SPRING/BREAK Art Show — Los Angeles, 2022
Necessary Illusions
First collaboration between Stillion & Board after six years working together, exhibited at SPRING/BREAK Art Show at Skylight Culver City, Los Angeles in February 2022.
Stillion’s paintings of face jugs, poppies, and houseflies evoke decomposition and the animation of inanimate objects, referencing African American pottery from 19th-century South Carolina. Board’s custom software manipulates and animates the imagery through code and algorithm, creating a living dialogue between traditional painting and generative computation.
Featured in the “HEARSAY:HERESY” themed exhibition alongside 50+ curated shows. The installation bridges physical painting with real-time digital processing, questioning the boundary between the handmade and the algorithmically generated.
Case Study
The Problem
The installation needed to connect physical painting with generative computation in a way that supported the work's themes instead of turning the software into a decorative projection.
Design Challenge
The imagery referenced decay, animation, and transformation, so the digital layer had to feel alive while still respecting the handmade qualities of Stillion's paintings.
Key Design Decisions
I built custom software around the source imagery and exhibition context, using algorithmic manipulation to extend the paintings' movement and material logic. The software was designed as part of the installation grammar, not a separate media add-on.
Outcome
Necessary Illusions was exhibited at SPRING/BREAK Art Show in Los Angeles, establishing the Stillion & Board collaboration and a recurring bridge between painting, software, and AI-assisted image systems.
Technical Highlights
Custom Generative Software
Software manipulated Stillion's imagery through code and algorithm, creating a live digital counterpart to the physical paintings.
Installation Context
Built for a curated art-show environment where the software, projection, and paintings had to operate as one cohesive installation.
Artist Collaboration
The project translated a shared visual language between painting and computation rather than treating the software as a separate effect layer.