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Histograms: The Dynamic of Stillness

Histograms explore a new vocabulary in representation. By extracting and reproducing the infinitesimal essence of an image, I create a new abstract organism (digital) whose source – its DNA- is directly based in nature (analogue). Histograms are a fingerprint – the border between perception and representation.

As a musician in close contact with the visual arts I began to recognize that there exist analogous thought processes and artistic mindsets between the recording of sound and the recording of image. Working for many years as a sound recording engineer, I had long thought of the tape machine as a sound camera - a machine that transfers vibrations in space into readable and reproducible information (much like a camera records reflected light onto film). Both fields capture moments in time on film. Histograms are visual slivers of moments. A fraction of a fraction of a second, extended and documented.

Using digital audio editing equipment I am able to view a representation of sound on a screen that, especially at certain magnifications, I edit using my sense of sight; the relationship between sound and picture blurring into one and the same. I may also extract sections – or samples - from both sounds and photographs that become starting points for new material.

We live in a time where the parent/progeny, original/copy, first/second relationship is blurring in all aspects of life. Major advances in cloning and genetics raise important questions that also have relevance in the art world. What is the value of an original? Should we edit all human error from film or photography or music? How perfect should we, and our creations, be? What is perfect? And ultimately, what is sacred?

All these implications are of great interest to me. What, today, is the essence of our being?

Histograms are a representation of DNA taken from my father, from his world. Like me, they are a creation born of him, sharing basic components, but uniquely divergent.

Even in their utter stillness, Histograms are exclamations of hope: they tell us that a positive transformation can be made. A metamorphosis can occur. A liberation is possible.

New York, March 14, 2002