I had wanted to create a piece for a while that nods towards one of my favourite films; 2001, and the visual simplicity of the film’s Tycho monolith with its silent, constant presence is obviously a perfect starting point. This is the first of (hopefully) a set of three prints and illustrates the moment immediately following the tragic impact of a small body against the large, omnipresent object.
The first of (hopefully) a set of three prints; the base element of this image started life as a photo of my microwave. I’m not great with microwaves, infact i tend to blow them up, and this one was only three months old when it went.
The unit itself had a very nice unmarked, uncluttered mirror front, which, in its own right, was actually a great piece of produce design and something I didn’t want to commit to the dustbin without at least giving it an aesthetic eulogy. So, to cut a long story short, i took a hammer and smashed it up. Unexpectedly, the mirrored front was plastic and didn’t crack as i assumed it would, instead breaking like shatterproof glass into thousands of pieces all over my kitchen floor.
I had wanted to create a piece for a while that nods towards one of my favourite films; 2001, and the visual simplicity of the film’s Tycho monolith with its silent, constant presence is obviously a perfect starting point. The structure of the 2001 monolith is mathematically relevant with the three sides of the object following a strict ratio based on the squares of the first three integers (1, 2, 3). The monolith is officially described as having a ratio of 1:4:9 with the depth being the smallest of those integers, and the length being the largest. This is an expression of (1×1):(2×2):(3×3). However, researching around, opinion is divided and states that the monolith doesn’t actually conform to this ratio, but instead conforms to the ratio 1:4:13, which incidentally is the same ratio seen in the Montparnasse Tower in Paris. 2001 was released in 1968, construction on the Montparnasse Tower begun in 1969. However, i couldn’t validate that particular opinion over multiple sources, so my monolith follows the original 1:4:9 ratio (or at least, as a flat object, the 4:9 ratio).
My imitation of Kubrick’s Tycho monolith stops there though; it is glossy, has rounded corners and the piece itself illustrates the moment immediately following the tragic impact of a small body against the large, omnipresent object.
Loosely titled ‘The Only Conceivable Outcome of Two Unaligned Ideals’ the piece is an exercise in appreciating the fragility of small things, that no matter how insignificant the latter may appear to the former, every encounter leaves its mark.
The original piece is 75x100cm (9000x12000px), which is also the biggest digital canvas i’ve ever tried to work with, and unfortunately doesn’t show particularly well as a small grab on a site like this.
