“I fear the day that technology will surpass our human interaction.
The world will have a generation of idiots”.
- Albert Einstein
The world will have a generation of idiots”.
- Albert Einstein
Through my artistic process of drawing and painting I would like to express my concerns about our loss of connection with the natural world. How the new developments of technology and increasing use of social media has distracted us from the real world, real connections and real interactions with each other and the surrounding environment. Without a doubt one of the pitfalls of the increasing use of technology in the art creating process is that the “artist invariably becomes entwined” which “tends to separate the artist from the direct creation and control of his art” (Bornstein 119). Rather than to imagine, we search, rather than to see, we capture, rather than to listen, we explain. These notions are all ideas in which technology has effected the way we create and experience the world around us.
I would like to know more about how the present relationships go through day-to-day interactions with one another. How have they changed and what effect does that have on the individual? It will be interesting to research into how advanced our technology has become and to see how little human creativity, thought, and connection is necessary in the modern world. Is technology hindering what makes us human or helping us develop and understand one another better? On a broader scale, I am interested in the issues of modernity and the phenomenons of present social interactions.
I am deeply engaged with the natural world, that being to me, nature and the simple beauty that the Earth provides for us. Flowers, colour, energy, growth, death and decay are just a few choice words which evoke passion in the work that I do. On the opposite spectrum to the natural, I am curious about the technological, and what impacts it has on our identities and relationship with our environment and each other. Metaphysics, a branch of philosophy is interested in spiritual energy and our connection to the world as I am.
I have found numerous parodies articles and videos, coincidently on social networking sites and online which outline many concerns and problems society faces in this Information Age. Cracked.com has an interesting read titled, “6 Scientific Reasons Social Networks Are Bad for Society” which outlines some “normal” activity of the average technologically savvy youth. Not to mention, being personally guilty of being absorbed into social networking and new technology I can see first hand the negative effects it has had for me. Advancing technology has truly seeped into every aspect of our lives, it has even “entered the body itself” (Huws 34) in the form of processed foods and manufactured goods. As our lives become more and more about consumption, advances and gaining new technologies lest we forget all that is lost and forgotten. In “Technology, Human Beings and the Fate of the Earth: A Social Critique of Modern Life,” Folisi brings awareness to some important social phenomenons that have become the norm of todays society:
I would like to know more about how the present relationships go through day-to-day interactions with one another. How have they changed and what effect does that have on the individual? It will be interesting to research into how advanced our technology has become and to see how little human creativity, thought, and connection is necessary in the modern world. Is technology hindering what makes us human or helping us develop and understand one another better? On a broader scale, I am interested in the issues of modernity and the phenomenons of present social interactions.
I am deeply engaged with the natural world, that being to me, nature and the simple beauty that the Earth provides for us. Flowers, colour, energy, growth, death and decay are just a few choice words which evoke passion in the work that I do. On the opposite spectrum to the natural, I am curious about the technological, and what impacts it has on our identities and relationship with our environment and each other. Metaphysics, a branch of philosophy is interested in spiritual energy and our connection to the world as I am.
I have found numerous parodies articles and videos, coincidently on social networking sites and online which outline many concerns and problems society faces in this Information Age. Cracked.com has an interesting read titled, “6 Scientific Reasons Social Networks Are Bad for Society” which outlines some “normal” activity of the average technologically savvy youth. Not to mention, being personally guilty of being absorbed into social networking and new technology I can see first hand the negative effects it has had for me. Advancing technology has truly seeped into every aspect of our lives, it has even “entered the body itself” (Huws 34) in the form of processed foods and manufactured goods. As our lives become more and more about consumption, advances and gaining new technologies lest we forget all that is lost and forgotten. In “Technology, Human Beings and the Fate of the Earth: A Social Critique of Modern Life,” Folisi brings awareness to some important social phenomenons that have become the norm of todays society:
The natural world, the earth itself; the air, the trees, the vast realms of animals, plants, oceans, deserts and mountains are increasingly losing meaning and value in the self-hypnotized, narcissistic lives of mechanized human beings. Although it is certainly an abomination of our essential heritage, we are ever-entrained to focus less and less on the natural world in which we live, and of which we are but one aspect – lest we forget – and more and more to focus on the world as fashioned through the minds and hands of men. It’s sad indeed when we ignore what is right before our eyes, i.e. our actual surrounding environment, and instead remain culled to a collective techno-vision of the ideal man-made life. It’s also sad when we ignore those human beings who are standing right in front of us because we’d prefer to text or talk with someone miles away, when we must remain overly-attached to those we know because we’ve lost our human capacity for interrelationship with our expanded world of fellow citizens who we now dismiss as strangers. Our advance in technology has engendered a compensating inversion in our capacity for compassion and community – which is to say, the further we develop our technology, the less we appear to maintain the qualities of a loving, caring and attentive human society.
My concern over the ever changing world and rise of technology is not a new train of thought, during the Industrial Revolution many people feared the loss of what makes us human. Eco-art as well, emphasizes the importance of the environment and the beauty in its fragility and ephemeral nature. “No longer the material of life, nature has become a site of non-activity or leisure, a negative, a signifier of the absence of human intervention...” (Huws 36) and as a place one goes to rather than just lives amongst. Devices such as “iPhones and Blackberries invite (demand!) constant use” and “...invite reaction rather than reflection” (Watson 161). My biggest concern and example of this would be when somebody comes stumbles upon some beautiful foliage or landscape and immediately take out their phone to snap a photograph or share on social media. Rather than to just observe and reflect upon, one is drawn to document and obliterate the timelessness of such beauty found within nature.
Not only is my work driven by social changes and technology but is also driven by tattoo artists and their work. They do not necessarily relate conceptually to my ideas but rather interest me aesthetically because of their use of colour, space, line work, or overall design appeal and cohesiveness. In a stretch though, tattoo artists seek to take something beautiful given to them and to capture it exactly as it is on their client. Although beautiful, a tattooed rose will never stand up to the real thing and the connection a person can have in physically holding one. I too, seek to capture the beauty of the surrounding world through flowers alike, yet in doing so, will never give the full picture or full satisfaction that they provide in the real world.
Within my own work I will be expressing a continual narrative between technology and interaction whether or not that interaction is in the physical presence of a person, or between the art and the viewer themselves. Senses are important in that through technology, sight, smell, or touch can be altered or diminished entirely from the persons experience of an object or place. I hope to alter the romance between art and technology, the environment and cyber space in that we become more aware of the dangers, phenomenons, and absences it has created in our lives versus the accessibility and convenience such technologies have provided for us.
Not only is my work driven by social changes and technology but is also driven by tattoo artists and their work. They do not necessarily relate conceptually to my ideas but rather interest me aesthetically because of their use of colour, space, line work, or overall design appeal and cohesiveness. In a stretch though, tattoo artists seek to take something beautiful given to them and to capture it exactly as it is on their client. Although beautiful, a tattooed rose will never stand up to the real thing and the connection a person can have in physically holding one. I too, seek to capture the beauty of the surrounding world through flowers alike, yet in doing so, will never give the full picture or full satisfaction that they provide in the real world.
Within my own work I will be expressing a continual narrative between technology and interaction whether or not that interaction is in the physical presence of a person, or between the art and the viewer themselves. Senses are important in that through technology, sight, smell, or touch can be altered or diminished entirely from the persons experience of an object or place. I hope to alter the romance between art and technology, the environment and cyber space in that we become more aware of the dangers, phenomenons, and absences it has created in our lives versus the accessibility and convenience such technologies have provided for us.
Works Cited
Bornstein, Eli. “Art, Technology and Nature: Toward New Affinities.” The Structurist Vol. 0, No. 21 (1981): 117-124. Print.
Folisi, Salvador. “Technology, Human Beings and the Fate of the Earth: A Social Critique of Modern Life.” State of Nature, The Green Issue, Sept. 2009. Web. Nov. 2013.
Huws, Ursula. “Nature, Technology and Art: The Emergence of a New Relationship?” Leonardo Vol. 33, No. 1 (2000): 33-40. Print.
Watson, Richard. Future Minds: how the digital age is changing our minds, why this matters, and what we can do about it. London: Nicholas Brealey Pub., 2010. Print.
Folisi, Salvador. “Technology, Human Beings and the Fate of the Earth: A Social Critique of Modern Life.” State of Nature, The Green Issue, Sept. 2009. Web. Nov. 2013.
Huws, Ursula. “Nature, Technology and Art: The Emergence of a New Relationship?” Leonardo Vol. 33, No. 1 (2000): 33-40. Print.
Watson, Richard. Future Minds: how the digital age is changing our minds, why this matters, and what we can do about it. London: Nicholas Brealey Pub., 2010. Print.