Appearance and Being

In 2021, I enrolled in a course about Genius, Inspiration, and Madness across ancient, European, and American traditions. A central theme of the course was a recurrent exploration of the Apollonian-Dionysian dichotomy described by Nietzsche in his seminal work "The Birth of Tragedy". Nietzsche contrasts the Apollonian (order, structure, rationality) with the Dionysian (chaos, emotion, primal nature) and suggests the interplay between these two drives is essential for creating profound art, reflecting the complexity of human nature.

For me, this study extended beyond academic curiosity. It reshaped my perspective, elevating a concept I was superficially familiar with into a recurring theme I observed in my life or applied in my artistic pursuits.

"Appearance and Being" (Schein und Sein) aims to build upon the explorations of my previous works, "Sol" and "Space & Ego," effectively serving as a third installment in an ongoing study. The series uses handpicked cellular automata rules at a close-up, through which I consciously navigate the space between strict structure and organic unpredictability. I start with a rudimentary, perfectly square form distorting it to the point of obtuseness. The ironically sharp edges of these obtuse elements, juxtaposed against a fading, concealed underlying structure, balance authenticity and aesthetics.

All works are designed with plottability in mind, aiming to convey solids, stripes, and gradients through lines.

Recommended pen tips for plotting are:

Solid iterations: 0.4mm (size 04), but also works across a range of pens.
Striped iterations: 0.4mm (size 04), but also works across a range of pens.
Gradient iterations: 0.2mm (size 005), also works with smaller sizes.

One rare color palette combination was inspired by a wonderful book I discovered at my local library - Edith Young's "Color Scheme." The book offers many different palettes across a diverse set of subjects. From these, I selected and merged two favorites to create a two-color palette - The Pupils of the eyes in Vermeer's portraits (1656-72) and The reds of the red caps in Renaissance portraits (1460-1535).

Implemented in JS, this code utilizes the Perlin.js and Simple-noise.js libraries.

Press p to save a PNG of the image in full screen. Press s to save a single complete SVG file for plotting.

And this is a redeemable project in case you’d like to receive a physical plot!

Pixel Love!