Intention Diaphane Dawn

Created with handmade liquid crystal pixels and oscillating voltage differences, Intention Diaphane Dawn explores the materiality of the digital image with a focus on the simulation of colour. The artwork begins with an intention to technologically emulate “morning light”.

Is it possible to produce morning light without the sun, without the horizon, or without the morning itself? Without all these characteristics, is it still the light of the morning?

As light-emitting devices (photo-media), screens produce high-precision digital images that appear like the world around us by emulating the coloured light we perceive. When we see light which appears to radiate from the objects in a digital image, what we look at is a calculated combination of coloured light orchestrated in a rhythm of pulses that, to our eyes, appears real.

Intention Diaphane Dawn uses different electrical voltages to control the electromagnetic frequency of light as it passes through handmade liquid crystal pixels to produce the perception of dynamic and shifting colours. Each pixel was designed and manufactured in an attempt to recreate dawn light. Although ultimately failing in its intention, Intention Diaphane Dawn raises an important question about our continued faith in the reality of digital images by asking, 'Does it matter if the material origin of two things that appear identical are in fact different?'

2026

Liquid crystals (5CB), electric field, cables, printed circuit boards, conductive glass, polarizes, electrical components, PLA, stainless steel.