AHOY-HOY

Humans receive and perceive information in various modes. Traveling across the expansive Pacific Ocean numerous times to China, I was amazed how communication internationally is instant and immediate. The world is more wired than ever.

Where does the internet live?

From Nicole Starosielski’s the undersea network book: “Undersea fiber-optic cables are critical infrastructures that support our global network society. They transport 99 percent of all transoceanic digital communications, including phone calls, text and e-mail messages, websites, digital images and video, and even some television (cumulatively, over thirty trillion bits per second as of 2010). It is submarine systems, rather than satellites, that carry most of the Internet across the oceans.”

I started to visualize how information traverses through fiber-optic cables on the ocean’s floors. The cables work similarly like a human nervous system in which a synapse permits a neuron to relay an electrical signal. As a result, it inspired a series of pen and ink drawings titled OPTIC. The artworks stretch and convert data into a pure linear form bypassing traditional language.

My interest grew to incorporating real-time movement to the OPTIC drawings. Working patiently with a pen and ruler, I made a conscious effort to be present with the process. The goal was to reconcile human behavior with an adaptable digital process. As a result, the research on how to merge a dependent but binary relationship was born.

OPTIC 2 becomes translated digitally to showcase its contortion through various network hubs:

The creation process of the video artwork was cumbersome and awkward. Like large ships laying fiber optic cables on the ocean’s floors, progress can be delayed due to unforeseen circumstances or my limited intellectual capacity. Nevertheless, I persisted through the help and guidance of online resources. Ahoy-hoy!