Writings — Jelena Berenc

Views on Art and Reality

Lectures on Nothing Real

Disclaimer: The following essays are not scholarly writings nor proper academic research. Rather, they are ideas I have encountered over the years through various scholarly books, literature, conversations, and observations. These ideas have combined to give rise to new thoughts. References and cross-references will not be used formally; instead, I will refer to source names as I recall them at the moment. These writings are derived from thoughts and research that have been incorporated into my art practice.

The essays are written in the way I speak, without human editing. Grammatical and spelling mistakes are not intentional but result from insufficient language comprehension; they are to be recognized, corrected, or ignored by more skillful readers. Please note that some facts, places, characters, and civilizations mentioned may be fictional.

Introduction:

In the ancient civilization of Mitrovia, it was widely accepted that understanding the world around us and within us (one and the same thing) is the only logical and meaningful activity within this short game of life: to discover as much new information as possible. The majority of past knowledge was available to Mitrovians if they wished to use it. Playing this game is how some Mitrovians made sense of an otherwise nonsensical life.

Some Mitrovians chose to play the game but accepted only one ancient view, rejecting any facts that supported new discoveries; they were cold "Platonic cave dwellers." Others, however, believed it is our human responsibility to play the game of life and discover as much new information as possible about this complex and non-intuitive world. The more knowledge we have, the more we can see, and the more complex the game becomes. The professions most valued in this "info-game," and most commonly chosen by curious Mitrovians, were Science and Art, which were collectively called Philosophy, as the term encompassed both. It is interesting to note that professions such as law, politics, business, and banking (most commonly cave dwellers) were among the least regarded due to their materialistic focus. In contrast, the most admired and valued roles were those rooted in unique skill or elaborate knowledge, such as artisans, craftsmen, mechanics, agronomists, farmers, and philosophers.

Mitrovians lived on the Berencian peninsula, approximately in the year 300,026 since the beginning of the species.

The following may contain names of artists or scientists with whom readers may or may not be familiar. Fortunately, they are all well-documented on Google servers and are easily accessible via the Google search feature.

All essays that follow are copies of the original lectures taught at the Mitrovian University of Philosophy by the Professor of Art Philosophy.

Many readers will experience strong feelings and specific thoughts of disagreement throughout. Keep in mind that any fact is only valid within a limited time scale. Every fact has an expiration date before a new, more comprehensive fact emerges. Once there was Euclid, but then came Gauss, Bolyai, and Lobachevsky. This type of disagreement is of the highest value as it contributes to progression. However, there is another type of disagreement: that brought by cave dwellers whose eyes have adjusted to the darkness of ancient beliefs, where any new vision angers them and is rejected.

Furthermore, anything can be explained from an infinite number of statements and opposing views due to the informational complexity of existence. Every statement, observation, and question is followed by an altered or opposing one. Hence, your disagreement with a specific statement will likely be short-lived even within these pages, as there is always an "unless" or "however."

Lecture #1: Methodology

Art History

There are four classical levels of Art History.

Level 1: Somatic Art

Somatic Art is representational art of superficial appearances, devoid of any significant substance. This is an agreed-upon reality deprived of individual perception. New ideas are nonexistent, or there are only timid hints of ideas hiding behind apparent symbols. The subject matter, technique, etc., within Level 1 Art is concerned only with logistics. It is Utility Art. Mimicking superficial appearances or repeating well established iconography, without individual views, characterizes this period. Utility Art includes all art from prehistory to the late 19th century. This category includes abstract Islamic art and World Art.

If an art piece is concerned only with its aesthetic appearance, spiritual beliefs, or the imitation of the apparent world, it holds a certain measure of satisfaction where artist and viewer benefit from consuming a good. Somatic Art is useful, profitable, and beneficial for promoting various religions, high-status humans, and ideologies, but at its core, it consists only of the physicality of aesthetic appearance. Somatic Art follows the language of the localized society—their symbols, narratives, aestheticism, and iconography. An artist is a skilled craftsperson, an executor of social cognition and norms. Individualized perceptions, even if present, must be hidden behind and within the aesthetic craft and social symbols.

Somatic Art is Propaganda Art, or as Joseph Kosuth called it, "Furniture." Level 1 Art is equivalent to Newtonian physics; it is based on physical appearances.

Level 2: Cognitive Art

Cognitive Art is Idea-Based Art that begins with Marcel Duchamp, Dada, and Conceptualism. Cognitive Art is equivalent to Quantum Dynamics.

Impressionism, Post-Expressionism, Fauvism, and all movements between Impressionism and Duchamp fall under the Transitional State between Level 1 and Level 2 Art. Those movements are still classical Somatic, but they do evoke a new understanding of the world; hence, they are equivalent to Einstein's theory of relativity.

Level 3: Empirical Art

Empirical Art is Process-Based Art. The rational process of Empirical Art follows the strict methodology of the scientific experiment. However, unlike an experiment whose goal is the proof of an idea, process-based Art is only concerned with re-experiencing the idea to understand it fully, or letting the phenomenon document itself.

The process of an art piece depends heavily on the Quality of Information that must be collected through relevant research. Empirical Art is equivalent to CERN, Fermilab, SLAC, Argonne, etc., where ideas are tested and proven while allowing the phenomenon to be documented.

Level 4: Information Realism : It from Bit to Bit

Wheeler’s “it from bit” , and I would add “to bit” :

Artpiece, IT, is derived from informational relations, BIT, from which, then, informational interpretation emerges. An art piece is defined through its structural, informational properties rather than its material substance.

Information realism in philosophy and physics, is the ontological view that reality is fundamentally composed of interacting informational entities rather than physical matter, positing that "information" is the foundational, mind-independent substance of the universe. John Wheeler suggests that every physical entity (the "it") derives its existence from information, "It from Bit". Similarly, Luciano Floridi, proposes that the world is a totality of informational objects interacting with each other, defining reality through its structural, informational properties rather than its material substance.

We move from the physical to the cognitive, to a merger of both in Empirical Art , and finally to information based Art. What is next? Science seeks the unification of classical and quantum theories through loop quantum theory or something similar. If we follow the evolution of Art instead of Science, we would easily conclude that the next step is not unification or a missing link, but a whole new theory—a whole new approach to Art practice. When quantum thermodynamics was proven, even experts were challenged in their understanding. Similarly, Dada evoked revolutionary confusion among artists. A hundred years later, in our present time, these new ways of thinking have been accepted as the norm and are no longer confusing.

As soon as humans get used to new ways of thinking, when we accept and become comfortable with new ways of looking at the world, it is time for brand new, non-intuitive ideas to arrive and disturb our understanding. Not knowing and not understanding are the only ways for collective and individual consciousness to develop. That uncomfortable state of insecurity is the only state in which creative progression and new knowledge can foster growth.

Perhaps our consciousness is not developed to the degree necessary to comprehend the workings of the universe. Dogs are not capable of comprehending quantum physics or Art in any way, yet they possess parts of consciousness that process smell and feelings that humans could never comprehend. Different consciousnesses see the world in different ways; perhaps we need all of them combined, in addition to new undeveloped ones, to see the whole picture.

The world is more bizarre and strange than physics can ever imagine. This is just the beginning of non-intuitive and nondeterministic understanding. Entropy increases disorder and randomness, and our collective consciousness follows this disorder and illogical way of thinking. After Information Realism, perhaps "Illogical Empiricism" is to follow. Everything is currently deduced via logical thinking. It is time to abandon logic, cause and effect, and determinism, and move on to more complex ways of thinking.

Infosphere and InfoArt

Who are we, and how do we relate to each other?

Luciano Floridi claims that we are all becoming integrated into an "infosphere." The boundaries between our online and offline lives break down. According to Floridi, there have been four revolutions so far. The infosphere is the fourth revolution

1. First Revolution: We are not the center of the Universe. Nicolaus Copernicus, a Polish astronomer and mathematician, proposed the heliocentric model of the solar system, placing the sun at the center instead of the Earth.

2. Second Revolution: We are not a unique species. All species of life have evolved over time from a common ancestor through natural selection (Charles Darwin).

3. Third Revolution: Sigmund Freud revealed that we are not rational but unconscious beings.

4. Fourth Revolution: We are not individuals but agents within a network: the infosphere.

The infosphere is our environment. It deeply affects our understanding of ourselves as agents. We appropriate ourselves as connected informational organisms, or "inforgs." We are interconnected informational organisms among other informational organisms, sharing an informational environment: the infosphere. We are not individuals but rely on the network.

In every department of life, the infosphere has become an environmental force creating and transforming our realities. "Onlife" defines our daily activity: the way we shop, drive, work, learn, care for our health, entertain ourselves, conduct relationships, law, finance, and politics, and even the way we conduct war. Who are we, and how do we relate to each other? Is Art to follow? Is Art not to be individualized, made by an Artist, but by inforgs? Can Art be singular, Geocentric Art? Are Artists the agents of the infosphere? Are Artists just a minuscule part of the informational organism, or have Artists always been the agents of the informational Universe?

It seems that art went from socially acceptable and socially controlled somatic Art, to Individually unique Art, and finally to Infosphere Art which just might be another version of socially acceptable Art just global rather than culturally localized.

Defining Art: Art Aesthetics and Reason

I am not attempting to define what Art “is”, but I will try to explain the Art process.

The most common responses or attempts to define Art are: Art is aesthetics; Art has no practical or functional use; Art is feelings; Art is expression; Art is language. The challenge in finding consensus in explaining Art lies in the sheer ubiquitous nature of Art. In fact, it is Reality that is ubiquitous, and Art is just attempting to make sense of any information that Reality is composed of, reflecting upon it, and making Art ubiquitous as well. Reality manifests Art and vice versa. Art is human-made Reality.

The following quote most perfectly summarizes what Art is. Carlo Rovelli, an Italian theoretical physicist, provided us with the most accurate and poetical explanation of what “Science” is. I have simply replaced the word "Science" with "Art":

"Artistic thinking explores and redraws the world, gradually offering us better and better images of it, teaching us to think in ever more effective ways. Art is a continual exploration of ways of thinking. Its strength is its visionary capacity to demolish preconceived ideas, to reveal new regions of reality, and to construct new and more effective images of the world. This adventure rests upon the entirety of past knowledge, but at its heart is change.

Different fields and theories speak different languages, but essentially, they all offer compatible descriptions of the same underlying phenomenon: Reality. There is only one Reality, and infinite ways of thinking about it, each capturing one element of Reality. Art uses the Art language to capture any element of Reality without being tied to any school of thought or theory. Unlike many specialized fields (with few exceptions, perhaps philosophy), the Art language is not limited but ubiquitous, and may explore any element of reality. Artists are philosophers, journalists, engineers, historians, scientists, and all of the above, depending on the piece. Art instigates free thinking and liberates people from self-inflicted decrees.

Art pieces whose main and only purpose is aesthetics are no more than crafty furniture; something you purchase to match your sofa. This usually involves craftsmanship whose process is based on a manufacturing assembly line. This Somatic Art is Utility Art, or Level 1 Art, as explained above. This is not to say that Art should not and does not have aesthetics as part of it. Of course it does. Nature is aesthetic; hence, Art is too. The difference is that aesthetics or decoration cannot be the only reason for an Art piece's creation. In that case, and only then, it is craft and not Art.

Art is not an object but an epistemological statement, or an inquiry into anything that constitutes our experiences and observations. Art is a continuous reconceptualization of human perception, and consequently, cognition.

Should We Define Art or Explain It?

Art is ubiquitous. It emerges from anything and nothing. Art does not show us a mistaken understanding of the world or a subjective opinion, as some may perceive. Instead, it presents the way our human understanding of the world is being constructed. It makes us aware of constructing meaning rather than receiving preconceived and established information. Art presents possible models of how our understanding of the world could be. Art is not limiting in any way. All materials and mediums are at its disposal; all possible ideas, existing and yet to be discovered, are available with which to explore the world, our relationship to the world, and make sense of it.

From the very first cave painting to the present, art is what separates humans from other animals. In the La Pasiega cave in Spain, scientists have found a ladder shape made of red horizontal and vertical lines. The artwork dates to more than 64,000 years ago, suggesting Neanderthals created it. In Maltravieso Cave in Spain, three hand stencils on a wall have been dated to at least 66,000 years ago, also suggesting they were left by Neanderthals. However, there is also a possibility that modern humans reached Europe tens of thousands of years earlier than previously thought. The world's oldest known cave painting made by humans is a life-sized picture of a wild pig, made at least 45,500 years ago in Indonesia.

The urge to understand the world, reality, and our relation to it is what has propelled Homo sapiens to a modern age and distinguished us from other animals. Why would early humans create art, a seemingly useless activity, when they should be minding their survival and building functional tools? Because making sense of the world precedes using and altering that very same world. Thinking precedes doing. Art is thinking. It is philosophy. Art is an essential and obligatory part of human progression. Art makes us aware of things-in-the-world. The more we are aware of, the more we know, and the larger the world becomes. Knowledge expands our physical reality, which I will expand upon. Creativity, curiosity, the ability to see the unseen, and the urge to understand are part of the art process. Because it is materialized as a physical, tactile entity, Art provokes creativity, curiosity, thinking, and awareness in others. Art, I will say it again, instigates free thinking and liberates people from self-inflicted decrees.

After a thousand years of the decline of European civilization and intellectual inexistence, it took the influence of artists to change it all. In the 15th century, the Medici family supported Ghiberti, Brunelleschi, Donatello, Fra Angelico, Michelangelo, Raphael, and Leonardo da Vinci. Besides art and architecture, the Medici supported scientists like Galileo Galilei. Art and science have different methods and use different languages, but essentially the same creative and cognitive processes are required for the creation of either. Art and science go hand in hand and feed off each other.

In 15th-century Europe, seemingly useless vanity objects produced by artists and the heretical belief that the Earth revolves around the sun (proven by Nicolaus Copernicus and Galileo, even though Aristarchus of Samos in the 3rd century BC used mathematics to prove the heliocentric theory) ignited intellectual freedoms and the spread of reason. Not even Girolamo Savonarola, who destroyed and burned numerous art pieces in the name of his religious ideology, could stop this. The reform was inevitable across Europe. Even if Art was useless vanity (which it was not), it brought a liberation of free thinking that began a landslide of religious, scientific, and artistic reforms. Moreover, this exponential progress is still propagating, one would hope.

When we are within the Dark Ages, within a cave, our eyes adjust, and we are no longer capable of perceiving the situation we are in. We should never again have to rediscover that which has already been discovered in the past. The potential power that Art institutions have to support the right artists, just as the Medici family did, is a heavy responsibility and a matter of humanity's progress.

Unlike any other field, Art in its most fundamental nature is so encompassing and vast in its universality that it is perhaps somewhat difficult to explain. If we were assigned the task of explaining the entire world, the Universe itself, in one sentence, we would miserably fail, just as we are failing in explaining Art. The universe is too encompassing to be summarized into one definition. Art explains the world, and as such, is as vast and complex as the world itself. Art can explore the world by exploring life, properties of matter, motion, energy, and force, just like Biology, Chemistry, and Physics. But just as well, Art may explore cognition, sociology, politics, culture, emotions, perceptions, aesthetics, imaginations, and pretty much infinite other possibilities through which Art may explore experienced and mind-independent reality. Art is not specialized like the subjects and fields mentioned. Art is not limited by seeing the world only through a specific narrow view of a particular profession but is limitless in the possible ways to explore the world. All possibilities are possible, just like the most fundamental structure of the Universe, according to Physics. Art liberates humanity from self-imposed chains and ideological imprisonment. Art's purpose is to advance humanity.

In a narrow sense, Art is the philosophical exploration of the world and its recreation, metaphorically, symbolically, or objectively. Every time a piece is created, the Artist creates a new reality within the collectively experienced reality. By doing so, the Artist not only explores the existing collectively experienced reality for the sake of understanding and/or being aware of a particular part of it but, through this process of exploring—through the physical activity of creating the Art piece—the Artist creates a new reality. In a sense, Artists are like mini-gods constantly creating new sub-universes that adhere to the same or similar laws as the collectively experienced reality. This is the power of Art: the infinity of possible creations, limited by absolutely nothing other than our own intellect. The Universe is just one big Art piece; within it, artists continuously keep recreating small sub-universes with each new art piece.

Artists must understand, fully, the reality that they are recreating. One thing that unifies all humans from the very beginning of our species is the urge for understanding Reality. First, religion, mythology, science, and art have been, each in their own way, trying to understand Reality: seen and unseen, known and unknown, presentations and representations. Every art piece that has ever been created is a self-portrait of reality. In the following pages, I will explore the most fundamental nature of Art processes, its relation to reality, and the relationship to the world as an Artist.

Why Do We Make Art?

Free will and freedom might be debatable concepts. From the moment we wake up to the moment we fall asleep, our decisions are ruled by others, our own necessities, societal rules, laws of physics, responsibilities, and physiological body constraints. Freedom and free will seem like foreign concepts and impossibilities. But, in moments of Art creation, during the Art process, Artists create their own Universe: the Universe of an Art piece. Within this universe, Artists are unequivocally free to make any decision and experience ultimate freedom. Creating an Art piece requires perpetual decision-making, but because the Artist is the only person making the rules and/or changing them, the Artist experiences the ultimate freedom of free will. This feeling of freedom is impossible to experience in daily life, and once experienced, it is absolutely addictive.

Why Art Matters

Artists decontextualize Reality. Every time Artists make a piece, they reinvent thoughts, perceptions, and the way we connote and denote the world around us and ourselves. Artists do not belong to any school of thought but live in a perpetual state of decontextualizing ways of thinking. Perceptions become tangible. Art does not give us answers like science does—that is true—but it questions Reality and our perceptions of it. The capacity to perceive the world in a new way is not impractical, naive, or idealistic; it is at the heart of any humankind's revolutionary progression through history. This makes Art the most important factor for humankind's progression and incomparably more pragmatic and useful than any other way of thinking, including science.

Process and Information Realism

Asking questions is a fundamental nature of humans that helps us understand the world around and within us. It all starts with perceptions, not only visual but, more importantly, cognitive perceptions. In order to gain a better understanding of the world, some humans set up experiments to test their cognitive perceptions, while others set up an Art process to understand it. Either way, it all starts with questioning perceptions. The best way to learn is to interact with Reality while seeking to understand it and reconceptualizing preconceived notions.

Each Art piece is a mini-universe adhering, fundamentally, to the same laws as the Universe. The most intriguing part about Art is its process, which, from my experience, emulates the most fundamental concepts of Information Theory and Quantum Mechanics, such as superposition (a quantum state can be in multiple states at the same time, a cloud of possibility), eigenstates (the observable state of the system right after the measurement, collapse of the cloud of possibility into one state), entanglement (two subatomic particles can be linked to each other even at large distances), and the act of quantum measurement (collapse of the cloud of possibilities into eigenstates). Information creates matter the same way an Artist creates an Art piece.

On an elementary level, the Universe is made of events, relations, and interactions, as quantum mechanics has proven. Art is made of processes, relations, and interactions. The brain that conjures an art piece, the body that physically creates it, and the art piece itself exist according to identical principles as the particles that make them. The most fundamental structure of the Universe is no different than the Art process. This parallel between the fundamental workings of the Universe and the Art process is the underlying theme of all that follows.

10⁻²⁵ seconds after the Big Bang, at 10¹⁵ degrees Kelvin, particles materialized from pure energy. Artists, within much friendlier conditions, materialize marks from their own energy, consequently creating the new universe of the Art piece.

To trust any artistic ideas, we must test them against experience, just as in science—measurements are performed to test theoretical ideas. Through Art processes, artists experience the questions to understand the answers; scientists build an experiment to confirm the answer. Both Art and Science bring new thoughts to the world, and as such, they are equally practical and necessary for the progression of humanity.

For process-based artists, the value of an Art piece is in its process. Once it is complete, the value shifts from personal to public experience. To explain this further, I will use the most reduced form of Art: a pencil mark-making drawing. At the beginning of an art piece, the paper is blank; there are only the Artist's thoughts, a field of sorts, and all conceivable options are possible. The Artist's piece is in a superposition state. As the first random marks are made, they become visible with their own properties or identity—that is, the information they convey. As the marks accumulate, the relations between marks change the individual information of the mark into collective patterns (just like many single photons make an interference pattern—wave-like features in a double-slit experiment). It is as if all the possible ways of drawing the marks have collapsed into the final pattern, an eigenstate. Moreover, marks are in an entangled state with each other since they are correlated and, together, can be treated as a single object.

There is a lot of information stored in a drawing, but it is not stored in the individual marks; it is stored in the correlation between the marks. If you want to "see" the drawing, you have to collectively observe all the marks. A drawing, just like a quantum system, contains or stores a lot of information, but if you look at its parts—a single mark—you cannot see the information; it is just a dot.

To experience, through one's hands, the materialization from randomness to complex deterministic objects is exhilarating. Once it becomes a material object, an Art piece begins a new life where an observer, a viewer, determines its information based on their superposition with it. A viewer, an observer, collapses a cloud of possibilities into ONE (just as an act of measurement of a quantum state yields only an eigenstate out of many). This means an observer, by interacting with the piece, reduces an art piece's meaning to a single state with one well-defined meaning. Every time a measurement is taken, an observation is made, and the eigenstate is different. The more viewers observe the piece, the more possibilities of the piece are revealed. However, as more views are made, revelations are more likely to be alike.

Art is about relations and becoming, not simply being. Hence, it is not an aesthetic, finite object but a field of an indeterministic wave function. On an elementary level, the Universe is made of events, relations, and interactions, as quantum mechanics has proven. Art is made of processes, relations, and interactions.

"Information" connotes and denotes multiple meanings. The word "Information" is used in this case in two ways. First, in its general meaning as a fact or knowledge (wet water, 100,000 heartbeats in a day, etc.), which I will simply call Information. Secondly, information considered as the fundamental physical unit, as a unit of something physical (i.e., a mark) that is encoded in the state of an Art piece's system, like the temperature of water. I will call this an Informational Unit (IU). Through the relations between IUs, an Art piece's system of meaning arises; meaning the Art piece's information is created.

Information Realism (IR) is art that, through its processes and IUs, most accurately captures information from Reality. What is not understood is created so it could be comprehended. Visual art pieces fundamentally present information observed from Reality. When it is in its purity, materialized into visual information by using only basic IUs and their relations, detached from the artist's beliefs, then it is Information Realism. This is to be distinguished from classical realism, which represents the external appearance of a form and gives us no information about the form except the impression of an appearance. IR is not a movement nor an Art group, but individual Art pieces that present information from Reality verbatim.

A successful Art piece is one that carries information about Reality. Art is information. Observing, interpreting, reasoning, and representing reality is the most fundamental urge in humans. The ability to do so—to have abstract thinking abilities, to imagine and recreate—is what separates us somewhat from the rest of the animal kingdom.

Art Philosophy

Philosophy studies the fundamental nature of knowledge, reality, existence, reason, values, mind, and language. Philosophy of art studies the nature of art, such as aesthetics (beauty and taste), expression, interpretation, representation, and form. I would propose a new and updated version of the nature-of-art definition. It is not so much that it changed as it has expanded. Art is the least about aesthetics and form, and mostly, if not entirely, about thinking processes. Art is information-based, where matter (form) is just a consequence of the processes (fields) among and within information.

It seems obvious that philosophy of art is studied externally, by non-artists. How else are we to justify studying art through sheer aesthetics, form, and emotion? Epistemology of Art has been criticized greatly throughout the ages, and disturbingly, contemporary philosophers are continuing the tradition. In 1992, Jerome Stolnitz wrote "On the Cognitive Triviality of Art," arguing that art does not and cannot contribute to knowledge primarily because it does not generate any sort of truth. He goes on to explain why, in his opinion (and not via scientific method), Art's influence on social structure and historical change has been inconsequential. His trivial opinions are exactly what he claims Art to be. If art is trivial because it is not using the scientific method, then was that same scientific method used for his own conclusions about art? Or does his opinion have no value or significance and is just as trivial as art is in his view?

The problem here is that the majority of people who write about art are not artists themselves. They base their opinions on external views of the subject without ever experiencing the process and understanding it. Art is epistemological. My thoughts on the subject are not "philosophy of art" but "Art Philosophy." It is a philosophy of an Artist for an Artist.

Many contemporary Art schools try to minimize, or entirely get rid of, the knowledge of traditional art and insist on conceptually based art. This cannot be done unless educational institutions are willing to teach Art Philosophy. Unlike an artist statement, which is a personal introduction to an artist's work or specific project, Art Philosophy reflects reality and its relation to ourselves. Reality is analyzed ontologically, epistemologically, or through axiological inquiries, not by philosophers but by Artists, who present observations through Art language.

The epistemic fundamental nature of things should be analyzed and correlated with Art processes.

Art Education: Art Learning Methods are Inquiry and Problem-Solving Based

Hypatia, who lived in Alexandria in the 4th century in Egypt, was a philosopher in the good old days when that meant astronomer, mathematician, artist, etc. Hypatia was a very good teacher and believed in the importance of taking small steps; she was sure that everyone had the ability to learn a lot. She tried to really understand what students found difficult. Students are usually put off from doing difficult things because we haven't been taught how to start with the easiest, simplest steps first. If students can't learn something, it is because we didn't explain it well enough for them.

Universal lectures, projects, and due dates have never worked for me as an educator. I may start with a lecture; however, a topic is communicated to each student in a unique way with particular examples that they can relate to. Art teaches us that we all reason slightly differently, and the way I learn is not the same as someone else's. This means we must adjust the way we communicate information to each student individually, which requires a great deal of empathic effort by teachers to try to understand and get to know each student individually. Through the process of me trying to understand how students perceive and reason reality, by asking questions and analyzing their work (critiquing), not only do I get to know the student, but they start to understand themselves better. Usually, this results in an avalanche of self-discovery and empowerment for students.

I must emphasize that when I say that I get to know students well, I mean I know *how* they reason and see the world, and if life experiences have scared them and to what degree, without knowing absolutely none of their specific experiences, which should and must stay private.

Once students are empowered by self-discovery and confidence, they start questioning and rethinking, re-contextualizing the world around them, which becomes incorporated in every art piece they make. This requires a high level of complex critical thinking and integration of diverse knowledge, just like in the good old days when philosophy meant art and science, or should I say, STEAM. Art builds self-confidence; Art leads to self-discovery and empowerment. When we are strong, confident, diverse thinkers, we learn faster no matter the field. Art changes us; as a result, Art can transform our lives.

Art learning as a question-base encourages critical thinking, not technique or craft-base, fostering strong, diverse thinkers in any field. Art is an access point for guiding student inquiry, dialogue, and critical thinking.

Questioning and rethinking the preconceived understanding of things-in-the-world results in new ideas. How do we express and materialize those new ideas and perceptions? Well, an artist's approach is not much different from scientists who set up an experiment. Based on an idea or hypothesis, an artist must think of appropriate materials, mediums, format, installation, time duration of the process, space where the process is taking place, etc., so that every aspect of the process most accurately matches the idea. This requires a high level of problem-solving skill.

Even if we are to talk about traditional approaches, problem-solving is an all-encompassing part of the process. What makes Van Gogh, Rembrandt, Anselm Kiefer, or any other Artist from art history so great is the decisions they made along every millimeter of their piece. Artists' choices and decisions of how much, where, to what degree, and in which particular way are what make an art piece an art piece. Choices are based on how we think, see the world, and how we want to present it.

The art piece starts with an idea, but the rest of it is all about problem-solving and making a decision among an infinite number of possibilities. Artists are quite skillful at solving problems that occur in everyday life and find solutions among an infinite number of solutions. A problem is reasoned like a puzzle to be solved instead of an overwhelming tragedy without a solution. Even if a puzzle is without a solution, artists are good at transforming it into a new puzzle that does have a solution.

In Art schools, we teach tools and the craft of making art objects. In order for Art to get out of its Dark Ages existence, we probably should consider changing our education curriculum. If you can use materials that are only two meters around you to build a house, no matter how creative a person you may happen to be, it will not be great. But if you were to have no limits to how far you go to find materials, you are bound to create a magnificent house. Artists should, like Chemists, discover and create new materials. Scientists have no limitations in how far they would go in search of their ideas. Artists, however, look no further than a few meters away for their ideas. Art education must address these limitations.

Art should learn how to truly observe the world around and things in the world, how to observe the world deeply and not be casual observers.

Art for Cognitive Health

Neuro-Arts is multidisciplinary research on how Arts affect us, giving rise to a field that is radically changing how we understand and translate the power of the Arts.

Art processing is part of the frontal lobe, the sections of the brain responsible for problem-solving, language, managing higher executive functioning, judgment, abstract thought, creativity, planning, and decision-making.

Colette J. Brown, a teaching artist and community health researcher, while working with dementia patients, came up with the following project: pick an object, describe it, rename it so it gives a new thought to the object. One participant renamed the word "Hands" to "Choice." "Hands can be used for good or evil," they explained, "we just have to make a choice." Now we have a new connection in our brain between these two new concepts, hands and choice, which results in neuroplasticity, and our cognitive reserve increases. 'Cognitive reserve' is the idea that people develop a reserve of thinking abilities during their lives. Cognitive reserve is directly connected to the neuroplasticity of the brain.

Art that asks more questions than it gives answers is proven to help improve neuroplasticity and prevent cognitive decline. The majority of people who make art for as little as 45 minutes reduce the stress hormone cortisol, no matter the skill level. People who engaged in the arts were found to have lower mental distress, better mental functioning, and improved quality of life.

Probable Interferences

Fermilab Colloquium, 2026

As a kid I shared a room with my sibling who had monopoly over it, and whose untypical sense for the interior design resulted in walls covered with posters, not of the super stars but real stars, galaxies, and nebulas. We both spent countless hours staring at those walls that transfigured into the infinite unknown worlds, and we both wondered the exact same questions “What in the world is all of this around us?” We both pursued this question and while my sibling’s life is devoted to physics, while mine to art. In the lab full of metal and liquid helium, my sibling sets up experiments to test the question and confirm the answers, while I, in a studio filled with carbon (pencils) and paper, set up an Art process to experience the questions and understand the answers. Both Art and Science question the world; they bring new thoughts to the world, and re-contextualize preconceived ideas and views.

To illustrate this I chose Carlo Rovelli’s quote, an Italian theoretical physicist, that provided us with the most accurate and poetical explanation of what Art is even though he was in fact talking about science, I just replaced the word science with the word art.

“[Artistic] thinking explores and redraws the world, gradually offering us better and better images of it, teaching us to think in ever more effective ways. [Art] is a continual exploration of ways of thinking. Its strength is its visionary capacity to demolish preconceived ideas, to reveal new regions of reality, and to construct new and more effective images of the world. This adventure rests upon the entirety of past knowledge, but at its heart is change.”

Art and Science may use different language but essentially are the same in their attempt to explain the world.

Erwin Schrodinger writes in What is Life? that we have inherited, throughout centuries, the unified, universal, all-embracing knowledge, which is the only one with full credit, however, the depth of knowledge has forced us to branch into specialized limited and narrow focus. Perhaps it is time to go back and attempt to unify some of the knowledge that will give us a more comprehensive view of Reality

Patrick Cavanagh, a co-founded the Vision Sciences Lab at Harvard, and leader in research in visual neuroscience and perception, recognizes that Art is a 40,000-year record of experiments in visual neuroscience that reveals as much about the human brain as it reveals about the world around.

Roberto Zenith, researcher in fluid dynamics and Professor of Engineering at Brown University, have extensively studied David A. Siqueiros and Jackson Pollock’s painting process realizing similarities between the paint technique to flow phenomena in other areas, which have helped explain formation of lava domes on Venus, and the Great Kavir salt desert in Iran.

Rayleigh-Taylor instability.

Professor Zenit recognises that artists manipulate flow of fluids, control instabilities to create patterns, they use Fluid mechanics as a tool for artistic creation while at the same time Art is a Source of inspiration for fluid mechanics.

In his lab professor Zent uses the exact brushes, inks, paint, and paper as I do in my classroom or studio. In my studio I have to learn by repetition and fine adjustment of how I use materials (speed of mark, amount of water and material on brush, surface, angle and pressure of the brush, etc) so I can understand the interaction and behavior of materials so I can willingly be able to repeat and get particular result. Prof. Zenit measures the exact same materials, their speed, angle, type, and amount of paint, and uses math language to explain the measurements so he can understand it and repeat it. Different language, same understanding.

Art that best encompasses these ideas of all-embracing knowledge is, what I like to call Information Realism, the Art that questions reality and shows us the unknown or not so obvious. IR is art that through its processes, through the relations between informational units (marks, brush strokes, etc), allows, most accurately, information from Reality to materialize into an art piece. An artist sets up an art process that allows a phenomenon to be documented by the phenomenon itself. IR presents information from Reality verbatim. IR is to be distinguished from classical realism that represents the external appearance of a form and gives us no information about the form except the Artist’s mimicary of the superficial appearances. Additionally, it is to be distinguished from data visualisation, that just like classical realism is concerned with visual mimicry.

Throughout history I recognise a few different stages of Art.

Level 4: Information Realism : Wheeler’s “it from bit” to bit :

Examples of Information Realism:

El Castillo cave in Spain contains handprints about 40,000 years old. We have direct information of the person’s physicality and actions who 40,000 years ago was present in the cave. The information of their existence at the moment, in the moment, is permanently preserved. This is one of the very first IR.

Similarly, Roman Ondák’s Measuring the Universe begins with an empty gallery space. Gallery attendants mark, with a marker, height, name and date of each visitor who enters the space. As the blank walls transform into a universe of marks, a dense, dark mass congregates at the average height of participants. Measuring the Universe is the most realistic, the most literal, representation of everyone who walked into the space, and who by simply existing in the space, temporarily has transformed that very space. Every name, even if invisible, has permanently defined the current state of the space while existing within the space only for a brief moment, just like the cave handprints. Ghostly trace of a moment in time and its effects. Randomness of the individual height marks has over time accumulated into a wave pattern.

Art movements like Dada and Fluxes liberated Art from physical objects at around the same time Thermodynamics liberated matter into field theory.

Dada, a nonsensical, 20th century European avant-garde art movement, is one of the most intriguing modern Realists. Developed in reaction to World War I, the Dada movement formed in Zürich, Switzerland in 1916. Dada rejected logic, reason, and aestheticism, instead expressing nonsense and irrationality in their works. In the time of WW1 the entire world was using the most rational reasons and arguments, according to them, for justifying behaviors that were the most irrational and ill conceived. The world made no sense and the most realistic representation would be nonsensical art and irrationality, which is exactly what Dada did. Interestingly enough, around the same time Max Planck, Niels Bohr, Louis de Broglie, Paul Dirac, Werner Heisenberg, Wolfgang Pauli, Erwin Schrödinger, to name only a few of the great thinkers, were working on Quantum theory. Quantum Theory, like DADA, at the same time period, seemed not to make sense at first and required a high level of abstract thinking, knowledge, and intellect in order to be understood.

Cornelia Parker is one of the most acclaimed British contemporary artists. In Parker’s work are literal objects, or more accurately, their remains, that have undergone dramatic event of a destruction, making them a documentation of an event frozen in time; an infinitesimal moment permanently tangible, like in Cold Dark Matter: An Exploded View 1991.

Charles Ross’s piece Year of Solar Burns (March 20, 1992–March 20, 1993), 366 painted wooden planks, 10" x 20", with solar burns; consists of burned wooden planks by concentrating sunlight with a lens. The Sun is 150 million km away from our planet Earth. Light travels at 300,000 km/s. It took 8 minutes and 33 seconds for the photons to travel from the surface of the Sun to Earth and burn the wood. The Sun is drawing a portrait of itself. Observation of the phenomenon documented by the phenomenon itself.

Rachel Whiteread makes us aware of things-in-the-world that we experience and are part of, yet are rarely, if ever, consciously aware of. By pouring the concrete inside a building, under the chairs, elevators, etc. she makes air and even more importantly space itself, solid. We exist now in our rooms only because of the space between the walls, we exist within the air, yet how often do we think about space under the table that allows our legs’ comfort. What if the air was solid and we were the air?

William Anastasi would hold a pencil, one in each hand, paper on the lap, and close eyes while taking a ride on the subway train. The movement and vibration of the train would move pencils across the paper creating the Subway Drawings. Even though the rules were the same, the commute, pencils, eyes closed, etc. the drawings are unique and different each time the same ride is repeated. The realistic representation of the phenomenon’s information, in this case a train ride, is documented by the phenomenon itself. Identity of things-in-the-world and experiences are never finite but unique and ever so changing due to the relation to all that is involved with.

Man Ray’s The Gift, 1921, flatiron with brass tacks glued in a column down its center, and Wolfgang Paalen’s Articulated Cloud, 1938, an umbrella crafted from spongy foam, both take an information that defines the object’s identity, reversing it into its opposite. The sponge umbrella denies the object’s intended function by causing water to be absorbed rather than repelled, the same as the flatiron with tacks fails to be flat. Reconstructing Reality makes us aware of Reality.

Personal IR studies and Probable Interferences, which is the name of the show currently in the Fermilab gallery.

John Wheeler suggests that every physical entity (the "it") derives its existence from information, "It from Bit". Similarly, Luciano Floridi, proposes that the world is a totality of informational objects interacting with each other, defining reality through its structural, informational properties rather than its material substance.

Works created for the Probable Interferences attempt to reflect upon the Information theory, and to go beyond mimicking things in nature or visually represent information, but to derive information through Art processes, through interactions. The assigned Information that is derived from the Art process results in structural, physical, or logical arrangements that inform or form the art piece. Many works have dual or multiple assigned information presenting possible different views that interfere but never cancel, instead they amplify the meaning and the artpiece. I wanted to show the unlimited, ubiquitous nature of Art that can derive and apply the information to anything from scientific laws to social structures, consciousness, mathematical constructs, etc.

Any complex state, in this case an Art piece, has a cloud of possibilities, but it is through the interactions that we "collapse" its meaning to a particular state. Every art piece, even though specific, contains many probable interpretations referring not only to the most fundamental quantum nature of things but also that our strong beliefs and views are no more than one of many equally possible views.

Many Worlds Interpretation

20,000 drawings, 2025

Sizes vary from 1”x1” to 60”x130”

Mixed media

It has been well over 100 years and we are still suffering from “long classicality” in terms of quantum physics as Marcus Appleby, mathematical physicist calls it, comparing it to long covid. There are multiple interpretations that are trying to give the narrative of what quantum mechanics is trying to tell us about reality; Many worlds interpretation, objective collapse, relational quantum mechanics, Spontaneous Collapse Theory, Bohemian mechanics, QBism, etc. These theories defer substantially which is remarkable considering that they are trying to interpret the same theory. It is as if we construct the story based on what we want our reality to be and make it consistent with QM. We form our interpretations based on prior beliefs which is not only true of how we see the news, how we interact and communicate with others, but this is also true when it comes to science data, or Art processes. Can we objectively look at information and let that dictate our interpretations rather than our prior beliefs or what we are told to believe dictating it. Can a rational person be so disjoint from their ego and prior experiences, go in without preconception, and let only data speak?

In Many Worlds interpretation piece 20,000 drawings are drawn without any limitation regarding format, material, and subject matter. Each drawing is numbered. Only some drawings are installed onto the available walls while others are left two plexiglass boxes on the pedestals. Drawings that are installed onto the walls are randomly chosen from the pile as well as the drawings with a significantly important number related to particle physics, i.e. the bottom quark mass is 4.183 GeV/c^2 so the 4183rd drawing is installed onto the wall. Every wall has its own unique label interpreting the piece partially and differently. Additionally, every month the installation will be replaced with a new set of drawings while labels will stay the same.

Complex systems with a large amount of information, visible and invisible, result in multiple interpretations depending on the context and our interpretation. Depending on the observer's interaction and context the Artpiece can be split into multiple interpretations, hence the title reference to the Hugh Everett III many worlds interpretation. Each of the statements collapse the Artpiece’s meaning into a single state, losing the information about its superposition. Viewers being exposed to a particular statement will interpret the piece that way. How much is our view of the universe influenced by the previous interpretations?

Time : Order : Disorder, 2026

16” x 16”

Clay board and string

Two clay boards are connected with strings. On the first panel strings emerge from a perfectly arranged grid and connect randomly with the second panel.

The universe progresses from order to disorder, following the Second Law of Thermodynamics, Entropy and the concept of entropy, which provides a one-way direction for time.

While one may follow a single string and believe they are on a straight path—much like others around them—the collective result is random and far from the original perfect grid. In complex systems where multiple simultaneous timelines interact, disorder emerges as a result of individual choices. Is it possible to step back, view the universe as a whole, and attempt to straighten our paths? Or are we simply too close to our own strings to notice they are no longer straight?

Probability, 2025

String and Marker on Paper

h40.25” x w41.25”

Process: String is randomly dropped 100 times onto the paper and traced with pencil. The traced line is covered with the dot marks. Approximately 90,000 marks.

Interpretation: Randomly determined waves dictate the individual marks localization. The more waves accumulate, the more interference patterns appear. From randomness to determinism. Once the interaction between string, paper and gravity happens, all the random possibilities result in an interference pattern. Observing an individual mark (particle) has a determinate, definite value, an eigenstate. Additionally, the piece’s process evokes de Broglie-Bohm theory, a deterministic interpretation of quantum mechanics where point-like particles are guided by a wave function, as well as the interference patterns of the double slit experiment.

The Art Interpretation: Individual marks follow strictly the random path. As individuals we follow strictly predetermined parts yet they are as random as any other ones. The more random paths there are, the more we cross and interfere. Essentially, we choose to live our, seemingly particular, lives yet our paths interfere leading us to the same or similar paths of beliefs, reasoning, and life choices. Randomness forms individualism which through interference results in deterministic herd-thinking/behavior.

Dual interpretation: Art does not mimic nature but is an integral part of it, that has a power to interpret and perceive correlations within and of Nature as a whole, without narrowing view to the particular parts of Nature. A good physicist does the same. Art and Science interfere resulting in the same path of trying to understand the Universe.

Hidden Perceptions I, 2026

Each of 16 14” x 10”

Tracing paper, carbon paper, empty mechanical pencil

Write continuous thoughts on the two layers of tracing paper and carbon paper in between. The whole time while writing the marks are invisible and can only be viewed after the sheet is complete as the carbon paper transfers the writing marks.

Some of the very complex information is invisible but the effect of it materializes something else into existence. The examples are numerous from the Higgs field, Dark matter, neutrinos, virtual particles or quantum fields, to our daily actions and choices. Attempting to decipher the invisible information is difficult, however defining something through its effects makes the invisible tangible.

Hidden Perceptions II, 2026

Each of 16 14” x 10”

Carbon paper

An Art process of Hidden Perceptions I consisted of writing continuous thoughts on the two layers of tracing paper and carbon paper in between. The whole time while writing the marks are invisible and can only be viewed after the sheet is complete as the carbon paper transfers the writing marks. Through the process the carbon paper initially used only as a tool, as a field through which the information will materialize, becomes its own Artpiece with its own meaning. When exposed to the light, hence installed on the window, the traces of the writing marks are clearly visible.

Through the interactions the carbon paper was altered by the forces, materializing the information but in reverse (white marks on black). From invisible forces (top layer tracing paper covered with blank pencil), to partially visible information (carbon paper visible only with the lite source going through), and finally to the clearly visible materialized information (bottom layer of the tracing paper with the carbon transfer on it).

Straight line : Free will, 2026

Each of 20 10” x 14”

Paper, wood stain, white marker

Paper is uniformly covered with the woodstain. After drawing two straight white lines with a ruler and a marker, paper is crumpled.

Does a straight line appear straight? Can a true identity ever be what it is or is it defined by the state of the other identities?
Our state of being, our attempts and actions are altered by other forces, visible and invisible, by the laws of physics, society, family, etc.
Einstein’s General Relativity of curved space-time due to gravity.
Dark matter and bending of light through gravitational lensing.

Foundation, Building Blocks, 2026

Installation varies

Used Bricks

Used bricks collected from different Chicago neighborhoods. Trace them onto the wall in an arrangement resembling the standard particle model. Crash the bricks onsite and install them on the pedestal in front of the wall drawing.

Indeterminism, 2022/2026

Drawing and prints each: h100” x w100”

Paper, mixed media

Process: After completing 100 drawings of flowers, 10” x 10” each. After the completion, all 100 drawings are photo documented and the originals are cut into 1 x 1 cm squares, a total of 40,000. Cut pieces are randomly reassembled back onto one hundred 10” x 10” pieces. The Giclee prints are printed of the original 100 flower drawings which are then installed on the wall next to the cut pieces. For 40,000 there are 2.1x10166,713 possible rearrangement possibilities (40,000 factorial which is 21 followed b y the 166,712 zeros).

What is the difference between determinism versus indeterminism and how is it expressed in reality? On the most fundamental level the world is made out of randomness, uncertainty, which, through interactions, causes the deterministic reality. Are randomly assembled small drawing pieces going to create new patterns, containing all together a new meaning? Is the world no more than absolute randomness with the human mind assigning the deterministic patterns to it? Is determinism nothing more than a human way of making sense of reality?

If we have the information of the specific recognizable imagery, flowers, but presented in random bits (cut drawings and randomly reassembled) would we visually be recreating the familiar patterns, creating new patterns, or would we only see randomness? Would randomness create wave patterns and clumps of more and less material, or would it be even? What is the state of disorder, the entropy, and order? How do we perceive order versus disorder?

Universe, 2022/2026

Liquid charcoal on paper

Universe is a wall size installation mosaicked by the small textured charcoal drawings. The mosaicked installation is in the shape of an oval resembling the current imagery of the Cosmic Background Radiation and Map of the visible Universe. One small drawing has two minuscule figures drawn, practically invisible, symbolizing humanity. The figures are independently looking down. There is no order to the drawing tiles, hence every time the piece is installed it is in different random order and visually different.

The process: Liquid charcoal and water are applied first onto the paper. Charcoal pencil is used at the end to emphasize already created textures. The charcoal creates textures by following the paper’s surface texture and water, accumulating more or less in different areas, resulting in 3D implied visual space. There is a correlation between the drawing creation process and that of the visible Universe. Superficially looking, paper and water are an invisible and insignificant part of the drawing, considering that we observe and are interested in a drawing's appearance and not the surface it is on. However, the blank paper and water are an invisible scaffolding that dictates where the charcoal will collect, consequently the appearance of the drawing at the end. The Universe is mostly made of Dark Energy (71.4%) and Dark Matter (24%), which has a strong influence on its structure and evolution, and affects the universe on the largest scales. Dark matter is invisible (it does not interact with the electromagnetic field) yet determines the structure, just like paper does. Water mysteriously forces charcoal matter to move and collect, causing it to spread/expand.

7 days of self portraits, 2024

Each day draws a number of marks equal to the number of days alive (17,354, 17,355, etc) on plexiglass. What pattern will appear? Will there be a pattern where marks clump up together or are absent. Who are we if we repeat ourselves, can we repeat or are we slightly different every day? Does our past, our memories appear differently to us daily as it marges with the previous layers? ......

1,000,000, 2005

170” x 41”

Pen on paper

Process: Draw one million bricks.

The piece: What is One million?

John von Neumann was a Hungarian-American mathematician, physicist, computer scientist, engineer and polymath. “How can we make something of long duration from parts that are very short lived? How something that is perfect could be constructed out of imperfect components? This is the basis of living systems.”

Any individual mark, in this case about 1/8”, carries its own imperfection. Any of one million marks would be invisible by itself, insignificant. Nevertheless, one million of insignificant imperfections, together as a whole, give rise to the massive wall (the part and the whole are rectangular in shape).

Probability, States of Information, 2026

68” x 52”

Paper, oil paint, house paint, gesso, and 12 pencils

This work utilizes twelve pencils to represent the twelve fermions of matter, used simultaneously to record continuous thoughts. Each pencil varies in grade from 6H to 9B. Four distinct materials, representing bosons as force carriers, are applied unevenly across the paper. The paper functions like the Higgs field, providing the foundation that allows these materials to interact and materialize.

While all pencils are used simultaneously to convey the same information, the resulting traces vary greatly based on their specific energy levels—determined by the pressure and angle with which they were held—and their interaction with surface materials like oil paint or gesso; interacting fields creating the material world.

Ultimately, this process reflects how our thoughts, however unique, are continuously molded by the environments with which they interact.

Book of Knowledge, 1,000 pages, 500,000 bits of mark information, 2021

Marker on paper

8.5” x 5.5” x 3.5”

Process: 1,000 page book has a total of 4% filled-in pages with the bits while the rest is blank, corresponding to the 4% of the known about the Universe, and 96% of the unknown. Filled in pages are fragmented and at the beginning of the book just like our collective knowledge of any subject is fragmented and missing. Estimate of 500,000 mark bits.

Knowledge helps us see, understand the state of our being and ultimately Be in Reality. Currently all that is known in the Universe, neutrons, protons, and electrons that make up everything we can see accounts for only about 4% of the mass and energy of the Universe. About 70% of the Universe is what is dark energy; about 26% is dark matter, and this 96% is unknown. All that humanity has ever discovered and learned accounts for 4% of the Universe. There is 96% that we know that we do not know. How much more is there that we do not know that we do not know? Is our consciousness not complex enough to see the unknown even though we are staring at the answers? Knowing the unknown is incomparably much more real than not knowing at all.

Mark-in-time, 2020

Pencil and Marker on paper

2.75” x 2.75”, Each of 365

Process: Paper is field with 1440 marks daily, number of minutes in 24 hours. 365 pieces of paper in total, one for each day in a year. Colored-in is the number of awake minutes daily.

The piece: Being aware of every minute of existence makes one experience the relativity of the time arrow perception.

Life:Death, 2010 redone 2018

Pencil on paper

h68” x w30”

Process: The number of marks on each drawing represents the number of daily births (on the right side) and deaths (on the left side) worldwide.

353,015 births

155,520 deaths

The book of all, 10,000 things, 2011/2023

9” x 6”, book thickness 60”

Ink, watercolor, pencil, charcoal on paper

Process: The book of 10,000 things, the book of all, contains 4 sections, 2500 drawings each: plants, stones, animals (including humans), and places.

The Piece: The book is a collection of perceptions, of the world, of being in the world.

Heart Beats, 100,000 marks, 2015

Watercolors on paper

5” x 3.5”

Process: Draw 100,000 watercolor marks in the book which format corresponds to the average heart size. The drawing represents the following fact: The human heart beats about 100,000 times in a day and about 35 million times in a year. During an average lifetime, the human heart will beat more than 2.5 billion times.

Self portrait of them, 2009 updated in 2018

Pen on glass

16” x 16”

Each side of the glass respectively contains the number of marks equal to the days in each of my parents’ lives. 24,622 ; 26,889

Limited view of a self-portrait, 1 mile drawing, 2004/2022

Mixed media

2.25” x 1 mile (1,609 meters or 5,280 feet)

Process: Originally created in 2004, as a kilometer long drawing of portraits, was expanded to a mile long drawing in 2022. The piece is installed on the film reels and the viewer can observe only a few feet at the time as they rewind the reels.

One mile long drawing represents all the possible selves even though the viewer can observe only one or few portraits at the time. They all ARE simultaneously in the superposition existence, that we, or the observer, collapse into one state, one impression of a character at the time. Our perceptual cognition has not yet evolved into complex enough consciousness to be able to comprehend the whole mile of portraits. Until that happens we must do the hard work of rewinding the reel in order to perceive. How much are we not aware of, within and around us?

Self Limitation, Circle, 40hr piece, 2004

Pencil on paper

h67” x w23.25”

Process: The piece began by drawing a spiral-circle with a continuous line for 40 hr. The limitation of the paper format (height of the paper equals physical body height) as well as physical exhaustion led to the circle’s deformation and line breakage.

One has a given amount of potential. One may constantly work hard on developing and building one’s self, but at some point one will reach one’s own limitations (the circle could not expand beyond the paper or physical abilities). However, when a limitation is reached, in order not to stop and go beyond imposed limitations, one must act or be something other than what one has been; the line breaks and deforms. In self development the further one gets, further one is from the self so that the self can be more of the self.

1 line extended, 30 hr., 2004

Pencil on paper

16.25’ x 1.7’

Process: A continuous line is drawn for 30 incessant hours.

The piece: Through the focused durational activity self becomes an observer and observed, simultaneously; one who is experiencing and one who is observing the experiencing self. How much can one extend oneself in 30 hr.?

How do we determine the value of an Art piece?

By applying the information theory, of course. This is the power of fundamental physics, that it can explain anything including Art.

If we take information to be physical and the fundamental bit unit of our reality, as Information Theory predicts, we can explain Art this way as well, I would argue.

We can determine the value of Art simply by determining How probable an art piece is, which determines its information content, and its quality.

The Ancient Greeks suggested that the information content of an event depends only on how probable this event really is. Aristotle argued that the more surprised we are by an event the more information the event carries. This means that information is inversely proportional to probability, meaning events with smaller probability carry more information. In case that an art piece is probable, let's say pure aesthetics, it then does not have much, if any, information content. Let's say realistic painting of a regular cat, not Schrödinger’s, (no mystery if it is dead or alive but a nice fluffy cat) the piece is probable, we know what it is, how it is done, and it is not saying anything new about the cat, therefore, information content is low, if any, the probability contact is higher, and the piece has low or no artistic value. The painting is an Artist’s impression and copy of a superficial appearance of an object, or predictable aesthetics, and no more, it is agreed upon reality without offering us new ways of seeing it. In contrast, Rachel Whiteread’s work or Man Ray’s The Gift is unexpected and consists of a high level of information content, meaning it is a high value Art.

This view I adopt from two of the most brilliant minds, Vlatko Vedral, Professor of Quantum Information Theory at the University of Oxford, and Claude Shannon an engineer and "the father of information theory". After all, physicists and engineers are artists who are very good at math.