Howl #16

Eric Zboya

Price Freely distributed at the Whitechapel Gallery, London, July-October 2011.
Format One-colour lithographic print on 250gsm silk paper.
Year [2011] editioned in 2011
Edition 1000
Dimensions 840 x 594 mm

We tend to overlook that mathematics is, in fact, a language; and it is a dynamic system of communication that has been largely ignored as a vehicle for textual translation. ‘Algorithmic Translations’ attempt to acknowledge this vehicular disregard by utlising the mathematical functionality found in graphic imaging software. This utilisation adds an element of dimensionality to a textual work by mutating a text into a kind of graphic, nonlinear entity. Through a series of algorithmic calculations, the computer program expels an abstract image based upon the original topographical placement of the type on the space of the page. This algorithm transforms each letter, each mark of punctuation, into dendrites that extrude into the continuum of the page. Each page is inimitable; the image can never be recreated in the same way twice due to the program’s seemingly aleatory function during the algorithmic transformation. This act of visual creation through mathematical calculation serves to challenge the reader’s notion of comprehension, perceptibility, and language, through visual poetics.