Page 66 - DontPostMe

I became interested in computers around the age of

8 or 9, first with a Sinclair ZX81 which I think had just

16 kilobytes of memory and then, my very first up-

grade a year or two later, to a ZX Spectrum which in-

troduced colour graphics, 8 colours in fact and a

whopping 48 kilobytes. As limited as they were it was

through these first computers that I became very inter-

ested in computer graphics and also programming. So

actually when I left school first I went to university to

study computer programming and spent about 3 years

completely immersed in that world but eventually re-

alised that it simply wasn't satisfying me. So I left and

then more or less on a whim enrolled in an art course

which led onto to studying painting in art college a few

years later and from the start that just felt right.

I guess it is quite natural that the influence from my

time studying computers would be very present in my

artwork. Although initially the idea of painting seemed

to be the complete opposite to the structure and logic

of programming languages and the mathematics that I

had come from but it didn't take long before all of

these past influences began seeping out and infecting

the way that I approached painting and art. Over the

years I worked professionally teaching multimedia ap-

plications and as a web designer, developer and pro-

grammer, so I think there is no way for me to avoid

dealing with the digital world and the technology in a

very direct way.

My interest in the digital errors and glitches is

partly an aesthetic fascination, coming from a love of

their purely abstract qualities and also it comes from

interest in the hidden structure underlying digital im-

ages. We live in a world that is increasingly reliant on

computers. They are like a hidden presence underlying

everything. Like the noise of any machine, the glitches

expose or remind us of the presence of the technology.