The Pink Lens Effect, 2004
construction: plastic, wood and paper 10.25 x 7 x 2.5 inches
When I came home from college for winter break my senior year I felt like I needed a break from painting. I was trying to figure out my thesis paintings, and I was having a difficult time getting started. I spent the week after Christmas in the wood shop experimenting with sculpture. At the time I was interested in making box sculptures similar to those of Joseph Cornell except using more modern, industrial materials like plastic and laminates.
The text written on The Pink Lens Effect reads: French scientist Charles du Fay distinguished two types of electricity, which he called vitreous electricity and resinous electricity. He proposed that the two kinds of electricity existed in all bodies as invisible, weightless fluids. Benjamin Franklin later suggested that the two kinds of electricity be called positive and negative electricity. Modern electron theory suggests that instead of a fluid, electricity exists as small particles called electrons which carry a negative charge. Negatively charged bodies, which have an excess of electrons, are attracted to positively charged bodies, which have a deficiency of electrons. Unlike electrical charges attract each other and like electrical charges repel each other.
Newly smitten lovers often exaggerate the positive qualities of their relationship while explaining away the flaws. Their perception often differs sharply from the perception of their friends and family. This is known as the pink lens effect.
Both the description of electricity and the description of the "newly smitten lovers" involve attraction. The difference between the two descriptions is that while electrical attraction seems objective and rational (unlike electrical charges attract each other and like electrical charges repel each other), the attraction of the "newly smitten lovers" seems the opposite of electrical attraction, that is subjective and irrational. The implication of this comparison is that while science is generally thought of as the realm of objectivity, perhaps it is also subject the the pink lens effect. That is to say that even if scientific results or statistics are objective, there is still room for personal bias in the interpretation of those results and statistics.
