Apogee Photo Magazine

New Digital Painting of Rick Globus

By George Robinson

During the late 1960's, the Globus Brothers (Rick, Ron and Steve) started a light show company that created "happenings" and environmental "be-ins". In 1970, the Globus Brothers created "The Museum of the Media". Exhibits were created for some of our country's leading institutions, including The Smithsonian Institution, The American Museum of Natural History, The Department of Commerce, The National Park Service, and many more.

In the 1970's, the Brothers Globus founded the Media Factory. Exhibits were created to celebrate America's Bicentennial. During this time, the Globus Brothers began exploring both slit-scan and panoramic technologies. Their Servo-Scan Camera was the first truly computerized slit-scan camera. In 1977, the Globus Brothers focused their energies to create "Globus Brothers Studios".

After the Bicentennial the Globus Brothers set their creative sites on the photographic and advertising industry. Their stroboscopic photographs of people, products and athletes in motion became a trademark in creative photography. Later using their technical skills they created 'pin-registered super composition' photography enabling ad agencies, their creative directors and their art directors the freedom to create visualizations. This type of photography was all accomplished without the aid of computers.

The Globus Brothers worked diligently to create the world famous GlobuScope Camera, the first hand held panoramic camera. In the early 1980's, Patents were issued to the Globus Brothers on both their GlobuScope Camera and their 360 degree projector. Please visit GlobuScope's home page for more details (WWW.EVERENT.COM/GLOBUS/) The GlobuScope Camera is in the permanent collection of the George Eastman House and the National Photography Museum in England. They also worked with Count Roger De Montebello on integral photography which created a full 3 dimensional photograph using a fly's eye camera. Other cameras the Brothers built were slit scan camera in 35mm, 2 1/4", and 4" x 5" formats; they also built a 8" x 10" 360 compass camera that photographed a 360 onto a 8" x 10" piece of film creating a flatten panoramic in the round. GlobuScope Cameras are still manufactured at their New York City operation.

Concurrent with his photography work, Rick Globus began exploring super composition techniques often experimenting with applying chemicals directly on film emulsion to create the amorphic compositions that still remain a theme in his art works. His work has been displayed at many museums, including the Walker Art Center, Gray Art Galleries, Herbert Johnson Museum, Hudson River Museum, etc.

Rick Globus started his abstract works as addendum to his very active photography career. In 1996, Rick Globus intensified his fascination with the fusion of art and technology. His long experience in the creative arena has now culminated in dramatic and often monumental paintings.

It is often interesting how new forms of art are created. Most historians claim that art is a simple reflection of the existing technologies that man has at their disposal. Photography is certainly reflective of that theory, being a recent form of art that has flourished in the past decades. With the advent of computers in the last decade of the twentieth century, it is not surprising that computer generated and printed art would be the focus of the next avant-guarde art movement. This new technological mirror on the art world can be best demonstrated in the works of Rick Globus. His paintings are not only created on a computerized palette but is painted on canvas through new technologies. His work is considered by many to be the next wave of museum hangings.

"I am guided by respect for the classical tradition in Western Art, and committed to the survival of classical techniques into the next millennium. I reject the notion that the advent of computer tools spells the death of time-honored techniques and effects. I strive to use the latest tools at my disposal to create paintings capable of evoking the same human responses as did those of the Old Masters".

"I have long been fascinated by sub-particle physics and astrophysics. Recently, cyberspace - the new frontier - has captured my imagination. Reflecting Modern Man's relentless penetration of nature's manifold secrets (an impulse that spawned what I think of as the Techno-Arts Movement), in my recent work, my objective has been to forcefully represent invisible, albeit magnificent, micro and macro environments. I am committed to revealing the beauty of dimensions wonder worlds I know exist beyond perception. My paintings liberate the viewer, offering extrasensory, extraordinary experience. Warhol reflected the banality of mid-century America. I reflect my contemporaries' insatiable voyeurism".

His New York City studio reflects his determination to invent new relationships between painter and canvas. Globus use cutting-edge "painting tools" in an arduous detailing technique after the classical tradition. Rick infuse my subjects with shape, mass and light, producing subtlety that distinguishes these singular canvases from stereotypical computer art. Unlike some conventional computer art, which merely involves compositional deployment of pre-programmed graphics, the content of each of my paintings is original, rooted in actual physical phenomena and imagination.

Rick usually begins his dialogue with the canvas by scanning a physical phenomenon, such as fluid droplets on acetate or brush strokes on paper. Like a sculptor working in clay, Rick then manipulates this raw material with PhotoShop to encourage it to reveal both itself and its representational potential, freeing the imagery hidden within the material and the event.

After the images are manipulated, proofs are made on a dye-sublimation printer, check composition, color, contrast and form are checked before sending the image information as a TIFF file to the computer's Rastor Image Processor (RIP). The RIP sequences the data stream to prepare it for printing.

Globus then runs test strips on a Encad 60 ink jet machine to check color quality on the canvas. After this successful completion, he again double-checks quality by printing a half-size artist's proof. Rick returns to the original file and recreate the painting if changes are necessary.

Paintings are stretched in the traditional manner and sealed with varnish. Two CD-ROM are "burn" for archival control. Each image is painted only once. Each painting is unique.

Whereas his oeuvre evolved from a single focus, it now consists of three distinct series: first, Drip Mix,, originating with the alchemy of chemical reactions, second, Chromatic Mix, consisting of layered images, and the most recent, my complex Mixed Weave paintings, in which matter is seen as woven in free space. In all three series, Globus have achieved dimensionality on a flat plain.

The web site, www.Globus-Brothers.com, is a unique visit into the creative minds of the Globus Brothers. Alan Lobel, digital artist, photographer, web site designer and long time associate at Globus Brothers Studios created the web site. "It was not easy to condense all of the Globus history into one comprehensive web site. Now that it is up on the web I'm sure that it will help generate further interest in the Globus Brothers Studios". Rick Globus can be E-mailed at: RGlobus@aol.com