Summon

Through the integration of machine vision aesthetics and human visual experience, this series of paintings aims to create a novel symbol of light that emerges from the illusory radiance of the digital world, returning to the real world to re-experience aura and explore the neutral objective beauty in the symbiotic world of humans, nature, and machines.

The dynamic and vibrant halos in the paintings exhibit a complexity and tension beyond the human eye’s ordinary perception, resembling a bold summons inviting viewers to gaze directly into the sun. They evoke spiritual experiences such as the ultimate pleasure and warmth of near-death experiences, connecting with natural aesthetics like extraordinary astronomical phenomena and quantum energy transitions.

The “light” forms created in the paintings are not solely derived from visual experience but also originate from programmatically generated digital light in the virtual world. These “lights” are clearly non-existent in the real world, mere simulacra of light, yet they are recognizable by both humans and machine algorithms, achieving a balance I strive for.

As a new media artist, I have long studied machine vision, utilizing photography, digital media rendering, programming techniques, and artificial intelligence in my creations. Machine vision experience profoundly shapes my visual aesthetic system. I believe beauty can be calculated, that beauty is information. Simultaneously, natural aesthetics and spiritual aesthetics inherently possess mathematical elements, such as symmetrical compositions and fractals, naturally connecting algorithms with spiritual aesthetics.

As a “screen generation” individual, I was fascinated by digital images from the age of five or six, spending entire holidays exploring and collecting various high-definition wallpapers. Immersed in games and the digital world day and night, I acutely felt how “first nature” and “second nature” (artificial nature) jointly shaped my visual experience. This phenomenon bears out the theory of simulacra, which holds that everything exists and is perceived through media, and that the postmodern real world will be a hyper-real world controlled by patterns and symbols (simulacra), where hyper-reality replaces reality. These digital images have also influenced my understanding and construction of the real world, becoming a part of my life. Therefore, moments of enlightenment and awakening do not necessarily require the guidance of “first nature” and can originate from “second nature.”

In this exhibition, I create a new symbol of light. I actively blur the distinction between organisms and machines in my creative subjects, exploring a unique halo symbol that combines human spirituality with the characteristics of “first nature” and “second nature.” It differs from traditional spiritual aesthetic works, possessing the coldness of modernity and the aesthetic of digitization.

To achieve this, I conducted in-depth research on machine vision and organically combined the two “natures.” In my paintings, the expression of machine vision is inspired by the characteristics of AI aesthetics. I studied multiple AI-generated image techniques, with the diffusion model particularly inspiring. The diffusion model’s computational process gradually clarifies images from infinite noise, a process from infinity to finitude, vastly different from the limited visual experience of the human eye. Theoretically, images can possess infinite details, maintaining equal clarity regardless of zoom. I interpret this characteristic as a unique “AI aesthetic” and incorporate this infinity, a defining feature of contemporary machine vision, into my paintings, such as the dazzling digital halos composed of intricate geometric patterns.

In the specific execution of my paintings, I express light through vast white spaces at the visual center. Lines radiate from the center, continuously branching and curving. Thick brushwork creates textured relief, while the semi-transparent, even airbrushing creates a light, digital sense of depth, allowing viewers to delve into layers of details and experience the return of aura.