Plymouth College of Art, Alumni Summer Studio 2014

During the summer of 2014, I was asked by Plymouth college of art to return to college to work in their gallery space. Myself and 3 others spent the summer working on separate projects with the aim of putting on a show on the final day. My work consisted of an exhibition of prints, and an interactive installation.

Pareidolia is a psychological phenomenon involving a vague and random stimulus (often an image or sound) being perceived as significant. Common examples include seeing images of animals or faces in clouds, the man in the moon or the Moon rabbit, and hearing hidden messages on records when played in reverse.

To understand this concept of this installation, start by taking a 2 by 2 pixel grid. in a 2x2 grid there are 4 pixels. if each pixel was either black or white we would end up with a total of 16 different possibilities. If we increased the size of the grid to 16 x 16 pixels, our number of possibilities go up to 65,536 varying combinations. At this level our brain can start to distinguish patterns and shapes.

The installation was an experiment to see if recognisable shapes, patterns or images appear within the chaos. 9 variations were presented showing different levels of colour and resolution. Each pixel was truly randomised, and updated linearly from top to bottom. In theory, the images presented could show anything that has ever existed, or will exist.