Circular Dimensions x Microscape

Over the past two decades Cristopher Cichocki has been working across a variety of media and disciplines to draw attention to collisions of nature and industry. The five-story-tall Circular Dimensions x Microscape, constructed with more than 25,000 feet of PVC tubes, presents a visual spectacle peering into the artist’s ongoing exploration of the historic significance of water in the desert. The pavilion contains a laboratory where “microscopic video paintings” are generated in real time through digital microscopic imaging of water, salt, barnacles and algae from the Salton Sea inside the pavilion’s “nucleus.” Meanwhile, an immersive soundscape composed in a mix of field recordings and found sound resonate through the tunnels, elevating in intensity from day into night. Cichocki, based in the Coachella Valley, creates “new earth art” interventions as well as video and installation works, all of which are informed by his deep roots as a biomorphic painter. This latest work gives mammoth new context to his familiar materials, including canisters of government-issued drinking water and “mutant” cast resin aloe vera — “a surviving seed” from the desert’s ancient sea. When the sun goes down, the magnitude of the pavilion amps up each night with sonic sets of the artist’s ever-evolving audiovisual performance Circular Dimensions.