Video From The Banquet At The Lab Gallery

Matt Semler introduces Kaz Maslanka at the banquet for "A Spectrum of Jewels" Roger Smith Hotel - New York city - March 3, 2010



Poet Philosopher Gregory Vincent St. Thomasino toasts Kaz Maslanka at the banquet for "A Spectrum of Jewels" Roger Smith Hotel - New York city - March 3, 2010



Kaz Maslanka speaks about "A Spectrum of Jewels" at the banquet for "A Spectrum of Jewels" Roger Smith Hotel - New York city - March 3, 2010 (part one)




(part two)


One very bad oversight, at the banquet, was not to thank some special people that helped make this thing happen. First of all, I would like to thank Robert C. Morgan - it was his idea for me to show at The Lab Gallery and it would not have happened if not for him and his work - I also want to thank Matt Semler, his vision for The Lab Gallery and how he pushed me into a direction that made me formulate the idea and to execute a three dimensional work, for I haven't done any serious three dimensional work in thirty years. Next I want to thank my beautiful wife and co-conspirator Ilju-Min Maslanka for helping me with the construction as well as putting up with my neurotic behavior throughout the whole deal. I also want to thank my colleague Ed Johnson who was a great sounding board and idea-mind when it came to the nuts and bolts of the thing. I want to thank my great friend Glenn Alexander for canceling his busy schedule and coming out and helping me install the piece in the gallery. Also helping me with the install was my friend Gregory Vincent St. Thomasino who also gave up a busy day to help. And lastly I want to thank Kelly Tracy who let me toil and ponder in his Imperial Beach studio as I tested my method for the install. Thank ALL of you for I could not have done it without you.

Kaz

Maslanka Show at Roger Smith Labs - NYC

Roger Smith Lab Gallery Announcement
“A Spectrum Of Jewels” is the title for the new art installation by Kaz Maslanka that will be featured at the Roger Smith Labs located at 47th and Lexington in New York City. The Show, Curated by Robert C. Morgan, will run from March 5, 2010 to March 26th 2010 and will feature what Maslanka calls a ‘Dodecaorthogonal Space Poem’. This type of ‘mathematical poem’ is constructed with twelve ‘orthogonal space poems’ arranged contiguously within a Cartesian coordinate system. Orthogonal space poems are always in the form of ‘A’ equals ‘B’ multiplied by ‘C’. What is different in this new work is that one of the variables in each poem is a fabricated word whose meaning comes from the mathematical operation applied to the other two variables (words). The words were carefully chosen to point to a spectrum inspired by Zen teachings. Thus, the aesthetic value of the piece is derived from visualizing the meaning of all the concepts spread throughout the entire three dimensional space.

The following URL will take you to a “computer aided design mockup” showing the main structure of the installation: http://www.kazmaslanka.com/RogerSmith.html

The following statements are to help navigate the installation:
The yellow ball is the point of origin for the entire system.
The green balls are points in space which represent the meaning of a concept which lies on one of the ‘word axes’. A word axis is a one dimensional line drawn between two concepts in space. In a three dimensional space you may have three ‘word axes’. The three word axes in this installation are “Emptiness / Thinking”, “Existence / Non-existence” and “Monasticism / Urbanity”
The red balls are points in space to delineate the coordinate pairs for which the orthogonal space poem starts. The poem lies on the planer space that lies between the red ball, the two adjacent green balls and the yellow ball.
For a better understanding of visualizing these poems you may want to Google “verbogeometry” and “Orthogonal Space Poem”

The twelve orthogonal space poems are as follows:
Emptiness times Urbanity = Socrastival
Emptiness times Monasticism = Apecksuval
Emptiness times Existence = Doalldoxuval
Emptiness times Non-existence = Nonalldoxuval
Thinking times Urbanity = Selcrasaval
Thinking times Monasticism = Taoodoxuval
Thinking times Existence = Wastconditival
Thinking times Non-existence = Dreemholeval
Existence times Urbanity = Natucrasaval
Existence times Monasticism = Onkeval
Non-existence times Urbanity = Boidasval
Non-existence times Monasticism = Onkeval

Robert C. Morgan's Response To Delineations

Robert C. Morgan is an international art critic who has written numerous books on art and aesthetics as well as published countless reviews on artist works for such publications as New York Arts, Artscribe, ARTnews, Art in America and many others. He has rewritten my 13 delineations and sent them to me. I have posted them below.

Response to Delineations by Kaz Maslanka (6-Jan. 2010)


Delineation #1:
Mathematical truths are discovered Artistic truths are mediated.
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Delineation#2:
Artists generally agree on what is mathematically correct. Mathematicians generally have no idea what is artistically correct.
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Delineation#3
Art illuminates the supportive skeletal structure of thought whereas Math illuminates the metaphoric wind, which blows through that structure.
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Delineation#4
Art reveals the body of God and Science reveals God's mind -- or is it the converse?
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Delineation#5
Pure Mathematics has no expression for poetic metaphor however; it does provide us a structure that can be used for it.
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Delineation#6
In general, the artist is not interested in finding truths through nonsense (except for Dada) as opposed to the mathematician who is. Therefore, we have Dada math instead of an After math.
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Delineation#7
The goal of mathematics is to go beyond language. Art is a language to describe what is beyond us.
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Delineation#8.
Mathematicians have an insouciant tendency to get lost in their imagination. Conceptual artists have an attentive tendency to map their imagination
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Delineation #9
A artistic theory seems to come in a flash of intuition before the final product is rigorously constructed. An mathematical theory seems to come much after the artwork that has been constructed in a flash of intuition.

Delineation #10
Artistic creations are not unique in the sense that they could be discovered by anyone.
Artistic creations are uniquely invented by individuals.

Delineation #11
Art, among other things, is a language.
Art, among other things, uses language.
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Delineation#12
In science one tries to tell people, in such a way as to be understood by everyone, something that no one ever knew before. But in poetry, it’s the exact opposite. —Paul Dirac
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Delineation #13
Art is the expression of culture.
Pure mathematics is independent of culture, and therefore, closer to what art strives to be.



Robert C. Morgan