IN MY PAINTINGS, CONTOURS OF MANY INDIVIDUAL ANIMALS MERGE INTO ONE SINGLE SWIRLING FORM, LIKE CRYSTALS INSIDE A KALEIDOSCOPE.
The choice of colors follows three simple but non-obvious geometrical rules. It's almost like magic.
Complex chaotic systems, like the images in a kaleidoskope, consist of simple overlapping elements. Minmal differences in their original position can result in radically different outcomes and new complexities. This is the science behind The Magic of the Swarms. Alas, colours exist only in the minds of the beholder. Outside our eyes, there is nothing but wave length and shape, and I will never know if the colours I think I put in my paintings are the ones that you believe to see. Is the green I see the same green that you see? Maybe not even though the electromagnetic waves in the visible spectrum are the same for all of us. Confusing? Just a bit. So let's talk about shapes!
In 1986, Craig Reynolds tried to emulate the collective intelligence of animal swarms with his software Boids: He wanted to find out how large swarms determine their speed and their direction. It was an amazing step in programming and a great lesson about how dynamic three dimensional systems are represented on a flat screen.
THE MAGIC OF THE SWARMS
A CLUSTER, LA FOULE, EIN SCHWARM
most languages use a singular to describe what is really a number of creatures seemingly merged into one large new being.
When geographer Francis Guthrie made a map of the English counties in 1852 he conjectured that any map could be made with only four different colours. It took mathematicians about a century to prove, that he was right.
In art, however, we sometimes need more than just the minimum, so I use dozens of colours. In a cultural sense, The Magic of the Swarms is descended from ecclesiastical lead lights and traditional Buddhist mandalas - meditative for both the creator and the beholder.
FUSION OF INDIVIDUALS
