelsus (Renaissance physician, botanist, alchemist, astrologer, and general occultist) in Saint Sebastian cemetery in Salzburg, Austria and placed it in an empty hut on a mountain nearby where I made a sculptural intervention. The hazel twig from the yard of someone named Sebastian that I used to capture the spider is shown along with a hazel tree energy amulet and a hazel nut energy bar obtained from a folk healer.









Poisons

“All things contain poison,” our beloved Paracelsus wrote, “there is nothing without poison.”

The same plant to cure and to kill. Tobacco is radically altered in different cultural contexts. It is used in ritual healing ceremonies in South America and has come to be known primarily as an addictive carcinogen throughout the rest of the world – a side effect of Colonialism.

Poisons constitutes a sculptural system in which the objects have been activated through use. However, visitors are confronted not with a performance, but only the residue of action and the events already past.

The work engages with how both the material thing is produced and how meaning is produced; so the installation included the equipment needed to produce the sculpture. Installing the “vessels” required filling all them. This was done using Victorian eye wash cups from which two substances were imbibed: Cat's Claw/Una de Gato liquid (a plant from the rainforest known to fight cancer) and the liquid Tobacco juice.









The Golden Hour

From Saint John Chrysostom (“Golden Mouthed”) Melkite Church (former home of Coca-Cola magnate Asa Candler) to Frederic Church via coca and shamanic gold work: Coca tea brewed as medicine with water from Hudson River School landscape painter Frederic Church’s home, Olana, was bottled in gold-leafed Coca-Cola bottles. This action exists in relation to Reichel-Dolmatoff’s Goldwork and Shamanism An Iconographic Study of the Gold Museum of the Banco de la Republica, Colombia and postcards of Church’s painting The Andes of Ecuador which is housed in tobacco baron R. J. Reynold’s former home, now an art museum.









Fractal Bridge Pattern for Decoupling an Abstraction from Its Crystallization









There are several interpretations









Ideal Free Distribution









If Our World Is Actually Related to Other Worlds









peripatetic-viability









Flat works