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Saturday, July 4, 2009

New friends

Ted Warnell
Warnell is a truly unique programmer of art inventions. This artist is the most influential one of his movement (although nobody knows to which one he belongs to). He is a visual artist and writer. His art works and writings on his witting about art and new media can be find in real and online art galleries, in print, digital, and also in web publications. He came to poetics through working with computer languages - machine code, assembly language and programming. He fuses digital imagery with markup language (HTML) and code (JavaScript) to create his web art and poetics. His source material is "code and data, program logic, information from cyberspace, all things digital." He has even found a creative use for spam.

Here are two quotations, about borge's work, that I specially selected for my friend:
"The Library includes all verbal structures, all variations permitted by the twenty-five orthographical symbols, but not a single example of absolute nonsense. It is useless to observe that the best volume of the many hexagons under my administration is entitled The
Combed Thunderclap and another The Plaster Cramp and another Axaxaxas mlö." - Borges

"The always wandering meaning of all literary representation
according to which meaning wanders,
like human tribulations, like error, from text to text,
and within the text, from figure to figure." - Bloom

Breakfast with Borges, which was named after the great Argentinian that we deeply admire, is one of the last his Ted made. When he gave it to me as a present, I was deeply moved and wordless.


Rob Bryanton
Rob is a multi-talented canadian author, composer, and sound designer. He is the President of Talking Dog Studios, and of Saskatchewan Motion Picture Association. He has written poems and song lyrics published in several anthologies.

My new friend published a truly innovative book about a "different way of thinking about time and space", called Imagining the Tenth Dimension The companion website for the book has attracted over 4 million unique visitors since its launch in July 2006. In his book he writes about complex concepts of modern science like string theory and how the subatomic particles that make up our universe are created within ten spatial dimensions (plus an eleventh dimension of "time") by the vibrations of exquisitely small "superstrings".

In his blog he writes and posts videos about The big bang, Douglas Hofstadter, memes, symmetry, death, multiverse, quantum observer, meditation, genes, philosophy and music among other subjects. In the entry called connecting it all together he talks a about some of the intrest we share.

68 comments:

kj said...

i am glad you have visited my blog and i find your blog both stimulating and fascinating. i want to carve out some time to come back and linger.

i hope i may be one of your new friends one day too.

xo
kj

Rob Bryanton said...

Hey Mariana, thanks for the mention. Your blog is a constant delight to me, always new insights and interesting tangents. Keep up the great work!
Rob

Jessie Carty said...

I am also fascinated by combining science and poetry, literature and math. Loved reading this!

darkfoam said...

yes, ted is one of a kind and one heck of a nice fellow ..

Anonymous said...

These two definitely look like people to check out. Their works seem quite interesting, especially Mr. Bryanton.

Ruela said...

/t. is the MASTER!

paulandrewrussell said...

A lovely piece of art, Mariana.

Mariana Soffer said...

KJ: Thank you very much!!! You are really nice!
I check your things to, and found them really interesting, sadly I still did not have enough time to read and see them with all the care that I want' but anyway I added you to my feeds, so I do not loose the new things you have.
I do not see why we can't be friends, relationships develop their own personal paths.

Mariana Soffer said...

Rob: I really feel honored that such an important person as you are, with all the people you can reach from your blog (several millions of people read that blog each month) in order to make them think, learn and share new thoughts.
And I want you to congratulate you about the hard work you put in helping people understand new concepts and ideas, specially bu producing those great videos that people can watch.

Mariana Soffer said...

Jessiy Carty: I like that you are fascinated by that, you see everything is related, connected, gets to the same point when searched deep enough.
There is not just one viewpoint/discipline/theory that is worth choosing exclusively, no one is good enough to cover every single gap. There are always others that can add new knowledge to make more interesting things in life.

Mariana Soffer said...

Foam: Exactely foam exactely, I he is very very nice, which is something I really like. But on top of that he is so talented, humble, and great, that is something so rare to find. I am still trying to get to know his mind blowing artwork, I have not had much time but I am trying to suspect that it kind of like Borges, you never end up knowing his work, cause they can be known in a million different ways. And then other new million appears in your head.

Mariana Soffer said...

The Clandestine Samurai: Great, I see one of my objective of witting this post is done. I would like people to get to know this kinds of scientific art thinkers, and expand their thoughts.
Thanks for stepping by

Mariana Soffer said...

Ruela:
/t (Ted Warnell)is too much, I could barely write a sentence about him, it is impossible to put in words all the dimensions he opens and then shuts and then shows.

Mariana Soffer said...

Paulandrewwrusell:
I am glad you liked it Paul, look at the work a little deeper, and you see how amazing stuff start to glow.

ines.gato@yahoo.com said...

I have to tell you that there had been many years since an artist did not hit me so hard near the center of my feelings or even near metaphysical-thoughts about life than Warnell had, thanks for sharing him with us.

I found Rob web very interesting also, I like it because it is pretty accessible to understand for a person who does not know much about quantum physics and it's related stuff.

How did you knew these people?

Mariana Soffer said...

ines: That is great that you got to discover new intresting people thanks to the things I posted in this blog. Not bad at all.

I got to know rob, I think, I am not sure cause I wrote a comment on his blog, and then one thing led to another, and we ended having many things in common and even weird coincidences like doing research about the same person at the same time.

I really do not remember how I knew Warnell let me check it and I will let you know.

girlontape said...

i agree w kj & rob: this blog is stimulating, fascinating, delightful

Mariana Soffer said...

Girlontape:
Thank you very much steff, it makes me very happy what you say, mainly because is you who is saying it, and no mr x.

Pedro said...

Hei things are so diverse in your blog, you are talking about string theory and poems done with code in the same post, but the wierdest thing of all is that it makes sense, that they are related themselves in a way.
I would like to know a little bit more about how warnell does or thinks about his stuff, can you share that?

Mariana Soffer said...

Pedro:interesting thing that you find the post coherent in a particular kind of way. Regarding warnell, he actually does not like talking much about his work, but I found this on a note they did to him, that you might like.

"Usually the visuals are solely of code though sometimes there’s a mixture of code and bitmap images. When that’s the case, it’s usually very hard to tell where the bitmaps are because they’re tightly bound in with the code.

Often the source code itself is included on the screen. The source code can be of interest in Ted’s work. Not only to note the similarities/differences between the ‘neath text and the browser’s rendering of the code, but to see not ‘the structure’ of the work but another aspect of its structure. I mean, when you look at the work itself, we see structure. Not necessarily the same structure we see when we look at the source code. But related."

Dave King said...

A really exciting blog which I have only just now found. I only wish I had done so earlier.

Lord of Erewhon said...

Ted's work is amazing! Rob I'm up to know better...

Cheers!

Mariana Soffer said...

Dave, thank you very much for visiting my blog, I am really please that you found it interesting to read.
I have been watching your blog and I am thrilled about a couple of poems you wrote (which is the only stuff I could read so far), I think i understand why you are intrested in my text, it is because we have many intrest in common, regarding the subjects and the way we aproach them.
See you soon

Mariana Soffer said...

Lord of Erewhon: Certainly Ted is incredible, and I know that rob takes longer to get to know, given you haveto read and learn lots of new concepts in order to reach his work.
MAn your last post is about pessoa, one of the best writters that ever existed, I am going to read it right now, but probably not going to write much given that my portughese is pretty bad.
A pleasure to see you arround
M

Little Lamb said...

Ted Warnell is very creative. He's even a good artist, too! :-)

Lord of Erewhon said...

That's OK, my English is fair enough...;)

My last post it's me impersonating Pessoa, it is a persona, build up according Pound's «make it knew»... and beyond...

Mariana Soffer said...

little lamb: I know Warnell alias warnell By nari, Alias slash T was an incredible artists he sees beyond things he sees everything different. Now that you say it the word creative ounds to me a little silly, I do not know what you think
Seee youuuu soooooon

Uncle Tree said...

Hello, Mariana.

I see you've made an additional change or two to your home page (wink!). When I grow up...please don't hold your breathe waiting for that to happen. Can I have a word with your bonsai? Perhaps it is not too late for me to set him straight.

It's good to see you've made some new friends whose feathers are quite similar to yours. Excellent! And to see that you been approved without getting stamped is comforting to this old uncle of yours.

I hope that everything is arranged for your trip and that your affairs are in order, according to your tastes. Good luck, and I wish you the best! Everything will be fine. I believe in you. Go get 'em!

Mariana Soffer said...

Lord of ereuhon (I belive). Sure your enlish is very good, you confused me less than the american speaking natives, it is provably cause you do an effort to made yourself understand.\

Ou that is intrestiing about your last post, I dkd not get that, probably is the portuguese missinterpreations that I make but with that, and I am also going to experiment with the translation and I am musre it will be fine. Anyway very interesting idea, I thought you where thelling the story that is similar to a borges whan he finds himself in a place with a much older version of himself. But I was wrong.
Bybbye

Klatuu o embuçado said...

Dear friend,
me and Lord of Erewhon, «we» are two sides of the same living creature... :)

Cheers!

Klatuu o embuçado said...

Take a look to O Bar do Ossian, I'm about to post there...

Mariana Soffer said...

Klatuu o embuçado : Thanks for stepping my two sided coin kind of being. I will search for the bar de osssian that you mention, but if I do not find it please lead me thowards it's contents.http://renascimentolusitano.blogspot.com/
here is the link to the blog but I warn you guys it is written in Portuguese language, but you can pretty well translate it to your native tongue and pray for the translator not to be wrong.
Bye bye my happily known bipartite friend

Mariana Soffer said...

Uncle tree: I was already missing you, and wondering how have you been. I am glad you kind of like what I wrote in my screen. I will try to free the bonsai myself, so the poor living creature does not have to suffer his diminishing size in planet earth.

I am getting ready for traveling, but we have a small problem around town, we have this pandemia, the infamous flue, which is killing many people, so I hope I can be able to fly.

Ups food is ready need to run to the table of mom will get angry, cause she is hungry already.
Love, from your niece

Lord of Erewhon said...

It´s a blog made by crazy ancient warriors believing in a «country» that includes all speaking Portuguese people all over the world... :)

A Cuban In London said...

Interesting path from computer work to poetry for Ted. I think that is one heck of an exception. Many thanks.

Greetings from London.

girlontape said...

queres jugar a un juego marian?

Renee said...

Mariana I see we have a mutual love for the same writer. John Irving; those are two of my favourite books by him. Oldies but goodies.

Such an intelligent blog Mariana.

Renee xoxo

Mariana Soffer said...

Uncle: I forgot to mention that I loved that you wrote:
"It's good to see you've made some new friends whose feathers are quite similar to yours. Excellent! And to see that you been approved without getting stamped is comforting to this old uncle of yours."
It is important to know what you think for me. I am traveling tomorrow morning so I will be witting in small bits, but I will free the bonsai from its reduced lifestyle soon.
Hugz

Mariana Soffer said...

Lord of Erewhon: I like that idea, therefore I will try to unpolished my Portuguese language as I write on your blog, please let me know if I make mistakes that make the text impossible to comprehend (which will happen)

Mariana Soffer said...

A Cuban In London:
I am in love with ted right now (platonic of course), so everything that he makes and things that relate to his work seem to me interesting to say the least.

Enjoy your English chamomile tea for me

Mariana Soffer said...

girlontape: gracias por invitarme steff pero toy saliendo en unas horas para los states, despes te cuento mejor. Quiero cerrar the fucking valija.

Mariana Soffer said...

Renee:
Yes, he is a great author, the first book I read from him, took me only 2 days to finish, and it had more than 500 pages I believe, It was of course his most famous one, the world according to garp arp rp p

Thank you very much for your compliment I like your stuff a lot too, but I need more calm time to watch it and think it, in order to say something coherent to you.
Take care my friend

Stu said...

Very interesting - thanks for the links.

I'd say it was through an early education in programming (partly through my mother, partly self-taught) that my interest in poetry came about. I still see poems as pseudo-algorithms.

I also love Borges, and The Library of Babel is one of my favourites... a poetic expression of the universe of text.

Mariana Soffer said...

Stu:
Really stu, I wouldn't have guess that ever, I like people that you get to know with time
and always surprise you with your past. Of course poems are algorithms and also css (style sheets that
give the color letter type, size, spaces in between texts, etc ..)

I did not know you love Borges either, but that does not surprise me at all, since you are such a good
witter yourself, you get interested in people who can write amazingly well ( although I think many things can be lost, specially in his poem, given the language translation that is in the middle).
My favorite book from him is fictions, that's the best one that I consider. And I love "uqbar tlon and orbis tertulis" short story incredible much, it can not be so well written and with such philosophic background driving the
plot of it, and changing you doubt your own beliefs.
I am going to keep sending you stuff about Borges, and I strongly suggest you check warnell work.

silvia zappia said...

Esto es sumamente interesante, aunque muy difícil para mí. Es por eso que me atrapa y aquí estoy, investigando tu sitio, al que volveré.
Ya leeré también la entrada de Rob Bryanton.
Presiento que todo ésto es algo así como "la música del Universo".
(o el Aleph,ese punto en donde converge el Universo todo)

Un beso!

Renee said...

Mariana I love the title of your blog and that is a whole story in itself.

Sing your own lullaby.

Love Renee xoxo

Mariana Soffer said...

Rayuela says: This is very interesting, but very difficult for me. This is why I am trapped here investigating your site, which I will be coming back.
Y will also read the entry from Rob Bryanton. I have the feeling/suspicious that all this is is similar to "the music of the universe" (or to the Aleph, that is the point where all the universe converges).

Mariana Soffer said...

Rayuela (español): Me encanta que te interese porque yo tambien estoy copadisima contigo. Mira lo que te resulte muy dificil, dejalo pasar si queres, o preguntame tantas veces quieras que tratare de ayudarte (si es que yo lo comprendo).
Esto no lo voy a traducir al ingles, pero este hombre rob, es super interesante, aunque no creo que te convenga embarcarte en su historia y filosofia, ya que si lo haces te llevara muchisimo tiempo, y muchas frustraciones hasta entender una pequenia parte de su propuesta, de todas formas es un tipo super super accesible al cual le podes escribir y te va a contestar feliz. En realidad quizas rob este tratando de encontrar la musica del universo cada vez que entra en sus estudios de grabacion y mezclado.
ES increible el concepto ese del punto donde todo el universo converge, me encanta el aleph es un buen ejemplo pero tambien podriamos pensar en el inicio, el big bang. O porque no en que todos los puntos son el punto en el que todo converge.
Carinios my friend.

Mariana Soffer said...

Rayuela: I am delighted that you are interested in this because I am really interested in your stuff too.
I tell him there to ask whatever he does not get as many times as he wants to, either if it is a language problem or any other kind. Of course I will answer it if I do understand it.

I tell him rob is very interesting but you can not just read it lightly, you have to study what he says, think about it, it is not easy to understand, takes lots of time to understand a small part of his philosophy, prepare for frustrating due to lack of understanding, mainly at the beginning. But he is also an extremely nice man, who you can write to and ask your doubts, and he will surely guide you happily.

I think Rob might be trying to find the music of the universe each time he enters his music recording and mixing studios.

I love the concept about a point where all the universe converges, el Aleph is a perfect example of it.
Another example might be the beginning, or so called big bang. Or maybe we can think that every point is the point in which the universe converges.
Cheers my friend.

Mariana Soffer said...

Renne:Thanks, indeed it is its own story by itself, and then it came several more, but here is one just to start with:When I broke with my many years partner I was pretty down and sad, and in pain, and one day thinking about that bad times we all go trough in life, I came to the conclusion that in the end all we have to do is sing our own lullabies, cause now one can sing it for us. Next the second history after that.
Dude, you are the first person that noticed it in a long long time, that makes me happy.
Take care

girlontape said...

suerte en tus malditos viajes marian! i thought you were coming back from the states...now it turns out you're leaving hacia los states?! confused, besooo stef

Mariana Soffer said...

girlontape:Thank you very much my daring! It is upside down, I mistaken stuff from dates also changed them due to the flue we are all enjoying with our bari-x models. I am not going to LA a friend of mine is, and one very good friend of mine is comming towars here. I know confusing, what the hell.
Txs any way.

Ruela said...

HAHA ;)

Do you know Sandokan!?

Mariana Soffer said...

Ruela: of course the tiger! I read all his books since I was a little kid, it was a yellow book collection mainly for teenagers, my perents brought them to me, so I knew where my name came from. The collection was called robin hood and of scourse it was written in spanish.
Se Ruela, the world is curious and strange.
M

Anonymous said...

thank you
for this post

i love your blog,
mariana

¤ ¤ ¤

/t.

ojo vidrioso said...

I´ve read variuos of the Robin Hood colection, too, years ago.

Cheers

Anonymous said...

I looked at that image mariana and the first thought I had was that this looks like my brain when I'm angry! LOL Indeed this is cutting edge in art and very wide open to all sorts of interpretations. Numbers and letters and the endless combinations, the variations of human relations. Your words are a joy to read mariana because they enrich my thought life. :)

Carlos said...

Mariana, I just visited Ted´s blog. Amazing! Regretfully I couldn´t open the "ring-poem" page, which appears to be very exciting. I`ll try again later. Thank you!
Carlos

Ruela said...

cool ;)

Mariana Soffer said...

/t thank youuuuuuuu, t, I love the fact that you open your name and then close it as an html tag kind of mark. This post is yours much more than mine my friend.
M

Mariana Soffer said...

ojo:really you did read that collection? I guess is a latin american one from when we where arround 12-15 years old, it was an amazing one, I also remember dickens, the jungle guy, mistery authours and all kind of great classic one. Have any of you who are native engilsh heard about this yellow collection of books? I bet not, but I am curious to ask.
Cheers to you.

Mariana Soffer said...

valbrusell:
You brain commen it is hilarous lets make t read it by himself. I do belive is in the cutting edge, of art science and crazyness, of the modern singularity pest test.
Thank you for what you say about my words, hope I did not confuse you with my past ones, cause I did confused myself, but no time for going back and make it up with a more settled head.
Hugz val

t: have you check this girls lines, when he talks about your picture/brain?

Mariana Soffer said...

Carlos Dante Ferrari: I am so so happy you liked it.
If you can nnot make somethinng work just write yourself to him, he is extremelly nice and will reply a soon as he can.

Best regards Carlos

Mariana Soffer said...

Ruela: thanks you dude, just one suggestion, open my post where I say stuff about language, some senseless some not, and read what t or ted says about it, if you do not get it stare at it for a while and you will, it is great.
M

ojo vidrioso said...

Yes, Mariana. I really did read so much books of that collection.
Y remember Emilio Salgari (who never slip out frem Italy), of course, and Julio Verne. Dickens was so sad an tragic for me.
I remmeber the robin hood logo of the collection.

Years ago, i´ve read lots and lots of book, of any matter. One day (20 yars all already) I´ve decided (about BOOKS) taht i will not read more fiction books in the future. I practiced that for many yers, lefting place only for study and work stuff, and analytic or history stuff. Slowly i gave fiction books another oportunity, and now I can say that sometimes one of them fall into my hands and it´s welcome.

Again: forgive me if I went out o far from the point.

Cheers

Mariana Soffer said...

OJO:
Of course julio verne, It was one of my favourite, if not my favourite one. He was a genious.
Well dickens I have to confess I loved, wierd for a 11 year old, but I guess it might be connected
with my intrest about the sad and dark side of humanity, maybe it was an attempt to understand it or
even to find a solution.

Wierd, fictions can bring to life the most amazing inventions ever made, look verne, yeah I am not talking about the repetitive love story stuff, but about interesting fiction, art works. You know what happend to me with time about that
I stopped reading fictions, not because I decided, I just love learning so much that I prefer focusing on those books. But once in a book like when a from john berger gets into my hand I cant let it go until i finish it.

I like this talks that are slightly off topic, but I think they are connected, and also that this places where we can chat with one another should allow people to express themselves without
following such strict rules that we hard science people are use to be guided by.

TAke care Ojo (take care means watch after yourself and ojo means watch out)

Anonymous said...

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hello everyone on this place!
i am Kate

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