#NTUMastered Spotlight: Paul Bryan

Our latest Spotlight piece features MFA Fine Art student Paul Bryan

Paul Bryan, MFA Fine Art 2019. Photo Rasha Kotaiche

In the run-up to Mastered, we will be sharing a series of student projects from across the participating courses through #NTUMastered Spotlights.

Paul Bryan, MFA Fine Art

Initially, I was attracted to these smashed LCD television screens because of their potential to present an anti-capitalist, or anti-consumerist position. And, having smashed quite a few phones screens in my time, I’ve always relished the subversiveness that the broken suggests.

However, after spending some time with them I became intoxicated, not in what I thought they could suggest, but by their uniqueness, their strangeness, and the almost painterly aesthetic.

Paul Bryan, MFA Fine Art 2019. Photo Rasha Kotaiche

Their function as transmitters of received pixels removed, laid bare, and squished between the broken plexiglass and brightly lit panel behind, finally showing their true colours. This display of liquid crystals directed me precisely to the material itself, presenting a much deeper conversation; one that was about the material basis of technology.

How often do we think about the materials which our current advancements in media technology exact? What are the conversations we should be having about the earth and its resources in relation to these materials? We are living in a crystal era, a world full of images that are supported and circulated by crystal mineral technologies.

Mastered is open to the public from 17 - 25 July 2019.

Find out more about Mastered by exploring the hashtag #NTUMastered