Subvert Systems is a body of new work by Brisbane based multimedia artist Warren Handley. Through subversion of the intended function of everyday technologies Handley exposes how technology becomes normalised and interrogates the trajectory of ideas from science fiction to science fact. Produced by interrupting the usual function of flatbed scanners and exaggerating the resulting imagery through image manipulation Handley presents a speculative and theoretical representation of the distortion effects that gravitational collapse might cause around the event horizon of a black hole.
Handley’s process aims to draw a parallel with the recently popularised scientific idea of super translations—the theory that matter passing through the event horizon of a black hole is destroyed but leaves an information imprint within the event horizon—a two-dimensional description or ‘information hologram’ of three-dimensional matter. Like these information holograms, resulting visual distortions are not a reconstruction of their original subject matter, nor an entirely new work.
Handley’s process of subverting the assumed function of this technology raises questions about consumers’ passive acceptance of everyday technology while generating something unexpected and unanticipated by its makers.
Image: Warren Handley, Magnetic Field Collapse, 2015, Digital collage/manipulation
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