About the design
INTENTIONS
My initial abstract design was based on layered, square, cut paper compositions. I cutout shapes that seem to have the 'right' amount of balance of white positive / negative space.
I took a tip from the ancient tile designers and added the white outlines so that the colors don't bleed together when printed. The main problem I encountered was the challenge of making a 'good' image almost always result after rotating the layers.
Reflecting on this process, I would say this is a sort of metaphor for the relationship between our intentions and what you might call 'external forces'. Significant life events, impactful relationships, natural events -- which are represented by rotating the underlying layers of the design.
The titles of the images are names of the most impactful people in my life.
INTERPRETATIONS
I shared my work in progress with several people to get their impressions or interpretations. My sister-in-law told me, "well...I guess one thing about abstract art is that it makes you think." She and others told me stories about what they see or feel looking at the design. Here are a few 'tags' that came out of those discussions:
animation. abstract. curiosity. puzzle. pepsi. rorschach. Stella. square. tile. box. plans. outline. border. container. space. dashboard. scale. motion. snapshot. paper. collage. planes. chance. choice. luck. kaleidoscope. sperm. virus. microscope. ship. Escher. floating. zero-gravity. calm. pong. rubik. portal. trigger. mandala. fourth dimension
QUADRIPTYCH
- The 'quadriptych' aspect is that are two four-sided layers that rotate; there are 16 individual image results. Four of 16 are unique; the other 12 are variants of those four.
- Nothing in the design makes there a 'correct' orientation. One image may be turned upside down, or turned on either side, so that means one image has four versions.
- Besides the individual images, I create combinations containing four images in one piece -- I guess that four-panel style is a true quadriptych.