In my artistic practice, I try and make sense of the complexity of computational systems through the becoming-sensory of data and algorithm. I'm concerned with how data and algorithm are understood and utilised in contemporary society, in that they are abstracted and made into something separate from their materials, conditions, and relations. Computation colours everything it touches with an algorithmic logic, a particular kind of ordering and sequencing that also brings forth apprehensions and paranoias. Â Permutations explores the way data is continually produced, manipulated, reordered, and made sensory. The works in this exhibition play with the seemingly endless permutations of data to investigate the scale and scope of data as well as its elegance and anxieties. Through 3D-printed sculpture, video, sound, simulation, and generative installation, these works find ways of making sensory the invisible data that subtends our experience of the world. In doing so, the works create new renderings of data that articulate both its darkness and our underlying fears, as well as how the extension and repetition of simple actions finds balance between order and complexity. Â I am particularly interested in the limits of data, such as the extent to which we can generate data. Although current logic in governments, corporations, and computer science (such as in machine learning and artificial intelligence) calls for ever more data in order to better predict and model behaviours, I am interested in how we can aesthetically investigate this glut of data, and what this mass of data means as it moves beyond our scales of comprehension. Here I hope to come to an understanding of computation through its affects and aesthetics, questioning what it means and how it feels to live alongside the interrelated complexity of data and the many ways it manifests. Kynan Tan
‘Combinatorics (Image)’ This generative work displays all possible colour combinations that can be displayed on an 8 x 6 pixel array. The work displays 60 frames per second and calculates 100 different possibilities for each frame. The images are shown in an ordered sequence. It will take 2.63 x 10 ^ 75 years to display the full range of images. Within this will be every single image that can be displayed within these parameters. The work calculates the current image based on the time since January 1st, 1970, also known as Unix time, a common time stamp for computer calculations.
‘Combinatorics (Sound)’ This generative work plays back all possible 10 bit, 512 sample audio buffers at 44100 samples per second. Each new buffer is calculated and played in realtime in an ordered sequence. It will take 7.23 x 10 ^ 2765 years to play back the full range of audio sample combinations. Within this will be every single sound that can be displayed within these parameters. The work calculates the current sound based on the time since January 1st, 1970, also known as Unix time, a common time stamp for computer calculations.
EDUCATION 2015 2007-11
PhD Candidate, University of New South Wales Art & Design (expected completion 2018) Bachelor of Music: Music Technology (First Class Honours), Western Australian Academy of Performing Arts
EXHIBITIONS 2018 Permutations, Dominik Mersch Gallery, Sydney being watched, second Beijing Media Arts Biennale at the Central Academy of Fine Arts, Beijing 2017 Primavera 2017, Museum of Contemporary Art, Sydney Co•–st•–l W•–ve Tr•–nsl•–tor, Critical Animals, This is Not Art Festival, Newcastle (with Devon Ward) _FOUNDATIONS_2100_, City of Perth Winter Arts Festival, (with Devon Ward) Co•–st•–l W•–ve Tr•–nsl•–tor, RAFT artist-run space, Elizabeth Quay, Perth (collaboration with Devon Ward) 2016 Longli International New Media Art Festival, Longli Ancient Town, Jinping County, Guizhou Province, China Polymorphism, Ideas Platform, Artspace, Sydney Automated Reasoning Paradigm, Firstdraft Gallery, Sydney 2015 Didactic Tools, Fremantle Arts Centre, Perth Dead Ringer, curated by Leigh Robb, Perth Institute of Contemporary Arts Pica Salon, curated by Leigh Robb and Nadia Johnson, Perth Institute of Contemporary Arts sculptures: 5, The Auricle, Christchurch, New Zealand Firstdraft Auction, Firstdraft Gallery, Sydney 2014 What I See When I Look At Sound, curated by Leigh Robb, Perth Institute of Contemporary Arts Print Award, Fremantle Arts Centre hyperthymesia, State of the Art Festival, State Library of Western Australia sculptures: 4, Firstdraft Gallery, Sydney perspectives [micro], NOW now Festival Group Show, SNO Gallery, Sydney 2013 perspectives [macro], free range gallery, Perth 2012 NH7 festival, Pune, India 2011 Wonderland, Museum of Contemporary Art, Taipei, Taiwan 2010 hypnogenia, Scitech Science Museum, Perth
RESIDENCIES 2014 2013-15 2013 AWARDS 2015-18 2014 2014 2013 2013 2013 2013 2012 2010
SymbioticA Research Residency, Biological Arts Facility, University of Western Australia Centre for Interdisciplinary Arts Resident Artist, Perth Performance Space Quickfire Residency, Carriageworks, Sydney (as Té with Andrew Brooks)
Australian Postgraduate Award, Research Excellence Scholarship Highly Commended award for city constructed from sleeping brain activity data, Fremantle Arts Centre Print Award, Perth Visual Arts New Work Grant, Australia Council (as Té with Andrew Brooks) Best Design for Wintering by Aimee Smith, Western Australian Dance Awards (video design, in collaboration with Ben Taaffe and Craig McElhinney) Young People and the Arts Fellowship, WA Department of Culture and the Arts Australia Council Artstart Grant WA Screen Awards, Outstanding Achievement Award: Best Interactive Narrative for Sound Chamber (with Yvette Coyne and Malcolm Riddoch) JUMP Mentorship Grant, to study with audio-visual artist Robin Fox Decibel Commission, to compose the audio-visual work Split Mirror Planes
PERFORMANCES 2017 CAPTCHA, Everyday Machines #2, curated by Tom Smith, Alaska Projects, Sydney Audible Edge Festival, presented by Tone List and Tura New Music, Perth Black Box Series, UNSW Art & Design 2016 Everyday Machines #1, curated by Tom Smith, Alaska Projects, Sydney (as Té with Andrew Brooks) Pretty Gritty series, curated by Gail Priest, 107 Projects, Sydney Electrofringe: New Terrains, Top Floor at Wellington, Sydney NOW now Festival of Arts, 107 Projects, Sydney 2014 perspectives [temporal], solo audio-visual concert, Perth Institute of Contemporary Arts NOW now Festival of Arts, Sydney (as Té with Andrew Brooks) Cinematic Scores, live soundtrack to Laszlo Moholy-Nagy’s Lichtspiel Schwarz Weiss Grau, Perth Fringe Festival, Packenham Street Art Space, Perth 2012-14 multiplicity - large-scale, dual-screen audio-visual work presented at: Perth Cultural Centre Screen Program, 2014; Test Tone, SuperDeluxe, Tokyo, Japan, 2013; Channels Video Art Festival, Melbourne, 2013; fractal shale, Perth Institute of Contemporary Arts Performance Space, 2012; NOW now festival program launch, Sydney, 2012; fractal shale, Tape Projects, Melbourne, 2012
PERFORMANCES CONTINUED 2013 International Computer Music Festival, Western Australian Museum (as Té with Andrew Brooks) Japan tour, solo audio-visual performances and as Té with Andrew Brooks, Osaka, Kyoto, Tokyo 2012-13 consciousness - large-scale audio-visual work presented at: Nu Things, Osaka, 2013; Tape Projects, Melbourne, 2012; AV Union, Sydney, 2012; Terrace Bar, Newcastle, 2012; The Bakery, Perth, 2012 2011 split mirror planes - for four instruments and four audio/visual sources, commissioned by Decibel new music ensemble - premiered at Perth Institute of Contemporary Arts 2010 lucidity - major composition for electroacoustic ensemble: acoustic instruments, computer signal processing, sound synthesis and video projections performed at The Bakery, Perth RECORDINGS 2014 100% hits by Té (Andrew Brooks and Kynan Tan), album, torrent download, self-released 2014 syllepsis by Motion, album, download, Wood and Wire CURATING AND ORGANISING 2017 ARTBAR September 2017, Primavera edition with Elena Papanikolakis, Museum of Contemporary Art, Sydney 2017 Black Box Series, experimental sound performances, UNSW Art & Design (co-organiser) 2014-15 Didactic Tools, co-curated with Sam Fox (Hydra Poesis), artist lab in November 2014, exhibition Fremantle Arts Centre in 2015 2013 fractal shale, Tape Projects, Melbourne 2012 fractal shale, Perth Institute of Contemporary Arts Performance Space 2013 circuitous by Té, album, vinyl + download, hellosQuare 2012 live recording 28072012 by Té, EP, CD + download, self-released 2012 raetina, album, CD + download, listen / hear collective COLLABORATIONS 2014-16 2013-16 2013 2013 2013
microLandscapes (sound, visuals, programming), interdisciplinary dance project by Emma Fishwick Assemblies for one Body(sound), improvised dance work by Rhiannon Newton Three Squared, (sound), dance work by Rhiannon Newton with Unkempt Dance Prompter (visuals and sound design), hybrid theatre work by Hydra Poesis, premiered at Arts House Meat Market, Melbourne Wintering (visuals), dance work by Aimee Smith, premiered at State Theatre Underground, Perth
SELECTED REVIEWS AND PUBLICATIONS 2017 Primavera Catalogue, Museum of Contemporary Art Australia 2016 Territories Within a Political Ecology by Ashley Haywood, Rochford Street Review 2015 Dead Ringer Catalogue, PICA Press 2014 Compulsively obsessive art & sound, review of What I see When I Look At Sound by Darren Jorgenson, RealTime Magazine 2014 Shifting the Registers, review of What I See When I Look At Sound by John Mateer, Art Monthly Magazine 2013 Review of perspectives [macro] by Steve Paraskos, Partial Durations (RealTime affiliate) Pleasures Synaesthetic and Crystalline by Sam Gillies, review of fractal shale, RealTime 2011 Slippage of Sound and Sight by Henry Anderson, review of Decibel Camera Obscura concert, RealTime SELECTED WRITING 2017 Computational Audio-Visual Temporalities, Writing Around Sound, edited by Richard Keys and Jo Burzynska 2016 Materialising the Conditions of Computation, Electronic Visualisation and the Arts 2014 Notes on Translation, Das SUPERPAPER, edited by Caleb Kelly (as Té with Andrew Brooks) 2014 Philosophical Investigations, Un Magazine, (as Té with Andrew Brooks) ACADEMIC 2016 2015-16 2012-14
Sessional Tutor, Narrative, Form and Time - Interactive Design, University of Technology Sydney Sessional Tutor, Data Rendering, UNSW Art & Design Sessional Lecturer in Composition and Music Technology, Western Australian Academy of Performing Arts
‘Deletion (kong.wav)’, 2017-18, inkjet print on metallic paper, 40 x 50 cm, framed, edition of 5 + 1AP
‘Multistructure Diagram’, 2017-18, inkjet print on photographic paper, 40 x 50 cm, framed, edition of 5 + 1AP
‘Deletion (thesis.pdf)’, 2017-18, inkjet print on metallic paper, 40 x 50 cm, framed, edition of 5 + 1AP
‘City Constructed from Sleeping Brain Activity Data (no.04)', 2015, 3D printed PLA plastic, 7 x 7 x 9 cm, edition of 3 + 1AP
‘Melt (Sydney)’, 2017-18, inkjet print on photographic paper, 40 x 50 cm, framed, edition of 5 + 1AP
‘City Constructed from Sleeping Brain Activity Data (no.05)', 2015, 3D printed PLA plastic, 10 x 7 x 6 cm, edition of 3 + 1AP
‘Particle’, 2017-18, inkjet print on photographic paper, 40 x 50 cm, framed, edition of 5 + 1AP
‘City Constructed from Sleeping Brain Activity Data (no.06)', 2015, 3D printed PLA plastic, 10 x 9 x 8 cm, edition of 3 + 1AP
‘City Constructed from Sleeping Brain Activity Data (no.07)', 2015, 3D printed PLA plastic, 10 x 7 x 10 cm, edition of 3 + 1AP
‘City Constructed from Sleeping Brain Activity Data (no.19)', 2015, 3D printed PLA plastic, 9 x 9 x 7 cm, edition of 3 + 1AP
‘City Constructed from Sleeping Brain Activity Data (no.08)', 2015, 3D printed PLA plastic, 8 x 7 x 8 cm, edition of 3 + 1AP
‘Metamodel.DNA (bacteroides fragilis - homo sapiens)’, 2015, 3D-printed PLA plastic, 12 x 10 x 10 cm, edition of 3 + 1AP
‘City Constructed from Sleeping Brain Activity Data (no.09)', 2015, 3D printed PLA plastic, 8 x 6 x 6 cm, edition of 3 + 1AP
‘Metamodel.DNA (lactobacillius rhamnosus ~ homo sapiens)’, 2015, 3D-printed PLA plastic, DNA data, 16 x 14 x 16 cm, edition of 3 + 1AP
‘City Constructed from Sleeping Brain Activity Data (no.16)', 2015, 3D printed PLA plastic, 7 x 6 x 5 cm, edition of 3 + 1AP
‘Metamodel.DNA (clostridium difficile ~ homo sapiens)’, 2015, 3D-printed PLA plastic, DNA data, 12 x 12 x 10 cm, edition of 3 + 1AP
‘Perspectives (Temporal)’, 2015, single channel computer-generated sound and HD video, 40:12 min, edition of 3 + 1AP
‘Combinatorics (Image)’, 2018, electronic components and computer-generated video, 2.63 x 1075 years, edition of 3 + 1AP
‘Automated Logistics Simulation’, 2018, computer-generated simulation, edition of 3 + 1AP
‘Combinatorics (Sound)’, 2018, electronic components and computer-generated sound, 7.23 x 102765 years, edition of 3 + 1AP
‘Automated Logistics Simulation (Permutations)’, 2018, computergenerated simulation, edition of 3 + 1AP
‘Melt (Integrated Circuit)’, 2017-18, computer-generated video and sound, 3:00 min, edition of 3 + 1AP
www.dominikmerschgallery.com