Macrophones is one of those art+science projects that starts with a hypothesis and then requires an awful lot of labor getting the whole thing together in order to see if it adds up to anything. On some level, the thought experiment is enough for me—if we could hear low frequency sounds from around the world, would we more directly feel our connection to and through the atmosphere?
STEAM challenges designed by Carol Bier for her teenage grandchildren, adaptable for other age groups. Since the beginning of the pandemic in March 2020, this blog has been updated daily!
I’ve been thinking a lot about play and playfulness here in my residency.
The history of this place is like the fog, thick and enchanted. At one moment we are enveloped in its mystery, its care, the next the sun breaks through and we can see outward again. We are all finding our way in the fog here.
My third day in residence at Djerassi, I join fellow residents Wei and Daiane in their Tai Chi practice. I have only previously tried Tai Chi once, for twenty minutes, when it was part of an employee wellness demonstration years ago. Here on the mountaintop, I decide to try it as a form of exercise. I can’t do my customary lap swims here. I imagine it will be something like yoga. Good for my body, but also meditative.
Dante wrote "Nature is the art of God", and we feel the art of nature here at Djerassi. The old master wrote The Divine Comedy while in exile from his daily responsibilities in Florence, while modern master of science-based fiction Andy Weir (The Martian) channels what Dante called "forza", or the force of action, in his thrillers. I'm feeling a kinship with both authors as I construct my new book Continental Shift during this Leonardo-Djerassi residency in exile.
This year I started to use computer fluid dynamics software, or maybe better said misuse, in my art practice. So far, I have been feeding data from specific environments in technical CFD software, creating a series of simulation situations and then projecting the results back on the very same physical environment (here link to a previous work). The idea of this process was to evoke a transcendental, psychedelic and poetic relationship to the environment by means of technical and quantified imagery.
A little bit about the first performance of the "Harmonic Roots Series" we presented last night in the Artist Barn - with Sebastian Perez and Dasha Lavrennikov .
While writing a novel at Djerassi, I've been drawn sideways to create a phootographic work capturing the creative fire and awe induced by this place.
