Human Algorithm II
(Pencil & pen on paper)
20 x 30cm
2021
This work is about human life. I became obsessed with human life for many years. Many years in which I could not make another human life, no matter how much I tried to visualise it. As an artist I try to create what I see, but I couldn’t create this. So instead, I had to go to medical science, and all its obsessions with facts and figures, to help me carefully produce such an important piece.
These artworks reference the embryo imaging techniques used within clinical IVF practices. Where embryologists obsess over algorithms which measure developmental changes against calculated variables, to grade the suitability of embryos; literally determining the potential for life. But here, the artist who creatively draws, intervenes; and rather than a digitised computer-based system, this hands-on process uses imagination, leaving room for variation and error. Geometric shapes are abstracted, and erratic forms ruin the perfect patterns. Marks are ingrained in the paper, creating white spaces that cannot be filled predictably by the tonal pencil work, whilst red coloured lines are used to create unstable intrusions. The obsession with creativity overtakes the scientific obsession with accuracy, and human life becomes just a series of beautiful lines, tones, shapes and spaces.