Let's begin at the beginning - LEA 1

I promised you a bit of a tour through the LEA art sims and the best place to start seems to be at the beginning.  So that is why I started at LEA 17 the other day.  Ooops.

Rewind.

So today I visited LEA #1.  I had no idea what I would find when I opened my map and teleported to LEA#1.  I don't actually recommend this as a way to start your visit as the landing point for the sim appears to be underneath a museum.  Perhaps the LEA folks might want to rethink the landing point or maybe I some how managed to show my dorkiness early on in this post.  Either way -- TP off to one of the sides or better yet follow this SLurl to get to the Survey of Hyperformalism 2011.

More about LEA#1 after the break

What the heck is "Hyperformalism?" Do you know? I have actually done some reading on this topic and I still don't know.  Hyperformalism is a concept developed by DC Spensley who happens to be one of the people who is on the Board of the LEA.  The following passage is a quote from his blog which you can find at this link.

Hyperformalism is a neologism that names something, distinguishes some observable social and cultural phenomenon. The term suggests a use for the word to describe formalist abstraction created in a hyper medium such as abstract 3D digital space or pure mathematical space.

Postmodern wisdom would have it that culture has fractured irreparably into a multiplicity of niches and that the metanarrative is passé. While I believe the former, the latter is still not true. The metanarrative is immortal, vulnerable only to another more contemporary story. Even the most pernicious and despicable narratives suffer memetic bit rot in deep historical time.

Now do you understand Hyperformalism? Me either but lets explore LEA #1 to see if this Museum educates us.

Well this looks interesting.  I recognize most of those names so let's have a look.  First lets start in the lobby of this "user interface."   Here is what we see.

All of the work in this "user interface" are comprised of large moving prims. The textures move on the prims and the prims themselves move as well.  For the most part the works are not interactive but they are colorful and mesmerizing in a "I wish I still smoked a lot of pot" kind of way.

Next I followed the teleports to the hyperformalist works in the sky. These exhibits are huge.  I mean really really enormously huge, which I *think* is a key concept of hyperformalism.  I can't be sure.  See the arrow and the circle?  I am the tiny dot inside the circle. This will give you a sense of the scale of this work by Selavy Oh.  Big.

 Green spinny object by Suzanne Graves.

You can walk around inside this ginormous work by RazerZ and he has a glowy spinny object you can click on to learn more about him, his art and his exhibits in SL.  He also gives visitors a bunch of freebies, which is always a nice touch.

I found it impossible to do this cool work by Oberon Onmura any justice in a still image.  First, like the other works at the "user interface" this exhibit is enormous.  It moves and winds around itself and then it falls apart in a slow dance of movement.  It was far and away my favorite part of this visit and I am sorry my images don't even begin to capture the experience.  You will have to visit!

Finally, this work by Sabine Stonebender was my last stop. I really liked the way the light played on this work in the various windlight settings.  Again, my images are a poor substitute for a visit.

I still don't really understand what Hyperformalism means other than really big 3d art works that are outside the bounds of space available to us in the atomic world.  Now this is a secret between us because what I am about to say is heresy and I am going to lose whatever street cred I might have in the SL art world by saying this but I don't care.  I don't need theories to explain my enjoyment of art.  Either I like it or I don't.  I liked the art showcased at LEA #1. The end.

Why don't you have a look and let me know what you think.