The series called NAMING is quite wide-ranging. Often, texts considered for the series have started when an image is needed for a publication's cover; sometimes such texts come into existence as a result of practising technique. It's a frame to tip things into, probably temporarily, and few are kept because they lack lasting interest. The few that are kept form the series proper.
Many, but not all, of the series are computer-generated. The computer-generated images are usually made in colour. Those that are to be published are then versioned in b/w to utilise cheap reprographics.
The originals tend to be made as quite large bitmap files which offer the potential for resolution far beyond the scope of most display screens and reprographic equipment. The images displayed here have been reduced in resolution in order to reduce file size and therefore speed up file transfer and loading times.
A few years back I did a whole sub series of Naming for the cover of a collection of poems by Jeff Nuttall, basically more and more elaborate variations on the word "celebration", in 2d and a kind of 3d, in colour.
I kept the working files and have returned to them from time to time. I think they still have potential. There are now 17 images in all of which 16 are published here. Potentially all are for performance although issues relating to how one would approach the interpretation of the images is complex and, for me, unresolved. [This is a matter on which I have made a start or new approach, with Bob Cobbing, in Word Score Utterance Choreography in verbal and visual poetry edited by Bob Cobbing and Lawrence Upton, Writers Forum 1998, 156 pp; ISBN 0 86162 750 4]
The images published here are ## 2 - 17, # 1 being less than interesting in retrospect.
Images ## 18 - 24 are variations which were made using the distorting features of a commercial package. Such a process is very easy to conduct and one can produce an enormous number of similar images very quickly. Despite its simplicity and ease of use, the results can be valuable if one resists the temptation to believe that more is automatically better.
Images ## 18 - 24 are among those made for what seemed to be an exciting invitation to publish but turned out to be hot air; it is good to see them available to others at last.
After much thought, I have decided not to wrap up these images in their own pages as I have with the images for Scott Thurston so you'll have to use your browser's buttons to navigate; but that should be ok..