NYAB Event - Don Zurlo "The Inconstant Illusion"

Don Zurlo "The Inconstant Illusion"

Viridian Artists, Inc.

This event has ended.

Opacity Is the Illusion of Nothing

I had an experience at Starbucks, looking out the window at a restaurant neon sign that malfunctioned, spelling out two different words, Liberty and Libe. One word was the restaurant ad, and the other was a nonsense syllable that I discovered had a meaning in computer programming that could be related to the first word, but seemed a contradiction to the first. In trying to make sense out of this event, I became aware of the capacity for chance happenings to expand our consciousness beyond the normal limits of our understanding. I incorporated the sign metaphor into esthetic principles I had worked with before, and used chance events to determine elements of form and color in the new paintings on which I was then working.

The rationale behind using chance as an element of design is very simple. Chance events force one to look at elements that one might not consider from one's limited personal experience. The artist has an opportunity to examine these events and incorporate new components into a composition, broadening the scope of creative possibilities, and expanding the artist's and the spectator's vision. In some ways, this relates to early 20th century principles of Dadaism, as well as mid-20th century performance art like the Happenings of Allan Kaprow and other artists.