… “Who wrote that?” - “You did”.
The Exhibition “Inertial Frame” brings together painting, digital animation, and sound to explore the properties and representations of light and form in the context of time as a narrative from different perspectives.

“Every observer…, carries around a sort of “reference frame” relative to which they may view everything else as moving – or not moving – in various ways.” (Aguirre, 2020)

As a central element to my recent MA Fine Art studies, through an evolving process of reflection on the language of painting and it’s connection with other mediums such as photography and computer graphics, a number of processes have been established by which abstract and representational planes, still and moving imagery, might function together as a means of mutual dialogue; an attempt to create a conceptual space where, for instance, the properties of light and the act of perception can be engaged with through simple scientific experiments and embedded references to certain iconography within film and news media. The title for the exhibition “Inertial Frame” refers to aspects of scientific study into relative motion in space and time.

The memory of walking through a moving train as one perceives the reference frame of the train one walks through, and at the same time perceiving the reference frame of the station the train leaves in the opposite direction from; and then to sit apparently still, an inertial frame for a time, at constant velocity with eyes closed unaware of moving at all. On the platform, an observer watches the passenger walk through the train in one direction as the train leaves in another, and for a moment, they appear not to be in horizontal motion at all, but still, until they sit, and the train and they disappear.

By way of metaphor, this concept of reference frame may provide a way of considering shifting states of relationship and consciousness. How can we imagine the perception of another’s frame of reference?

The ongoing series of paintings “Inertial Frame” draws inspiration from multiple sources, such as the 1961 film “La Notte” by Michelangelo Antonioni. “It’s a strangely self-displacing story, one that’s pulled back to the past and catapulted forward into the future” (Brody, 2013). It takes place over the course of around twenty-four hours. The night that the film’s title alludes to sees the characters move in and out of shadow in a way that recalls Caravaggio’s paintings, in chiaroscuro lighting, with their manifestation and dissolving of form.

As a counterpoint to the representations of people, each painting also depicts abstract patterns on photographic emulsion of multiple dark instances. These are produced by passing a laser beam, multiple times, through a double-slit slide onto the photographic emulsion which is then developed in photographic chemistry. This simple experiment first produced by Thomas Young in 1801 (though not with a laser) proved that light had wave-like properties. Instead of two dots produced by the double slit we see multiples dots gradually diminishing like circular ripples on water seen in cross-section. This experiment would later be applied to particle physics and form one of the central strands of wave-particle duality in quantum mechanics. “Electrons are sent, one by one, toward a barrier with two slits on it, and detected on the other side. Even though they cross the barrier singly, the pattern they make when detected shows that they passed through the slits as waves.” (Crease, Goldhaber, 2014).

So, instances of light interference patterns on photographic emulsion sit beside depictions of instances from the film “La Notte” painted in oil.

Projections of animated digital sculptures extend the references to film media. Their monochrome simplicity is deliberate. Whereas the norm would be to attempt a greater degree of photo-realism, in this case the concept of a sketch or study drives the visual language of each piece. Visible geometry, artefacts, and uneven surfaces are left unrefined to acknowledge the nature of the medium and process. The illusion of solidity is broken when one sees the animated forms merge through each other, known as “clipping”, enabling unpredictable distortions and mutations. Chance and uncertainty then, is a significant element of the process.

Sound being a wave form has a part to play in the work not as a form of auditory decoration but as a means of exploring time and memory with reference to the ideas described above. The first animation has three parts with sound recorded via microphone.

Altogether the exhibition is a tentative inquiry into the phenomenology of perception.

“Our body is in the world as the heart is in the organism”. (Merleau-Ponty, 1962)


An excellent scientific film on frames of reference can be seen on YouTube.
A selection of the artwork can be viewed on the website.

Contact details: djgreeves67@gmail.com
Instagram: @davidgreeves