English: Circular loom

The loom is an 28’’ aluminum rim, with 200 anchor pegs on its circumference.

Knitting pattern In contrast to conventional knitting, absolutely no knitting is done inside the area of the loom. Instead, the thread is knitted as straight lines across the anchor pegs on the circumference, only. In geometric terms, the thread follows a path of consecutive circle’s chords. Thus, one single thread runs from one anchor peg to another, continuously, for 3.000 - 4.000 times, reaching a total length of 1 - 2 kilometers. Knitting is done by hand, with step-by-step instructions dictated by a computer. The absence of black thread gives a completely white color tone. The tone darkens as the density and the intersections of the black thread increase. Thus, a full grayscale palette (from black to white) is possible. Colored artwork is created from a limited palette of basic colors as black, blue, magenta, yellow and green. The combination of these basic colors can effectively produce a full color palette. The knit is transparent and can be viewed from both sides.

Pattern generation The pattern is generated from a specially designed algorithm, coded in openframeworks (http://openframeworks.cc/ ). The algorithm takes as input a digital photograph and outputs the knitting pattern. Over 2 billion calculations are needed to produce each pattern; not much of a load for today’s computers, but definitely an impossible task for the human brain. So, this is a new and unique type of knitting that could not have been implemented a few decades ago, without computers.

Theme and aesthetics Although any digital picture can be converted to a knitting pattern of this type, portraits are the most interesting themes. Despite the extreme limitations of the design, the depicted faces are still recognizable, but inevitably appear fuzzy and smudged; a large degree of uncertainty about the characteristics and the emotions of the depicted persons is inducted. The first series of knitted portraits is based on El Greco’s expressive figures.

Statement

How is it possible to produce a complex portrait from such a limited design? Is our surrounding world “tricking” us the same way? As science evolves, new tools and experiments prove that our world is far more complicated, compared to what we think it is; our senses provide a very thin portion of reality. So, our brains are full of misconceptions and false ideas; our experience of the world is incorrect and incomplete. The project challenges our poor perception of reality and serves as a comment to our limited understanding of the world. Furthermore, it’s hard not to make physical and metaphorical connections to the mythological entities of Moirai (Fates) that controlled the thread of life of every mortal being, from birth to death; human life defined by a complex path of threads...