Polyopticon Series
various locations
ongoing, 2005 - present
Each piece in the Polyopticon series is an experiment in architectural optics. Interior space is converted into a complex camera obscura through the introduction of mirrors, lenses, and baffles into the darkened windows or specially made apertures. Live, colorful imagery from the room’s surroundings is projected on various surfaces, interacting with details of interior design. The imagery is displaced and re-oriented in its relationship to scale and gravity, creating a fantastic composition, a kind of collage, of exterior and interior details of landscape and built space.
Rather than attempt to capture the resulting images (as many artists using the camera obscura do), Jackson works to create an experiential environment of light and image that allows for slow, contemplative viewing and ongoing discovery. The substance of the work is in the physical specificity of its spaces and locations, where viewers experience an inversion of inside/outside space. Folding context and position into one another allows for a reflection on the meaning of spaces and places, with their own histories, and the interior subjectivity of the viewers.