Friday, November 6, 2020

Coordinated Chaos


The Coordinated Chaos series has been a wonderful exploration into the hazy line between order and chaos. The idea of the series is that I create a framework and develop a set of design elements. Then I use a random number generator to randomly select the design elements and how they connect within the framework. 

It has been a fascinating exploration. The images appear to have patterns within them, but none really exist- just momentary alignments that the brain can focus on, but overall there is no repeating patterns. 

The series is an exploration of the randomness of the real world. So much of the world is occurring by chance. We humans are excellent at pattern recognition- so good in fact that we can't really turn off this ability and can see patterns where they may not really exist. Our biology and mental capacity evolved to enable us to navigate complex environments of overlapping patterns from the living and naturally shaped world. This system finds patterns wherever it looks, an ability that often lead us astray, seeing patterns where they do not actually exist (ahem, any conspiracy theory...).

One thing I love about this series is how much the designs feel like something you might find in the natural world. They feel familiar but you can't put your finger on what you are seeing...

Here are various versions I've worked on.













I've done this series as sand paintings in the smaller scale. Here is a playlist of videos of me doing that:




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