An Evaluation of the use of the Incomprehensibility of Quantum Theory in Art

Lucy Papadopoulos 15831732
Fine Art Critical Practice, University of Brighton
An evaluation of the use of the
incomprehensibility of quantum
theory in art
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Lucy Papadopoulos 15831732
Contents
Images………………………………………………………………………………3
Introduction…………………………………………………………………………10
Art work 1: Mucilaginous Omniverse……………………………………………12
Art work 2: Is the Museum A Battlefield?………………………………………17
Art work 3: Report of a Surveyor……………………………………………….22
Bibliography………………………………………………………………………30
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Lucy Papadopoulos 15831732
Images
Fig. 1: Evelina Domnitch and Dmitry Gelfand. Installation of Mucilaginous Omniverse.
Photographer unknown. Web. 12 October 2017. http://www.portablepalace.com/
mucilaginous.html
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Lucy Papadopoulos 15831732
Fig. 2: Walters, P. and Hey, T. Image showing the build up of electrons arriving individually
after passing through dual slits. After a large number of electrons have arrived, the exact
same interference pattern as though waves were passing through the two slits is shown.
(1987). The quantum universe. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, p.12.
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Lucy Papadopoulos 15831732
Fig. 3: Evelina Domnitch and Dmitry Gelfand. Still from documentation video of
Mucilaginous Omniverse. Web. 12 October 2017. https://vimeo.com/115867488
Fig.4: Graph used in quantum mechanics to show the behaviour of particles, from Six
Stories from the end of Representation, p221, 2008.
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Lucy Papadopoulos 15831732
Fig.5: Hito Steyerl. Still from Is the Museum a Battlefield? Web. October 2017. https://
vimeo.com/76011774
Fig.6: Hito Steyerl. Still from Is the Museum a Battlefield? Web. October 2017. https://
vimeo.com/76011774
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Lucy Papadopoulos 15831732
Fig.7: Hito Steyerl. Still from Is the Museum a Battlefield? Web. October 2017. https://
vimeo.com/76011774
Fig. 8: The invisible bullet. Hito Steyerl. Still from Is the Museum a Battlefield? Web.
October 2017. https://vimeo.com/76011774
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Fig 9: John Latham. Cartesian-like graph from Report of a Surveyor, p15. 1984.
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Lucy Papadopoulos 15831732
Fig.10: John Latham. Graph representing the converging trajectories of art, philosophy and
physics from Report of a Surveyor, p16. 1984.
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Lucy Papadopoulos 15831732
Introduction
In 1900, Max Plank proposed that light and radiation itself is quantised, meaning that it comes in
discrete, indivisible amounts. This idea, which few had taken seriously, led Albert Einstein, Niels
Bohr, Erwin Schrodinger, Werner Heisenberg, Paul Dirac, Max Planck and others, to develop
Quantum Mechanics, the Uncertainty Principle and Relativity. The history of physics had taken an
unexpected and tangential turn and, by 1930, a revolutionary new world view had been created
and accepted, affecting disciplines that may follow its trajectory. This essay explores the influences
of ideas in quantum theory on artists, particularly:
1. Its absurdly counterintuitive theories of matter: That we can only contemplate the probabilities
of particles in quantum state and that subatomic objects and events do not operate as they do
in the macro-world. This is down to effects like wave-particle duality, local effect and observer
effect which, in the context of the dual slit experiment, have led to unique interpretations (e.g.
the many-worlds theory) unlike any other theory in the history of science.
2. The philosophical implications of this science, in terms of classical language being limited and
the questionable effect of inter-disciplinary action between art and science.
Since the quantum revolution cosmology and quantum mechanics have experienced a upturning of
old attitudes. Classical Newtonian physics, the paradigm that the laws of nature are absolute,
universal and completely deterministic, is insufficient to explain the behaviour of quantised particles
— strange and inevitable behaviour which has formed one of the most experimentally successful
scientific theories to date. The established term “laws” incorrectly prevails in physics as a key
characteristic of our scientific world-view however the rules of classical physics cannot be used to
create a state in which we can observe new quantum phenomena. As a result of this there has
been much philosophical debate; the term ‘habit’ has been suggested more appropriate as
evidently such theories haven’t proven themselves infallible enough to be called ‘laws’. 1
In this study I will analyse three works by different artists that explore one or more of these areas of
interest within quantum theory:
1. Is the Museum a Battlefield? by Hito Steyerl
2. Mucilaginous Omniverse by Evelina Domnitch & Dmitry Gelfand
3. Report of a Surveyor (chapter 1) by John Latham
1 Rupert Sheldrake et al. “Unnatural Laws”, Soundcloud, The Institute of Art and Ideas, October
2017.
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With regard to contemporary physics (of which quantum theory plays a large part), there is a
significant link to art in an era where many believe art and science are becoming similar: Art and
science philosopher Catherine Elgin notes that ‘the arts and sciences use the same symbolic
resources to achieve much the same symbolic ends.’
2
Both scientists and artists pursue questions
of truth through analysing and criticising, where experimentation and creativity (with ideas as well
as processes) play a key role. Planck, said to be the father of quantum theory
3, asserted that
pioneer scientists ‘must have a vivid intuitive imagination, for new ideas are not generated by
deduction, but by an artistically creative imagination.’ 4
2
Catherine Elgin, “Nature’s Handmaiden, Art”, Thinking about Science and Reflecting onArt:
Bringing Aesthetics and the Philosophy of Science Together, Otavio Bueno et al. (London:
Routledge, 2017), 27.
3
Carlo Rovelli, Seven Brief Lessons on Physics, (Great Britain: Clays Ltd, [2014] 2015), 13.
4
Larisa Shavinina, The International Handbook on Innovation, (Pergamon, 2003), 451.
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Mucilaginous Omniverse, 2009
Evelina Domnitch and Dmitry Gelfand create immersive multi-sensory installations and
performances that consist of explorations and collaborations
5
in physics, chemistry and computer
science with an underlying interest in phenomenology. Recent works are particularly focused on
mesoscopics
6
in their investigation of our perception of the world, triggered by ‘the slippery frontier
between our classical impression of reality and the quantum world of light on which it is based.’ 7
Created in 2009, Mucilaginous Omniverse is a live projection of micron particles in a petri dish
which are used to simulate quantum behaviour in an experiment performed by the duo (Figure 1).
It is an installed-performance, creating an immersive landscape of the subatomic world,
transforming the scale of the micro into the macro. This piece brings into our perception the
behaviour of quantum phenomena in an analogy using silicone oil instead of photons. Droplets of
the oil float above a bath of the same substance with a low frequency sound dispersed through it;
preventing coalescence with the droplets and the bath, making them ‘acoustically airborne’.
8
These
droplets are ten million times larger than an atom but are the largest known objects to demonstrate
the characteristics of quantised particles. The duo are focused on this means of using electric
fields to levitate matter to observe phenomena rather than taking measurements scientifically,
representing surprisingly well the behaviour of quantum phenomena which is usually inconceivable
to the naked eye. Domnitch expresses this as something insufficiently described by science to
those outside it: that results of this nature are of ‘a system that has been dramatically reduced’
9,
that new phenomena are described in the specialised language of science which is unfortunately
hidden to most, and that ‘scientists never present results of their research as an immediate slice of
reality’. 10
5
In order to work directly with scientific technologies and processes they have collaborated
intensely with various scientific research groups, including the Physics Institute of Goettingen
University, the National Institute of Advanced Sciences and Technologies (Nagoya) and the
European Space Agency.
6
Mesoscopics in physics relates to “a size intermediate between macroscopic and atomic (typically
between 10−6 m and 10−8 m). Hence: influenced by or exhibiting both quantum and macroscopic
phenomena.” — https://en.oxforddictionaries.com/definition/mesoscopic
7
“Evelina Domnitch, Dmitry Gelfand & RySQ”, FEAT. Web. Accessed November 2017.
8
Evelina Domnitch and Dmitry Gelfand, “Art As Rigorous Phenomenology”, Portable Palace, Web,
accessed November 2017, 6.
9 Evelina Domnitch, “Slices of Reality: Ion Trap & Quantum Lattice”, Creative Disturbance, FEAT /
Future Emerging Art and Technology project. Web. 30 November 2016, accessed November 2017.
10
Ibid
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The process they use in this piece is known as ‘ion tapping’ and is common in quantum research,
recreating the dynamics in a quantum system which otherwise is ‘impossible, absolutely impossible
to describe in any classical way.’
11
This creates the controlled environment in which these particles
move in a quantum state. This is the behaviour that revolutionised physics in bringing to attention
how inexplicably strangely the fundamental building blocks of matter can act. In Mucilaginous
Omniverse, the behaviour represented takes the form of what is known as wave-particle duality.
This is the same phenomenon that was examined in the double slit experiment, described by
Richard Feynman as having in it ‘the heart of quantum mechanics’.
12
It is the most direct example
of the contradictory nature of newly discovered phenomena, utterly counterintuitive to the classical
world that science had previously become so accustomed to.
The wave like nature of particles was confirmed in 1927, a year of intense discovery in which the
subject of quantum theory proliferated. The demonstration that electrons, already known to be
particles of matter, also behaved as a wave, exactly as light itself, was a revelation. It was
conclusively shown that light exhibits characteristics of both a wave and a particle at the same time
(Figure 2), and yet the two descriptions of nature are absolutely distinct from each other in classical
physics. The term wave particle duality was coined for this by Louis de Broglie in 1924.
In the artist’s experiment, the optical projection of the ion trap transforms the effect of wave-particle
duality into a conceivable scale. Quantum phenomena like this are not only inconceivable but
present characteristics unlike any pre-notion of our sense of what an object might be like; particles
are unpredictable and indefinable in their nature, only described by probabilities rather than exact
states or positions. They can also be in 2 or more places at the same time, down to an effect of
wave-particle duality called local effect. This behaviour is brought into our visual understanding in
the movement of the droplets in this experiment, where the particles work in strange rhythms of
coalescence, entangling
13
with eachother and at the same time popping up randomly in different
parts of the petri dish (Figure 3). Acoustic vibrations travel through the liquid making it quasi-solid
medium for the oil droplets to form in lattices. In the same way that a photon can show
characteristics of a wave when passing through the double slit, ‘a sonically levitated droplet can
11
John Gribbin, In Search of Schrodinger’s Cat, (Black Swan. [1984] 1991), 164.
12
Richard Feynman, “The Feynman Lectures on Physics Vol III: Ch. 1: Quantum Behaviour”,
Feynman Lectures, September 2017.
13
Particles in a quantum system can entangle with each other at impossible distances. The
process of quantum entanglement has recently been used to ‘teleport’ a particle from one island to
another. Please see https://phys.org/news/2012-09-km-physicists-quantum-teleportationdistance.html
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interfere with its own surface wave and begin to drift or “walk” along the wave.’
14
Such behaviour
was thought only to be possible in the context of quantum physics. The artists see their work as
converging with Husserl’s transcendental phenomenology, highlighting the change in perspective,
a ‘perceptual mapping’, that ‘greatly enhances the observer’s awareness of non-local mental
phenomena.’ 15
Lending more scientific context, the title of the piece defines the space of the piece as
metaphorically representative of the same quantum realm in which interference with other
universes might occur according to a particular interpretation of quantum mechanics.
16
The notion
of an omniverse is viewed by many leading scientists as an interpretation of the double slit
experiment, known as the Many Worlds Interpretation (MWI). According to this interpretation, a
particle in one universe passes though one of the two slits but interferes with a 'phantom'
17
particle
from another universe, which passes through the other slit. The wave-like interference persists until
we make a measurement, at which point the wave collapses and there is no wave like duality. This
is known as the observer effect. The MWI lends itself to interpreting this situation by saying that the
act of measurement defines which universe the observer exists in, at which point there is just one
particle and it exhibits no wave-like behaviour at all. Thus the MWI sees quantum effects as the
interference between different worlds.
Domnitch and Gelfand have extended the viewer’s imagination to reveal quanta accessibly and
intimately; a world where such staggering suggestions for reality have arisen from. The MWI is a
concept (inevitably) unprovable and unimaginable on a realistic scale even to physicists. However,
it remains a mainstream interpretation of quantum mechanics, and as a result of this artwork we
get a sense of where the seeds of multiverse concept started to materialise; in the engagement
with the kind of behaviour that exists on a quantum scale.
James Elkins analyses the visualisation of quantum phenomena used for educational means:
Symbols, graphs and diagrams are invaluable fore describing our understanding of the quantum
world, however ‘chances are good that the intuitive image will be so far from the mathematics that
14
Theresa Schubert, Experiencing the Unconventional: Science in Art, (World Scientific Publishing
Company: 2015), 144.
15
16
Domnitch & Dmitry, “Art As Rigorous Phenomenology”, 7.
David Deutsch The Fabric of Reality, (London: Penguin Press. [1997] 1998), 54.
17
Michael Slezak, “Ghost universes kill Schrodinger’s quantum cat”, New Scientist, December
2017.
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it will end up being useless, “lame,” and even misleading.’
18
Mucilaginous Omniverse might
exemplify an artwork which is partly successful in embodying wave-particle duality, in that the
viewer can imagine how the real phenomena behave on a quantum scale. After all, it might be
seen as futile to attempt to visualise actual phenomena that cannot exist within our scope of reality.
We can, however, understand it partly at least through metaphorical devices: Domnitch and
Gelfand have achieved the closest possible sense of representation of this subject by using matter
which is tangible to us as set up in this art-experiment. According to Elkins the subject in question
in the representation of quantum phenomena in science and art; this behaviour of particles; is
‘inconceivable’ and therefore can ‘only be visualised by conceptualizing the unresolvable tension
between what can and cannot be pictured.’
19
This incommensurability between micro and macro,
and between classical and quantum, as it has manifested in this revolutionary paradigm, has
evidently been key to the duo’s thought processes. It is these ideas which have triggered the artists
to translate the experience of the subject of focus into a feasible scale; Evelina Domnitch describes
their artistic journey as a ‘challenging path of trying to rescale our senses’. At the same time it
offers us experience of the behaviour of quanta alluded to from a differing (art) angle to the
scientist’s, whose mathematical reasoning is inaccessible for many.
Elkins describes his view that newly discovered phenomena signal end in ‘what might be called
“ordinary human sense” of pictures’
20, an end of amenable representation, in the new domain of
quantum theory: Particularly notions like wave-particle duality which even in their standard visual
form (wave-function graphs, Figure 4), ‘are not represented except as dilemmas, conflations of two
incommensurate possibilities.’
21
Mucilaginous Omniverse demonstrates that we don’t have to rule
out this subject matter for representation completely — metaphorically, in terms of their dynamics
of movement, at least. These new understandings of nature might signify a modification of our
sense of representative forms, in that representation, when addressing issues of quantum theory,
cannot be directly visual but can still be indirectly alluded to.
18 James Elkins, Six Stories from the End of Representation: Images in Painting, Photography,
Astronomy, Microscopy, Particle Physics, and Quantum Mechanics, 1980-2000, (Stanford
University Press, Stanford, Calif, 2008), 208.
19
20
Elkins, Six Stories from the End of Representation, 222.
Ibid, 200.
21
Ibid, 223.
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Is The Museum A Battlefield?, 2013
Creator of the second work of focus, Hito Steyerl creates films, installations and performances that
explore topics of media technology and the global circulation of images. Through the dissemination
of these images into culture she explores forces of militarisation, surveillance migration and
dominant institutional regimes. Her work pushes the boundaries of conventional filmmaking as a
result of her engagement in New German Cinema
22, often presenting imagery in symbolic form
with many underlying layers of meaning and hints of satirical humour. In Is The Museum A
Battlefield?, first exhibited at the 13th Istanbul Biennale, she traces the bullet that killed her friend
Andrea Wolf back to its provider, unveiling many strange revelations along the way. Elements of
quantum theory are entwined into her dense argument, making this piece a good example of how
artists might use the uniquely strange theories of current physics as a mode of enquiry to support
or understand other concerns.
The lecture focuses on the battlefield she visited where her friend was killed. Andrea Wolfe was a
childhood friend of Steyerl’s, ‘extrajudicially executed’
23
for being part of the women’s army of the
PKK, the Kurdistan Worker’s Party, in a battle in Van, Turkey, in 1988. The film shows her
identifying detritus from the site; rags of clothes and shoes from missing people, but more
importantly artillery shells, missiles and ammunition cases which become key evidence for her
investigation. As the lecture progresses we come to learn of Steyerl’s proposal that seemingly
disparate spaces of society — of militant violence, post-millenial communication (the circulation of
images) and art — are not as separate as we previously believed. However, what makes this
artwork relevant is its following use of the inherent complexity in quantum behaviour to describe
the same impenetrability of the hidden affairs that occur behind the scenes in the dominating
structures of society.
In the next shot she points her iPhone at the headquarters of Lockheed Martin who, she explains,
produce the ammunition cases that her and her team found traces of in Turkey. Her investigation
leads her back to the source of this weaponry in western metropolises, to the headquarters of
Lockheed Martin in Berlin, which happens to be a piece of cutting-edge architecture by Frank
Gehry (Figure 5). Here Steyerl remarks that ‘once missiles are fired, they can change their form.’
24
She holds up an imaginary bullet in her hand, an illustrative gesture used throughout the film and
symbolic of a central theme of her argument. The bullet from this battle has travelled across
22
23
Maggie Gray, “Artist Profile: Hito Steyerl”, this is tomorrow, accessed October 2017.
“Is the Museum a Battlefield?” perf. Hito Steyerl, 2013.
24
Ibid
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several countries and somehow taken form in an art related space. The strange trajectory of the
bullet becomes analogous to quantum phenomena; she explains that in this process the bullet
’travels across several states of matter’ and ‘transforms into something else entirely.’
Steyerl then reveals an even stranger phenomenon: a piece of hers that is related to similar
subject matter, entitled Abstract (2012), was exhibited at the Art Institute of Chicago who are
strongly supported by members of General Dynamics. Coincidentally, this company were the arms
dealers of the M179 gun used for the 20mm bullet they found in Van. This symbolises the irony in
that even the artist herself who is acting against these forces can still become indirectly, and
unwillingly, involved, ‘so, did I shoot the bullet I found on the battlefield myself?’ She analyses this
state of affairs scientifically; that the bullet’s invisible link to art spaces seems to ‘exist under
strange laws of physics.’
25
She then goes onto explain the double-slit experiment in quantum
theory (Figure 6).
As I have described in the context of Mucilaginous Omniverse, the double slit experiment
revolutionised physicist’s view of matter: Experimental data about quanta
26, the discrete chunks
that make up our fundamentally granular universe, demonstrate a completely contrary view to our
understanding of reality. Steyerl, with a hint of underlying sarcasm, seeks answers to her unruly
observations of the bullet in the quantum theoretical study of particles. Here, an animation is
shown of a photon being shot at a wall with two holes (Figure 4); as in the double slit experiment,
which then ‘transforms into a wave which goes through both holes [at the same time]’. The notion
of the changing state of a particle as a result of this experiment is aligned with the trajectory of the
metamorphic bullet which ‘can not only fly in circles, but in waves and in zig zag lines.’
27
She asks
‘is this how the bullet flies both in the museum and in the battlefield?’
28
The behaviour of the bullet,
displaying similar unpredictable qualities to the photon, thus becomes evidence for the hidden
inner workings of the system: As the lecture develops Steyerl gives many examples of arms trade
who produce weapons, ultimately supporting more wars and creating more unrecorded missing
people like Wolf. Wars create profit for these companies, enabling them to sponsor cultural events
and art institutions, in return giving them more widespread publicity, control and money and
ultimately creating more production of weapons and violence. According to Steyerl, these affairs
are just as hidden, impenetrable and unpredictable as quantum theory has proven to be.
25
26
27
Ibid
The plural of ‘quantum’: The minimum amount of physical phenomena involved in interaction.
“Is the Museum a Battlefield?” perf. Hito Steyerl, 2013.
28
Ibid
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In one of Steyerl’s pedagogic essays, entitled Missing People: Entanglement, Superposition, and
Exhumation as Sites of Indeterminacy, scientific concepts used in this artwork are explained in
more depth: In the first section entitled ‘X’ she describes Schrodinger’s Cat, a famous thought
experiment which was conceived to illustrate the absurd but real implications of the observer effect.
Within this, devised in 1935, a cat in a box is used as a metaphor for the quantum event. Until we
open the box, we have not triggered the observer effect and so the particle, and hence the cat,
exists in a state of indeterminacy. According to one interpretation of quantum theory, the cat's life
can only be defined by a probability of being in a certain state — until we measure it. This is the
point in which ‘we end its existence as an indeterminate interlocking waveform and freeze it as an
individual chunk of matter.’
29
Before this point, according to quantum theory, the cat is not either
alive or dead, but both at once.
In the film this notion is analogous to surveillance control over affairs that are related to violence,
given in many instances, for example in Syria: where Nokia-siemens, a subsidiary of Siemens
30,
are able to intervene in revolutions, riots and personal telecommunications. She gives many
examples of this, including Vodaphone, another sponsor, who have openly admitted surrendering
personal telecommunications to the British security services. These tools of control create ‘toxic
data clouds’ that ‘could potentially kill people’. As in the observer effect, the ‘shooting’ of the iPhone
or the media device (Figure 7), analogous to the moment the scientist measures the particle,
triggers the fate of the people involved in revolutionary combat all over the world, including Andrea
Wolf. She notes that the chances of a live cat emerging in Schrodinger’s experiment was 50/50,
however ‘whenever the metaphorical box of political laboratories was opened, this probability
would drop to extreme lows.’
31
In physics what is decided is the state or position of a particle
(represented by the live or dead cat that emerges from the box); in Steyerl’s analogy it is the
people, who end up either dead or alive.
As Steyerl describes, there are many ‘invisible forces’
32
that indirectly cause or contribute to the
materialisation of social violence. She sees the state of indeterminacy in Schrodinger’s experiment
as having similar qualities to the process, in our reality, in which people go missing, ‘what then, is
29
Hito Steyerl, “Missing People: Entanglement, Superposition ad Exhumation as Sites of
Indeterminacy”, e-flux, October 2012.
30
This demonstrates another unpredicted link to an art space; Siemens are also sponsorers of art
events including the 13th Istanbul Bienniale, in which Is The Museum A Battlefield? was first
exhibited.
31
Steyerl, “Missing People: Entanglement, Superposition ad Exhumation as Sites of
Indeterminacy”
32
“Is the Museum a Battlefield?” perf. Hito Steyerl, 2013.
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the state of missing itself? Does it take place inside Schrodinger’s Box, so to speak?’
33
Again,
there is an element of sardonic humour here, as complexity and difficulty of the situation is just as
inherent as in the most advanced theories of current physics.
At the end of the lecture Steyerl reminds us of the ultimate symbol which her whole argument
revolves around. She opens the torch function on her smartphone, ‘the one function thats not so
likely to be intercepted or disrupted…’, shines it against her hand on white wall. Suddenly we see
an image of the shadow of her hand holding a bullet on the wall, without seeing the actual bullet in
her hand. There is a hint of scientific imagery here in light of what has been said about the dual slit
experiment; a touch of magic in the invisible bullet, existing only as a shadow (Figure 8). The bullet
is untouchable, ’disappearing lots of people on its way’.
34
The mystery inherent in the behaviour of
the bullet is what has created this ‘paradoxical superposition that cannot be understood with the
conceptual tools of Euclidean physics’.
35
Is The Museum A Battlefield? demonstrates the implicative force of quantum theory: Its
fundamental indeterminacy and complexity is used to conjure the level of difficulty in tracing
missing people, in affairs such as data communication intervention and the unsuited sponsoring of
art by arms dealers. The extension of this metaphor is hinted at throughout the rest of the lecture in
her descriptive conduct, however, the highlight of Steyerl’s interest in quantum theory occurs in her
description of the photons in the double slit experiment.
36
Although Steyerl’s focus is not scientific,
she has used quantum theory subtly and powerfully for the sake of her argument. Unlike
Mucilaginous Omniverse which intends to represent qualities of intangible particles in a material
metaphor: Is The Museum A Battlefield? exemplifies an artwork which uses the theoretical thought
processes in relation to quantum entities as a humorous mode of enquiry for her subject which, as
described, presents inconceivable and unpredictable qualities akin to characteristics of quantised
particles and other elements of quantum theory. The absurdity of modern physics has
strengthened Steyerl’s case of the frustration inherent in the unknowable aspects of other political
and cultural phenomena. She has demonstrated a complex and convincing art work which uses
quantum theory for wider social concerns, drawing the character of scientific theory out into the
rest of the world.
33
Steyerl, “Missing People: Entanglement, Superposition ad Exhumation as Sites of
Indeterminacy”
34
35
“Is the Museum a Battlefield?” perf. Hito Steyerl, 2013.
Steyerl, “Missing People: Entanglement, Superposition ad Exhumation as Sites of
Indeterminacy”
36
“Is the Museum a Battlefield?” perf. Hito Steyerl, 2013. at approx 15:20.
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Report of a Surveyor, 1984
Finally, John Latham is a British artist whose performances, films, collection of physical works, and
extensive writings have been highly influential in the development of conceptual art. His solo
exhibitions have taken place worldwide and recently he exhibited at the 51st Venice Biennale in
2005, before his death in 2006. He was a leading member of the Artist Placement Group (1966)
which proposed that artists would bring completely different ways of thinking to the varying
organisations or areas of knowledge they worked in. The ideas inherent in the the APG’s
guidelines are very relevant to his own work which itself spans many knowledge areas and is
significantly inter-disciplinary, particularly in the sciences. This methodological approach has
become important to many quantum physicists too; Werner Heisenberg notes that ‘in the history of
human thinking the most fruitful developments frequently take place at those points where two
different lines of thought meet’
37, however this reflection could also apply to art-science
collaboration.
Latham and his collaborators worked in this way to create a new theory of space and time in the
early 1980s when he started to merge and clarify his ideas in writing. Various analyses of his
physical works (e.g. Time-Base Roller, 1972, Skoob Towers, 1964, and The Story of Rio, 1983)
have stressed that they are ‘conscious embodiments’
38
of his theories, and that we cannot fully
understand them without ‘a consideration of his evolving conceptual framework’.
39
For this reason I
am choosing to instead focus on Report of a Surveyor (1984) which, ‘in itself a work of art’
40,
includes extensive evidence of Latham’s use of quantum theory as a mode of enquiry for his theory
of existence.
Report is a document consisting of two parts, beginning with; five pages describing Latham’s
notion of an Incidental Person, the essence of his conceptual thinking, followed by seven
appendices expanding on his arguments. It is profoundly complex spanning many subject areas, of
which are all intertwined; as an example of his philosophical writings it questions belief systems in
society and his proposal for a new understanding of time in light of implications of quantum theory.
I will analyse Part 1 only, where his use of theories of dimensionality from modern physics is most
apparent.
37 Ibid
38 David Thorp, John Latham: Time Base and the Universe, (John Hansard Gallery, 2006), 14.
39 John Walker, “John Latham and the Book: The Convergence of Art and Physics.” The Burlington
Magazine, 1987, 716.
40
Richard Hamilton et al, John Latham: Early Works 1954-1972, (London: Lisson Gallery, 1987),
11.
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In all of Latham’s writings there is a first impression of seriousness and density in the language,
organised similarly to scientific journals (the use of graphs) or political treaties (the document is
addressed to The Secretary General of United Nations). A closer look reveals the subtle
strangeness of the text settings; there are many differences of font in size and scale. The use of
unusual type and progressive text is a result of his attitude towards systems of language, relevant
to philosophers of science; “— Language is a dividing medium. It has been so since Plato
established the first division. Philosophers have overlooked this feature of their medium.” 41
This is a significant element of Part 1, the essence of Report laying out a ‘New philosophy, new
stratagem…’
42
Here it becomes directly evident that Latham values scientific discovery, particularly
the effect of quantum theory on our epistemic description of our world, as a significant part of his
philosophical formula. The inherent difficulty in representing quantum phenomena that Elkins
described in relation to Mucilaginous Omniverse, the ‘most conceptually challenging
representations that the twentieth century produced’
43, is a consequence of the limits of scientific
language in describing them.
44
Classical physics held the notions that
1. the universe is made up of a simple mechanical movement of its inner parts
2. all motion has a cause and effect,
3. everything is certain, only a consequence of an earlier effect,
4. electromagnetic wave theory and Thomas Young’s double-slit experiment confirm a perfect
theory and observation of the properties of light,
5. energy can act like a particle or a wave, not both simultaneously,
6. it is possible to measure accurately the properties of a system.
These were all believed to be definitely true before the rise of quantum theory in 1927.
45
Since then it has been proven over and over again that these principles cannot describe in any
way the movement and position of quantized phenomena. These commonly termed ‘laws of
physics’ cannot describe the universe as scientists have grown to know it. The most profound
implication of these changes might be argued in relation to the notion of our universe being
41
42
43
John Latham, Report of a Surveyor, (London: Edition Hansjorg Mayer, 1964), cover.
Latham, Report of a Surveyor, 7.
Elkins, Six Stories from the End of Representation, 192.
44
This has signalled physicists to search for a new unified theory to account for both quantum
theory and gravity, a ‘quantum theory of gravity’, from Stephen Hawking, A Briefer History of Time,
(London: Transworld Publishers, 2008), 16.
45
James McEvoy, Introducing Quantum Theory, (Cambridge: Icon Books. 2003), 8.
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Lucy Papadopoulos 15831732
determinate. Quantum theory has proved particles to be impossible to determine; in a quantum
state they lack definite physical properties and can only be described by probabilities of being in
certain states or positions. For Latham this signifies the inaccuracy of scientific language so far; ’a
development that contradicts common sense and its logic.’
46
The revolution of the space-based
view of science in light of quantum theory has dumfounded experts and left physics in a mess:
Quantum physicist Carlo Rovelli describes quantum theory as having ‘gained unequalled
experimental success…yet more than a century after its birth remains shrouded in mystery and
incomprehensibility…”
47
Consequently Latham proposes that the artist is as equipped as the
scientist to confront ideas that are primarily seen as scientifically advanced; ‘From a resolution of
the split logic thus entailed a principle proposed in terms of the INCIDENTAL PERSON has arisen,
and is described.’ 48
Revered artist Richard Hamilton described Latham’s Incidental Person as contributing ‘to every
aspect of human thought concerning the cosmos, even with the kind of problems that confront
workers in advanced scientific studies.’
49
In this way Latham draws together the seemingly
separate disciplines of art and physics (and other disciplines) which have more recently been
discussed by some as sharing similar methodological or philosophical problems. Hamilton notes
that ‘If the blank canvas is a symbol of the artist’s understanding of the limitations imposed by the
classical media of art it may also stand for the scientist’s predicament.’
50
In Appendix 1 of Report
these ideas of language are expanded upon and there is a Cartesian-like graph illustrating the
convergence of ideas in art, labelled as ‘line of art as zero action’, and science, ‘line of mass at a
dimensionless point’ which shows that they both reach the same ‘stalemate’
51
(Figure 9).
He describes the “dimensional framework that can accommodate spacetimes, and energy as the
in-forming component [which] is firmly established in mathematical terms in present physical
theory.”
52
Here it could be argued that Latham is talking about special relativity (classical physics)
being a “dimensional framework” which prevails in scientific thought but cannot account for how
quantum phenomena behave. He says “this framework will not account satisfactorily for sources of
46
47
48
49
50
51
Latham, Report of a Surveyor, 7.
Rovelli, Seven Brief Lessons on Physics, 11.
Ibid, 8.
Hamilton, John Latham: Early Works 1954-1972, 11.
Ibid, 11-12.
Latham, Report of a Surveyor, 15.
52
Ibid
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Lucy Papadopoulos 15831732
action.”
53
These “sources” could be the the unknown in terms of quantum theory; the mysterious
inner-workings of the double slit experiment, the enigmas in phenomena like observer effect, and
so on. Latham’s description of his influence and use of language starts to appear very coded and
ambiguous to most readers at this point.
He goes on to explain that language in science and art have ‘led to a dimensionless point which
appears to defy both logic and the validity of the sensory world altogether’, that ‘verbal logic is a
casualty’.
54
This demonstrates his solidarity with philosophical debates attacking the efficiency of
scientific language; notably Nancy Cartwright who writes extensively of how ‘the fundamental facts
of physics do not describe true facts about reality’.
55
In the dual slit experiment, the conditions for
testing quantum phenomena are set up in a classical state, and end in a classical state, but what
goes on in the middle (the ‘sources of action’
56); the manifestations and behaviours of quantum
systems, is unexplainable by classical laws, only described as an ‘interference of possibilities.’
57
As
such, Latham writes ‘science is still language-based and a language-divided discipline’.
58
Latham uses quantum theory to draw an analogy between art and science here again by criticising
the language in art (Platonic, Cartesian, Baconian), and gives an example of two visionaries —
Wittgenstein, Joyce — as unsuccessful attempts at communicating their subjects.
59
This meeting
point of separate areas — of art, philosophy and science — all with similar impasse, is illustrated
by another graph (Figure 10), summarising the declining trajectories of physics, philosophy and art.
Latham’s pursuit for a new artistic form of expression, as different from previous art practice as
possible, presents parallels with the trajectory of physics’ theories. As described, quantum theory
could not be much more contradictory compared to the classical view. In Latham’s view systems of
language like this are prevalent in our culture and they significantly limit understanding and even
contribute to the continuation of divisive social structures; ‘language itself has constructed the
dividedness.’
60
53
54
55
56
57
58
59
Ibid
Ibid, 16.
Nancy Cartwright, How the Laws of Physics Lie, (USA: Oxford University Press, 1983), 54.
Latham, Report of a Surveyor, 15.
Werner Heisenberg, Physics and Philosophy, (London: Penguin, 2000),125.
Ibid
Ibid
60
Ibid
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Lucy Papadopoulos 15831732
The final two pages of Appendix 1 touch on Latham’s metaphysical concepts which are explicated
in Appendix 3 however at this point non-sensical without intense further reading. Latham considers
his theories a contribution to science; however his synthesis of dominant scientific theories of the
universe and the ethical goals of humanity has had a controversial reception, occupying ‘a curious
position in the international art scene…known and unknown, respected in some quarters,
denigrated in others.
61’
John Walker notes that many art-educated people have found Latham’s work too far-fetched and
impenetrable, however proposes that if they had knowledge of the scientific context in which it
proposes its concepts, they might think differently: ‘In the context of extraordinary speculations
about the origins, nature and future of the universe contained in the new cosmology texts,
Latham’s ideas are not outlandish.’
62
Besides, even scientists admit there is a crisis in physics
caused by the limitations of language and incompatibility of current theories, exemplified by the
failure of classical physics. As Cartwright notes, ‘if physics’ basic, explanatory laws do not describe
how things behave, what do they do?’
63
This may be true, and Latham’s incomprehensibility is reflected in quantum physics so it makes
sense for his practice to consider it in the same way that Steyerl has done. However, Latham’s
manifesto may seem hypocritical to many, in that it is objectively difficult to fully understand,
making its use of the incomprehensible subject of quantum theory even more incomprehensible.
Critics Adrian Searle agrees that ‘conceptually, Latham is impossible’
64
and Laura Cumming
describes him as ‘a hardcore conceptualist… [whose] work is as tough to look at as it is to
comprehend.’
65
Nevertheless, all this controversy of Latham’s practice has demonstrated how
profoundly quantum theory can influence artists, and in this case there seems to be space for
improvement.
61
John Walker, John Latham: The Incidental Person - His Art and Ideas, (Middlesex University
Press: London, 1995), 163.
62
63
Ibid
Cartwright, The Laws of Physics Lie, 55.
64
Adrian Searle, “A World View: John Latham review — trying to make sense of an oddball
visionary”, The Guardian, January 2017.
65
Laura Cumming, “A World View: John Latham; Speak review — a time bending experience”, The
Guardian, January 2017.
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Lucy Papadopoulos 15831732
Conclusion
Evidently there is something to be gained of art and quantum mechanics collaborations: art has a
role to play in inspiring science in implementing ‘relationships that embody the exploration of
human complexities and experiences.’
66
This inter-disciplinary action works vice versa: In all three
artworks the quantum holds a very fundamental underlying meaning; first as visual aid, secondly
as social analogy and thirdly as philosophical enquiry.
All three require a level of scientific understanding upon viewing of the work. In the case of
Mucilaginous Omniverse this would be highly relevant as its subject is a macroscopic metaphor of
something subatomic that can only be (imperfectly) described by the intensely specialised
language of quantum theory. Steyerl demonstrates an art practice that deals with the more
profound implications of quantum behaviour, using it convincingly to support other political and
cultural concerns. Both artists use the technique of analogy in differing but primarily effective ways,
carefully considering their use of science and thus allowing for a satisfactory amount of
understanding in each case.
Latham’s synthesis of philosophy, science, art and social theory indicates how dramatically modern
physics can influence art practice, however, to this day, remains largely misunderstood. I agree
with noted critics that Latham may have had too complex an approach towards something that is
already inherently counterintuitive. After all, the paradox of quantum mechanics prevails for
physicists, their dominating world view ‘radically and irreversibly altered.’
67
In his use of complex
pseudophilosophical and pseudoscientific language, Latham’s work might be argued to use
concepts of the unknown in quantum theory and make them even more unknowable.
Overall, I strongly agree with Elgin that art is suitable to deal with such scientific concepts, which
differ from literal truth (especially in quantum theory) and yet are still seen as ‘epistemically
estimable’
68
contributing to the pertinence in the fact that ‘we have no reason to maintain that its
divergence from truth excludes art from the epistemic realm.’
69
Quantum physicist Niels Bohr’s
famously reflects on quantum theory; ‘how wonderful that we have met with a paradox. Now we
have some hope of making progress.’ I would apply this way of thinking to the problem of artists
66
Jeffrey Shaw, “Convergence of Art, Science and Technology?”, Art @ Science, Christa
Sommerer et al. (Austria: Springer-Verlag, 1998), 166.
67
68
Heisenberg, Physics and Philosophy, vii.
Elgin, “Nature’s Handmaiden, Art”, 29.
69
Ibid
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like Latham, too. His controversial legacy has been useful in exemplifying that such science must
be carefully handled by whoever uses it (artist or other). However, the collaboration of art and
quantum theory can create successfully enlightening collaborations, where the scientific theories of
the unknowable can be clarified in a different light, as exemplified in this case most powerfully by
Steyerl, Domnitch and Gelfand.
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Lucy Papadopoulos 15831732
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