Craig Dorety
We use our senses to help us understand our position in space-time. Vision is our main sensory input for the world we exist in. The human brain has some built-in limits beyond which it cannot properly interpret visual information. I use this limit to express the workings of the subconscious. Also embodied in my work is a sense of scientific realism; the elements and information of a natural system can be reduced and modulated and still exhibit characteristics of that natural system and to me this is proof that information is a true and robust representation of our universe. Clean lines, simple shapes, self-similarity on varying scales, and pure, changing color are my palette; information systems and data-sets are my subject matter.
I use mathematics and engineering to formulate physical space-time distortions: displaying static images through time while squeezing and folding the images’ space into 3-dimensional layers. Using industrially prefabricated LED technology and custom firmware, I collapse space and re-map it onto the time axis. By re-displaying information in this manner I give the viewer a glimpse into space-time as seen through my eyes. It’s an automatism whereby I fold my own perception of space-time in an effort to understand what it means to exist.
Craig Dorety (b. 1973 in Oakland, CA) graduated from U.C. Davis in Mechanical Engineering with emphasis in Automation and Control Theory in 2006. Dorety builds custom electronics that express the complicated, bigger ideas he’s developed from experiencing occasional ocular migraines and also synesthesia. He has exhibited at the Thoma Foundation’s Art Vault (New Mexico), where his work resides in the foundation’s Digital and Media Art permanent collection. His work has also been shown at the Yerba Buena Center for the Arts (San Francisco), the Orlando Museum of Art (Florida), the Knoxville Museum of Art (Tennessee), the Hunter Museum of American Art (Tennessee), and Johansson Projects (Oakland). He currently lives and works in Portland, OR.
Knoxville Mercury, “The Future of Electronic Art Opens Up at KMA’s New ‘Virtual Views’ Exhibit”, February 8, 2017 Denise Stewart-Sanabria
“…Unseen strands of LEDS hide behind the aluminum circles…it has the feel of a time-lapse animation showing what the light of the sun and moon does to an object over the course of one day….” LINK
BLOUIN ARTINFO, “‘Lunar Attraction’ at Peabody Essex Museum” January 13, 2017
“…Lunar Attraction features artworks and interactives that explore our longstanding fascination and connection with the moon, ranging from myths about the connection between werewolves and the full moon to the gravitational pull that controls Earth’s tides to the 21st-century international race to build a base on the moon…” LINK
The Monthly, “When Art is Art” July 2016 DeWitt Cheng
“…Dorety, in contrast, updates static abstract painting and nature photography with his wall-mounted constructions…” LINK
The Creator’s Project, “LEDS and Carved Aluminum Create a Swirling, Reflective Moon June 7, 2016 Mike Steyels
“An aluminum moon floats at the end of an empty shipping container while multicolored lights swirl around it, amplifying and diminishing the craters and textures that mark its surface.” LINK
The Stanford Daily, “‘Front Yard/Backstreet’ frames cityscapes as fine art” October 7, 2015 Eric Huang
“Craig Dorety and Jim Campbell’s ‘Inverted Pixel Array — Street Scene’ decomposes a cityscape into simplified black shapes and multicolored glowing lights. It is particularly fascinating to consider how the glow of lights themselves overlap and create smaller patterns and hue variations.” LINK
Pasatiempo, “Algorithm and hues: Digital works at Art House” July 31, 2015 Michael Abatemarco
“Among the most compelling works in Luminous Flux 2.0 is Craig Dorety’s Offset Circles — Yellow Flowering Tree Against Blue Sky… The shifting colors and offset composition of the concentric circles is designed to mimic the effect of ocular hallucinations produced during migraine headaches. It’s a disorienting work with a hypnotizing effect that makes it difficult to pull your eyes away.” LINK
East Bay Express, “Maintenance + Gradient” July 2016 Sarah Burke
“…Together the works present a sci-fi collection of works made with technical prowess…”LINK
San Francisco Chronicle, “’Division’ by Craig Dorety at Johansson Projects” April 17, 2014 Kimberly Chun
“The effect is both sensuous and mesmerizing.” LINK
Cool Hunting, “Craig Dorety: Division – Light animation sculptures inspired by ocular migraines that examine our visual limits” April 18, 2014 Nara Shin
“In ‘Division,’ San Francisco-based artist Craig Dorety is examining visual limits and perception, bringing our own neurological shortcomings to our attention.” LINK
East Bay Express, “Ocular Meditations” May 21, 2014 Sarah Burke
“Following in the footsteps of longtime artistic mentor Jim Campbell and prolific light artist James Turrell, Dorety has created a series of light sculptures that pull the viewer into a dazzling reverie.” LINK
Art Digital Magazine “Craig Dorety exhibits Layers and Light at Johansson Projects” April 30, 2014 Max Eternity
“It’s an exhibition that captivates viewers in a perceptual seduction supplanted by-way-of Dorety’s curious technique and process, which marries soft-edge geometric planes with emotive halos of light juxtaposed in voids of potentiality scaling to infinity.”LINK
Oakland Magazine, “May Event Highlights: Undulating sculpture, festivals, Mother’s Day, and two takes on seaweed.” May 2014 Matthew Craggs
“Using pixels, LED lights, filters, and digital images, Dorety creates animated gradients of light that play across the sculptures, seemingly transforming their shape and depth while playing with the physical realities and the perceived voids between the colors and the sculpture itself.” LINK
Professional Lighting and Design, “Inspiration: Division – Exploring the senses to light and technology” May 2, 2014 Sabrina Schluckebier
“The result is the illusion of light organically moving and pulsing through the rigid shapes, breathing life and spontaneity into a cold, technological feat. Minimal forms are employed for maximum effect and go a little way towards describing the relationship between man and technology.” LINK
Boing Boing, “Lunar topography replicated in gorgeous fine art carvings” July 10, 2012 Xeni Jardin
“San Francisco-based artist Craig Dorety has a series of carvings that “represent segments of the moon’s surface as found in the topograhical data from JAXA’s Kayuga mission.” LINK
Create Digital, “Nature, Through a Window: Moon, Fire, Water, in Light and Engraving, by Craig Dorety” July 9, 2012 Peter Kirn
“In his Light Objects series, Dorety responds to the natural world closer to home, with animated LEDs, wood, and imagery of fire and water. See video below. As Dorety tells CDM, “the Light Objects animations are derived from still images of natural systems, like fire and water – which gives them astounding natural motive beauty.” LINK