Sergio Albiac’s Generative Portraits Are Digitally Fascinating

moray mair | Art and design | October 16, 2012

Sergio Albiac‘s generative portraits are a hard one for me to explain. I first came across his ‘You Are Not The News’ portrait series and was blown away by them – the idea that you could generate images out of newspapers as opposed to using collage techniques to do the same thing. Albiac’s process is very different from a traditional illustrator. First thing that has to said is that he is both a trained and qualified computer scientist and artist and it’s this marriage of science and art that creates his unique images.

To create his work Albiac does not use commercial programs to make his work rather he writes open source computer programs to generate his own images. Once his idea has translated into code he creates, finds and selects the visual results that best express the theme. Sometimes these computer generated images are the final work other times his code is used as a sketchbook to visualize concepts before painting the image himself. In short its an interesting process with fascinating results.

Here is what’s said about the themes in his work:

Albiac focuses on the relationship between the inner worlds we create in our minds and the tensions that result when faced with our realities. The illusion of control in a world largely governed by chance and the elusive nature of emotions are also recurring ideas in the work. He Wants to stimulate the viewer, give alternative answers to questions about beauty, personality and identity. Or rather, entirely new questions.

Albiac is currently showing his work at the El Bigote del Sr Smith Gallery, 38 Joaquín Costa, Barcelona until 10th November.

Via Triangulation