Already made

Rob Myers, Urinal, 3D file

Like Duchamp Myers has enabled an art work to exist by an idea alone. In keeping with Duchamp's iconic Fountain (1917) the artist (Myers) has removed his hand from the work - albeit by employing another to create a potential object to exist, rather than appropriating an existing object and nominating it as art.

Myers Urinal was created by Chris Webber a software engineer who generated the model as three dimensional image so that the digital file could be physically rendered by a 3D printer. The file has been made available by the artist for anyone to download, print and sign (see thingverse download page). Alternatively (if you don't happen to have a 3D printer to hand) Myers 3D printed Urinal is also available to purchase through shapeways. Although technically Duchamp did not completely remove the Urinal's possible function I do believe Myers Urinal to be purely ornament.

Rebel Relief

Sam Burford, Star Wars Relief, 2011

Sam Burford's Star Wars Relief is a timelapse photograph taken from the film Star Wars IV. Burford uses a bespoke capture device to record the film footage that is then rendered as a series of extended (and abstract) film stills (see example here). In this instance the image has been transformed into a surface relief made from silicon - a material previously used in film production to create sets and props. The relief work subsequently has allusions to pre-digital cinematic model making methods and aesthetic reference to the surface structure of the Empires Imperial Starships and Space Station.

The Pond of Tranquility

Matthew Day Jackson, Reflections of the Sky, 2010

With presentation cue's to Monet's Reflections of Clouds on the Water-Lily Pond Jackson's Reflections of the sky depicts a surface area of the moon that has been rendered by laser etching gypsum board (wallboard or Drywall) - a mass-produced material often used within domestic interiors. The etched pits and troughs that create the images surface topography also retain a gritty interference quality that exists somewhere between the production process and the transmission reception of such distant images.

Augmented Print

James Alliban, AR Business card

Also see the application of augmented reality in German Suddeutsche Zeitung magazine publication and previous posting the Loaded Surface concerning the integration of the physical space with the digital environment.

Analogue after Digital

Stefan Kubler, Aljarn, 2007, collaged postcards, 148 x 104 cm

Somewhere between Chuck Close's grid portraits that pull information inward and Tom Friedman's three dimensional interpolated packaging that explode outward. Stefan Kubler's Aljarn jumps forward within its two dimensional plain - a distribution process using multiple copies of a single printed image.

Loom Moon, I saw you standing alone.

Jeff Sanders, Moon, 2007, Jacquard tapestry, 72 inch x 8 inch depth, Edition of 12

Published by Magnolia Editions

Jeff Sanders Moon 2007 is a tapestry work constructed from a digital image. Using a series of interwoven threads the tapestry has been rendered by a specialized, electronic Jacquard loom. To get a better view of the Moon see the work at Magnolia Editions.

Another wry smile

Mike Ruiz, Replaced Mona Lisa, 2011, Oil on Canvas

As described by Mike Ruiz;

The Mona Lisa with the lady selected then put through Content-Aware Fill (a Photoshop CS5 tool that automatically generates content based on the existing surrounding content of the image and fills in selected area). The resulting image is a potential landscape as interpreted by the software. The image was sent to a painting manufacturer in China where an oil painting was produced.

Pretty fly for a print guy

3D Printed Hovering Ornithopters

Project by Charlie Richter, Floris van Breugel, William Regan, Zhi Ern Teoh

The Ornithopter project uses 3D printing technology to construct complex wing structures that replicate 'natures design'. See video here

Interesting thread

Devorah Sperber, Holodeck: Simulation Program..., 2007-08

The Human Printer: A Namesake Production

Paul Laidler, The Human Printer.tiff, Produced by The Human Printer, 2010

“We shape our tools and thereafter our tools shape us.” (M. McLuhan, 1964)

The Human Printer.tiff is part of a series entitled Print is Dead and was produced by a group called The Human Printer. The group consists of eleven individuals who specialise in reproducing by hand, the digitised rendering of a half-tone image that is normally associated with mechanical print processes. The Human Printer group has adopted the remote Print-on-demand facility for transferring digital files, although the potential to rapidly produce large editions is somewhat limited due to the extensive labour involved and the small-scale production of the studio. The Human Printer.tiff (see source file here) took just over two weeks from order to receipt.

In keeping with the mechanised half-tone print process, the digital image is printed as colour separations using the four printing channels of CMYK. To produce the final drawn image, each colour separation is traced individually on to a single sheet of semi-transparent paper so that collectively, the channels register with one another. The layering order of each colour follows the half-tone print procedure using four different coloured pens that correspond to each of the separate colour channels.The Human Printer’s transcription process includes the visual descriptions associated with reproduction through the mechanised image. The Human Printer’s rendering of a coarse photographic half-tone and its associations with automation are reminiscent of Andy Warhol’s 1963 comment “I want to be a machine”.

Further overtones of convergence between humans and technology reference a (hypothetical) Post-human future where a biological generation of humanity ends and technological one begins. The influence of science and technology upon the human condition has been a constant source of inspiration for the field of science fiction. In more recent times the fictional associations with phenomena such as implants, smart materials and cloning have accelerated the science fiction world toward are own.

The idea that a fiction can become functional through an associated process has been incorporated in to the selection of a specific technology for the work entitled Stretch out with your feelings.

The Human Printer.tiff is part of larger series of work entitled Print is Dead that continues the theme of humans as printers and the broadening definition of the print medium in the digital age. Collectively these works have contributed toward the development of paper for the Impact 7 2011 printmaking conference in Australia - further details can be found here.