"At the core of my work is creating forms from often simple components. Whilst these parts are seemingly ordinary, the power comes from when you combine them in hopefully interesting ways.

On the far left is a simple straight line. Using a little system I made I then add some noise to that line, though keeping the top and the bottom exactly the same as before. It’s important for me to have this fine grain control, rather than just allowing chaos to take over.

There’s something interesting there, but I think it becomes something else when I make multiple copies of that line whilst also adding some rotation with each copy. Now it seems to have volume. Maybe there are things to explore down this route…"

WORDS BY BRENDAN DAWES: “I’ve always been fascinated by the possibilities of creating with computers. From the moment I plugged in a Sinclair ZX81 and a cursor blinked back at me, inviting me to type something to the generative systems I now build to “make a thing which makes a thing” the curiosity has only increased. It’s through working with these machines — these code based collaborators — that I can put into the world my thoughts and ideas exploring our relationship and interactions with the analog and digital.”

Demanding participation, Brendan Dawes’ artistic practice harnesses time as medium in his explorations of the surrounding world. By means of code, data, and generative systems, Dawes’ interest in human connection is revealed across electronic objects, screens, physical sculpture and interactive installation. Much of the artist’s work instigates dialogue. Take real-time generative work You, Me, and the Machine (2022) – created for the Herbert W. Franke Tribute – which morphs its appearance in relation to a viewer’s proximity, or Passengers BCN (2023) – created for Digital Impact, Barcelona – which responds to official passenger data from Barcelona airport during COVID and gives sculptural form to the relationship between digital and physical. An openness to collective authorship gives Dawes’ conceptual approach a tangible accessibility and a playful edge, which serves to interrogate the rigidity and revelations of data.