Friday Fractal XXXI

I must apologize for being a bit slow with blogging lately, and now a day late with the Friday Fractal. A series of events and observations left me in an existential mood, pondering the fuzziness of the line between reality and fiction. Since my story on the subject, Illusions in Lavender was published this week, I have to admit, it is just that sort of philosophical pondering that can drive a person to madness. I've gotten used to these moods, however, and the most that suffered was my blogging. This week, however, as I emerged from that feverish hermit state, I caught another sort of fever, this time by the more traditional head cold. So, please, bear with me as I try to describe some of my thoughts on existentialism, through a fog of illness.

That line--between reality and fiction--is fuzzier than you might think. As a child, I began to wonder if everyone else saw the world the same way I did. Did the color we all call blue look the same to me as it does to someone else? Even if we stood in the same spot, and described the same patch of clear sky? I found it wasn't an easy question to even phrase, let alone pursue an answer. Yet, I never stopped wondering, setting my fate in stone... I was to be a philosopher... the sort who studies questions of existence and being, and goes half-crazy on the way. I was probably also destined to be an artist of some sort, trying to share that which I saw, from dreams to empirical observations.

It took me some time before I realized my fractals were art. I never quite developed the patience for painting or drawing. Yet, for some reason, using a medium of values--numbers, formulas--is a comfortable experience. Over the past year, I tried to show how the many forms fractals could take compared to the designs of nature. In doing so, I'd compare the fractal with a photograph to add a degree of realism. But there are many times when realism is almost too much to bear, when the stark realities of being are stranger than the visions found in dreams, or the memories triggered by a sensation. At these times, the abstract can be more appealing.

Abstraction in art (or any pursuit) can be difficult to swallow. I'll admit, I look at a Kandinski-like work, and feel rather awkward, as if I'm missing something. It makes me feel as if someone is whispering across the room, leaving me out of some secret. The abstract artist paints a secret, and then refuses to tell. Every once in a while, however, I run across one of these abstract pieces, and catch a glimpse of the secret. Then, it elicits an excited, guilt-ridden giggle, as if I was peeking through a keyhole, seeing what the artist saw. At those moments, I love abstract art.

I suppose abstract art isn't any easier to create than it is to see. How awkward it must be to paint one's secrets, to lay them on a canvas for all to see. It's that shyness that has kept me from straying away from the photographs in my fractal art. I don't want you peeping though the keyhole... better to leave the door wide open. Still, there is something else that keeps me from sharing the completely abstract forms. I can't help but cling to the familiar, the sorts of things I want to see, that I know others can see as well.

So, I end up in sort of a compromising position, staying in the shallows of the sea of abstraction, when I have a cartographer's ship ready to sail off and chart the deep. From there, I have a fractal to share, which stays within sight of familiar ground, but is washed over by waves of the abstract. This is a layered fractal, merging a Joukowskij set with a simpler set called "Jeppesen". Well, the latter was simple, until I applied a bit of kaleidoscopic symmetry, and then shattered it by mapping with an fBm "glass" algorithm. Sound abstract? Sure... yet, the resulting image reminds us of familiar forms:

If you'd like a simple title, I'd call this a fractal painting of a floating blossom. If you'd prefer an abstract title, call it "Perfume Floating on the Surface of a Dream". Beware of peeking through keyholes at hidden meanings, though. This one disguises secrets about that fuzzy line between reality and fiction... that line which, examined, can drive a person to madness, as I warned.

It's a Kafka thing. It makes you feel like a bug... a bug attracted to the fragrance of a strange blossom. I'll have to explain that later--how examination of being can turn one into a bug--and perhaps re-post my favorite Kafkaesque blog. It sounds rather dark and abstract, but don't be daunted... taking a peek might be delightfully entertaining.

All fractals made by the author using ChaosPro