Michael Tolson: Phage

 
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Artist(s):


Title:


    Phage

Exhibition:


Creation Year:


    1991

Medium:


    installation

Category:


Technical Information:


    Hardware: Silicon Graphics Iris.
    Software: Xaos Tools, written by the artist in the C programming language.

Other Information:


    “PHAGE” from the Greek word phagos meaning “one that eats,” is liter­ally a work in progress, driven by the metaphor of image-as-ecosystem. The title derives from the fact that the visible image at each moment constitutes a snapshot of a population of brushstrokes that is in constant flux, with each stroke, as an independent dynamic entity that is born, evolves and dies, leaving its imprint as it grazes on fields of color, texture, and light. Since these strokes are modifying their environment as they themselves evolve, what results is a non-linear, or “chaotic” system, which will never repeat itself. Apart from the system’s evolving population of strokes, there are ongoing global “geologic” processes of metamor­phosis, erosion, drift, and accretion as well as “atmospheric” processes of changing light and shadow. The image is evolving in real time on a Silicon Graphics 4D workstation, and being output at stan­dard video resolution via a framebuffer.