Glass: Something to look at, not just through

Hakemuksen tiivistelmä

Within this art and research project the focus is on exploring how glass is used as a multi-functioning material, part of the mechanics of image making. Rather than focus on photography solely as a medium to (re)produce images, the project delves into glass as a core element of the photographic, as a substance imbued with distinct characteristics, both physical and conceptual, which are useful to expand the discourse around the current state of the medium. Since photography’s inception this transparent, inert, and stable substance has been central to the technological advancements of how we capture, preserve, and circulate photographs. For example, with precision optical lenses that capture images beyond human vision; as a substrate to preserve photographs on plate negatives and more recently in new data storage solutions etched into quartz. Through the interactions and circulations of images though various screens, cables and touch sensitive devices. We are in an exciting phase where many developments are occurring, we can’t always identify whom or what is producing images and conversely whom or what is using them. Both historically connected and part of future solutions, glass is a key material to think through urgencies around archiving and data storage but also image production, circulation and dissemination. Within these shifting grounds, this art and research project looks through the prism of one material to gain greater understanding of the other.