Petro National by John Gerrard in the digital museum in progress
With mouse or gesture control, the individual works can be viewed from different perspectives and in variable focus.
"Petro National" by John Gerrard depicts 196 nations and regions as gasoline spills on the world ocean. The artist has developed a special algorithm that translates the phenomenon of prismatic light reflections into a novel conceptual oscillating language by simulating millions of light rays. In "Petro National", each country reflects its per capita annual consumption of petroleum within its borders. Countries with low consumption are presented by a very thin spill leaning towards the blue green spectrum, while countries with high consumption thick, lustrous and highly iridescent forms. The global community consumes 100 million barrels of oil per day, with political power also reflected in energy consumption, and patterns differing massively between the global North and South.
In this project, Gerrard has connected the world of WebGL with NFTs to harness the potential of temporal and spatial online media using game engine technology. Each of the 196 generated nations is rendered in real time in the browser and runs according to local time, which is determined by the time zone of each capital city. Night, day and seasons can be experienced throughout the year, with long days in summer and short days in winter.
"Petro National" by John Gerrard was the first art project presented by museum in progress in its online exhibition space "digital mip". It was also the first manifestation of museum in progress's "raising flags" project.
Further information on "Petro National:
Pace Gallery: www.pacegallery.com/journal/john-gerrard-petro-national
Art Blocks: www.artblocks.io/project/0x64780CE53f6e966E18a22Af13a2F97369580Ec11-0
Production credits: Werner Poetzelberger, Producer; Helmut Bressler, Programmer. Courtesy: John Gerrard, Pace Gallery, Art Blocks and Richard Kim.
raising flags