http://www.nytimes.com/2014/10/10/arts/design/agnieszka-kurant-variables.html 2014-10-10 01:24:39 Agnieszka Kurant: ‘Variables’ In her show at Tanya Bondakar, Agnieszka Kurant uses an autopen signature machine and a community of termites to explore the notion of phantom entities. === Art, science and philosophy seldom converge as felicitously as they do in “Phantom Library” is a shelf of paperback and hardcover books produced in collaboration with a book designer. Each purports to be a literary work by a fictional author — e.g., a phantom — mentioned in a book by a real writer: Kilgore Trout, for example, the science fiction writer made up by Kurt Vonnegut. “The End of Signature” features an For a set of six glittering colored mounds displayed on a low platform, Ms. Kurant worked with entomologists at the University of Florida. For each piece, termites were placed in a container of colored sand, gold glitter and crystals, and then left to their own devices. In effect, the community of termites acted in concert to create a kind of sculpture. This raises a cosmic question that Ms. Kurant doesn’t make explicit: Might humans, like termites, be unconsciously engaged in the production of a tremendous collective project, the likes of which no one is even remotely aware of?