Artwork Inspired by Bubble Chambers
New York artist Roshan Houshmand found the photos of particle events recorded in bubble chambers, like those used at BNL's Alternating Gradient Synchrotron in the 1960s and 70s, to be so compellingly beautiful that they became the basis for an entire series of paintings.
Particle tracks recorded in BNL's 80-inch bubble chamber. When liquid in the chamber is kept at extremely cold temperatures, accelerator-produced charged particles flying through it leave a visible trail of bubbles along their path.
Says
Houshamand, "the process of drawing and painting these 'perfect' spirals and
swirls from the photographs was different than anything I had ever
pursued in my artwork. I loved the sophisticated, simple playfulness
of lines depicting charges, energies, speeds, mass and so much
more. I also love that these are paintings, drawings which depict a
very 3-D sculptural space. They are paintings of very specific
energies; paintings of collision-created trails called 'events'.
The creative process for this series is one of simultaneous control
and expansion where each canvas searches for its own form and
movement. There is something so pure and primal and universal about
the movement of the trails and swirls and dancing lines against the
black, which exist for less than a breath of time before they
disappear."
"Their dignity and great sense of chaotic balance appeals to me as I proceed to prime all my canvases in the densest black I can find; “Cold Black” which is actually a very dark blue. It is the black of the blackboard and the black of the universe. Once the paint is dry, armed with a piece of chalk and photographs of tracks from Brookhaven National Laboratory as a reference point, I begin my search for the energy and dance of the colliding, spiraling lines until my aesthetic vision and the photographed image are in dialogue; neither too fast nor too slow, until the point is made."
"The process repeats as layers of black against layers of white perfect each other until there is a complete unity of surface between the black and the white painted forms. Each painting tells a different story."
