eye candy 99

digital ornamentation / research / interactive installation / decoding / urban patterns

both theoretically as well practically sarah dorkenwald researched on the phenomenon of contemporary processes of ornamentation. digital applications increased the appearance of new surface treatments in disciplines like architecture, design, music and art by reassembling, recycling, or remixing familiar images.

as an artistic response to this phenomenon she conceived the computer program ‘eye candy,’ an interactive system to create infinite urban patterns relating to movement, scale, geometry, and motif based on photos of familiar urban structures such as public parks, pavements, gas stations, streets, and street lights. by taking elements away and leaving others she stripped the images of their formal legibility. these new images were the material for the program to create an abstract pattern. the application was programmed in c++ by mathias wollin/meso.

an experiment, visual perception, the observer as the constructor, mixer, relationship, a sum is formed. stage sets are repeated, sequence, rhythm, seeming rules allow for connections, weave patterns, process, form ornaments, flow, infinity, fleeting. visual impressions, dissolve, fade, without purpose, without function, beautiful. elements offer recognition, memories, meaningless, they result in wholeness, are part of a mass that fascinates but also is a surface, flat, smooth, shiny, universal, arbitrary.