Hooks found in nature include porcupine quils, cactus thorns, hooked seed pods, sperm to peninsulas that hook water. Man discovering how the hook functions in nature uses the physical properies of the hook form and puts his knowledge to a new use. The new purpose modifies the hook in nature making it an invention.
As an artist what if I used a honeycomb of hexagons to identify geometric pairs in nature? Artists use the grid to enlarge or reduce the scale of photographs as a tool in making representational copies of photographs. Why not study the skies for repeated pairs of hooks forming a mirror image of heart shapes? Pairs of heart shapes curved sides overlapping form a hexagon. The hexagon is inside a pair of equalateral triangles in the shape of a six pointed star. Inside the triangular six points a hexagon with a pair of hearts mirroring the orientation of the hearts on the opposite side. The fractal geometry is not new and has been discovered by artists and mathmeticians. My application of hexagons is an invention of using geometry in making a picture of swirls of clouds so they have a natural look. This application is not original.
Furthermore, in applying this invention I do not draw the honeycomb and fractales. I just use my geometry invention instintctively. The blurry point where discoveries are employed is blurry because artists do not recognize their science in making art.
About Me
- Diane Widler Wenzel
- Documenting a period in my development that could become pivotal
4 comments:
It would be hard for me to want to see hooks everywhere or dwell on them too much because despite being a tool, as you point out, they are very negative in what they feel like. I have had the hook on a cactus attach itself to my knee and still remember how hard it was to remove. Hooks are what people use to see things and yet I don't like it there either. I want what I would sell to be bought because someone wanted it, not because they got trapped or stuck with it. It's one of those conundrums that we need it but it's unpleasant especially if you end up on the end of the barb.
Hooks have a bad reputation. Prostitutes are called "hookers" for example. It is all how they are used. A seed pod with a hook catches on animal fur and is carried to a new loction where it is deposited eventually producing another plant. The hooks could annoy the furry animal but are necessary for survival of the weed plant.
People are more excited about looking for grids than hooks. But hooks are an important concept in critical thinking and one that people of very different political perspectives can consider peaceably.
Grids aren't terribly popular either as in what ends up gridlock and the threat of privacy rights being lost. But they are less invasive than a hook that actually penetrates someone's body or willpower and hence forces them to do what they do not want to do. Hooks must be handled carefully or they become traps of a sort. Not many people are fond of that feeling. It's not a matter of liking or disliking something but just saying that hooking someone say into buying something is not something that feels good. Not saying they might not be needed but that it's a negative sort of feeling about them-- she hooked him etc.
It is interesting and exciting to think about how designing from nature makes life better. These designs and inventions can also become weapons to experiencing a quality life. We might be designing intuitively without awareness and without foreseeing how our designs will change us. So I will for awhile look at hooks.
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