SOLUTIONS was conceived on-screen. Composed and worked in digital files in a way that parallels the processes of etching a copper plate that is the vehicle carrying idea from artist, to print, to viewer. Each time I review these images the temptation to tinker is nigh irresistible but eventually the manipulation had to stop and I went to press, to the 'printer' and made manifest prints that take up space.
On paper, the dynamism of each image takes on a momentum of its own.
I'm distracted by the transformation from screen to paper as I am by the first proof from any printing plate, and by the ephemera produced in the printing process ... borders where there weren't and won't be, trim-marks, bleed-edges, paper qualities ... yes those in-studio concerns, and borders were not in the plan, in the mind's eye, but could they? Now, all the rules have changed, could they be?
Some don't make out well on paper. I'm struck afresh that images have a 'right' medium. Some work on screen only and that's where they must stay. Some are prints from now on and after appearing here their screen-life is over.
People have seen them, liked with interest and loathed by their indifference. Conclusions cross their faces and questions are posed. Asked bluntly or with care, some questions seem startlingly obvious. Arrantly, I assumed these would answer themselves. Not so. Of course they don't.
They peer closely and try to read. However obscured, abstracted in form or impenetrable in meaning, numbers and letters where sense and message lie demand the reading reflex irrespective of context.
Q. What do the numbers mean? Q. Is it a book? Q. Will you print it?
The colour borrows from the softwares that SOLUTIONS is made in - the blues of scroll bar, operating system, highlights and notation. The colours of successful software packages are simultaneously attractive, functional and unobtrusive. This palette is intrinsic.
The bookmarks serve a dual function - retrieval and colour. A precious love token, even a favoured one's strand of hair can mark a page, any-old tat can, ticket-stubs, old mail, advertising, ntm custom buys from the trinket counter. There is a fine-craft-art history of bookmarks. We 'mark' books and magazines and the notion persists as 'favourites' and 'favicons' and the personalizing of digital devices.
Explanations don't necessarily explain all. It is tempting not to answer questions, to think 'viewers problem now I've done my bit', but equally tempting is to fill in the gaps the questions reveal, that I dreadfully realize I've skated over ... or missed. It is lazy not to answer and mysteriousness in not mystery.
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