inspiration to pixel profiles [pp]

"you push the button we will do the rest"

(slogan by Kodak)

George Eastman

blue_ghost

This blog entry serves to outline a new collaborative project I want to put into motion. I am calling it: pixel profile [pp]. The inspiration for this project comes from the numerous profile pictures, that I encounter everyday, on different screens (blackberry, email, google +, google chat, followers) which students use to 'show themselves'. I am also facinated by the ubiquitous ( I love learning new words) nature of photography especially in a ' digitally wired world'.

UBIQUITOUS:  means  omnipresent, ever-present, everywhere, all over the place, pervasive, universal, worldwide, global; rife, prevalent, far-reaching, inescapable.

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make (something) accessible to/for everyone

The quote below by Susan Sontag [SS] in her book "On Photography" echoes George Eastman's slogan above and both got me hinking about the 'snapshot' qualities behind most profile pics. I am particularily drawn to her words "democratize all experiences".

On page 7, SS writes: "the subsequent industrialization of camera technology only carried out a promise inherent in photography from its very beginning: to democratize all experiences by translating them into images".

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colourful QR codes

 

osmosisSTYLE (in QR code)

One day I accidentally clicked on a small gif and previewed it with the spacebar option on the Mac. It started to pixelate. I was curious. I expanded the window, and was completely drawn to the re-defined image. It looked nothing like its original which ironically when small, resembles more of a photograph type aesthetic, but when enlarged it became painterly and abstract, a colourful QR code. It became more about the conglomeration of multi-coloured squares, each one in it's own right attractive, each one significant to the whole, making up the whole.  Chuck Close's artistic sensibility jumped to mind.

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 Chuck Close [CC]

[American Photorealist Painter specializing in Portraits, born in 1940]

1970

2007

"I build a painting by putting little marks together -  
some look like hot dogs, some like doughnuts."

 

Chuck Close   is associated with the style of painting called Photorealism or Superrealism. Photorealism is a style of painting in which an image is created in such exact detail that it looks like a photograph; uses everyday subject matter, and often is larger than life. In this style, which was predominant in the 1970s, artists tried to create links between representational systems of painting and photography.  Photorealists frequently used a grid technique to enlarge a photograph and reduce each square to formal elements of design. Each grid was its own little work of art. Many of the Photorealists used  an airbrush technique. http://www.artsconnected.org/artsnetmn/identity/close.html

buka lapha

click buka lapha above and watch the video below to know more 

Perhaps one could say (well i think) that CC's style is smalls infusion of 3 styles of historical painting movements: Pointillism, Minimalism, Impressionism mixed with is a prophetic glimpse into the future shaped by technology, a vision made in pixels.

GLOSSARY:
Pointillism--A painting technique in which a white background is covered with tiny dots of pure color that fuse when seen from a distance producing a luminous visual effect.

Minimalism--A style of art in which the least possible amount of form shapes, colors, or lines are used to reduce the concept or idea to its simplest form (geometric shapes, progressions).

Impressionism--A movement in painting in which the emphasis on light and color, loose brush strokes, ordinary subject matter; creates the "impression" of a moment in time. Dabs and strokes of color are used to depict the natural appearances of objects and reflected light.

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