Jonathan Harris, Artist Statement:
“Since the late 1990s, my work has dealt with how the human condition attempts to maintain its integrity in the midst of our hyper-connected technological reality, not by escaping to a more primitive time, but by finding the humanity within the machine and learning to love it.
Trained in computer science at Princeton University, I write software programs that automatically collect very large data sets from the Internet, then analyze and process these data sets in real-time, extracting stories and patterns. They are then presented back on the Internet in playful, beautiful ways, closing the feedback loop. Since my work typically incorporates millions of found, personal artifacts collected from public blogs, dating sites, forums, and social networks, viewers often find their own words and pictures in my finished pieces, making them two-way mirrors in which people see reflections of themselves even as they voyeuristically glimpse the lives of others. As an optimist, I prefer to illustrate the utopian promise of technology by focusing on its human, emotional side, which constantly battles the widespread belief that exponential technological growth will produce a dystopian future. These works are never “finished”, as they continually add new data from the Internet as it becomes available, growing and changing every few minutes like organic digital creatures or creative machines. In this sense, my works become alive and autonomous the moment I release them.
…One final theme running through both bodies of work (and why I place so much faith in technology) is a belief that science and spirituality will soon converge (despite the rift that has traditionally separated them) and that technology will be the mediator to broker the deal. As developments in fringe physics and cosmology start to suggest a model of reality that resembles the ancient spiritual teachings of Hinduism, Sikhism, and certain mystical religions, I imagine a future where technology itself becomes spiritual, and this is finally something I can believe in.”
August 2009 . Brooklyn, NY http://www.number27.org/statement.html
I recall discussing Jonathan Harris in one of our online chats – well actually, it was a piece of his work we discussed, I believe – we feel fine. This work, I can now see was an inspiration for my soul text.
His work is really inspirational – he collects the data and makes stories, artwork and programs out of his ‘collections’. I did not realize until now that his work also held a spiritual/scientific element.
