Degrees of Paradise
1991
Kurdish-woven carpet, wool, video monitors, laser disc playback, sheetrock, wood, metal tubing, rubber, slate
9 x 60 x 12 feet
Degrees of Paradise is a study for the proposed State of Heaven, where an immense, floating, hand-knotted carpet, serving as a symbolic and sacrificial sky, will be placed under a directive that parallels the actual destruction of the ozone layer.
A Tantric-like image of an atmospheric envelope unfolding as the petals of a fragile flower is flanked by two triangular galleries. In one gallery, a 9 x 24 foot “floating” carpet lingers above the heads of viewers. This “test” rug for the 66 x 66 foot State of Heaven carpet was hand woven by members of a traditional cottage industry in Damiacik, Turkey. The unorthodox pattern is a slice taken from satellite data in April 1989 and imaged by a Cray 2 supercomputer. The larger rug will serve as a scale replica of our imperiled atmosphere.
With no desire to project his subjective interpretation of the atmosphere onto the rug, Chin sought another partner to extend this vision to a greater objectivity by employing the realms of physics and mathematics. The result of this partnership is prominently displayed in the adjacent gallery, through a “sky” of video monitors. Its triangular configuration echoing the test carpet, the monitors play back the State of Heaven multidimensional fractal program developed by McGill University physicists S. Lovejoy and F. Begin. Their radically new interpretation of meteorological dynamics advanced understanding in the fields of climatology and plate tectonics. The resulting final images generated were returned to the weavers to be reinterpreted in wool.
Tantric Dream Diagram
gallery floor plan