On Thursday, January 13th, I got an invitation from Gem Preiz to visit his current exhibtion of fractals at Elven Falls Art Collective Gallery 1. It has been a while that I saw Gem’s art the last time at the Borderless project (read here).
Gem Preiz “is educated in science and mathematics and is fond of anything related to Nature, Cosmos and Earth, from astronomy to geology. The world of fractals is, in the same way, ruled by Mathematics functions which, as Physics do in Nature, enable to create objects which features repeat themselves at every scale. There lies his passion for fractals: create thanks to the power and pureness of the Mathematical concept, images the complexity of which can suggest Nature beings, objects or sceneries.” (excerpt from the notecard that you can grab at the exhibition)
The exhibition extends over two floors and 6 rooms and gives a broad overview of Gem’s art and the world of fractals. Gem has placed boards in each room which provide some background information about the art in the rooms and I used the text of the boards for this post.
Self-Repetitiveness: The shapes of nature seem to repeat themselves at all scales, giving the illusion of being able to explain the whole by understanding on a fraction. Fractal objects have the same prperty. There lies thair ability to evoke Nature, though without providing its keys.
Impressions of Gem Preiz’ fractal exhibition at Elven Falls Art Collective Gallery 1 (1)
Artefacts: Self-repetitiveness and complexity are also found in the creations of Man, often themselves inspired by Nature. Architecture, urbanism, technology are all areas where they seem to govern our creations, and provide me with the theme of same frames.
Impressions of Gem Preiz’ fractal exhibition at Elven Falls Art Collective Gallery 1 (2)
Complexity: The Universe is huge and extraordinairy complex. We are only a tiny portion of it but have the ability to observe, analyze and understand it. This difference of scale gives kind of vertigo that I try to make feel through the complexity of the pattern that I stage.
Impressions of Gem Preiz’ fractal exhibition at Elven Falls Art Collective Gallery 1 (3)
Fractals and SL: How to bring all this complexity inworld, while the textures enable only to transfer little data (1 Mb)? By uploading my images in pieces, then glued precisely on SL. Thus, visitors capture more details as they zoom, instead of seeing the image become blurred.
You can see this effect as Gem Preiz’ pictures build up from pieces when the textures rezz. If you don’t see Gem’s pictures, just wait a few moments, it takes some time to load the pieces of which they are built.
Impressions of Gem Preiz’ fractal exhibition at Elven Falls Art Collective Gallery 1 (4)
Abstractions: Man’s intelligence is intimately associated with his ability to invent, and therefore to imagine. Fractals, by their complexity and the richness of patterns provide a priviliged field of abstraction for the imagination, as Rorschach images do.
Gem Preiz write about himeself: “To try to evoke the world through images is also to try to tell stories. That’s what I’ve been trying to do for the last eight years, through 30 exhibitions I’ve done.”
You can grab a notecard with his biography, a list of all exhibtions and installations Gem made, a list of links to blogposts about his work, his flickr account and his YouTube channel.
Impressions of Gem Preiz’ fractal exhibition at Elven Falls Art Collective Gallery 1 (5)
Elven Falls Art Collective consists of 4 double floored galleries, 6 stores plus a huge sculpture park which is also available to exhibit larger works. Elven Falls Art Collective is owned and curted by Ant (antoinemambazo), Aires Hax is managing the gallery. I haven’t come across this space for the art so far – there’s a lot to see and I hope to find time to come back soon. Thank you Ant (antoinemambazo) for providing space for the art! I enjoyed my visit.
Thank you Gem for another great exhibition of your art. I look forward to see more of it.
Landmark to Gem Preiz’ fractal Exhibition at Elven Falls Art Collective
http://maps.secondlife.com/secondlife/Elven%20Falls/123/55/22
Gem Preiz flickr
https://www.flickr.com/photos/187894176@N07/albums
Gem Preiz’ Youtube (music for exhibitions and slideshows)
https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCGskNA8m9GAhiFwkpWlXE1Q
(music for exhibitions and slideshows)
Diomita Maurer’s Blog 