a singular horizon
2 digital prints. 213 x 145 cm.
A Singular Horizon interrogates the mediated relationship between nature and human-made environments, translating a garden plot encased in a concrete courtyard into digital reconstructions rendered as prints. These works, created using photogrammetry, transform the material and spatial qualities of the garden into an aesthetic study of distortion, rupture, and the tension between the organic and the artificial.
At a glance, the prints appear complete and cohesive, offering an illusion of unity. However, closer inspection reveals fractures, distortions, and breaks within the landscape. These disruptions are a direct result of the photogrammetric process, which attempts to construct a seamless digital representation from incomplete and complex reference data. The concrete edge of the courtyard serves as the primary spatial anchor for the reconstruction, imposing its rigid geometries onto the organic irregularities of the garden. This structural mediation highlights the tension between the human desire for order and the unruly complexity of natural systems.
The temporal dimension of the work is underscored by the conditions under which the reference photographs were captured: sunset, when shadows elongate and fix themselves onto surfaces.
These native shadows, embedded within the digital object, act as markers of time, emphasising the transient interplay of light and material. The fixed shadows in the prints suggest a moment suspended, a symbol of how human-made environments mediate and alter our perceptions of vegetation and our conceptions of ‘nature.’
By presenting the garden plot as a digitally mediated simulacrum, A Singular Horizon confronts representation and reality. The prints are not photographs but renders of the digital reconstruction—a “copy without an original.” This condition reflects philosopher Jean Baudrillard’s notion of the simulacrum, where representations become detached from their referents, existing as autonomous objects that obscure the authenticity of what they depict. The fractured digital landscape becomes emblematic of the ways in which human systems attempt to impose coherence on environments that resist simplification. The concrete edge, serving as both boundary and reference, exemplifies how built environments define and constrain our understanding of the organic. The distortions in the reconstruction amplify the inherent flaws in this endeavor, pointing to the limits of human attempts to systematise and control natural processes.
