“wolf-light” - twilight, dusk. French ‘Entre chien et loup’, ‘Between dog & wolf’ - the time when the familiar becomes wild. The phrase envisions the approaching dark as a time when things move from familiar to wild, or when the failing light means it’s hard to distinguish between a dog and a wolf.”

z d e n k o k r t i ć wolf-light: new encaustic scanographs 

Friends and Plaza Galleries, Hoover Public Library

The work featured in this show comprises of digitally manipulated scanographs (pixelated illusions), printed on paper and then encapsulated and augmented with “real” natural substances like tree resins, melted beeswax, microcrystalline and carnauba waxes. The central question here is: how real is real? What is the role of illusion?

Our civilization, oblivious to our circadian rhythms, with its brightly lit up monitors, relentless consumerism, and ubiquitous 24-hour entertainment and news cycle, has almost lost its ability to observe and appreciate these subtle and regular transitions and changes.  Appreciating cycles of days and night with all their minute transitions, all living forms, their slow growth, and often equally slow decay, and the inevitable dulling of our senses through gradual loss of vision, hearing…. the work is about these moments of transitions, embracing both moments of clarity and moments of blurriness and enigma.

These works are a study in contrasts. Contrast of that which is mundane, common, and familiar to that what is increasingly altered, misrepresented, and even fictional. 

Process: For the past dozen years or so, the artist has been experimenting with a use of a flatbed scanner that he approaches as a studio tool, akin to a brush, or a spatula. The artist sees an infinite creative potential built in the scanner’s technology of capturing reality – in its shallow depth of field and in the way with which it captures the images by slowly moving arm across forms, illuminating its predetermined path with built-in light. Forms that are very close to scanner’s CCD array capturing device are recorded with a great precision, and in high resolution and detail. Yet, as soon as the distance between the device and objects increases, a new, altered reality emerges (ironically, one that is still captured in high-resolution). The resulting prints feature varying degrees of these rapidly dissolving and distorting forms - from stable and familiar, to that which is harder to perceive and even comprehend.

Scanography, more commonly referred to as scanner photography, is the process of capturing digitized images of objects for the purpose of creating printable works of art using a flatbed “photo” scanner with a CCD (charge-coupled device) array capturing device.  Fine art scanography differs from traditional document scanning by using atypical objects, often three-dimensional, as well as from photography, due to the nature of the scanner's operation. 

Encaustic painting is an ancient technique, dating back to the Greeks, who used wax to caulk ship hulls. Its name comes from the Greek word meaning “to heat or burn in” (enkaustikos). Heat is used throughout the process, from melting the beeswax and varnish to fusing the layers of wax. Encaustic consists of natural bees wax and dammar resin (crystallized tree sap). The medium can be used alone for its transparency or adhesive qualities or used pigmented.