The Glass System, 2016

This body of interrelated works uses video, glass, magnets, water, and mirrors to explore scientific and traditional concepts of time and reality. Translating these ideas into tangible models and visceral experiences, the works focus on a central concept in physics: symmetry (in which a physical property or process has an equivalence in two or more directions). The work is informed equally by the writings of theoretical physicist Brian Greene and my research as a Fulbright Fellow in Indonesia. There, I focused on Javanese ideas about interrelationship between humans, nature and the supernatural, especially the idea that we interact with everything in our world, including much that our bodies are not designed to perceive. The Glass System opened at the North Dakota Museum of Art during the 47th University of North Dakota Writers Conference, where I was on multiple art-and-science panels with Brian Greene, as well as science fiction author Kim Stanley Robinson.

I use The Glass System title in homage to late filmmaker and friend, Mark Lapore.

The Glass System | Installation Views
Video, sculpture, videosculpture, sound by Yann Novak (03:30)

Three Feet Above Earth
Installation video, sound by Yann Novak (runtime: 42:00; excerpt: 01:30)

Sculptures

The Glass System No. 1a
Plexiglass, neodymium magnets, light
4″ x 6” x 4″

This piece is part of a series investigating nonlinear time and space. Concatenated layers of translucent plexiglass describe slices in a region of space-time; conducting video through it provides a way of thinking about events in that region (see it in action in Resonant Luminance).

Tatal Pawukon
Scientific glass, neodymium magnets, video, steel, electronics
4” x 6″ x 6″

Tatal Pawukon models nonlinear time as described in the Javanese 30-week perennial calendar. It is based on my print of the same name, included in The Beginning Was The End.

The Glass System No. 1
Scientific glass, neodymium magnets, light
4″ x 6” x 4″

This piece is part of a series investigating nonlinear time and space.

The Glass System No. 5
Scientific glass, neodymium magnets, mirrors
6″ x 10” x 6″

This wall-mounted piece begins exploring different means by which symmetry occurs.

Strange Loop No. 4
Scientific glass, neodymium magnets, mirrors
4″ x 8″ x 8″

This wall-mounted piece focuses specifically on symmetry in physics, in which a physical property or process has an equivalence in two or more directions. Here, that includes viewers’ true reflections, as others see them.