CATASTROPHE OF SUCCESS

 

Catastrophe of Success Gouache on paper 56 x 76 cm 2025

Speed, Technology, and War

Cultural theorist, Paul Virilio wrote extensive commentary about speed, technology, and war. His book Desert Screen: War at the Speed of Light (2002) is an English translation of an earlier 1991 French publication. 

Virilio identified that the first Gulf War (1990-1991) signposted a pivotal change in the character of war. He presciently observed that in the first Gulf War the “real environment for all important military action is no longer so much the geographic environment, be it desert or other terrain, but rather the electromagnetic domain” (1). The electromagnetic domain Virilio refers to is the electromagnetic spectrum (EMS), and speed of light frequencies (RF, microwave) that enable digital and cyber inter/connectivity in the earth to orbiting satellite environment. Please note, both military and civilian technologies increasingly rely upon the EMS. 

Over 35 years after Virilio's observation, our current wars are a continuation of a trend he identified - speed is the mantra. While speed is often mentioned in various government, military and defence industry media, it is not a focus of critical attention. Yet, it is the underlying agitation, for example, for the Australian government's 2023 National Defence: National Defence Strategic Review, warning that "in the contemporary strategic era, we cannot rely on geography or warning time" (2). And, another note - artificial intelligence and machine learning assist in maintaining the tempo. This, of course, involves the removal or reassignment of human beings. 

In 2012 Virilio observed, "For speed, its success is also its damage" and "Its success itself becomes a catastrophe." (3) 

Catastrophe of Success

My painting Catastrophe of Success was inspired by my research and Virilio's prescient observations. Like most of my paintings, lines connecting various elements indicate electromagnetic signals that carry data and instructions. These 'signals' seemingly extend beyond the painting into the wider environment, drawing us all into the militarised world via various hyperconnected media. 

It is important to note that in an active contemporary war zone, signal connectivity, and therefore identification of signal emissions, can mean as little as 90 seconds to ready for attack. For those in the midst of the quagmire of kinetic and signalic warfare, the bloodiness of war remains. This is why Catastrophe of Success is painted predominantly red. Speed and signal connectivity can be deadly. 

The painting is a scape - a cosmic scape, a militarised scape ... It extends from the strange hands - are they human or robotic - to orbiting satellites. Various well known symbols for connectivity occupy the scape's mid zone. They are proxies for human activity. Sky-based and space-based assets complete the 'occupation'. Look closely - there are larger drones, smaller drones, and various satellites. A smartphone, situated on the far right, displays its various apps, each one allowing instantaneous access to a plethora of choices from social media to banking. The blue squares mimic the pixelated 'sky' I have painted in the background. I ask, what is real landscape and how does our understanding of landscape change in a digitised world where we constantly gaze at screens positioned 20-30 cm from our eyes? 

There's much more to think about, but I'll leave that up to you. I will however, leave you with a sobering statement that 'speaks' to why techno-success in an increasingly dual-use age can be catastrophic. War Studies scholar Matthew Ford makes a blunt assessment of the smartphone in his book, War in the Smartphone Age: Conflict, Connectivity and the Crises at Our Fingertips (2025). He argues that the smartphone is now ‘a central weapon of war’ and an ‘integral part of the kill chain’ (4). 

1. Virilio, Desert Screen, 88.
2. Australian Government, 25.
3. Virilio, TheAdministration of Fear, 69.
4. Ford, 17, 100.

*My article 'Light Speed, Contemporary War, and Australia's National Defence Strategic Review', in Digital War journal, examines the Review through the lens of speed. 

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NEWS

I presented about my research and creative practice at the AOC Aust/NZ Convention in Canberra last week. The AOC (Old Crows) is an international non-profit professional organisation for people working in electromagnetic and information warfare capabilities. 

I am pleased to report that my presentation was very well received. And, my stance that I was not there to provide answers, but to provoke questions was also openly received.

• My presentation was: The Invisible Battlespace: What Does it Look Like?

What does the 'invisible battlespace' look like? This seemingly simple question is addressed by contrasting standard digital representations/simulations of the EMS and the 'invisible battlespace' with research-informed creative visualisations. I present this contrast as a productive way to critique and perhaps shift current conceptualisations of the invisible battlespace.

For example, should the EMS be designated a domain, along with land, air, sea, cyberspace, and space? Does the beyond-human speed (and therefore time) of signal-enabled hyperconnectivity and interoperability position scale as a risk?

Focussing on signal invisibility and issues of speed, time, and scale, this presentation meets growing calls for new ways to imagine and think about war in an age where civilian and military digital and cyber technologies are increasing reliant on signals.

I opened my presentation with an image of my painting Theatre of War: Dromo-Domain. Dromology is a word Virilio developed for the study of speed. A speaker earlier in the conference had said we cannot see ourselves in total. So, I opened my presentation saying that with imagination we can try - with imagined flight we can conjure a totality beyond the screen, the sensor, the aperture. Theatre of War: Dromo-Domain, turned out to be the perfect opening slide - an image of the pale blue dot (after Sagan, Earth) ringed (satellite zone) by repeated symbols for lightspeed - c - and covered with interlocking circles representing hyperconnectivity via fake 'clouds'. 

 

Cheers,

Kathryn

SPECTRUM: ONLINE EXHIBITION

Data Data Gouache on paper 30 x 42 cm 2016

ELECTROMAGNETIC SPECTRUM

Regular readers know that I have been thinking about the increasing interest militaries around the world are paying to the electromagnetic spectrum [EMS], as an enabler of technology, a type of fires, a manoeuvre space and a domain. The fact that EMS is a shared civilian - military resource problematises military desires to dominate, appropriate and ensure access. 

In the techno-world in which we live, we are all reliant on the EMS to enable digital and cyber technologies, to allow networking and interconnectivity, and also interoperability. 

I've been interested in the EMS for some time. 

When I started painting airborne drones in 2015, I also started visualising the normally invisible signals that connect the drones to remote controllers and to GPS satellites. I also visualised sensor detection, targeting and transmission arrays. These paintings were informed by my Master of Philosophy research at the University of Queensland. I completed my M. Phil in 2017. My paintings from 2020 are inspired by my PhD research, Curtin University, Western Australia

ONLINE EXHIBITION

This online exhibition of fifteen paintings tracks my interest in the EMS and my ideas of the 'spectrum warfighter'. This fighter could be human, an enhanced human, a robot, an algorithm, an avatar in a simulated wargame. One question I think about a lot is - how doe we memorialise when the warfighter is no longer human? This question has lead me to another question - how do we memorialise when the warfighter was never alive?

Please click on the hyperlinked titles to read the previous posts for each painting.

Cheers,

Kathryn

Not a Game Gouache and watercolour on paper 57 x 76.5 cm 2016

Space Net Gouache on paper 56 x76 cm 2017

New Star-False Star Oil on linen 97 x 112 cm 2018

Charting the Invisible gouache on paper 30 x 42 cm 2019

01010111 01000001 01010010 WAR Gouache on paper 30 x 42 cm 2021

Theatre of War-Spectrum Gouache on paper 56 x 76 cm 2021

Spectrum Warfighter Gouache and watercolour on paper 30 x 42 cm 2021

Theatre of War-Domain Dominance Gouache on paper 56x76 cm 2021

Theatre of War-Spectrum Access Gouache on paper 56 x 76 cm 2021

Theatre of War-Infrared Gouache on paper 56 x 76 cm 2021

The Tree Asks, What Can't You See? Gouache on paper 30 42 cm 2021

Theatre of War-Photon Gouache on paper 56 x 76 cm 2021

Spectrum Warfighter 2 Oil on linen 61 x 66 cm 21

Theatre of War - Photons Do Not Care Oil on linen 92 x 112 cm 2021

 

THEATRE OF WAR: THE CLOUD

Theatre of War: The Cloud Gouache and watercolour on paper 56 x76 cm 2021

This is my 11th or 12th painting in my Theatre of War series. I'll have to write one post with all of the paintings, so you can see them as a body of work! 

PhD Research

Theatre of War: The Cloud is informed by my current PhD research into the increasing interest militaries around the world are paying to the electromagentic spectrum (EMS) as an enabler of technology, a type of fires, a manoeuvre space and a domain. I am examining the use of frequencies for military purposes, and the ability for state or non-state actors to appropriate civilian technology via the EMS. I pay particular attention to the spectrum range from radio to visible light frequencies. 

THE CLOUD

The Cloud ie: the euphemism we ascribe to the contemporary world of networked and interconnected digital and cyber technologies, is of great interest to me. The concept provides the means for interoperability, a key aim for modern militaries. This means that traditional army, navy and air forces work together using technology that networks capabilities across all of their domains. The military term 'joint force' also encompasses the digital and cyber domains of information and cyber war. The space domain is also drawn into this interoperable mix, with satellites playing pivotal roles in communication, operability and connectivity. The Cloud, however, is not just a military asset - civilian technology also relies on the connectivity, operability and communication that EMS enabled Cloud technologies and systems enable and use.

I have been researching the idea of the cloud as a metaphor. One interesting way of thinking about The Cloud is to draw upon John Ruskin's nineteenth century observations of 'plague clouds' and 'plague winds'. Is militarisation of technology, including the militarise-ability of civilian technology, like a 'plague wind' blowing through the EMS? Is The Cloud, therefore a 'plague cloud'? 

Theatre of War: The Cloud

In Theatre of War: The Cloud I have tried to represent an excavation of military interoperability. The painted-in circles at the bottom of the painting are underwater, possibly autonomous underwater vehicles or sensors. Through the middle are land-based and on-sea systems, possibly also autonomous. At the top of the painting, an airborne drone and a satellite over-watch. In each of the circles with obvious clouds, the technology is obscured. This implies that systemic complexity obscures understanding. The repetition of red and white circles across the painting indicates interconnectivity. These circles visually form a stylised cloud that draws all operations together. That this cloud extends beyond the painting is clear. It is part of The Cloud.

While I conceived Theatre of War: The Cloud as an excavation from sea to space, the painting can also be viewed as a map. This play with perspective is deliberate...

Cheers,

Kathryn

SPECTRUM WARFIGHTING: INVISIBILITY

The Tree Whispers, Beware of Fake Clouds Gouache and watercolour on paper 30 x 42 cm 2021

As I research more about the increasing interest in harnessing the electromagnetic spectrum for strategic and tactical military purposes, I think about how we are mediated and affected by the invisible aspects of contemporary war, conflict, geopolitics and techno-politics.* As invisible signals and wavelengths enable technological operability and interoperability, they also forge techno-political-industrial relationships. In a world of the Internet of Things (IOT) interconnectivity blurs boundaries, potentially collapses dual-use and allows political seepage.

So, I continue to think about what happens when the invisible is made visible? What questions are triggered? What kinds of new maps are revealed - relational maps, topographic maps ie: signal-maps? I continue to take cosmic perspectives where I invite viewers of my paintings to fly, in imagination, around and beyond drones, satellites, visualised signals and more. I call this critical kind of 'flight' imaginational metaveillance. 

With each of these three paintings I wanted to trigger questions, in me and you, about the importance of what we cannot normally see. In two of the paintings, the tree-of-life prods us to probe deeper. 

Can you 'see' anything?

Spectrum Warfighter Gouache and watercolour on paper 30 x 42 cm 2021

In Spectrum Warfighter, it's what you cannot see that's important. The warfighter, whether robotic, human or other, carries various antennae. What might they be connected to? That you cannot see the bottom half of the warfighter may indicate a simulation - one being generated or one being deactivated...

The Tree Asks, What Can't You See? Gouache on paper 30 x 42 cm 2021

In The Tree Asks, What Can't You See?, is the tree asking you or the warfighter what can be seen? What if the warfighter is a robot or an avatar on a screen, a digital metaphor or proxy - if so, does even asking a question about seeing even make sense? 

Cheers,

Kathryn

* There are so many recent articles, military statements, industry information about the increasing use of the electromagnetic spectrum by militaries around the world. Just Google the topic!

Here's an article "The Outcome of Future Conflicts Depends on Who Controls the Electromagnetic Spectrum" from Engineering.com 

And, another "Electronic Warfare Success Hinges on Spectrum Dominance" from the Asia Pacific Defence Reporter 

AND, the DOD's Joint Electromagnetic Spectrum Operations: May 2020

  

TOPOGRAPHY OF SIGNALS

Topography of Signals Oil on linen 57 x 57 cm 2019

Topography of Signals relates to two recent works on paper Martial Map and Charting The Invisible . In all three works I imagine flying to a distance beyond Earth and its array of sky-based and space-based technologies. From this imagined perspective I visualise the signals that transmit data and instructions to various kinds of technological hardware, such as, satellites, drones, ground control stations, mobile phones, credit cards, GPS in vehicles etc. By exposing signals it becomes apparent that the networked and interconnected system imposes a new kind of topography upon landscape. This new topography volumentrically occupies our extended environment, from land to orbiting satellites.

Imagine you are below the netted landscape revealed in Topography of Signals. Now, imagine you are above the signal-net. From either of these orientations a sense of foreclosure is felt. If you are below the signals you are woven into the matrix that volumetrically occupies extended environment. If you are above, an netted enclosure is 'witnessed'. 

This kind of imaginational metaveillance, undertaken in imaginational flight, is visualised in my paintings in ways that intersect with counter-mapping tropes. Counter-mapping is a way to scrutinise maps created by colonisers. It helps to reveal and map the ignored or subdued stories of pre-colonial  cultural, political and societal significance. While exposing signals as nets that occupy extended environment is not a re-examination of the past, it is a way to critically think about the networked and interconnected system as a coloniser, now and into the future. This is especially important in an age where the lines between militarised technology, dual-use technology and militarise-able civilian technology, are increasingly blurred. 

What kinds of risks and vulnerabilities are attached to a system that potentially enables global techno-colonising forces?

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Looking forward to the 

AESTHETICS OF DRONE WARFARE CONFERENCE 

7-8 February, University of Sheffield, UK.

Please check out the conference booklet 

I am presenting a talk about my work 

Painting Airborne Militarised Drones: An Act Of Imaginational Metaveillance

Cheers,

Kathryn

STEALTHY TECHNO-COLONISING FORCES - SEVEN PAINTINGS

Space Net Gouache on paper 56 x 76 cm 2017

INTER-CONNECTIVITY AND NETWORKING
A recent article "Weapons Makers Unveil A Herd of Robotanks— As the Army Worries About Battlefield Bandwidth" in Defense One caught my attention. Why? Because, it discussed how inter-connectivity and networking are vitally important for militarised technological operation and functioning. It discussed the US Army's plans for increasingly interconnected militarised hardware and systems, including air-based and ground-based robots, gadgets and weapons carried by human soldiers, autonomous systems and relay stations. However, the article highlighted a problem - networked systems that are not necessarily consistently reliable. In the military case, this is exacerbated by increasing demands for inter-connectivity, such as sharing data, and speedy transmission. So, ideas for robotised and autonomous, motile and stationary, scaffolding technologies to ensure signal relay reliability and speed, are planned.

SIGNALS
I have been writing and painting about signals, and humanity's reliance upon them, for some time. I have a particular interest in the way signals enable contemporary militarised technology, and the appropriation of civilian technologies by militarised forces, state and non-state. I have made the argument that signals ricocheting from node to node, device to device, occupy landscape and environment, from land to orbiting satellites. I 'see' this occupation as a stealthy techno-colonisation that enables new modes of empire, and therefore, power. The invisibility of signals means we pay attention to visible hardware, placing significance on advances in hardware, and not always taking into account that without signals most hardware is rendered inert. 

A reliance on signaling, networking and inter-connectivity for militarised purposes, that can appropriate and use civilian systems, builds capacity and acts as a force multiplier. However, this reliance is also a vulnerability. Risks of deliberate interventions such as hacking and jamming, unintended consequences and phenomena such as severe solar storms, can all cause havoc and cascading systemic consequences. 

SIGNAL-SCAPES
In this post I have uploaded a few of my paintings that visualise or make visible, invisible signals. I argue that by making them visible, we can see how they impose new types of  topographies. I say topographies because signals map the environment with transmission pathways or highways, they build domains that are invisible to the human being, they create terrains that enable or disable, they manifest new full spectrum spaces for battle.

 Code Empire Gouache on paper 56 x 76 cm 2017

Lethal Landscape Gouache on paper 56 x 76 cm 2018

 Mission Capable Landscape Oil  on linen 72 x 137 cm 2018

Lethal Landscape - False Horizons Oil on line 70 x 100 cm 2018

 Charting the Invisible Gouache on paper 30 x 42 cm 2019

Martial Map Gouache on paper 30 x 42 cm 2019

STAY ALERT: SAYS THE TREE

Stay Alert: Says the Tree Gouache on paper 56 x 76 cm 2019

For information on my forthcoming exhibition 

Occupied Landscapes: Evidence on Drones

please visit my post HERE

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Stay Alert: Says The Tree

I was thinking about a painting from 2017, Forever Watched  [below]. It is one of only a few paintings where I depict human figures. In the painting a group of people are encircled. But, are they performers encircled by a spotlight on a stage, or something more sinister? Or, maybe the stage is contemporary life, one where everything we all do is monitored, surveilled, watched. 

I was thinking about Forever Watched when I was painting Stay Alert: Says the Tree [above]. In this new painting I have replaced the people with a symbolic reference to humanity and life, the tree-of-life. Regular readers will know that the tree-of-life is often depicted in my paintings. The radiating lines indicate some kind of surveillance emanating from a single point, maybe an airborne drone, a satellite...? Maybe the single point indicates control, rather than a particular device.

The split surveillance could mean a few things, increasing persistence and dominance by surveillance systems, intrusion at global and intimate levels, dispersed targeting and more. The replacement of the human figures with the trees-of-life draws us all into the surveillance system as contributors and victims. 

The two trees-of-life, however, present us with some hopeful possibilities and some dire possibilities.It depends on your perspective.

I'll leave it to you to think about these possibilities. 

*Forever Watched and Stay Alert: Says the Tree will be in my forthcoming exhibition Occupied Landscapes: Evidence on Drones. 

 

Forever Watched Gouache on paper 56 x 76 cm 2017

CHARTING THE INVISIBLE

Charting the Invisible Gouache on paper 30 x 42 cm 2019

Charting the Invisible is another of my paintings that 'exposes' how signals operatively enable contemporary technologies to function in a networked and inter-connected manner. Without connectivity, many devices would be useless or near useless. By 'charting' the normally invisible connectivity and inter-connectivity of the modern technological world this painting can be understood as a kind of counter-map. Here, I focus on the 'map' as a subversive exposure and demonstration of the connection between militarised and civilian technologies. When you consider that security and policing activities are increasingly blurred with military activities, the militarise-ability of civilian technologies is an issue. Does this make everything dual-use? Additionally, while security, policing and military activities are generally considered necessary by many, malign entities using networked and inter-connected systems are more than unwanted interlopers. 

NODES AND DEVICES

Like my last painting and post Martial Map I have painted lines that join nodes and devices. These lines represent signal connections. For example, a ground control station is linked to an airborne weaponised drone. This control station is also linked to a communication satellite, which is also linked to the drone. The drone is linked to a mobile phone, also linked to the GPS and communication satellite. The phone is linked, then, to a car, and a computer. Some nodes and devices send signals beyond the edges of the painting, to indicate connection to other devices and nodes. And, there are more connections between all the devices, and some connections are still invisible!

TECHNO-COLONISATION

While the painting can be read as some kind of map, the cosmic landscape background positions the viewer in an ambiguous perspective. Is the viewer above or below, in front or behind, the net of signals? If they are below, the sky is netted, if they are above the planet is netted. If they are in front or behind the nets act as walls. Here, the netted appearance is important to me, as I 'see' this signal-net as an imposition on landscape, an occupier of space and a sign of a new kind of colonistion, a techno colonisation that holds us all hostage. Given the militarise-ability of civilian technology, in addition to designated militarised technology, does this colonisation come with a persistent readiness for defensive and offensive actions? If so, are we in a constant state of war preparedness, where the near light-speed delivery of data and instructions via signals expunges time for peace?  

On that 'happy' note.

Cheers,

Kathryn

MARTIAL MAP

Martial Map Gouache on paper 30 x 42 cm

I have returned from overseas. In Toronto I presented on a round-table, themed to war preparedness, at the International Studies Association annual conference. I then had meetings in London and Berlin. 

EXHIBITIONS

And, I saw a lot of art, from the Rembrandt exhibition at the Rijks Museum in Amsterdam, to Is This Tomorrow at the Whitechapel Gallery in London, to Hito Steyerl's Power Plants exhibition at the Serpentine Gallery, London. Two exhibitions at the KW Institute in Berlin still occupy my thoughts. The exhibitions showed works by David Wojnarowicz and Reza Abdoh. Both artists brutally, honestly and sensorially reflected upon the AIDS crisis of the 1980s/early 1990s. I saw a number of exhibitions in Berlin, including Cian Dayrit's thought provoking counter mapping/cartography exhibition Beyond the Gods Eye at Nome Gallery. And, at C/O Gallery I saw two provocative photographic exhibitions - Double Take by duo Cortis and Sonderegger, and Before Sleeping/ After Drinking, a survey show of work by Boris Mikhailov. Matthew Day Jackson's exhibition Pathetic Fallacy at Hauser and Wirth, Somerset was a highlight. This quote from the gallery site gives you an idea about Day Jackson's motivation in this exhibition, "The overarching conceit is an interest in our compulsion to document, map and systemise our natural world as a method for understanding nature." Day Jackson's exhibition and Dayrit's exhibition were both highlights.

COUNTER MAPPING?

Since returning home the idea of counter cartography or mapping has occupied my thoughts. Are my paintings, where I expose signals that enable drone operations, a kind of counter mapping? In many of my paintings I paint proliferating nets of signals as imposed topographies that occupy landscape, from land into space. This volumetric occupation, I 'see', as a techno-colonisation of landscape and environment, facilitating an insidious control and manipulation of human behaviour and movement. I call my paintings 'new landscapes in the drone age'.

By exposing the nets of signals that enable militarised and militarise-able technologies I manifest a kind of map. These paintings expose the invisible, thus resisting techno-military forces by drawing attention to the insidiousness of inter-connectivity and networking. Additionally, the medium of painting enables the exposure of signals without relying on contemporary technologies that utilise connectivity, networking, for example, cloud storage, downloaded software - the internet. While I might upload images, the process of creation remains discrete. 

Martial Map 

The idea for Martial Map was inspired by reflecting upon IR scholar Antoine Bousquet's book Eye of War: Military Perception from the Telescope to the Drone. In this book Bousquet provides a compelling historical perspective on what he calls the development of the "martial gaze", the human eye's conscription into surveillance, targeting and destruction. But, the human eye cannot see signals. Yet, once Heinrich Hertz first transmitted and received radio waves in 1886, radio communication opened the door to modern day connectivity and networking, the enabling signal forces of contemporary militarised and militarise-able technologies. 

The word 'martial' describes something that is related to or suitable for war, related to military life or inclined to war. Martial Map shows how various nodes can be linked, and inter-linked. I have painted various nodes; GPS and communication satellites, credit cards with chips, a cruise liner, home security technology, a digital tv, a drone's ground control station, human beings holding a mobile phone, a car, 'cloud' storage in the form of a huge building, a fitbit, a street surveillance camera, airport security apparatus, a relay aerial and three weaponised airborne drones. The painting suggests how civilian technologies can be conscripted into the militarised network. Dual-use is clearly  a highly problematic and diffused concept in the contemporary world. 

Cheers,

Kathryn

LANDSCAPE DECEPTION

 Pacific Currents Gouache on paper 30 x 42 cm 2019

DECEPTION

What do I mean by 'Landscape Deception", the title of this blog post? I think it can mean a number of things  eg: perhaps landscape itself employs deceptive means, perhaps landscape is hijacked by fake landscapes that deceive? 

Regular readers know of my long-term interest in landscape generally, and my more specific interest in what I call the militarisation of landscape. I see the latter as an insidious occupation of landscape by the signalling systems that enable near light speed operation of miltiarised technology and militarise-able technology. Here, I not only include things like drone operation, but also, things like manipulation of social media, hacking into financial and communication systems, monitoring of personal devices, access to personal data and so on. That militarisable technology includes civilian systems reliant on signals and cables, and their associated infrastructure such as satellites, data centres, relay stations, cannot be ignored.

The three new paintings in this post reflect upon ideas of deceptive landscape, or the deception of landscape. 

PACIFIC CURRENTS

MULTI MISSION

Pacific Currents [above] depicts the flow of Pacific water currents on the left. On the right I have painted a map of the undersea cables that connect across the Pacific ocean. These undersea cables, while tangible, are also essentially invisible. Yet, they enable the operation of 21st century networked technology. 

In Multi Mission [below] cabling from Creech airbase in the Nevada desert connects with the US Air Force base in Ramstein, Germany. From there signals sent to and from a satellite enable airborne drones to undertake missions. Signals sent by subterranean and undersea cables, and signals sent by wave frequencies into and from space, are invisible. I 'see' them as creating new 'topographies' that net the planet from underground/sea to space. 

 Multi Mission Gouache on paper 30 x 42 cm 

DECEPTION PERSPECTIVE

The invisibility of these new 'topographies' can be associated with deception. In Deception Perspective [below] I have painted cross-hairs to create an illusion of perspective. That the cross-hair on a camera or gun helps draw a subject/victim closer cannot be ignored. It is a way of using targeted perspective. 

In the painting I have painted three large red cross-hairs in a row. I have then painted white cross-hairs in diminishing sizes to give the illusion of perspective. These cross-hairs parody the cross-hairs on lenses, computer screens, imaging devices. They are part of the insidiously invisible signaling net that wraps the planet, the new landscape of deception.

So, is landscape deceived or deceiving. Are we deceived or are some of us deceiving? Is anyone even aware of what is happening?

These three paintings are part of my - signalscapes, dronescapes, militarised landscapes work
Cheers,
Kathryn

DRONES - NO DRONES - DRONES - NO DRONES: ONLINE EXHIBITION

Mass Exodus

PLAYFUL EXERCISE?

This online exhibition is an exercise. It plays with the positioning of images. 

I have placed a non-drone painting, then a weaponised airborne drone painting, one after the other. 

What happens when I position paintings that do not depict drones, or indications of their presence, with images of weaponised drones? Are the non-drone paintings of trees-of-life, Australia, and the sun, colonised by the drone images? Or, do the paintings depicting trees-of-life, Australia and the sun remind us of life in the face of  destructive technologies? In a sense, do they combat the drone images? 

If you took the non-drone paintings away from the images of weaponised drones, are they different paintings? Without a militarised context, do they lose agency or gain it? Or, if you have seen them positioned with the paintings depicting militarised technology, can you ever forget - unsee?

The last two paintings depict human figures, Through the Mist of Time and Forever Watched. The latter does not depict a weaponised drone, but it does indicate surveillance - or does it? As I placed these last two paintings, I saw that Through the Mists of Time could provide another perspective for Forever Watched? A perspective that was not militarised. What do you think? 

COSMIC LANDSCAPES

All the paintings are landscapes - cosmic landscapes, landscapes where you too can fly. This poses even more questions, but I will leave them for you to ask.

All the paintings in this post are from 2016 and 2017, and they are all gouache on paper. 

Cheers,

Kathryn

 Not a Game

 Across Time and Space

 New Sky

 Between Existences

 Persistent Surveillance and Strike

 Run Off

 Sky Drone Net

Future and Past

 Anomaly Detection

 A New Sun, A New Day - Somewhere

Combat Proven, Long Range, Long Dwell

Through the Mists of Time

 Forever Watched