(non)semantic process [ version with a driftwood by the Rhine ]

A photograph of a piece of driftwood, collected in the city where the exhibition takes place, has its image data processed by a computer program that converts its pixels into letters. Based on this pixel-to-letter transformation, the program searches a dictionary for matching words and then displays the resulting words on a monitor. The words extracted through the countless simulations after the natural object is connected to a human-created computer system emerge as mere coincidences. Yet, the work raises questions about whether the world is governed by randomness or inevitability, while simultaneously revealing a horizon of no meaning beyond the human tendency to understand the world through meaning. (Yoko Nose, Curator)