An Empty Room

Abstract

In conjunction with Coded: Art Enters the ComputerAge, 1952-1982, LACMA's Art + Technology Lab presents a two-part digital work by Casey Reas: a simulation of and an homage to Victor Vasarely's unrealized proposal for LACMA's Art and Technology Program (1967-71). Vasarely was interested in cybernetics and permutation during this period, and he envisioned a machine composed of lights arranged in a grid that would generate millions of different visual patterns related to his paintings (such as the one on view in Coded). Estimated at the time to cost two million dollars to fabricate, the project was deemed prohibitively expensive and was left unrealized.