Rainbow Keys and the Big Ear

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Found objects, mixed media – electronic typewriter, tall coconut water cans, and paint.

This is an old electronic typewriter that is such an interesting moment in the history of computers.  I don't think this device had a long life before the personal computer hit the scene, and for sure I never got to use one in a proper way.  I really enjoy what happens when you pour paint over an electronic machine because it instantly shows off the beauty of the form.  I am so mesmerized by the devices that we use every day and the familiarity of their sculptural forms, yet how often I overlook the details of what these objects are in a physical sense.  The paint instantly takes away the electronic function of the typewriter, but the imagination involved in painting on this piece became something magical and with infinite potential as a new kind of machine.  The coconut cans became the new computer output and gave more visual movement.  I then passed the piece to one of my early on collaborators Brendan Getz, who at the time had a highly skilled and true to life painting approach, and he really amped up the humor by adding the high definition ear onto my cartoony profile portrait.