I once read a text entitled “The Yoga of the Great Symbol.” I don’t claim to have
comprehended it completely, but one concept has stuck with me over the years, namely “the union of the moving and the non-moving.” One way of thinking about this concept is in terms of time and timelessness. I guess the key takeaway is that from the point of view expressed in the text, neither of this pair of opposites completely describes ultimate reality.

A few years back, someone posted a video on Facebook in which a scientist described the formation of complex molecules in the explosions of stars: super novas. The conclusion the scientist presented is that we are made of stars. The science is fascinating, but the conclusion can be considered as relatively simplistic from a Buddhist point of view. Our bodies may very well be made of the residue of stellar dust, but to paraphrase Thich Nhat Hanh, we are neither the same as stars, nor different. Reducing reality to one fixed concept or another, even a lovely one like our being made of stars, is a limit on the freedom of an open mind. I could say we are all manifestations of limitless, interrelated cosmos, but that’s just another concept.

My work, which over the past three decades has been mostly digital, is reflective of this mode of thinking. Thus it’s been and continues to be an evolving process of discovery. I can’t predict what will come next, which from my point of view is a good thing. My hope is that each instance of this evolution of my personal consciousness, as reflected in the individual pieces that are its artifacts, can serve as a jumping off point for the open minded and fruitful contemplation of others.

Carl Van Brunt
Dialogues with a Machine
Oct 28 – Dec 3, 2023
Opening Reception Sat, Oct 28, 4-7pm

ABOUT THE EXHIBITION
I once read a text entitled “The Yoga of the Great Symbol.” I don’t claim to have
comprehended it completely, but one concept has stuck with me over the years, namely “the union of the moving and the non-moving.” One way of thinking about this concept is in terms of time and timelessness. I guess the key takeaway is that from the point of view expressed in the text, neither of this pair of opposites completely describes ultimate reality.

A few years back, someone posted a video on Facebook in which a scientist described the formation of complex molecules in the explosions of stars: super novas. The conclusion the scientist presented is that we are made of stars. The science is fascinating, but the conclusion can be considered as relatively simplistic from a Buddhist point of view. Our bodies may very well be made of the residue of stellar dust, but to paraphrase Thich Nhat Hanh, we are neither the same as stars, nor different. Reducing reality to one fixed concept or another, even a lovely one like our being made of stars, is a limit on the freedom of an open mind. I could say we are all manifestations of limitless, interrelated cosmos, but that’s just another concept.

My work, which over the past three decades has been mostly digital, is reflective of this mode of thinking. Thus it’s been and continues to be an evolving process of discovery. I can’t predict what will come next, which from my point of view is a good thing. My hope is that each instance of this evolution of my personal consciousness, as reflected in the individual pieces that are its artifacts, can serve as a jumping off point for the open minded and fruitful contemplation of others.

ABOUT CARL VAN BRUNT
Carl Van Brunt has been an artist since his teenage years. Early on, he focused on painting, mostly in acrylic. Around 1980, he became aware of digital art and that has increasingly been his primary focus ever since.

Up until the year 2000, Van Brunt spent most of his adult life in New York City where he worked in commercial art and advertising while he continued to develop his digital art. He showed his work in various venues including one Upper West Side gallery appropriately named Outer Space.

In 2000, Van Brunt, and his family moved to Cold Spring, NY. Soon thereafter he bid farewell to advertising and started Van Brunt Gallery in Beacon, NY. Later he was Gallery Director of Woodstock Artists Association and Museum. Throughout this period his digital art continued to evolve and he now includes animation, video projection, collaborative performance, installation, and exploration of Artificial Intelligence in his practice. Van Brunt has shown his work extensively throughout the Hudson Valley region.

EVENTS RELATED TO THIS EXHIBITION

SAT, Oct 28, 4-7pm
Opening Reception

SAT, Nov 12, 3pm
Chaotica 3 – Live performance by Ben Neill and video performance by Carl Van Brunt

Chaotica 3 is the third in a set of performances featuring Ben Neill’s music in conjunction with Carl Van Brunt’s projected animations. Neill is the inventor of the electro-acoustic mutantrumpet which gives him the capability to interact with digital technology to create multilayered music on the fly. Van Brunt uses digital technology to create continuously evolving painterly abstractions. Neill and Van Brunt’s performance will consist of a mix of preprogrammed and spontaneously altered material.