Filed under: Developing the Process, Duality in God's Nature, Random (Ha!) Thoughts
“God’s Appointment Book for 2-16-09″
I owe a lot to www.random.org for supplying me daily with wonderful “true” random numbers. Their website also provides a copious supply of math philosophy that dumps me pretty quickly into the deep weeds. In reading the ponderings of these high-octane math minds, I can see I’m definitely just skimming the surface of this whole idea, but It’s fun to see what goes into the search for “true” randomness.
One irony I love is that this random number stuff is a great balance of opposites. It’s NUMBERS, right? How more technical and cold and mechanical can you get than that? I view the numbers part of my art as the “control” end of control/chaos, the “head” part of the head/heart balance. But, random.org tells me their numbers are generated “by atmospheric noise,” which I understand as basically radio static picked up from charges in the atmosphere. So, what turns out to be the source of the mechanical, strict control aspect of my artwork? It’s nature! Apparently a machine can’t do as good a job at manufacturing randomness as nature does. Now add on top of this that the Bible says randomness is solely the province of the Creator: Proverbs 16:33 “The lot is cast into the lap, but its every decision is from the LORD.” So is randomness a kind of signature of Deity?
My usual procedure for making my paintings is to set up a canvas on the floor, and cover it with a grid of wooden blocks to act as masks for each cell of the grid. I then go to random.org and have it generate enough numbers for all the blocks, and appropriate digits for what I have planned. For instance, if I have a 20x 20 grid and want to remove 1/5th of the blocks, I’ll have random.org generate 400 digits between 1 and 5, and remove a block every time a “1″ comes up. Instead of printing these integers out and having to look at a piece of paper and remove blocks at the same time, I have my Mac speak the number list to me which leaves both hands free.
The result? I make my paintings by listening to and obeying —quite literally— a voice from the sky.
“God’s Appointment Book for 12-21-09”
I’m continuing work on the 150″ x 70″ canvas, arranging the masking blocks to grade the randomness left to right for the red layer, right to left for the blue layer and exposing the black and yellow layers completely randomly at a 1:3 ratio. I’m spattering very light layers of paint, using a technique I’ve been working on and used on the painting I posted on the “Spatter Obsession” entry. The droplets are coming down great: consistent, small, opaque.
But after a few layers of paint, it’s really hard to see what’s actually happening. Or IF anything’s actually happening. The droplets are so sparse, I can’t see any change to the canvas. Usually it’s a great moment when I lay down a cloud of color and watch it transform everything on the surface. But with so few droplets falling, nothing appears to happen. I’ve had to turn off the radio and actually listen for the droplets to make sure something is actually hitting the canvas.
Something is happening, though—the color is building up, and the very sparse, spread-out block pattern is beginning to show the influence of the red/blue bias I built into the math.
This got me thinking about how slowly and subtly God speaks stuff into being in our lives. An awareness dawns on me and I remember it’s been something I’ve been praying about for a few months. Or I realize I feel certain about something I had big doubts about a few years before. How did it happen? I didn’t see it in process for sure. Maybe instead of trying to see, I have to learn to listen to the colors falling.
