Andrew Jones, live painting, and the Illuminated.

Andrew Jones (aka Android) creates hypnotic digital works that can be full of dreamy enlightenment or the stuff of nightmares. His use of repetitive patterns and layering creates a skeletal effect, not unlike H. R. Giger's death-obsessed work, but in Jones' hand these elements speak to a life affirming sense of time, movement, and collectivity.

Along with typical studio work, Jones has been developing a series of live painting performances: images created in large nightclubs along with DJs and masses of people dancing about. It may sound like a gimmick, but having seen him take over the Seattle Space Needle during one of ConceptArt.org's workshops, I was sold on the reciprocity between his image-making and the audience—sound, movement, and lights informing his still images while the action of his painting and the patterning affects the dancers around him. He's been performing these paintings at various festivals including the Sundance Film Festival, Burning Man, and Sigraph. If you're lucky enough to be near a show, take advantage of it.

Currently, Jones, along with POD Collective, Phong, Guerilla News Network, and Broken Saints, are starting a series of animated films called the Illuminated. The story line seems overly Matrixy, but I am curious to see if they will be able to replicate a similar hypnotic, trance experience that Jones' live performances do.

Check out Andrew Jones's website and blog. Much of his work is done in an extreme horizontal aspect ratio. The best place to see it in detail is on the POD Collective website, under "Android Jones." For those who really want to dig deeper, you can download a series of instructional demos for $15.00 a pop at Massive Black Downloadables.

Illuminated Trailer:

WatchMojo.com interview with Andrew Jones that shows off a bit of his process: