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I live, 2003,  P.M.S., Galerie 35 Berlin

The self-portraying computer.

If the slogan of the modern human being is: “I work, therefore I am”, then this computer can also have a right to claim the same. Or with the other words: “I make a portrait of myself therefore I live/I exist/I am.”

Functioning Process:
The computer’s hard disc is programed, through the keyboard, so that the scanner (which is connected to the computer) scans randomly and then also the printer (which is connected to the computer) prints at random the scanned pictures. The scanner is placed in front of the monitor, so when the scanner gets the order to scan, he scans the surface of the monitor. He scans the surface together with the actual programming text, which is on that particular time displayed on the monitor. Afterwards in random, the printer prints the scanned pictures.
What happens in fact in this case or what kind of product do we get? We have a new way of observing and a new observer which is not a human being anymore. We get by any scanned picture, as a result, always one printed sheet of paper with a different picture of the monitor. This is one different form of processing and visualization than the previous forms that we’ve know until today. This could be called Computer realism. In the case of the human being, when we look at the self portrait of the painter, we do have a portrait of the human meaning eyes, ears, nose etc. but we cannot see the momentary ideas or the momentary occupation of the human being. In the print of the computer we have on the picture, the surface of the monitor with all the shadows and reflections – we also have a new quality, we see the current activity, work, occupation of the computer. We see something that happens in that particular moment inside the computer. Inside him. He is watching himself and printing in paper, precise and real pictures in 2 dimensions. Now the subject is not human, but the computer himself. He/she is the observer, the one who is observed and the creator. In this way, each computer can make hyperrealistic auto portrait, what not each human, can do.

The programming of this work was done by Dmitry Kleiner

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self-portrait sheets