Introduction: The Theory

“Post-modern art takes advantage of it [the soft contour of a work versus Cartesian industrial hardware] by freeing itself of ‘mechanical’ forms and pursuing iconographies that evoke ‘energy,’ which is a mark of dematerialization. ‘Soft’ art breaks out of fixed frames and spreads itself in space. It is produced and received by way of intermediate electronic equipment such as videos.”
—François Burkhardt, Design After Modernism [3]

While I was a student at the San Francisco Art Institute (1994–1998), the faculty exposed me to the concepts of pluralism, Situationist theory, the role of the artist in public spaces, post-structuralism, Lacanian psychoanalysis and the politics of representation. (The influence of such knowledge on my work will become clear throughout this article.) I intended to weave my understanding of these concepts into my quest to gain access to NASA space-flight technology as I sculpted institutional relationships by appropriating business conventions and scientific research methodologies [4].

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