A.I. Phone Home

 

                                                               A.I. PHONE HOME 

AI Brainbleed

 

 

By Tom Wachunas

 

For it is written: “I will destroy the wisdom of the wise; the intelligence of the intelligent I will frustrate.” Where is the wise man? Where is the scholar? Where is the philosopher of this age? Has not God made foolish the wisdom of the world?  - 1 Cor.1:19-20

“The sad thing about artificial intelligence is that it lacks artifice and therefore intelligence.”  —Jean Baudrillard

“The development of full artificial intelligence could spell the end of the human race….It would take off on its own, and re-design itself at an ever increasing rate. Humans, who are limited by slow biological evolution, couldn’t compete, and would be superseded.”  — Stephen Hawking

   Here’s my newest artwork – a messy, mixed-media painted assemblage which I have titled AI Brainbleed. Embedded in all those twisting sketchy swirls, splotches and half-inch-thick paint blobs are various broken remnants of common electronic devices (mostly I-phone components and tv remote sticks), intended as a general reference to the dizzying, complex reality of Infomation Technology, empowering the www. Woefully Wobbly World. And at the core of it all there’s that inflection (or infection) named AI. Artificial Intelligence.

   Artificial = fake, unnatural, false. Superficial imitation. Think of AI as having our minds progressively altered, or amputated, and replaced with prosthetic robots. AI= Algorithmic Insemination, creating a new ”smart” us.

   This artwork is a symbol of my spiritual concerns about navigating and understanding the conditions and circumstances of human existence in a progressively tech-addicted, distressed and duplicitous world. A world immersed and floundering in the confusing confluence of darkness and light. Is our growing attachment to AI - and all its collateral manifestations and mutations -  a help or a hindrance? Panacea or placebo? Cure or curse? 

Scintillating Metamorphicals

 

Scintillating Metamorphicals 

Dryspell

Wild Dreams

Transmutation

Beach Tracks

Fortress

Sublimation

Broken Lilies

By Tom Wachunas

  

   Excerpts from artist statement: "My central theme considers science and patterns in nature as backdrops… Physical processes such as melting, solution, crystallization, fluidity, outer space nebulae, microscopic images...  my paintings often reflect not what I see but what I think, how I feel, and what music is playing in my studio or in my head. My art is an abstract reflection of what is within me, what is around me, and the art of how my mind deals with the external influences of both the real and the imagined.” – Joe Martino

   “After a certain high level of technical skill is achieved science and art tend to coalesce in aesthetics, plasticity, and form. The greatest scientists are artists as well.”  - Albert Einstein

   “Art and science create a balance to material life and enlarge the world of living experience. Art leads to a more profound concept of life, because art itself is a profound expression of feeling.” - Hans Hofmann

EXHIBIT: MIXED MEDIA MAGIC: ARTISTIC ALCHEMY – work by Joe Martino / at Strauss Studios Upstairs Gallery, THROUGH MARCH 14, 2025 / 236 Walnut Avenue NE, downtown Canton, Ohio / Mon.-Fri. 10-5, Sat. 12-5

http://www.joemartinoart.com/

https://john-strauss-furniture.myshopify.com/collections/joe-martino

 

    A remarkably prolific mixed-media artist, Joe Martino is an enchanter, a conjuror. His elegantly framed wall pieces are evocative, mesmerizing transformations of diverse materials and processes. He doesn’t paint flat, static “pictures” so much as he raises amorphous, intricate geometries into quasi-sculptural structures. They’re at once tactile vessels and transportive conduits, holding and channeling ephemeral layers of coalesced realities, earthborn and celestial.  

   Molded, rubbed, carved or scraped into those realities is a tangible wealth of accumulated visual data that exudes the sensation of being on an adventurous expedition into a mindscape of pure intuition. The artist’s and my own. On this adventure, my personal act of looking infected me with a serious case of synesthesia. Spontaneous multisensory activation.

   Martino’s numinous architextures are transcendent topographies replete with vigorous flows of color harmonies, variable rhythmic cadences that pulse and dance, and even mystical melodies.  

    Eye keep hearing a magnificent symphony orchestra soaring.