{"id":3632,"date":"2011-12-20T17:02:54","date_gmt":"2011-12-20T22:02:54","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/orbittrap.ca\/?p=3632"},"modified":"2011-12-20T17:02:54","modified_gmt":"2011-12-20T22:02:54","slug":"phase-3-the-relentless-pursuit-of-color-shape-and-pattern","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/orbittrap.ca\/?p=3632","title":{"rendered":"Phase 3: The Relentless Pursuit of Color, Shape and Pattern"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"\"

Untitled by Jackson Pollock, 1943<\/p><\/div>\n

\"\"

Shimmering Substance by Jackson Pollock, 1946<\/p><\/div>\n

\"\"

Cobra Chair by Carlo Bugatti, 1902<\/p><\/div>\n

\"\"<\/a>

Wall Piece 2 by Abhidnya Ghuge (Click for full-size)<\/p><\/div>\n

We’ve all watched or taken part in, at sometime or another, that great quest to “define” fractal art.\u00a0 Although few members of the fractal world seem very interested in this sort of “constitutional debate” everyone operates with at least some sort of understanding of a boundary around fractal art.\u00a0 The boundary is where fractal art is combined with or merges into “other” things and becomes something more, or less, than fractal art.\u00a0 There are limits to what we’ll call “fractal” art.<\/p>\n

These “phase” things are attempts to clarify what fractal art is and thereby produce a more energetic approach to it.\u00a0 More energetic because when one is more focused on what it is they’re doing, their efforts usually become intensified.\u00a0 Also when one identifies new areas of the same discipline there is often a burst of creativity.\u00a0 At least that’s why I keep returning to this puzzle of defining fractal art: taking stock of what you have or who you are usually leads to new possibilities and undiscovered resources.<\/p>\n

But another reason is that I don’t think anyone has really put their finger on what exactly fractal art is all about.\u00a0 Strangely enough, I have never thought fractals and fractal geometry was really the heart of fractal art, that is, the thing that people are pursuing when they make and view fractal art.<\/p>\n

Of course not everyone whose work falls in the domain of “fractal” art is motivated by or pursuing the exact same interests.\u00a0 There are some who (possibly) can claim their interest is primarily fractal algorithms and they aren’t interested in art work that might look similar to it but isn’t derived from the rendering of those fractal formulas.\u00a0 But I see this more as a technical, scientific pursuit than an aesthetic one.\u00a0 However, the art world is a pretty broad and eclectic place so maybe an obsession with math graphics qualifies as an art form as much as any of the more obscure art forms of the 20th century did.<\/p>\n

I am not interested in fractals or fractal math, or any of the technical aspects of how algorithmic art forms are made.\u00a0 The underlying mechanics of how algorithmic art is made to me consists of little more than technical trivia.\u00a0 What’s important is the images themselves and discovering new sources.<\/p>\n

What I’m getting at here is the notion that what attracts and drives fractal artists and their audiences is not the pursuit of rendering fractals and the establishment of an art form defined by –and delimited by– fractals, but rather the admiration and pursuit of this intriguing way of creating art works of color, shape and pattern with a computer.\u00a0 Fractals are, so far, the best tools for doing this and as such fractal programs are the thing our mutual interests congregate around.\u00a0 But it’s really those three graphical ingredients: color, shape and pattern; that are the heart of what we do and what drew us to fractals in the first place.<\/p>\n

But who can overlook the incredible story of how fractal images are made?\u00a0 Such simple geometric formulas… repeated a million times… yielding a galaxy-sized panorama of elaborate imagery.\u00a0 But you get over that pretty quickly and soon it’s just playing with parameters and flipping through formulas until you see something that shows some potential –graphical potential– and not some new discovery in the field of fractal rendering.\u00a0 We’re here for the visual thrill; to look at the “pictures”.\u00a0 Fractals are just the only thing the machine will do, and so that’s what we do, and that’s how we label it.<\/p>\n

But I think it’s more accurate, as well as more liberating, to say that what has passed for fractal art all these years and what will live on in the future as fractals compete with other forms of software, is that enduring game of creating art from color, shape and pattern.\u00a0 Fractals themselves I think are a fad and eventually become a trap to those who either forget, or just plain fail to see, that what can be done with fractal software is just a small part of what can be done with graphical software as a whole.\u00a0 There is nothing to be gained by “specializing” in fractals, and in fact, I’d say there’s a lot to be lost and missed out on by doing so.<\/p>\n

We’ve made fractals the subject of the art form when in fact they’re really only the tool and the real subject matter is color, shape and pattern.<\/p>\n

Well, that’s the end of the lecture, but here’s some really good examples of color, shape and pattern in current fractal artwork:<\/p>\n

~Click on images to view full size on original site~<\/em><\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>

Destroy by bib993 (Jeremie Brunet)<\/p><\/div>\n

Is Neo-Pollockian too strong a term to use here?\u00a0 I just found this a few days ago browsing the Deviant Art Fractal feed for recent uploads.\u00a0 I can’t think of a better example of the “abstract, but not really abstract” aspect to works of color, shape and pattern.\u00a0 It also has that strange, endless detail quality to it.\u00a0 There’s a thousands paintings in this one big one ironically named, “Destroy”.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>

Sunturn by DarK--MatteR (Deviant Art) aka Boris Danilevitch<\/p><\/div>\n

New things from old tools!\u00a0 That’s what the relentless pursuit of color, shape and pattern is all about in its highest expression.\u00a0 How many of us have written off “spirals” as exhausted and cliche?.\u00a0 And yet there’s plenty more possibilities as Boris has shown here.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>

X Marks the Spot by element90 (Deviant Art)<\/p><\/div>\n

Old school; maybe more like ancient school: “Classical”.\u00a0 But forget all that and just take a closer look at the patterns.\u00a0 From one side to the other and also from top to bottom, there is no similarity except shapes shifting into each other –a liquid pattern.\u00a0 There’s really nothing retro or primitive about fractal imagery like this.\u00a0 The newer rendering methods and formulas just make different stuff.\u00a0 But in these simple renderings patterns stand out much better and are presented more effectively.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>

Flowabrot-13M by ker2x (Fractalforums.com)<\/p><\/div>\n

I think this was intended to be a test render posted to a thread entitled: “A 3D Buddhabrot with 13 Millions voxel :) “.\u00a0 There’s a YouTube video<\/a> related to it.<\/p>\n

What is so great about this image?\u00a0 The author, Ker2x didn’t even post it to the online gallery and as you can see this is just a screenshot of what I think is his own program Flowabrot (download link<\/a> -Windows).\u00a0 Color and shape is what I find most engaging about this image.\u00a0 But the colors are fairly basic;\u00a0 and yet that oversaturated effect (which comes naturally when using oversaturated colors) is electrifying.\u00a0 The shape is unique and although symmetrical there is enough variation in the edges (a type of pattern, or texture) to make the fairly simple shape engrossing.\u00a0 This is another great example of how fractal tools can really give us an edge in making works of color, shape and pattern, that is, at least when we keep looking for new things to do with them.<\/p>\n

Anyhow, I hope I’ve at least made the idea seem plausible that fractals are the tools and not the subject of fractal art –as strange and contradictory as that may at first sound.\u00a0 The ramifications of this I think are obvious: fractal artists will see and discover new opportunities and get a “second wind”, as marathon runners say, when they begin to see fractals merely as the tool and not the subject of their of their art;\u00a0 an art form that is simply defined as the combination and permutation of three graphical elements: color, shape and pattern.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

We’ve all watched or taken part in, at sometime or another, that great quest to “define” fractal art.\u00a0 Although few members of the fractal world seem very interested in this sort of “constitutional debate” everyone operates with at least some sort of understanding of a boundary around fractal art.\u00a0 The boundary is where fractal art … Continue reading →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":3636,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-3632","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/orbittrap.ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2011\/12\/pollock01.jpg?fit=460%2C362&ssl=1","jetpack-related-posts":[{"id":362,"url":"https:\/\/orbittrap.ca\/?p=362","url_meta":{"origin":3632,"position":0},"title":"Fractal Woodburning","author":"Tim","date":"28 January, 2009","format":false,"excerpt":"I'm not making this up.\u00a0 I went surfing about to see what I could find in the fractal world and lo and behold at Flickr, a couple of pages into a search on the term \"fractal\", I saw wires, boards and strange, curly burn patterns.photo by AetherPhoto caption from Aether's\u2026","rel":"","context":"Similar post","block_context":{"text":"Similar post","link":""},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":248,"url":"https:\/\/orbittrap.ca\/?p=248","url_meta":{"origin":3632,"position":1},"title":"Spider Writing","author":"Tim","date":"10 November, 2007","format":false,"excerpt":"Block-waving is all about lines. If there's no lines, then you just end up with a pile of block-waved mush.I was looking through an old book on my computer. It was a series of scanned, tiff images. I noticed the fine lines in the black and white engravings and instantly\u2026","rel":"","context":"Similar post","block_context":{"text":"Similar post","link":""},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":326,"url":"https:\/\/orbittrap.ca\/?p=326","url_meta":{"origin":3632,"position":2},"title":"Mark Townsend: Son of Pollock!","author":"Tim","date":"4 July, 2008","format":false,"excerpt":"Emergence by Mark Townsend 2006While writing a recent posting, I was Googling to find Mark Townsend's orbit trap works done using the image importer, Sprite, and I surfed head first into a coral reef of Neo-Pollockian Artworks at his gallery site, Fractal Dimentia. Like Odysseus from the old Greek stories,\u2026","rel":"","context":"Similar post","block_context":{"text":"Similar post","link":""},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":410,"url":"https:\/\/orbittrap.ca\/?p=410","url_meta":{"origin":3632,"position":3},"title":"Losers imitate winners","author":"Tim","date":"14 September, 2009","format":false,"excerpt":"One of these is from the Museum of Bad ArtIt occurred to me while browsing some of the greatest art of the 20th century to ask this question: Why don't we see more art like this today?For instance, it ought to be very easy to imitate the famous drip paintings\u2026","rel":"","context":"Similar post","block_context":{"text":"Similar post","link":""},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":419,"url":"https:\/\/orbittrap.ca\/?p=419","url_meta":{"origin":3632,"position":4},"title":"Meanwhile, back at the Academy…","author":"Tim","date":"8 October, 2009","format":false,"excerpt":"lesson_2_atmosphere_isolation_for_janet Click to EnlargeI found this in the Student Galleries section of the Visual Arts Academy.\u00a0 There's no name or date but it's filed in the Ultra Fractal Artistry section of the gallery, a course given by Janet Parke.I like this.\u00a0 In fact, I fished it out of all the\u2026","rel":"","context":"Similar post","block_context":{"text":"Similar post","link":""},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":5625,"url":"https:\/\/orbittrap.ca\/?p=5625","url_meta":{"origin":3632,"position":5},"title":"Place: Where Art and Fractals Overlap","author":"Tim","date":"23 June, 2016","format":false,"excerpt":"As I concluded in my previous posting, there are only two art genres which fractals are capable of contributing to: Abstract Expressionism and Landscape\/Place. Everything else created with the fractal medium is what I would call snapshots: interesting, even fascinating imagery but lacking in expressiveness or the portrayal of a\u2026","rel":"","context":"Similar post","block_context":{"text":"Similar post","link":""},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/orbittrap.ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/06\/pollock.number-8.jpg?fit=1058%2C850&ssl=1&resize=350%2C200","width":350,"height":200,"srcset":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/orbittrap.ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/06\/pollock.number-8.jpg?fit=1058%2C850&ssl=1&resize=350%2C200 1x, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/orbittrap.ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/06\/pollock.number-8.jpg?fit=1058%2C850&ssl=1&resize=525%2C300 1.5x, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/orbittrap.ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/06\/pollock.number-8.jpg?fit=1058%2C850&ssl=1&resize=700%2C400 2x, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/orbittrap.ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/06\/pollock.number-8.jpg?fit=1058%2C850&ssl=1&resize=1050%2C600 3x"},"classes":[]}],"jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/orbittrap.ca\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3632","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/orbittrap.ca\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/orbittrap.ca\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/orbittrap.ca\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/orbittrap.ca\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=3632"}],"version-history":[{"count":10,"href":"https:\/\/orbittrap.ca\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3632\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":3784,"href":"https:\/\/orbittrap.ca\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3632\/revisions\/3784"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/orbittrap.ca\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/3636"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/orbittrap.ca\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=3632"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/orbittrap.ca\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=3632"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/orbittrap.ca\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=3632"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}