[spectre] Perpetual.portrait by Garrett Lynch
Garrett Lynch
lists at asquare.org
Mon Jan 1 02:23:43 CET 2007
Announcing the release of Perpetual.portrait by Garrett Lynch:
http://www.asquare.org/project/perpetualportrait/
Perpetual.portrait was photographed during 2003 and completed as a
gallery piece for the inaugural exhibition "Renewal 1868/2004" at the
Sidney Cooper Gallery, Canterbury, England. It has recently been
completed as an online work. Below is a text concerning the work. On
the site is further documentation concerning the differences between
the gallery and online versions alongside the online work.
Requirements: Shockwave player version 10+ (users with intel macs
please make sure your browser is open using Rosetta, see here for more
info http://www.adobe.com/cfusion/knowledgebase/index.cfm?id=82216d24),
a sound card with headphones or speakers, access privileges to your
computer (Perpetual.portrait writes preference files to your system), a
reasonably fast computer with not too many background applications
open.
---------------------------------------------------------------
"How sad it is!" murmured Dorian Gray with his eyes still fixed upon
his own portrait. "How sad it is! I shall grow old, and horrible, and
dreadful. But this picture will remain always young. It will never be
older than this particular day of June. . . . If it were only the other
way! If it were I who was to be always young, and the picture that was
to grow old! For that--for that--I would give everything! Yes, there is
nothing in the whole world I would not give! I would give my soul for
that!"
Oscar Wilde, The Picture of Dorian Gray
Perpetual.portrait is a work inspired by Oscar Wilde's The Picture of
Dorian Gray. It is an automated, self-perpetuating, portrait
application created to be distributed and viewed in two ways, as a
gallery piece and an online piece.
The Picture of Dorian Gray tells of the transference of sin from the
subject of a portrait, Dorian, to his portrait. The suggestion is that
the gaze of Dorian adds to the accumulation of sin in the portrait. By
staring his actions in the face he confronts his own deeds and sees his
true self as no mirror could reflect it. By studying his portrait he
destroys it, distorting himself. The story culminates with the death of
Dorian and the discovery of his body next to view the portrait, Dorian
horribly disfigured while his portrait is as fresh as the day it was
painted.
A digital photographic portrait was taken daily for the period of one
year. The photographs measure exactly 320 pixels wide by 270 pixels
high, giving an equivalent to the amount of seconds in a day. The
complete collection of digital photographs represents a calendar year,
a single photograph a day and each pixel of each photograph a second of
that day. The photographs become more than simply representational
forms, they are transformed into a database of information which can be
copied / pasted / modified / deleted / broken down and manipulated as
required. Collectively they form a documentation of change as seen in
the artists face. Aging, health, mood, state of mind are all recorded.
Perpetual.portrait, the application, uses these photographs, this
database, as its source to assemble the portrait. For any given day it
uses the corresponding photograph and updates it pixel by pixel until
midnight, when it becomes the photograph for the next day. Each version
of the application evolves uniquely with time for the viewer / user who
observes it. Starting from the same series of photographs it becomes a
unique portrait, reflecting the gaze of each and every viewer / user
and their time watching it. Their presence, their gaze, their
connection contributes to the fragmentation of the portrait and further
diffusion via the network.
Perpetual.portrait is both an ideal portrait and an anti-portrait. As
an ideal portrait, it continually modifies itself to reflect change in
the subject. It is no longer the impression of a subject at any one
given moment but instead displays samplings of all and every possible
moment, every possible permutation. As an anti-portrait the subject is
in a continual state of degradation, the face is continually eroded
away, the image continually polluted, corrupted. While the concept of
'digital' typically evokes ideas of longevity and one of the primary
shortcomings of traditional arts is preservation, here the technology
purposefully assists in the deterioration of the work to keep it in
constant flux.
a+
gar
__________________
Garrett at asquare.org
http://www.asquare.org/
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