The Parallel Series, 2012
“Sculptor, seer, scientist, spiritualist Kelly Heaton allows us to glimpse the ghost in the machine….Heaton replicates the world while seeming to tap into the cosmic mainframe.”
The Parallel Series is a collection of “living pictures” that combine visual art with electrical engineering. Electricity flows within these living pictures to generate the animated light and naturalistic sounds of people, animals, apparitions, and deities. Electronic devices and delicate wires are central compositional elements for delicate nervous systems and anatomies of the soul. Because electronic components have an innate lifespan, these artworks have a bittersweet, performative quality like the impermanent sand mandalas of Tibetan Buddhism. The art asks us to be here now and celebrate our dynamic, impermanent nature.
The Parallel Series, through the intersection of nature, energy, and spirituality, asks what does one gain when a painting is imbued with electronics; and what does one lose when the electricity is gone. Audio and video recordings will archive the work.