Transformation is a central aspect of all processes,
in nature as well as art, culture, and science.
If you go to the thesaurus Norske synonymer blå ordbok[1] and look up transformation (transformasjon), you will find the words ...
converting (omdanning)
reshaping (omforming)
remaking (omskaping)
and is further referred to ...
change (forvandling)
which is again described with, among other things, the words ...
metamorphosis (metamorfose)
transfiguration (transfigurasjon)
transmutation (transmutasjon)
The prefix trans-[2] itself stands for ...
across (over-)
through (gjennom-)
on the other side of (på den andre siden av)
Transformation refers to a state of change.
From something to something else ...
The first transformation I made was to take the sign-form[*] from the starting point of the numerical material, from the die: the dot. On traditional dice there are dots on each side, which we read as numbers. The number of dots indicates the number. I chose instead to give the dots different sizes.
The choice of dot as a sign-form came from the idea that the transformations should be able to easily be connected to the dice roll project and the numerical material as base material. I am a visual artist and work with visual expressions and visual tools. I am interested in developing a visual sign language that corresponds to the starting point and can be easily understood, or decoded, if one just takes a little time to truly see.
In the very beginning, I worked quite a lot with this sign-form. I combined it, among other things, with photographs – as a kind of visual grid to see the world through. It was a start – to begin getting a little familiar with the material and start experiencing what it was, and what it could be and become over time.
As I gained more experience with the numerical material, the need arose to look more closely at the material itself. That was the beginning of what I am still working on, an exploration of the inherent nature of the numerical material – with a working method that is reminiscent of and could be seen as an artistic parallel to a scientific method and process: collecting data, making observations and experiences, developing an understanding of the material being worked with, and of forms of communication that open up the material and make it visible.
It is important for me to clarify that this happens through the eyes and from the perspective of an artist, as well as in an artistic process which does not always follow facts, but just as often is guided
by strange thoughts, associations,
and perhaps also mis-associations
and other whims – inspiring and creatively fruitful.
Mis-associations
can lead one onto unfamiliar paths,
or back to thoughts one had forgotten but still are relevant or becomes relevant again because of a new situation or a new context.
As time passed my thoughts about time itself grew stronger. How could I bring time into the work without using it concretely, not as, for example,
in video works and animations? These reflections led to the development of
a sign-form with an angled straight line, where the sign-forms are connected in long lines – one for each dice.
A dot is a point in one place. By stretching the dot into a line and giving it
a direction, the gaze of a spectator might begin to move with the line,
and a sense of time and the passage of time can arise in the viewer. It is
a relatively small, but concrete, change in sign-form that gives a quite different perceived experience.
To preserve the distinctiveness of this numerical material,
I use a digital work process to translate the numbers into visual expressions.
Altough the work does not always end up in a digital form,
the experimentation always takes place digitally. This involves manually placing one element at a time in a vector-based drawing program, a process I call ‘digital handicraft’.
This method gives me ample time to become familiar with
the transformation of the material in a very thorough and accurate way.
As more time passed, more thoughts arose about what this numerical material actually is. I experienced it as having a life of its own, a thought
that might not be so strange, considering it is a material I cannot control.
The associations moved in the direction of processes in nature where randomness interacts with rules. For example, how something develops into
a blade of grass, a flower, a bush or a tree – and how one birch tree and another birch tree do not become exactly the same. Something lies in the rule that says what it shall become, something lies in the randomness that make the development of something that is initially the same, nevertheless become different.
How could I give my numerical material an expression that could make this visible – the organic quality of the material, as I experienced it? At the time,
I was reading about evolution and wanted to try using ideas from these readings to further develop the sign-form.
I took the straight line as my starting point, the straight line which in the previous stage had been derived from the dot, and began bending it to see what would happen – would it lead to a more organic expression? I first tried a slight bend of the line, then a more pronounced bend, but I did not quite get it to work. After some trial and error, I eventually ended up with a semicircle as the sign-form and a rule to connect the semicircles to each other at
a 90-degree angle.
With this sign-form and rule, the line begins to wander across the surface in
a relatively unpredictable way, and the expression that arises becomes partly quite figurative and creates associations in a different way than with dots and straight lines.
My experiences with this new sign-form gradually led me to wonder how it might move – in time. For the first time, I wanted to create a work that was actually time-based. I made my first animation. Here, one follows the line progressions of the six dice through one hundred rolls and see how they unfold – roll by roll – all around on the surface.
This animation made me think about what it would be like to be able to see this type of progression in a self-determined time, to somehow freeze time and progression. The idea for my first sculpture arose: To extend a line progression into a three-dimensional space.
What I particularly noticed was the kind of evolution processes where something relatively simple, slowly and gradually develops into something more complex. Evolution can also occur in larger leaps, but it is the process where something almost gradually follows a form of logical progression of something else that I find interesting in terms of further development of the sign-forms.
This sign-form and rule is connected to both the dot/circle from the numbers on the die and the square/cube in the shape of the die itself. This is
a visual form of logic that I find meaningful in relation to the base project. It also appeals to me from a purely visual point of view.
One approach in the transformation process that I have had with me from the very beginning, is to give the numbers visual variables that are related to what numbers are to us, generally speaking. Numbers are used to indicate differences
in terms of length, quantity, size, and the like. It is natural for
me to work with this, to use this language visually, rather than inventing something completely different. I want it to be possible to see how the visual expression connects to the numbers that the expression derives from.
Another approach is the use of geometric shapes such as dot,
straight line, semicircle, and square, which give associations to mathematics and numbers, and in that way also point back
to the dice roll project.
To me, this process of experimentation and further development sets
a domino effect in motion. There are so many ways to see and visualize
a material. The numerical material itself is one form of information (abstract,
but still concrete), the transformation into a surface (drawing) is another,
the transformation into something three-dimensional (sculpture) a third,
and into movement (animation) a fourth.
Some time after I had made my first animation, a desire appeared to make another one.
This time I took hold of an experience from my work with the dot as sign-form: the feeling that the dots are fixed in a grid – there is no movement across the surface. If one looks at the variations in the numerical material from day to day, one can detect a quiet pulse. The dots are in the same place all the time, they do not change position, but they change size.
The desire to see this pulsation probably also came as a result of thoughts about the material as a living thing – if such a term can be used for it.
In this animation, the material consists of transitions from one day to the next over a time strech of three months. It has a length that is sufficient to be set on a loop, so that the loop seems to never repeat – an eternally pulsing situation without any form of pattern formation – similar to the timeless
and always ongoing dice roll project.
My working process often takes the form of a hermeneutic spiral – a sign-form is developed and used, leading on to a new
sign-form that is developed and used. Later, the experience of using one sign-form can lead to new thoughts that bring me
back to an earlier sign-form but then used in a different way.
The process can take the form of a circle, but it does not return to exactly the same point – something has happened along
the way, it has shifted in time and resembles more a spiral.
The same applies to the use of transformation rules. A rule applied to one sign-form can later be used on another – either as it is, or in a slightly modified version. The modified rule can then be applied to yet another sign-form – a new one or an old one
– and in this way, the development can pulsate back and forth.
The online encyclopedia Store norske leksikon, writes the following about the hermeneutic circle/spiral:
Understanding is a central concept in the philosophy of science. […] The hermeneutic circle illustrates how understanding, as a process, moves from an overall understanding through partial understanding to
a new overall understanding. […] The circle can be better depicted as a spiral, because understanding has changed over time, it is not finished. […] The process should be unfinished and open. The one who seeks understanding, shall make his understanding available for change and possible improvements.[3]
In my process, it is the experiences I gain via the
sign-forms and rules that constitute this ‘understanding’.
Thoughts about language, both how language builds meaning and about the purely sonic quality of words, led me to the idea of transforming the numerical material into
a linguistic form. One method starts with a sentence of six words where each word
is associated with a number from 1 to 6. The words are then shuffled around according to the number sequences from the dice roll project. A form of new meaning emerges – or a form of nonsense poetry is created – depending on the words in
the original sentence and how they appear in the new constructed sentences.
The text has the potential to become almost musical in its word-rhythms.
The organic nature of the material led me on to another kind of line form – this time horizontal and with varying line thicknesses. The starting point for this
sign-form is the idea that the numerical material is a kind of genetic material
for the shapes that arise through the artistic transformations of the material.
Here, the lines are equally long, with the thinnest line representing the number
1 and the thickest representing the number 6. The lines are arranged in columns where the column furthest to the left contains numbers from die one, and continuing to the far right where the column contains numbers from die six.
The experience with the horizontal line led me to develop yet another variation of the straight line. I got the idea to take a closer look at a very specific sequence of numerical material: number combinations that contain all six numbers; 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, and 6. I wondered what it would look like.
I went through all the numerical material in the archive, collected these combinations and drew them in the order in which I had received them. I then arranged them in column form – one for each year. At the same time, this made visible how often this type of combination occurs per year, in this project.
The column form meant that I had to make some adjustments to the sign-form, not just in the thickness of the line, but also in its length. I also gave the lines
a moss-green color, from lightest for the number 1 to darkest for the number 6.
The phenomenon of sound waves led me further to a sign-form with waves. Here, the same logical principle is used in the sign-form. Each drawing in a circle is a transformation of one roll of the dice. The drawings are collected in an artist book with transformation of the first roll of each day
– one spread per week throughout an entire year.
My experiences with the semicircles as a sign-form for an organic expression have led me further to other ways of transforming numbers into something that might give associations to nature. It led me back to my earlier ideas about the combinations of randomness and rules as a developing principle in nature.
I returned to the straight lines and angles as sign-forms, but this time with
the number of lines corresponding to the six numbers.
This became the starting point for a systematic investigation of what happens to the results and branchings under different conditions: with the same
sign-form and different numerical material, and by slightly changing the
sign-form for each variant.
I transformed numerical material from the start of each day, but no more than the first four dice rolls, throughout an entire month. The next month, I slightly changed the lengths of the six sign-forms and repeated the procedure with numerical material from this month. The following months, I changed the character shape a little more and repeated the procedure. The result was
five drawings with the figures arranged in a calendar format.
Through the manual dice rolls and the part of my practice that I call digital handicraft,
I experience a kind of rhythm in this numerical material. The rhythm alternates and varies between six different units,
and thoughts arise in me about how this might sound?
I have begun to explore this as well and given it some initial sonic expressions.
In these three works, the starting point is nevertheless visual in the form of drawings with various types of transformations,
and differing degrees of complexity
– which in turn produces different sonic results.
Aleatoric means characterized by chance and comes from the Latin word alea,
which means dice.
An arboretum, from the Latin word arbor
for tree, is a systematic collection of trees and shrubs cultivated outdoors for the purposes of research, education and experimentation.[4]
I often create works in series – carrying out the process of transformation on several, often consecutive, days of numerical material. This is to make visible the variations that arise as a result of the randomness in the numerical material.
Even though I work digitally, with the possibility of multiplying each individual variant, I only make one copy of each. The uniqueness of the numerical material that underlies each individual variant must be retained – also in the finished work.
The transformations are carried out using different sign-forms and rules.
Another aspect of this process is to look even closer at the numerical material – to make a kind of deep dive into it. That is, not just by transforming, but also by seeing what I can find within the material: a process of searching and finding, examining, and discovering – a journey of discovery in the material.
I have also experienced that one and the same die can get the same number several times in a row.
Similar to how I repeat the act of rolling the dice every day, the individual dice are occasionally repeating certain numbers.
Throughout one year, I have every day registered when this happens.
I decided to collect these events for a whole year to have a large amount of material to work with, and to see what new ideas about expression and form they might lead to.
To have something visual to start thinking from, I have initially transformed
this form of ‘extraction’ to dots. What kind of final form – or final forms – this particular extracted material might take will be the subject of testing in a later part of the process.
I have, among other things, wondered about and looked for what is similar from one day to the next.
This curiosity comes from the experience that to transform numbers into dots placed
in a grid, can give a feeling similar to the number combinations – there is just a lot of numbers, just a lot of dots.
Even though the combination possibilities
in the large block of one hundred rolls were enormous, something still had to be the same from day to day. If so, what did this look like?
In this work, numerical material from several days forms the basis for the transformations – one drawing per day.
On the first day, all the numbers are transformed into dots.
The following days numbers are drawn as extract drawings, meaning that only those numbers that are of identical size and in the same position as the numbers from the first day, are transformed into dots.
The result was a series of drawings that are all partly very different but originate from one and the same base material. Many drawings with an organic inner life,
lie latent in the more systematized/constructed single drawing.
My way of working artistically lies in the extension of conceptual art, an art movement that emerged in the mid 1960s.
Contrary to some conceptual artists’ ideas that the artist does not need to
carry out the project as described in the form of a 'recipe' (that the idea and description are enough) or does not need to carry it out themselves
(that someone else can do it) – I insist on doing it myself.
For me, the conceptual is not just about the idea, it is just as much about my time, my presence in the process, my experience in what happens, and my possibility through that to carry the exploration to the next step. It is not only thought, but thinking through action and experience.
If I had left the implementation process to someone else – or something else, for example through pure programming – and only related to the result, I would have missed what unfolds during the process – something that may arouse curiosity and interest in what occurs: That which is there for a short while but perhaps disappears the next moment as the process progresses
– whether it is in the act of rolling the dice and noting the number combinations or transforming the material number by number.
Presence and the gaze are, to me, important factors in the process.
Other central aspects of the conceptual
and transformation processes are ...
methods
frameworks
rules
variations
time
continuity
development
change
diversity
... keywords that have been with me for a long time
in my work as an artist.