Fractal drawings

In the drawings project of the Abstraction unit, I explored the transformation of computer-generated fractal images into the medium of painting. I used my own computer-generated images as a source in the same way that an urban landscape artist would use city scenes as a source. The longer term goal remains to find motifs and new imagery that can sustain a series of paintings, and to see if mathematically derived images can produce new interesting drawn images of a kind not seen before, in that they are not derived from the “real” world. However, my aim is to avoid the standard mathematical art of spheroid-type shapes.

One of my projects in the subject Abstraction used fractals as the source of images, but not just the traditional Mandelbrot style, but rather those involving angular and circular modifications. I related these to the City Rail ticket-based images I had done in earlier Painting subjects and in extra-curricular projects.

The challenge was to produce an image that is as visually interesting as the one first captured on the computer screen, but which also stands alone as a painting. The aim was not to produce a pixel-perfect photo-realistic direct copy, otherwise all that would be needed would be a computer-printout. I wanted the painted images to highlight some of the features of the painting medium itself, such as texture and painterliness (e.g. broken colour & brush strokes).

For the Abstraction unit drawing project, I selected a dozen angular fractals to be drawn in charcoal on A1 paper, three examples of which are shown below. Figures 1, 3 and 5 show the original computer fractal images, and figures 2, 4 and 6 show the corresponding charcoal drawing. Figure 8 shows a later painting based on the fractal drawing in figure 7.

Fig 1. Fractal screenshot	Fig 2. Charcoal on cartridge paper, 84x60cm, 2005
Fig 3. Fractal screenshot	Fig 4. Charcoal on cartridge paper, 84x60cm, 2005
Fig 5. Fractal screenshot	Fig 6. Charcoal on cartridge paper, 84x60cm, 2005
Fig 7. Untitled Charcoal on cartridge paper, 84x60cm, 2005
Fig 8. Untitled, 2005. Acrylic on canvas, 100x75cm

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