a seemingly (un)important occurence...

Thursday morning was unlike any other morning...

the way the furniture is situated in my room is that whilst reclining in bed I and able to extend my arms and reach to obtain any one of the expanse amounts of items on my desk, including my laptop... at approximately 5:20am while shifting in position... i caused my pillows to moved, which consequently knocked over a tall glass of water... before i realized what had happened my poor computer was immersed with water... seizing my computer and immediately attempting to shake it dry... i watched as the blue lit 'on' button slowly flickered then faded off.. as did the screen immediately after...

thus followed the desperate attempts to thoroughly dry and revive... through broken sobs i continually blow dried and wrapped a towel around my computer... i also took this as an opportunity to thoroughly clean in between the keys... i'm sure my computer was not too fond of being as dirty as i had let it become ... and i was willing to do anything in an attempt to coerce this thing back to life... which really intrigues me in retrospect...

The almost death of my computer was almost like and felt like it was the death of another person or being... the time i spend on my computer is insane... It has been said that people interact with their cell phones more than they do with any one person... which is not only fascinatingly true... but incredible... because not only do we use our phones as communication to talk to people we continually check them for the time, set alarms, use them as planners, type and send text messages to other people... machines are extremely crucial and inevitably will be interacted with multiple times through out the course of our day...

Its nuts to think about how much time i spend with my computer... and to think how much this machine is like a best friend... just by going on my computer you could find out so much about me... through my music, typed documents, photographs, artwork, video, etc... and my computer has gone through and been to alot of places with me ...its fascinating how when i recounted the seemingly destruction of machinery as a 'death in the family' ... because of all the memories my computer has documented... to me it was a seemingly traumatic loss to experience... and im sure that this doesn't hold true to just myself...

this analogy of human to machine... got me thinking... about the whole idea of man/woman vs. machine; man/woman becoming machine; the actions of human mimicking that of a machine; the routine life of a human equated to that of the routine process a machine has been made to carry out...

I have put a lot of thought into this... and have on two occasions created art work expressing this idea... the first being a stop action short film "your bones got a little machine" and an approximately 5'4" plank of wood painted with acryllic paint to reveal the inside of a human vein juxtaposing red blood cells with nuts [and bolts] entitled "in the vein of humanity" ...

i feel like there is something extremely interesting in this and something that can be further explored with in this realm and duality of machine/human...

there is also something extremely interesting in how people and get on a computer or a video game system or any other interactive electronic for that matter... become so immersed in and easily learn and know how to manipulate it... what is also interesting in how both man an machine have a linear duration... that is for life existence ... perhaps on and off could be deemed similar to sleep and awake... or conscious and unconscious... also human error vs. mechanical error...

there is much that can be extracted from this comparison i feel... more to follow...

Edit:

Ken Berman in response to the question: "why machines?"
taken from: http://www.metroactive.com/papers/sonoma/05.29.03/berman-0322.html

"I see them almost as human. Nowadays everything is mechanized, you can't get away from them. Because of that, I see man and machine almost melded. I don't see it as a takeover of human nature, but I see a way for the machines to explain what I see as human nature. I also wanted the pieces to connect, so that they connect into other paintings. The idea is that they could be reassembled and rearranged, and that permeates this avenue of thought."

what I do...

I feel as though I have achieved a certain level of clarity and lucidity within the way I process, understand, conceptualize, and develop thoughts/ideas... Its as if everything is coming together, and that in recontextualizing things I am finally making my own decisions... and in not just making decisions based on caprice or opinion... these are informed... and a direct result of questioning... on 3 different occasions by 3 different people on the same day... coincidence or fate?... regardless... i was instantaneously impacted... "question things... questions will lead to more questions which will lead to answers that will and should yield more questions..." ...this may be meaningless... and a superfluous jumble of words... but for some reason... it stuck out like a sore thumb (i hate cliches)... and try as i might to disregard this imparted wisdom...there will always be that faint trace of a question mark ingrained in my mind... as a result...

Thus far I have been a mental maelstrom... and still i have not experienced the calm after the storm... yet i can still find solace in this tumult... though not staunchly set on a solid path... i feel that pliantly molding to the flux of life has been successful... i'm not sure when but that faint glimmer of beacon in the distance will guide me through the dense fog rolling off the murky waters...

I feel as though I have a hard time saying things... and even more so writing things... i have such high standards and expectations... its hard to free write without striving to be grammatically correct and employing at least one "big" word in every sentence...

Words are important to me... not so much letters because on their own their functionality in a sense becomes futile... its like giving a person a plank of wood and asking them to make a house out of it... its not possible because ... planks (along with a plethora of other various materials)...are necessary in its construction... likewise with words...

last Friday I drove into Wilmington with my good friend, peer, and contemporary Ben Lenoir... It was first Friday in Wilmington, DE... Specifically we went to check out Carrie Ann Baade's Vices and Virtues Exhibition at the DCCA; as well as Ron Longsdorf's exhibition opening at the LoFi Gallery... What stood out the most about that excursion was... not just the great experience, Carrie's Incredible paintings and attire... but some thing she had said ... to the effect of... "I feel that every painting was made for one specific person... every painting has one specific owner..." ... which i felt was an incredible way to look at the relationship between art and viewer... it was as if the painting took on a life of its own... what i found was also interesting occurred when you took the converse of that statement... and instilled a role reversal... every painting inherently has an owner that it was made specifically for, yet unaware at the time... but does every person have a painting...? a painting cant just go out and look for a person ... the person has to find their painting.... but then what if the person is as mindless as the pseudo culture of the society in which we consume...? then that person may either never have their own specific painting... so unlike the paintings that will inevitably all be accounted for... there will be orphaned people who do not have a specific painting...

Just as paintings have specific people... i feel that certain ideas, things, statements, experiences, etc. have specific words... in describing or recounting something to another person... i feel that the communicator needs to be aware that there is always that one word which will be the word that best described something... lets face it ... "i saw a good movie" ... what the hell does that mean?! there are so many better words that can be used to communicate more thoroughly to another person about what you experienced... depending on the person... good has a vast expanse of meanings in which it denotates... good: ... because it was thought provoking?...because it was reminiscent of an experience you had? ...because it made you experience a certain strong emotion? ...when trying to communicate... you must be aware that there is always a better way of thoroughly conveying to your audience what you are experiencing... and maybe... words might not be adequate... which is why I am a visual artist... i communincate in the constructed language of images ... and with in this realm it is my responsibility to find the best possible image to convey and share a certain experience/emotion with my audience/person i am interacting with ...