∆ æther

æ t h e r

p a n o p t I c o n ∞ is
nothing
vapor-ware
æther

æther [Classical Element]
According to ancient and medieval science, aether
(Ancient Greek: αἰθήρ), also spelled æther or ether and also called quintessence,
is the material that fills the region of the universe above the terrestrial sphere.

The concept of aether was used in several theories
to explain several natural phenomena, such as the traveling of light and gravity.

In the late 19th century, physicists postulated that aether permeated all throughout space,
providing a medium through which light could travel in a vacuum,
but evidence for the presence of such a medium was not found in the Michelson–Morley experiment,
and this result has been interpreted as meaning that no such luminiferous aether exists.*

But I say yes, such luminiferous æther does exist
[and I have photographic evidence]

Google Earth, Google Street View and the æther Bunny
The whole world exists as a digital construct floating in The Cloud, ones + zeros depicting reality.
I frequently enjoy traveling the planet via both Google Earth and Street View.
So much to see, soaring like a drone, following a 9-eyed spider around as it scours the globe.
I spend a lot of time in this simulacrum, taking pictures of what I see along the way.
I feel like an explorer because this vast facsimile doesn't exist except as digits in silicon,
and now I'm the first to see this vista from precisely this angle.
I snap a screen-shot, move the cursor and the scenery... off-screen, the image, now unseen, no longer exists.

A photograph is as much a work of Art as it is a static document recording a moment.
Choices were made about dimensions, cropping, composition, color...

Art is whatever you say it is (if you can explain why).
e.g. Marcel Duchamp, AKA R. Mutt - The Fountain, 1917 )

And so Marcel begets Andy; who reappropriates the Brillo© logo, reproduces soup cans,
and pees on sheets of cooper – and then dares to call it art. Brilliant, no?
And the icing; both artists were literally taking the piss . What a nice meta twist.

Somebody famous once proclaimed "a Photograph Stops Time."
But the truth is; a photograph Creates Time.

Only the fact of light striking film – or a CCD array, or a Screen Capture command
– causes that exact moment to actually exist.

If that exact moment had not been recorded, from that precise angle, would it have happened?
Did it actually happen, vaguely happen, or not happen at all?

Is it safe to take a picture of Schrödinger's cat – and if it becomes a meme, will it take on a life of it's own?
It is philosophical questions like these that keep me awake at night.
Also, who let the cat out of the box?

Nobody would ever see the exact image I have recorded if I had not documented its existence in the first place.
If I take a screen shot, the computer records the order of the pixels, and their light-values, fixing a moment at a point in time.

If I use a camera to take a picture of my computer monitor, the act of exposing electromagnetic radiation to a CCD array
causes the event to exist. It would not “Be,” but for me.
The same as if I take a picture of a tree beside my street.

I like to travel. I go on trips all around the world – never leaving the comfort of home.
I like to take snapshots of what I see and share them with others.
Postcards from my adventures in cyberspace.

This shot and the previous 5 were taken when I visited Blue Jay Orchards, in Bethel, CT

I hope you enjoy looking at these images.
I'm curious to know what you think of my work.

If you would like to sponsor my research, limited editions of each image are available,
printed on archival paper.
Alternative options for concept ownership are also available.
Please contact me at [email protected].

Of course you can always go online and find a similar vantage point and take your own picture.
But it will never be exactly like the picture I have taken.
If nothing else, my picture predates, documents an older event.
My images are chill and so relaxed, they're way past tense.

Your version of the picture will be one of a limited edition of no more than 20, and each signed by me.
An image conceived with specific aesthetic intent, a digital photograph and physical proof
which documents my conceptual performance art piece.

You will be purchasing the idea I had of recording a picture of my laptop screen
as it displayed an image I found compositionally satisfying.
I move the pointer to the icon of a camera and click to get a screen-capture,
causing a confluence of events to be recorded as a digital image.
Please note the icon is a camera and this action is commonly referred to as "Taking a Picture."
I didn't ask permission – I just took the picture of what I could see when I went to visit a site.

The piece of paper with an image printed on it is a record of an event from the past,
a photo of a ghost, It is an idea, a wisp of luminiferous aether,
and serves as your physical receipt for the purchase of a thing that has no physical form.

The images I take screenshots of on my laptop do not exist - but for my taking the shot.
And then, the digital file "x.jpg" exists on my hard drive, like Schrödinger's cat waiting to be seen.
It does not exist again – until you look inside and open it up on your browser.
A sequence of 1s + 0s divined; controls light and color levels of LEDs, projecting lightwaves onto your retina.

Should I give a portion of what I earn from selling my art to Google?
Would it be legal if I took a selfie with the laptop screen, coincidentally open to Google Maps, visible right beside me?
When has an image source been reimagined and repurposed enough to be used without permission?
Is it Art if I take a screen shot and then make a photo-realistic painting of that screen shot?

Is it Art if I use digital tools to change the color and cropping of a digital file and then print it on an aluminum panel?
What if it is never printed, but existed solely as a digital art work,
only ever displayed on a screen or through a digital projector?
What if I sent you a thumb-drive with the digital file on it - kind of like a Non-Fungible-Token?
aether...

Would it be Art if I bought a laptop and airdrop the image file onto it - and consequently
sell the laptop and the concept of the image file that (may or may not) exist on it
- and which has the potential to be viewed only by turning the computer on and opening the file?

Can an idea about the creative process alter your way of thinking about something so that you look at it a different way?
The image has not changed, but your perception of it has shifted.
But if you now look at it differently, hasn't the original image been altered?
Is it Art yet?

I've gone all over the world on my travels, anywhere I pleased.
Neither distance nor altitude was a hindrance, thanks to GoogleMaps© and StreetView©.

In a truly mind-boggling undertaking, Google has thoughtfully stitched together how-many-trillions? of satellite images
and mapped them all out in a vast 3-D virtual space as big as the entire planet. And taken street view photographs
of much of the surface to boot - and repeatedly, over many years. Documenting History from on high and on the down low.

5 Pointz - Long Island City, NYC - lost to progress.

Why all the hubbub, Bub? Graffiti is ephemeral. It was never meant to last.

Why all the hubbub, Bub? Graffiti is ephemeral

How many photos does Google take every day via Streetview© cars and backpacks?
How many satellite images are taken daily?
Who takes them and how are they paid for?

VIGOR

How much time passes from when a satellite image is taken and when it is uploaded onto Google Earth©?
How often are the photos updated?
Those security guys in the Streetview© image above?
You can see where they're standing in satellite image below and a different angle of the HVAC above.

Can we access older satellite images - in the same way we can view Streetview© images from the past?
The polar regions in particular might be of interest. Pipelines and coastlines too...

Think about the reams of data and the processing power required
to create a detailed simulacrum of our entire planet – from above, and at street level to boot.
And it''s hard to believe, I know, but Google did all this purely in the name of Art.
I mean that 100%. I find these images beautiful
Thank you for your sponsorship.
Cease and Desist you say?
OK, but first, what do you think fair recompense should be?

And besides, none of this actually exists anyway. In theory.
All of this visual data is reassembled, 1's + 0's transmuted into lightwaves,
bent and processed by our eyes, turned back into digital information,
and finally interpreted by our brains.
I see. Sure. Intelligent design, alternate reality.
But like Schrodinger's cat, somebody has to open the box to take the picture,
and thereby put the poor thing into its misery - and into a quantifiable state.
Until then, the potential image existed - and did not exist - at the same time.

I expand the browser window dimensions beyond what the screen size can display – and then take a screen shot to get a panorama.

Should Google© pay Storm King Art Center to photograph and reproduce their property?
Should I pay Storm King Art Center for images I captured on Google© of their property?
Or I may use it - but only if I do not profit from using the image?
And it is a rather poor likeness, a reinterpretation, an amalgam of multiple images,
an approximation based on an algorithm. Or, one might argue, a kind of Digital Art
created by artificial intelligence. And I'm the first person to visit.

I went on trips to exotic locations, places anybody else can visit,
and I took pictures whilst there to document what I've discovered
in this brave new world, this virtual cyber metawurst, if you will,
a potent uncured sausage of alternate augmented digital realities.

As an experiment/publicity stunt/performance art piece
I will sell images taken during my global digital travel.
As a digital-only copy of the image the cost is US $1,111.11 per image file - plus cost of memory device and custom display case (+ 20%).
Any one image - limited to 20 editions each. digital and printed.
As a physical print of a digital file, the cost is US $2,222.22 per print (print type and mounting medium, display/framing - all custom case (+ 20%).

Please send $1.00 to the planet-oriented charity of your choice for every image that you copy on this site.
Please give credit to me Mr.Lunch and to Google, bless their heart.

I developed a simple hack to take panoramas on Google©;
I expand the browser window dimensions past what the screen size can display – and then take a screenshot.

Monument Valley

MASS MOCA - North Adams, Massachusetts. Signage casts a shadow for satellite communications.

Occasionally bits of text can be observed floating in the lower atmosphere.
This font-flotsam is a kind of digital pollution, which adds visual interest
- much like smog improves a sunset,
or an island of plastic waste provides a new ecosystem in an otherwise barren ocean.
I'm not showing you anything you can't see for yourself.
Did you know the DHS has built 50-foot digital border walls at the north and south borders of the USA?

Ever been to the top of Machu Picchu? I have. It was breathtaking.
Easier to get to than you might think. A breeze really, and no troubles with the thin air.
A new kind of ethical world travel is gaining traction; take a lot of pictures, leave zero carbon footprint.

The Eiffel Tower in a scene from Spielberg's "2001: a Space Oddity" (1968).

It is interesting to watch the images coalesce as the software conjures up a facsimile,
to see buildings built of vaporware slowly firm up as they're Franken-stitched into existence.

Golden Gate Bridge, SF, CA

First Ward: Johnson Fastener Corporation, Global Horizons Enterprises

Welcome to Niagara Falls

Overlook Mountain is the southernmost peak of the Catskill Escarpment in the central Catskill Mountains near Woodstock, New York.

The 2.5 mile hike on 11/18 was more challenging than expected. Snow did not help.

Summer is so over.

When you see the road up to the hotel, you can see why it wasn't sustainable.

Central Park, Cherry Hill, Strawberry Fields

Watched a Ken Block Video.

Went sightseeing in Buffalo where the video was shot. Found the bridge - and other interesting shots.

Super Cali Fragilistic Highway

Villa Cheminée in Cordemais, France - an art installation by Tatzu Nishi.

Villa Cheminée in Cordemais, France. An art installation by Tatzu Nishi.

The 2012 project Villa Cheminée featured a small hotel placed on top of a replica of a power station tower in Cordemais, France. As of 2018, the artwork continued to be operated as a hotel, being available for rental at the rate of 119 Euros per night.