Artist Statement Also Artist Talk

Other Realities sub-programme

The subject of the installation is the inter-spatiality in art. The key challenge is to detach color (sensations) from form (representation) and make the creative process aboveboard i.e. to deal openly with the audience. “Augmented Abstraction” deals with the creation of a simple Augmented Reality (AR) system designed to create an immersive environment simulated by a computer. Consisting of a camera, computational unit and a display, the system is run on a tablet PC using a built-in camera. By using marker-based tracking, it captures the marker, which is a digitally painted nude depicted in a mode of everyday visibility, displayed on a large TV screen. The augmentation is in 3D, consisting of multiple parallel offset planes (and parallel to the marker), holding the Photoshop layers i.e. different abstract color patches, color patterns, brushstrokes etc. produced during the  painting process, thus creating complex 3D abstract permutations. By using the AR technology, the final result is the chance to observe simultaneously the real world, represented in the mode of everyday visibility, and the virtual elements which exemplify the idea or the abstract code.

• Yane Bakreski (born Feb 06, 1982 in Ohrid, Macedonia) is a visual artist and professor in visual arts. Currently he is lecturing in the Department of Digital Arts at the University of KwaZulu-Natal. He holds Bachelor’s, Master’s and PhD degrees from the National Art Academy in Sofia, Bulgaria. Yane is author of many one-man shows and various group art projects in Macedonia and abroad. His creative and teaching interests are inter-disciplinary, equally oriented towards the traditional art disciplines, as well as the new digital media and art forms created with computer technology.   yanebakreski.wixsite.com/artworks

Supported by the University of KwaZulu-Natal