cur-vi-rec-ti-lin-ear \ adj. - a game board for geometrical interpretation;
cur-vi-rec-ti-lin-e-ar \ adj. a game board for geometrical interpretation;
Painted drawing installation at ArtPark, Lewiston, New York 2013
©Joan Zalenski 2013
Perhaps a trivial observation, but the influence of geometry in our daily lives is rather significant. It’s not even likely that anyone would pay much attention to this discovery. Is it possible that the daily visuals that bombard our brains influence whether our thinking is circular or linear? The most common examples are traffic lines and symbols, dots of red, yellow and green lights, grids and charts, maps, roads, driveways, sidewalks, patios, platforms, sports fields and playing courts, parking lots and on and on. Few if any are not in some form of geometric pattern or design. These elements generally have a universal meaning; for example, do not pass on a double yellow line. Most people know what is a foul line, baseline, goal line, etc. on a sports field. And most table-top game boards are designed in a geometric motif.
Although I disliked math during my school years, I loved geometry – perhaps for the artistic possibilities in diagramming a geometric shape, figuring angles, intersecting circles, measuring arcs. In many of my public art pieces I have used various formats of grids, lines, rectangles and dots, without conscientious intention. Eventually I created interactive game boards in public places that are more or less self-directed by the individuals who move along the paths and squares of the game, for example on a train platform. While I call them “games” these pieces are really meant to stimulate the mind, and prod the imagination, encouraging an individual to invent their own rules or direction. When you are on one of these “game boards” you become a “Player” and your moves are directed by your reaction to the color, shapes, or text – the ingredients that I use in inventing the game, allowing you to have a cerebral minute while waiting for a train or bus or just crossing a plaza.
For ArtPark, I took elements from one of my earlier public art works, and rearranged them in a graphic application for a purely visual design. The connective, curvilinear, rectilinear, intersecting, broken lines and arcs, compose a drawing on the plaza in front of the Art Gallery, and compliment the angles and surface features of the surrounding buildings – the vertical girders and angles of the Theater, the striped awnings, and the geometric pattern of the concrete/brick plaza itself. It is in effect a “game board” of sorts, employing the random movement of the “players” that walk across it, inviting them to make it a game of their own device.
Special thanks to: Tanis Winslow, Jessica Tamol, Stephanie Kowalski, Laura, David Hobba, Andrew Dickerson,Tanis's Mom for the bike, Sunny's Roost, Airport Al's,
and my friend, teacher, and collaborator Thomas Golya.
Although I disliked math during my school years, I loved geometry – perhaps for the artistic possibilities in diagramming a geometric shape, figuring angles, intersecting circles, measuring arcs. In many of my public art pieces I have used various formats of grids, lines, rectangles and dots, without conscientious intention. Eventually I created interactive game boards in public places that are more or less self-directed by the individuals who move along the paths and squares of the game, for example on a train platform. While I call them “games” these pieces are really meant to stimulate the mind, and prod the imagination, encouraging an individual to invent their own rules or direction. When you are on one of these “game boards” you become a “Player” and your moves are directed by your reaction to the color, shapes, or text – the ingredients that I use in inventing the game, allowing you to have a cerebral minute while waiting for a train or bus or just crossing a plaza.
For ArtPark, I took elements from one of my earlier public art works, and rearranged them in a graphic application for a purely visual design. The connective, curvilinear, rectilinear, intersecting, broken lines and arcs, compose a drawing on the plaza in front of the Art Gallery, and compliment the angles and surface features of the surrounding buildings – the vertical girders and angles of the Theater, the striped awnings, and the geometric pattern of the concrete/brick plaza itself. It is in effect a “game board” of sorts, employing the random movement of the “players” that walk across it, inviting them to make it a game of their own device.
Special thanks to: Tanis Winslow, Jessica Tamol, Stephanie Kowalski, Laura, David Hobba, Andrew Dickerson,Tanis's Mom for the bike, Sunny's Roost, Airport Al's,
and my friend, teacher, and collaborator Thomas Golya.
