For()Loop Meditations

Over the past year or so I've been contemplating the meditative lives of computers as I develop a new push-button prayer bead project entitled For()Loop. The installation, in its final form, will use prayer beads to digitally "meditate" on a image, changing the color of the light in the room to the color of each successive pixel of the given image. While I prototype (click here for that whole endeavor) I'm happy to have finally begun a series of supporting drawings!

This first drawing, For()Loop Meditation 0.1 (Prototype), takes the circuit diagram of one such prototype for the pushbutton/LED interface and reimagines it as a cosmological diagram. Similar to my other Meditation drawings, it culminates in a functioning QR code. When scanned, it fills the user's phone with a modulating color, in a sense replicating the functionality of the final installation. Given that the image to be meditated upon in the installation is yet undetermined, I decided to let the drawing itself decide what the pixel colors would be, randomly fading between colors.

Here are some progress shots:

I began with the circuit diagram itself...

...and reconfigured it according to the conventions of many eastern mandalas to make it a circuit diagram cum cosmological diagram:

I then overlaid that sketch onto my drawing and impressed it into the paper beneath, to create lines that would be revealed after rubbing charcoal over the page.

In the spirit of apophasis, the lines are drawn blindly, then revealed by covering them with charcoal, and then erased into to create the spaces for the QR code. Finally I added renderings of the bead prototype, as well as add a bit of color to some of the circuitry aspects (which harkens both to the colorful functionality of the QR code and to the historical symbolism of color in many mystical/occult drawings).

I'm very happy with how it turned out, and even happier to report that it sold at auction this month, to benefit the very worthy Gallery Aferro in Newark, NJ!

I'm looking forward to continuing this series of drawings, and finding a home for the final installation as it develops further!

CLICK HERE to go to the next drawing in this series >>;