Hello everyone and welcome to the next iteration of the Artist Spotlight. We are going to cover another big name in the fxhash community, Jacek Markusiewicz. Whom is also known as mrkswcz. I really find mrkswcz’s work to be a lot more unique than a lot of other artists. I think his background as an architect really shows in his work and puts a very unique stylistic spin on it. He has had some astonishing releases, like hollow, one of my favorite generative art pieces of all time. He has had seven successful drops on fxhash with one that was released last month.
Next month will mark one year since he released his first project on fxhash, f-emerald.
“f-emerald generates unique ephemeral crystal-like structures that morph in space. Each generation has a different shape, animation, and colour palette.”
I find these to be very beautiful. The dancing geometric shapes forming a larger moving cohesive shape. They are quite mesmerizing to watch. Follow the link under the image and hit run on the following page to see them in their natural state.
Here is one of the rarer traits with a light background. This gif doesn’t do them justice at all. I suggest following the link below one and checking it out live.
Unbuilt follows a journey through architecture that never existed. This piece is a tribute to the research of Stiny & Mitchell, that covered The Palladian grammar in 1978. Which was about the Italian Renaissance architecture of Andrea Palladio. He is widely considered to be one of the most influential individuals in the history of architecture. It’s also inspired by the grammatical rules behind French sacral architecture of the Middle Ages.
Reims Chathedral - Built in 1211
Reborn is another very cool architecture based project, an album of cities too ideal to ever materialize. They are algorithmically generated plans that resemble drawings from theorists of the Italian Renaissance. I’ll cover the three he named below.
Filarete - May best be remembered for his design of the ideal city of Sforzinda, the first ideal city plan of the Renaissance.
Pietro Cataneo - “His plan for an 'ideal city' is said to have influenced Richard Newcourt's proposal for the rebuilding of London after the Great Fire, as well as the design of cities such as Philadelphia and Savannah.”
Vincenzo Scamozzi - “He was an Italian architect and a writer in the second half of the 16th century. He was perhaps the most important figure there between Andrea Palladio, whose unfinished projects he inherited at Palladio's death in 1580.”
This is my second favorite project of his and I find it to be one of the more interesting project he’s made. De|growth:generations continues the exploration he started on hicetnunc over a year ago with de|growth: nomad and a few other pieces you can see on Teia.
“Materials tend to take particular forms due to their physical properties, technological necessities or natural limitations. However, what rules should a simulated environment follow when no physical constraints are inherent to the digital environment?”
This project is an interpretation of the artist Eduardo Chillida’s work. He intended to 'hollow out' the Tindaya mountain to build a gigantic cube inside of it. Chillida called his project the Monument to Tolerance. It was conceived as a space for "all the people" to "fully experience the tininess of humankind", though it never came to fruition.
Hollow is my favorite gen art project to date. The work has a very somber yet elegant feel to them, a vast place of a beauty to be lost in.
One of the rarer traits are birds flying around in the ‘gigantic cube’. It really adds something special to the piece.
This one has the flying birds trait. Click the link below and hit run on the follow page and you can see the piece live.
Proxima, named after a flare star in the constellation Centaurus that is the nearest star to the sun. Proxima is Mrkswcz’s first collaboration work with another artist, ismahelio. It is a sci-fi setting on a planet in the far future. They have a very cool story to go along with the art and I think it’s really worth reading if you want to get a feel for the project.
Adrift is the result of a creative collab with Tender.art. It is another beautiful sci-fi style project with a deeper meaning. Some amazing looking planet scapes with polar lights, comets, and milky way like galaxies. I love astronomy, so this really hits home for me and the message behind the art is commendable. Read below for the full description by the artist.
“Take your entire life, full as it is with the vastness of your lived experiences – and shape it into your cupped hands. Cherish this mesmerizing world of yours as you would a ripe summer fruit, and behold at a glance its delicate yet dynamic balance — one change here or there, no matter how microscopic, affects the entire course of your world.
How will you receive this world – its situations that overwhelm, its sights that awe, the catastrophes, the serenity, its steadfast commitment to the present? Will you look upon all of us here, adrift and fragile together, with love?
Adrift is a project that reminds us to make peace with our world – with all worlds – by stepping back to make space for an all-encompassing perspective.”
I really enjoyed writing this article and hope you enjoyed reading it. Looking into what inspired the art was a lot of fun and enlightening. Please check out all of the links below to follow Jacek Markusiewicz and his work.
twitter - https://twitter.com/jMarkusiewicz
fxhash projects - https://www.fxhash.xyz/u/mrkswcz
teia market - https://teia.art/mrkswcz
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