Rafaël Rozendaal, 2025
At a passing glance, Rafaël Rozendaal’s Passage could deceive the viewer into thinking that it is just another abstract modernist painting, but upon spending another second looking the viewer notices why this piece is on a screen instead of a canvas. Then, if the person dares to click the screen, they experience why this piece is on a computer and not just a monitor screen. Through the movement of the screen and interactive elements, Rozendaal is signaling his work as a continuation of the artistic movements that came before. He has added motion and intractability in a way that is not possible without our modern technology and yet the formal qualities of the piece are very much like abstract art of the past. Rozendaal is firmly placing the internet and technology as a whole as a site of evolution and continuation rather than of wholly new creations in a vacuum. With a looping visual and almost 30 different colors to switch between, the screen becomes hypnotic and invites the viewer to keep watching it to see if anything changes.