Plegado – Desplegado
Realization of a “painting” style work, using the primitive figures of Vera Molnár as a frame and tokens. The goal of this work is to transport the viewer into the diverse culture of board games in a digital artistic piece.
Technical, aesthetic and conceptual development
Molnár, a pioneer of computer-generated art, worked using simple geometric shapes (in her case, squares) and introduced certain changes to each one, whether it was a specific square or how she linked one to the other. His minimalist and captivating style created a series of artistic scenarios in my mind that would later result in an idea that I managed to bring to my work.
In the beginning, Molnár began by imagining that she had a computer, that is, she designed a program by hand by herself, using algorithms that dictated how she should place lines. I tried to follow a similar procedure, imagining a physical board game inside the computer, and, with the help of reference photos, capture it digitally, converting a material game into a digital artistic piece, and using cultural concepts of a person and/or society.
“Culture” is a set of ways of life and customs, in a time and social group, of an artistic, scientific nature, etc., taking this into account, I decided to make a piece that shows one of the most important multiculturalisms that we human beings have, the world of games, specifically “board games”. At first I had my doubts, “can this be transformed into a work of art? Can I turn the “ladies” (example) into an artistic piece?”
“There are no works of art, there are work and practices that we can call artistic. They have to do with significant, affective and cultural production, and they play specific roles in relation to the subjects of experience.”
Furthermore, in the Redefinición writing (mentioned above), Brea stated that “we should compare the work of art to that of dreams, that this production is a formation that induces formations that express, that roughly translate, an unbalanced state of energies.” I took it as a great example, because my creation (although it was not invented through my own dream) was formed by my mind, which expressed a series of ideas through my imaginations, and these were reflected and later transformed into the work.
For the construction of the work I decided to start using a medium dark gray background, after this I built the frame. To form it, I used Molnár’s square structures, creating several squares of different styles manually. Once the frame was made, I chose to make a board-style background inside it, and again I added Molnár’s structures but not as a frame, but as tiles, of course, all in black and white.
Literature
Brea, J. L. (s.f.). José Luis Brea. Wikipedia. https://es.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jos%C3%A9_Luis_Brea
El arte digital. (s.f.). Vera Molnár. https://elartedigital.wordpress.com/artistas/vera-molnar/
Ludilo. (2022). ¿Por qué los juegos de mesa son cultura?. https://www.ludilo.es/blog/por-que-los-juegos-de-mesa-son-cultura/
Rodríguez, A. (2023, julio 14). La historia de Vera Molnár, la pionera del arte generado por computadora que utilizó algoritmos e inteligencia artificial. Xataka México. https://www.xataka.com.mx/otros-1/historia-vera-molnar-pionera-arte-generada-computadora-que-utilizo-algoritmos-inteligencia-artificial
Centre Pompidou. (s.f.). Vera Molnár. https://www.centrepompidou.fr/es/programa/agenda/evento/PA7jRZ5#:~:text=Moln%C3%A1r%2C%20que%20primero%20trabaj%C3%B3%20en,ordenador%20conectado%20a%20un%20pl%C3%B3ter