This Is Not A Rock

Nicole Vella

350 unique artworks

Browse on secondary

One day in 1991, I went swimming in a lake. Going out to the deepest point where I could still tippy-toe touch, I felt a large, smooth rock with my feet. I could barely dig it out and bring it to the surface. That rock is still with me. I once thought I lost it. Six months later, I found it in the trunk of my car. I threw a party to celebrate its return, but it was just us two.

The rocks you see here are not my rock. They are not rocks. They are not even images of rocks. They're code. But does that matter? If I were to show and ask you "What is this?", you'd probably say "It's a rock". So then, what is it? The title and imagery borrow from René Magritte's paintings Treachery of Images and The Castle of the Pyrenees. Like those paintings, This is Not a Rock acts as a gateway to introspection and encourages the viewer to question what they are looking at while thinking about the interplay between object, representation, and truth.

This is Not a Rock continues my exploration into Quines (software which outputs its own source code). In the scene, a large rock hovers, defying gravity. Behind the rock, a backdrop of computer code; combining the digital and the physical. The code you see is is the actual code used to generate the scene. It is all created inside a single-pass fragment shader with Javascript and GLSL, and rendered using a technique called Raymarching.

Keyboard Commands: Press [L] to save an image. Press [Z] to zoom in/out.

RELEASE DATE

27 Sept 2023

LIBRARY

js@na

DISPLAY NOTES

WebGL required. Best experienced in a modern browser with Hardware Acceleration enabled. Chrome on desktop is recommended.

CREATIVE CREDITS

Thank you Piter Pasma, Patricio Gonzalez Vivo, Inigo Quilez, Martijn Steinrucken, and Melissa Wiederrecht. All your articles, help, and guidance are greatly appreciated.

RELEASE DETAILS

350 works released on 27 Sept 2023

CHARITABLE GIVING

10% of artist proceeds will be donated to Rainbow Railroad.

PROJECT ID

0x99a9b7c1116f9ceeb1652de04d5969cce509b069-471

CONTRACT

Etherscan

471000304

ABOUT THE ARTIST

Nicole Vella

Lives and works in Toronto, Canada

Nicole Vella is a computer artist and web developer. She works with computers and code to create artworks and installations that invite interrogation into our relationships with technology and the world at large. Her works have been featured in public installations in Toronto, Canada and in galleries in New York, and have recently been included in exhibitions ...

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Nicole Vella