Aluminum, Printed Circuit Board (FR-4 Glass-reinforced Epoxy Laminate, Copper)
Framed: 22.4x14.9" (57x37cm)
Unframed: 19.5x13" (50x30cm)
2021
I’m excited by the ability for art and technology to coalesce in a transcendent unity that redefines what it means to be human. But also horrified by the misuse of technology to oppress people, wage war, and take lives. I think in part my Codex artworks are about this duality.
The aluminum frame's forms are inspired by #hardsurface 3d modeling style, that combines real world functional machined parts with scifi forms from the video game and movie industry. Hardsurface is usually military adjacent, with designers obsessing over mechanical details of weapons and vehicles. The Codex series pairs this aesthetic with soft heartfelt poems and spiritual mantras wondering about the purpose of our life. Rational precision meeting indeterminate, unknowable truths, etched and printed onto a circuit board.
The largest phrase "Fierce Compassion" is a reference to wrathful deities in Buddhism, who destroy obstacles to enlightenment. The main figure with the large eyebrows is a still frame of Vegeta of Dragonball Z, a kind of fierce deity of pure willpower
"Water pours from the sky, yet the oceans never fill" is from a 2200 year old scripture about not wasting our lives on vanity, and striving to live a life of purpose and meaning.
Some of the text like “I’ve been held...” was written by OpenAI' s GPT neural network, which has been trained on large portions of the internet and learned to emulate human language, and some early form of general intelligence.
The phrase about beauty and suffering is a kind of translation of Om Sarve Bhavantu Sukhinah, a Shanti mantra.
Unframed edition
Unframed edition detail
Unframed edition detail
Unframed edition detail
