entry 2

since being two years out of college and no longer immersed in a printshop environment, my work has had to change and adapt to the simplification of the materials and resources around me. The printshop and BFA community had fostered a collaborative and receptive group of people, and I was proud to be part of that environment. Regularly exchanging ideas and receiving honest feedback became something I deeply missed. At the same time, working in isolation allowed me to move inward and develop a more idiosyncratic mode of research, free from the pressure to constantly explain or verbalize my intentions.

during this period, I began taking inspiration from software developers, particularly their self-directed and autonomous workflows. I became interested in the parallels between developing a piece of software or a game in isolation and building a body of artwork. In both cases, a singular idea is slowly developed over an extended period of time and often remains opaque to an outside viewer until the work is complete. To deepen this connection, I began frequenting the same digital spaces and archival platforms used by developers, drawing source material from areas such as automation, early web development, cybersecurity, and data visualization.

a big inspiration towards my personal interest in data visualization was the work by author edward tufte and the discovery of this pdf of his book called the visual display of quantative information. aside from the images themselves, i think i started to think about how something that previously seemed straight forward was actually incredibly creative and abstract. when recieving a set of data the researcher really has any way to go about how they best want to make that data easily understood by the viewer. that was kind of why i think software developers, particularly wholly indepedent ones, that have to act as salesmen as well as designers and engineers were so cool to me. it kind of made the idea of just making art alone feel kind of dumb, when you could personally delegate and visualize something much greater. at the same time i have a lot of admiration for someone that dedicates their life to a single activity and practice, who's passion is often very infectious and everyone can see how driven they are even if it's to a fault. i dont get a lot of comfort from considering myself a certain thing like a printmaker, or illustrator, or painter, etc. it always kind of feels like an ideal that i don't have a real connection to. but i think it's really beautiful when someone does resonate with calling themselves a particular thing, or finding an identity in that.