ARTIFICIAL TREES: PULLING THE FUTURE TOWARDS US

 Artificial Trees: Pulling the Future Towards Us Oil on linen 92 x 112 cm 2021

Read about my new painting below my recent news:

Recent News

A lot has happened in the last few weeks.

The four paintings I had hanging at the Australian Defence College (ADC), Canberra, as part of the College's launch of Arts@ADC are now home. I wrote about the ADC program two posts ago. You can read about it HERE. You can also read about it in an official Department of Defence article by Jess Spry Tacking Defence Issues Creatively. 

There is further news! I was very lucky to meet the Governor General of New Zealand, Her Excellency The Rt Hon Dame Patsy Reddy GNZM, QSO and His Excellency Sir David Gascoigne KNZM, CBE, when they visited the ADC. It was a great opportunity for COL Richard Barrett, Director of the ADC Centre for Leadership and Ethics and founder of Arts@ADC, plus being a sculptor, to speak about his sculptures and Arts@ADC. I was also able to speak about my paintings. Both the Governor General and her husband are keenly interested in the arts, so were a great audience for COL Barrett and me.

L - R Kathryn Brimblecombe-Fox, COL Richard Barrett, Her Excellency The Rt Hon Dame Patsy Reddy GNZM, QSO and His Excellency Sir David Gascoigne KNZM, CBE and CDRE Peter Leavy. COL Barrett is talking about his two sculptures Redacted and Homo ex Machina. You can read about them in this Defence briefing Tackling Defence Issues Creatively  Photo: Lauren Larking Copyright: Commonwealth of Australia

L - R His Excellency Sir David Gascoigne KNZM, CBE, Kathryn Brimblecombe-Fox, Her Excellency The Rt Hon Dame Patsy Reddy GNZM, QSO and CDRE Peter Leavy. Photo: Lauren Larking Copyright: Commonwealth of Australia

I am also super pleased that my paintings have triggered questions and prompted more enquiries about engaging with my work and me. Shall keep you posted.

 

Artificial Trees: Pulling the Future Towards Us

This new painting relates to a previous painting called Not Waiting For The Future (2018) where I respond to the Chief of the Australian Army, Lt Gen Rick Burr's, 2018 Accelerated Warfare: Futures Statement For an Army in Motion. In the last paragraph he wrote We must pull the future towards us rather than wait for it;  

In my new painting I have included a cascading tree-of-life. The foreground depicts a swarm of Loyal Wingman drones* flying over what appears to be farmland planted with rows of some kind of 'crop'. Are the drones swarming 'pests'? However, these radiating lines are, in fact (?), geolocating graphics guiding the drones' flight paths. Fake or artificial trees sprout from this 'landscape'. These trees take on the appearance of computer chip-board circuitry, key enablers of contemporary technology. Three rectangles enclose yellow trees-of-life, indicating that life is being monitored, identified and possibly targeted by surveillance technology. Is another human even watching?

BUT, there appears to be some hope! A branch of the cascading tree-of-life seeks a new path - maybe?

The fake or artificial trees herald a future of technological speed and acceleration, where algorithms, machine learning and AI mediate human life in realms beyond human access. The Pale Blue Dot observes....

Collisions and Accidents?

If we think about Paul Virilio and his theories of speed and accidents - Collisions occur when speed cannot be controlled - what about a collision of the present with the future? 

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* A previous post called Wingman might interest you. 

Update: the Wingman drone is now called the MQ-28 Ghost Bat. You can see more of the Wingman/Ghost Bat drones on my online exhibition  
WINGMAN (MQ-28 GHOST BAT): ONLINE EXHIBITION

Cheers,

Kathryn

ECHOES ACROSS TIME

Echoes Across Time Oil on linen 97 x 115 cm 2020

The COVID-19 pandemic is occupying our thoughts, dominating the media and changing our lives. 

In the midst of thinking about 'pandemic drones' and surveillance, plus thinking about the concurrent and continuing development of militarised drones, such as the RAAF and Boeing joint Loyal Wingman drone project, I felt the need to return to a quieter contemplation.

The result of this quieter contemplation is Echoes Across Time. While it might appear quieter, I still had thoughts about the current pandemic in mind. These thoughts, however, took me on a journey across time to previous pandemics - the Bubonic Plague of the Middle Ages, early nineteenth century cholera pandemics, the Spanish Flu that traumatised people just after World War 1. Paintings, drawing and prints created by artists across time clearly depict the anguish of pandemic, the ravages of illness and the sorrow of death. 

Like war, disease is a thread that weaves its way through human history. But, life continues. Sometimes lessons are learnt, sometimes not. 

Echoes Across Time 

In Echoes Across Time a red tree-of-life stands as a beacon in a ambiguous landscape. This landscape could be time. Below the tree, a pale blue dot could be Earth. The inference is that life as we know it is dependent on our Earthly environment. Another pale dot hovers over a distant horizon. Is this our moon? Or, is it a mirror image of Earth, but without the tree-of-life. If so, why? Is it Earth before life appeared, or is it a future Earth, after life has disappeared? What secrets do the echoes across time reveal?

Human future depends on how we deal with climate change, pandemic and war. That they intersect needs attention. Perhaps listening for and hearing the echoes of the past, and the echoes that bounce back from the future, are worthwhile undertakings. I suggest that art might help! 

Cheers,

Kathryn

STRANGE TIMES AND IMAGINATION

Earth's Pulse Oil on linen 80 x 200 cm 2005

EXISTENTIAL RISK
As regular readers know I am very interested in ideas of existential risk, particularly posed by emerging technologies. I have attended talks and read quite a lot about existential risk generally, and pandemic is one of the risks I am somewhat acquainted with.

AND, here we are in the midst of a corona virus global pandemic.

IMAGINATION
Back in January, when I was preparing for my trip to the UK to attend the Aesthetics of Drone Warfare conference at the University of Sheffield, the corona virus had reared its ugly head in China. By the time I left Australia in early February I was getting worried, so I went overseas with a few masks, alcohol wipes, gloves, nasal sprays and a bar of soap in my handbag. Yes, I was that strange lady wiping her table at the hotel restaurant, opening doors with my elbow, washing my hands vigourously. My young adult children thought I was mad, but they don't now! The motto of this story is, don't dismiss someone with an imagination prone to extrapolating burgeoning negative situations into catastrophe and disaster! Remembering, too, that this someone has studied history and researched topics associated with existential risk for quite awhile.

The role played by informed imagination in times of unfolding catastrophe is an interesting one. A vivid imagination can compel action to be taken, but it can also provoke a paralysis of action. Ultimately fearful reactions to an existing situation, and subsequent imagined thoughts about the future, can be productive or non-productive.

LEADERS
But, what are the benefits or dangers of not having an imagination? Do our leaders need to have  imaginations that responds to data, are informed by a knowledge of history, are open to the expertise of others from across the sciences, social sciences and humanities? Surely an imagination is required to even 'see' how multiple sources of expertise can interact in meaningful ways? Surely an imagination is required to extrapolate future possible outcomes from graphs that map historic and current data? An imagination surely must help determine how intervention can arrest dire trajectories? I would say an imagination is needed in order to undertake logistical planning!

And, ultimately we need people who can imagine a life after pandemic, possibly a life vastly different from pre-pandemic life. And, a reminder, difference does not necessarily mean worse. Nor, does it necessarily mean better. But, it might mean we have a choice. Let's imagine in compassionate ways that are productive and meaningful. Let's imagine in ways that disallow the paralysis of fear. Rather, let fear contribute as a driver rather than a brake.

Compassion oil on linen 100 x 100 2010

Earth's Pulse [top]
This painting, from fifteen years ago, has a graph-like appearance. It 'maps' the pulse of the Earth. How do you think its currently performing?

I exhibited this painting in Abu Dhabi at my 2005 exhibition at the Abu Dhabi Cultural Foundation. A Middle Eastern man dressed is swathes of white robes and a largish head-dress came to the exhibition a few times. I cannot remember which country he came from, but he had fought in Afghanistan. On one visit to the show we had a long conversation that involved discussions about a few of the paintings. When he looked at Earth's Pulse, before even knowing the title of the painting,  he said:

"This reminds me of my own mortality."

Now, I think that demonstrates an imaginative response!

DISTANCING
As a studio-based painter I am used to working alone. With a couple of conferences cancelled I don't have much else to do, but paint...and be online! I am currently working on a painting I will call Machine Unreadable. Please check out my Instagram page for studio photo updates of work in progress. Hopefully, when the pandemic is over, I can get to exhibit some of my paintings!

In the meantime please stay safe, for yourself and others.

Showing Them Our Home Oil on linen 30 x 56 cm 2017

Me, with my three adult daughters. And, Earth, the pale blue dot.

Cheers,
Kathryn

LOYALTY TO EARTH AND HUMANKIND

It's Everything Oil on linen 50 x 50 cm 

Historian, Yuval Noah Harari has written an article, "Moving Beyond Nationalism: Three global problems create a need for loyalty to humankind and to planet Earth", published by The Economist. The three global problems Harari identifies are "nuclear war, climate change and technological disruption." That these three issues require global attention and co-operation is clear. Each pose major risks, even existential risks, to humanity and the planet. Combined, they pose a hellish picture of the future. 

As Harari notes, a retreat into nationalism does not protect nations from risks posed by nuclear war, climate change and technological disruption. He writes "We need to create a global identity and encourage people to be loyal to humankind and to planet Earth in addition to their particular nation."

LOYALTY

I like the idea of being "loyal to humankind and to planet Earth." Regular readers of this blog will know that this kind of sentiment underlies much of my work. My use of the age-old transcultural/religious tree-of-life, depictions of Earth as a pale blue dot, and my use of cosmic perspectives, coupled with visual signs and metaphors of contemporary risks, are attempts to focus attention on humanity and the Earth. Visual questions about militarised technology and the militarise-ability of technology, pose questions about the future of humanity and the planet.

The medium of painting moves thinking away from what artist and writer James Bridle in his fascinating book [do buy it!] The New Dark Age: Technology and the End of the Future calls "computational thinking" eg: data driven computation, computer simulation/modelling. The act of painting and the medium of painting can help remind us of alternative ways of thinking. Ways that may assist us in creating a loyalty to humankind and Earth. Ways that can critique contemporary technology - without using it for creation, exhibition and storage.*     

FOR THE ARRIVAL OF 2019

So, for the arrival of 2019 just a few days away, I have decided to upload a selection of my paintings where, variously, the tree-of-life, the pale blue dot, cosmic perspectives and images of airborne weaponised drones may induce thoughts about loyalty to humankind and Earth. 

* Resistance 

 Future Oil on linen 91 x 102 2015

 Australian Landscape Cutout Oil on linen 55 x 80 cm 2015

This painting is a reflection upon how nationalism might work, or not work, in the 21st century. It reminds us that all nations share the one planet.

 Beacon Oil on linen 92 x 102 2014

The Birth of Landscape oil on linen 138 x 168 cm 2014

A small tree-of-life is cradled by the emergent landscape, at Earth's beginning. Ultimately life, including humankind and the planet are entangled.  

 Pale Blue Dot Oil on linen 120 x 160 cm 2014

Reading/viewing the painting above with the two below triggers a few questions about what kinds of risky anomalies are we not noticing. I propose human imagination can take us to revelatory perspectives.

 Anomaly Detection [No 2] Oil on linen 120 x 180 cm 2017

Anomaly Detection Gouache on paper 56 x 76 cm 2017

Happy New Year,
Kathryn

DRONE SPIRAL 2

Drone Spiral 2 Oil on linen 120 x 160 cm 2018

I have been working on Drone Spiral 2 [above] for some time. I started it last year. And, now I think it is finished. As you can see from the image below, this new painting relates to an earlier work on paper called Drone Spiral. This painting won the inaugural World of Drones Congress, Art Prize, held last year here in Brisbane. The organisers are gearing up for the WOD2018 congress. 

DRONED LANDSCAPE

In my new painting I wanted the image to look like an overview of a new leafy suburb, with houses, gardens, parks etc. But, the houses are replaced with weaponised drones! I wanted a landscape-type appearance in order to generate questions about our Earthly environment generally. I also wanted to visually suggest that new technologies, such as unmanned surveillance and weaponised airborne drones, are changing landscapes and, thus, how we might operate and live in them. 

The spiraling appearance of the strip of droned landscape gives the impression of falling - but is it falling to Earth or away from Earth? Earth - here - being the pale blue dot! Also, maybe it depicts just one drone, demonstrating the different stages of falling - or - maybe there is a swarm of drones. If this is the case, maybe they are not falling, but in formation to optimise mission outcomes. 

DIZZINESS

Whether falling to or away from Earth, or on a mission, there is a sense of constant motion, even dizzying motion. This dizziness reflects the fast paced nature of drone technology development, including increasing advances in autonomous systems. Policy makers and lawyers are finding it difficult to respond to rapidly developing systems that impose potentially new impacts and risks on society and humanity.

The dizziness and sense of falling - to or from Earth - signifies that maybe we human beings are on a metaphoric precipice. As Lord Martin Rees wrote in his fascinating book Our Final Century  

I think the odds are no better than fifty-fifty that our present civilisation on Earth will survive to the end of the present century. Our choices and actions could ensure the perpetual future of life (not just on Earth, but perhaps far beyond it, too). Or in contrast, through malign intent, or through misadventure, twenty-first century technology could jeopardise life’s potential, foreclosing its human and posthuman future. What happens here on Earth, in this century, could conceivably make the difference between a near eternity filled with ever more complex and subtle forms of life and one filled with nothing but base matter.

Martin Rees, Our Final Hour: A Scientist’s Warning: How Terror, Error, and Environmental Disaster Threaten Humankind’s Future in This Century—On Earth and Beyond (New York: Basic Books, 2003) p.7-8

COSMIC PERSPECTIVE

A plethora of thoughts tumbled through my head as I painted Drone Spiral 2. I do not have space to write about them all here - plus it would make for a long winded post. However, regular readers will identify that the viewer enjoys a cosmic perspective - my favourite perspective. The viewer is not caught in the spiral, but is, in fact, witnessing it. Have you fallen away from earth too or have you deliberately propelled yourself, in imagination, to a vantage point where you can turn the surveillance back onto the technology? 

What do you see? What do you dream? What to you imagine?

• Drone Spiral 2 is another cosmic landscape, and a dronescape.
• I've depicted a pale blue dot in many of my recent paintings. This references the famous photograph taken in 1990 by Voyager 1, as it started to leave our solar system. its camera was turned off soon after, to preserve energy as it departed on  its interstellar journey. Carl Sagan's sage words are an inspiration.

Drone Spiral Gouache on paper 30 x 42 cm 2016

Cheers,

Kathryn

COSMIC DREAMING: SIMULATION? (EXO-PLANETS)

Cosmic Dreaming: Simulation? Oil on linen 31 x 56 cm 2018

Continuing with my 'pale blue dot' interest, I introduce you to Cosmic Dreaming: Simulation? (Exo-Planets). 

EXO-PLANETS

I was thinking about recent discoveries of potentially habitable exo-planets [example NASA site] orbiting distant stars. And, I was thinking about the unlikelihood of humans retreating to alternative planets outside our solar system in the near future, let alone the not-so-near future. That there might be life [of some kind] on these distant exo-planets is certainly intriguing though. 

But, with regards to humans travelling in space, getting to Mars is difficult enough! Plus, Mars will be obliterated, along with the rest of our solar system, when the sun reaches its final demise in around 4 billion years. So, staying within the solar system is doomed! Getting to Mars, though, is a stepping stone for all sorts of reasons. 

I was also thinking about the urgent need to look after the planet we do call home - Earth. We need to look after the planet, its non-human inhabitants and ourselves in order to sustain life. No good having escape plans, to set up home on an exo-planet, if we perish before we develop technology that will allow us to retreat elsewhere. But, this may be our fate...

SUSTAINABILITY - DREAMS - SIMULATION

While I was thinking about planetary sustainability, I was also thinking about simulation and dreams. 

So, is my painting an image from a dream, where alternative habitable planets, other 'pale blue dots', offer tantalising refuge for a beleaguered human species? Or, is the painting an image of a simulation, perhaps a game...a way to dupe us into thinking there are alternatives? The painting is not a game though.

Regular readers know of my interest in contemporary militarised technology, ubiquitous surveillance and increasingly autonomous weapon systems. While Cosmic Dreaming: Simulation? (Exo-Planets) does not refer directly to weapons or surveillance, it is linked to my dronescapes. It is linked by the cosmic perspective I take in many of my paintings. This perspective allows the viewer to fly. For example, in Cosmic Dreaming: Simulation? (Exo-Planets), are you above, below or beside the three pale blue dots? Are you on another planet, or in a spacecraft? Or, are you a spirit, a ghost from the future, maybe 10 billion years time - long after our solar system existed? Or perhaps you are a downloaded mind transmitted, ad infinitum, along an energy wave of some kind? Are you caught in some kind of simulation? 

VISION

As a painting, Cosmic Dreaming: Simulation?(Exo-Planets)offers many alternative interpretations. But, for me,  the power of human 'vision', in all its permutations - sight, insight, imagination and dreams - is an overarching consideration. This painting is, therefore, a resistance to the insidious infiltration of technological scoping, disguised as 'vision'. 

HERE ARE A COUPLE OF OTHER 'PALE BLUE DOT' PAINTINGS

       

Look again at that dot. (Sagan) Oil on linen 23 x 29.5 cm 2017

                                              Showing Them Our Home Oil on linen 30 x 56 cm 2017

Cheers,

Kathryn 

SHOWING THEM OUR HOME

Showing Them Our Home Oil on linen 30 x 56 cm 2017

Here's me with my three daughters. They are all adults now. We hover in space as we gaze upon Earth - a pale blue dot - home. 

An experience with perspective - temporal, spatial, metaphoric.

Looking back upon my role as a parent, there are many things I consider important. One is that as a significant adult in a young person's life, whether parent or other, the role of introducing them to the world, our Earthly home and universal environment, is up there on top of the list. One could say that birth is an introduction to the world, and yes it is, but as time goes by, the world is a continuously unfolding mystery. 

There are many ways to introduce someone to broader terrains and ideas. For me, engaging perspective - literal and metaphoric - transcends distance, and in doing so, imagination and compassion are ignited. In catapulting a person from one point of view to another, the world and oneself, dances the rhythm...one minute up close, the next flung to a distance - at one instant close enough to feel breath, the next flung so far away that features disappear - exposing a much bigger picture.      

Polymath Grandmother

My maternal grandmother D. E Ross - a polymath - knew the constellations and planets. She would take me and my two younger brothers out into dark nights, to show us various celestial entities. In Western Queensland there was no light pollution, thus our night skies were [and are] truly wondrous. As a child I was interested in my grandmother's impromptu lessons, but as an adult I look back and recognise a special introduction to the world, our universal one. I wonder if my interest in far horizons and cosmic perspectives was spurred by my grandmother's urgings to look up and wonder.

One of my daughters  has shown a keen interest in space, the outer-space kind of space. She has attended one of the International Space University's Summer programs, held in Adelaide, at the University of South Australia. As a law graduate, she has interests in how current and future legal frameworks will cope with issues such as mining on other planets/moons, space travel and so on. Her impetus comes from a concern for humanity, but also the environment beyond Earth. Maybe discussions about my cosmic paintings, and the things that influenced them, worked their way into my daughter's consciousness? An introduction to 'our world', the universal one, via art!

Another daughter relishes creativity. With her keen and divergent intellect she comes up with amazing and quirky ideas that shift other people's perspectives of our world, whether its our immediate home or the world 'out there'. And, another daughter literally dances her way into and around space ie: our earthly environment. Her energy somehow channeling  other-worldly forces. 

OUR - our

When I showed my daughters Showing Them Our World  they all understood it. The 'our' in the title is not only about us as a family, but all of humanity - the collective OUR. This latter sentiment is truly conveyed by Carl Sagan's words in his book Pale Blue Dot (1994). I have a number of pale blue dot paintings - inspired by perspective, Sagan's words and the famous photograph taken by Voyager 1 as it started its exit from the solar system in February 1990. I recently wrote a post about a few of my pale blue dot paintings. You can read more at this link Pale Blue Dot - Planet Earth 

It is unanimous - all four of us - this painting is never for sale. 

Cheers,

Kathryn

LOOK AGAIN AT THAT DOT. (SAGAN)

Look again at that dot. (Sagan) Oil on linen 23 x 29.5 cm 2017

Carl Sagan wrote:

Look again at that dot. That's here. That's home. That's us. On it everyone you love, everyone you know, everyone you ever heard of, every human being who ever was, lived out their lives. The aggregate of our joy and suffering, thousands of confident religions, ideologies, and economic doctrines, every hunter and forager, every hero and coward, every creator and destroyer of civilization, every king and peasant, every young couple in love, every mother and father, hopeful child, inventor and explorer, every teacher of morals, every corrupt politician, every "superstar," every "supreme leader," every saint and sinner in the history of our species lived there--on a mote of dust suspended in a sunbeam.

You can read more if you buy Sagan's book Pale Blue Dot, or check out HERE, or you can hear him speak HERE.

In 1990, as Voyager 1 started its exit from the solar system Sagan suggested that the spacecraft's camera be turned back towards Earth. The photograph called "Pale Blue Dot" showed Earth as a pale blue dot among a myriad of other shining celestial entities - a mote of dust suspended in a sunbeam. After the photograph was taken, the spacecraft's camera was turned off, to conserve power. Voyage 1 is now in interstellar space, the only human-made object travelling beyond the solar system. 

Although Look again at that dot. (Sagan) is a small painting, using cosmic perspectives, it channels big ideas. Sagan's commentary makes it clear that the past and future history of the human species relies upon the Earth. It is our home. 

How are we going, looking after it? 

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Merry Christmas 

and Cheers,

Kathryn

PALE BLUE DOT - PLANET EARTH

Pale Blue Dot Oil on linen 120 x 160 cm 2014 Private Collection

I offer you a selection of paintings that depict a.......................................... 

pale blue dot - aka Earth. 

I am taking the descriptor 'pale blue dot', coined by Carl Sagan for the famous photograph Voyager 1 took as it left the solar system in February 1990. At Sagan's suggestion the spacecraft's camera was turned back towards Earth. Soon after, the camera was turned off in order to conserve power for the spacecraft's continuing interstellar journey.  You can read and listen to Carl Sagan's famous words describing the photograph, and the effect it had on him and many others HERE

A snippet from Sagan:

Our posturings, our imagined self-importance, the delusion that we have some privileged position in the Universe, are challenged by this point of pale light. Our planet is a lonely speck in the great enveloping cosmic dark. In our obscurity, in all this vastness, there is no hint that help will come from elsewhere to save us from ourselves.

How poignant is - no hint that help will come from elsewhere to save us from ourselves?

In an era where emerging technologies pose existential risks, saving us from ourselves is a useful thought to ponder. In an era where weapons systems are increasingly interconnected across military and civilian arenas, and increasingly autonomous, saving us from ourselves takes on even more poignancy.  

Me in the studio working on Pale Blue Dot - helped by a glass a bubbly! 

Pale Blue Dot - AKA Earth Oil on canvas 90 x 100 cm 2017

Anomaly Detection no 2 Oil on linen 120 x 180 cm 2017

Detail of Anomaly Detection no 2

Rose Tinted Landing Oil on canvas 40 x 50 cm 2017

Have we accepted ubiquitous surveillance and always present potential targeting into our collective subconscious? I call it a 'landing' on our subconscious - a kind of insidious colonisation of imagination presented as a way to save ourselves! 

Launching the New Horizon oil on canvas 60 x 92 cm 2017

In Launching the New Horizon there is a pale blue dot, set amongst the array of other celestial dots. The 'new horizon' is created by the flat wings of the unmanned weaponised drone.

21st Century Cloud Fantasy Oil on canvas 67 x 76 cm 2017

 Australian Landscape Cutout Oil on linen 50 x 70 cm 2015

From a cosmic perspective it becomes apparent that Earth is our only home, at least for the foreseeable future. Concepts of nationhood, land ownership, borders, and sovereign power seem futile. If we all dug to the centre of the Earth, we'd all meet as one!

Planet $ oil on linen 30 x 30 cm 2011

Carl Sagan The Earth is the only world known so far to harbor life. 

Planet $ poses questions about how we 'value' our safe harbor, our home. 

Will the way we 'value' things help save us from ourselves? 

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Cheers,

Kathryn

www.kathrynbrimblecombe-fox.com 

21st CENTURY CLOUD FANTASY

21st Century Cloud Fantasy Oil on canvas 67 76 cm 2017

SURVEILLANCE
Regular readers will know that 21st Century Cloud Fantasy relates to contemporary surveillance in the broadest sense - visual surveillance, data collection and mining, online behaviour monitoring, physical tracking and so on. It also relates to the way I attempt to turn the surveillance back upon itself, by placing the viewer in multiple orientations, even simultaneously. Like with many of my paintings over the years, 21st Century Cloud Fantasy takes a cosmic perspective which has the ability to oscillate at multiple close and far distances. Cosmology, the scientific study of the universe across all spatial and temporal scales, informs my visual oscillation. 

For example, are you looking down, as if gazing at something microscopically, but enlarged by some kind of vision device. Or, are you looking up into an endless sky? Or, are you Voyager 1 with its camera turned back towards Earth - like it did in February 1990 as it left the solar system - one last photo Pale Blue Dot before its camera was turned off, and it embarked on its continuing interstellar journey. Are you being propelled away from the pale blue dot, or are you falling towards it?

But, I was thinking of more! 

Clouds have featured a fair bit in my recent paintings. But, whilst they look like atmospheric clouds, I am playing with the idea of The Cloud ie: multiple servers designed to store computer generated information and data in ways where it is retrievable by possibly an array of systems or people. Is anything secure? 

MANY THOUGHTS
There were so many thoughts going through my head when I painted 21st Century Cloud Fantasy. The choice of colours is deliberate, the targeting appearance is also, as is the positioning of radiating lines with the fluffiness of the clouds. I'll let you think about the painting. However, you might like to read some of my previous posts, where I position militarised systems, like airborne drones - with clouds!

LANDSCAPE
Oh - and - yes, this painting is also a continuation of my attempt to renegotiate what landscape means in the 21st century. A century where the real and the virtual collide - and - where at the same time as humanity has succeeded in sending human-made technology into interstellar space, we also have people in conflict zones who are afraid of the sky - a droned sky. 

Cheers,
Kathryn

PALE BLUE DOT: AKA - EARTH

Pale Blue Dot AKA: Earth Oil on canvas 90 x 100 cm 2017

Carl Sagan's description of Earth as a 'pale blue dot' was coined after seeing the photograph Voyager 1 took as it left the solar system, February 1990. On Sagan's suggestion the spacecraft's camera was turned back towards Earth. The image of Earth, identifiable as a pale blue dot, set among a myriad of other celestial entities had, and still has, a profound affect on people. The colour blue indicates an environment that can sustain life. Voyager 1's camera was turned off not long after the famous image was taken, to enable scientists to re-purpose computers. Sagan wrote a book called Pale Blue Dot in 1994. Voyager 1 is still travelling in interstellar space. Please visit this NASA website for more information.  

In Pale Blue Dot: AKA Earth I have played with a scoping type perspective. It feels like Voyager 1 is falling back to Earth, maybe? Or, perhaps that we have been catapulted at speed away from Earth. The red flames around the pale blue dot, could represent the increasingly volatile nature of Earth's existence. They could also indicate some kind of renewal?

Regular readers will identify my play with a surveillance-like perspective, mimicking but also extending that of a militarised drone, a recurrent figure in some of my other recent paintings. Clearly, you and I, are well above or beyond the current reach of drones. Our 'surveillance' is far more sophisticated - it embraces imagination! The cosmic perspective 'reveals' the fiery threat-potential around Earth. Cosmologists, such as Lord Martin Rees suggest, that like at no other time in human history, the decisions we make now will affect whether life on Earth continues into the next centuries. A cosmic perspective reveals the kind of metaphoric precipice we now hover upon.

Cheers,
Kathryn
P.S. Please read another recent post Anomaly Detection with more paintings that represent the 'pale blue dot'

ANOMALY DETECTION (NUMBER 2)

Anomaly Detection (Number 2) Oil on linen 120 x 180 cm 2017

The term 'anomaly detection' is a technical one. With contemporary technology and the help of algorithms and artificial intelligence, systems have been devised to detect unusual online behaviours, discrepancies in documentation, weaknesses in cyber systems, and unusual patterns in things like financial transactions and movements of people etc. Anomaly detection enables, in many cases, preemptive action, such as isolating/fixing weaknesses in cyber systems, identifying potentially dangerous activities and malign intent. Anomalies can be detected in image, written and online data that is collected, analysed and stored. 

Where did the idea for Anomaly Detection (Number 2) come from?

The idea came after I saw a drone manufacturer's promotional video that demonstrated anomaly detection capabilities of airborne drones. This is where the drone's wide-area electro-optical surveillance systems can cast such a wide net that, for example, three vehicles travelling at speed and many kilometers apart, could be identified as aiming for the same destination. In the case of war and conflict zones this may indicate that the vehicles are aiming for a target, either to destroy it, deliver insurgents to it, or possibly protect a valuable human asset. The latter, of course, in the eyes of those watching may be considered a high value target - HVT.  

In Anomaly Detection (Number 2) I have turned the surveillance back onto the drones; in this case three weaponised Grey Eagle drones. I am suggesting that imagination can deploy its own wide-area - even cosmic - surveillance capabilities to question whether technologies designed to detect, monitor, surveil and target, are really beneficial for humanity and the planet. In this painting the three drones seem to be aiming for the same destination - the pale blue dot. Here, I am drawing upon Carl Sagan's term for Earth, as it was seen in the famous photograph, 'Pale Blue Dot', taken in February 1990 by the spacecraft Voyager 1 as it started to leave the solar system. The photograph showed Earth as a small pale blue dot situated within and against our celestial environment. The three drones in Anomaly Detection (Number 2) potentially threaten the pale blue dot. 

Anomaly Detection (Number 2) poses a few questions about the vulnerability of humanity and Earth's environment in an age of accelerating technological development. The drones can be seen as literal threats or as metaphors for a society seduced by technology, or exhausted by it. The three drones are painted as if they are pixelated, thus representing their reliance on, and use of, digital and cyber systems. The pixels also suggest a kind of virtual reality, mimicking images seen on computer screens, either those used by drone operators or those used for war games and simulations. There is plenty of room for anomaly detection!

New Sky

The drones are also painted blue to reflect upon the way vertical threat creates a new sky. This is particularly so in places such as Somalia, Yemen, Pakistan and Afghanistan where drone operations and attacks have made people fearful of the sky. In an age where Voyager 1 now travels in interstellar space, the fact that people on Earth are afraid of the sky, is an indictment on humanity. 

Dronescape 

Anomaly Detection (Number 2) is another of my dronesscapes, but it is also a cosmic landscape provoking and pushing perspective, of all kinds, beyond Earth, even beyond the solar system - and - possibly this universe!  

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In 2014 I painted Pale Blue Dot [below]

  

 Pale Blue Dot Oil on linen 120 x 160 2014

Anomaly Detection

I recently painted another Anomaly Detection painting [below]. It is a work on paper, depicting three weaponised Reaper drones aiming for the tree-of-life. 

   

Anomaly Detection Gouache on paper 56 x 76 cm 2017

Cheers,

Kathryn