Lapis

James Whitney made Lapis using a machine developed by his brother John Whitney - a pioneer motion control system prefiguring the slit-scan and other famous special effect creators of the later 60s, which was built largely from surplus World War II anti-aircraft guidance hardware. The images were all created with handmade cells, and the rotation of more than one of these cells creates some of the movements. Consisting entirely of hundreds of constantly moving points of light, Lapis performs such marvelous transformations of positive and negative space, projected color and after-image, similarity and difference, that the viewer cannot help but contemplate the relationship of the unit to the whole, the individual consciousness to the cosmos, of space to time - and not a dry, forced meditation, but a supremely sensual, purely visual dialogue. "Lapis", the Latin for "stone", suggests the alchemical philosopher's stone, but no knowledge of hermetic doctrine is necessary to appreciate the wondrous display - the transmutation occurs directly in the viewer's mind. (Dr. William Moritz)