“The New Adventures of Spatchcock Jones.”— A political allegory. Intro page layout. Text reads: This is a tale of woe, of loss, of sadness and of anger.
In a distant nation a political experiment fails, frightening changes take place that cannot be stopped ... I do not know — I cannot rightly say — how they first came to be here.
What can be known exists as a unitary whole. In order to "know" we must segregate and deconstruct manageable portions. I suspect at some point in our species past the same priestess could have also been the doctor, the dancer the visual artist etc., but in the world we live in today disciplines are much more discrete and separate.
Jayeeta Basu's lab is doing basic science seeking to understand how older memories influence the formation of new memories. Though I understand that much of what she is observing is biochemical and electrochemical in nature, I can not help but reflect on how these phenomena relate to my conscience experience of the world.
For this project I decided to work with light, shadow and motion because these elements are, at once, ephemeral and persistent. I tried not to be illustrative in my approach but when I look at the result I think that the interaction of object, shadow, and the video record of a previous shadow; all begin to work as an apt, if somewhat loose, metaphor for the relationship of memory and experience.
The Ligo Project has been an opportunity for me to observe and experience scientific inquiry first hand. In many ways the lab felt like a studio, and the technique of making experimental results more comprehensible through the use of beautiful images or compelling narratives feels like what artists do when, at the end of the creative process, we produce an aesthetically pleasing object.
