Casey Reas | Erika Weitz

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Transfer from 0x457ee5f723C7606c12a7264b52e285906F91eEA6 (REAS Wallet) to 0xfD4539D06B39250c67207E1928e107b534f5eF13 (unitlondon) - Apr 18, 2024 4:33 PM

Physical work courtesy of Unit London and Casey Reas Studio

London, Unit London, Wet and Saturated Process. 24 April - 25 May 2024

Casey Reas, a pioneer in generative art, masterfully blends technology and creativity to craft mesmerizing digital compositions. His work Technical Image #3, realized in collaboration with Erika Weitz, will be showcased at Sotheby’s auction for the Lumen Prize Anniversary, a significant piece from his solo exhibition Wet and Saturated Process. Created through algorithms, this work showcases Reas’ enduring exploration of the intersection between nature and technology, resulting in kaleidoscopic patterns that mirror organic forms while being entirely digital.

Technical Image #3 is part of an investigation by Reas into the notion of the “technical image”, a term explored by philosopher Vilém Flusser’s Towards a Philosophy of Photography, a seminal book for the comprehension of the realm of image-making in our age. Reas follows a tradition of artists working with technology to expand upon the repertoire of forms found in nature. Rather than neutral representations, Flusser contends that technical images are shaped by the mechanics of the devices used to construct them. The artwork derives from a machine-learning model trained on scans of organic plant material and enhances our understanding of the natural world by offering a “technical image” for our data-driven age.  

Working with Erika Weitz, an expert in 19th-century wet-plate collodion photography, a technique that involves coating a metal plate with photosensitive solutions before inserting it into a camera and exposing the plate to light, Reas transforms his machine-learned images into analogue, tactile abstractions. These 4 x 5” textured works embody Flusser’s notion of the technical image: a depiction of reality complicated across a range of systems, bridging our material and immaterial worlds through automation and handmade creation.