{"id":39971,"date":"2020-05-30T14:38:09","date_gmt":"2020-05-30T21:38:09","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.politicsplus.org\/blog\/?p=39971"},"modified":"2020-05-30T14:38:09","modified_gmt":"2020-05-30T21:38:09","slug":"saturday-smiles-an-artist-who-found-the-keys-to-success","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.politicsplus.org\/blog\/2020\/05\/30\/saturday-smiles-an-artist-who-found-the-keys-to-success\/","title":{"rendered":"Saturday Smiles: An Artist Who Found the Key(s) to Success"},"content":{"rendered":"

Most of us have probably seen George Seurat’s well-known example of Pointillism: “A Sunday Afternoon on La Grande Jatte”<\/em> (1884-1886).<\/p>\n

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Artist Erik Jensen<\/strong> has updated this process using computer keys from discarded keyboards instead of dots of paint. Employing a flathead screwdriver, he wedges it under the edge and then “peels” them off the board.<\/p>\n

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(He actually now pays his Mom to strip the keyboards.)<\/em><\/p>\n

Jensen refers to his art technique as “Tech-Pointillism” with each key becoming a pixel, like on a computer screen. A single project can take up to 40,000 keys \u2013 that’s about 460 keyboards! But since he possess over 8,000 discarded QWERTYs<\/strong>, he’s pretty well set “paint-wise”.<\/p>\n

He was inspired by a college art class assignment where students had to transform something nobody any longer wanted into something they did.\u00a0 Realizing that we all are familiar with a keyboard and its myriad of applications, he decided to use old and discarded keyboards to transform them into a piece of art.<\/p>\n

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Since he doesn’t cut any of the keys, each piece must adhere to a strict grid pattern. This makes recreating curves and circles the most difficult part of the creation.<\/p>\n

To begin, after stripping the keyboards, he soaks the keys in a soapy solution for at least 24 hours to get rid of dirt, grease, grime, food and cat hairs.\u00a0 Then to stock his palette, he dyes the lighter colored keys in a multitude of colors and shades.<\/p>\n

He has a secret dye recipe that the keys are soaked in for varying lengths of time. The longer they stay in the dye, the darker the shade of that color.\u00a0 And he stores all the varying shades of that one color in a plastic bin.<\/p>\n

The special feature of his secret dye recipe is that it does not obscure the letters.\u00a0 That’s important to Jensen because if you stand back, you’ll see a masterpiece reproduction.\u00a0 But if you look closer, spelled out with computer keys, you’ll find quotes from the great masters.\u00a0 Like Van Gogh’s quote of \u201cI dream of painting and then I paint my dreams\u201d found in Jensen’s “Starry Night”<\/em>.\u00a0 (There’s an example in the YouTube video)<\/p>\n