A Visual Circus : The Art of Seeing.

2025-05-14T06:28:00.000-07:00

1st post using my old mothballed blogger site in 5 years and the world has changed beyond recognition... I started playing with Deep Dreaming and G.A.N.S. starting in 2015. fast forward to today 2025 and we have opened and crossed thru the visual doors of perception using tools not imaginable just 10 years ago.

⚡ NOVA — Neural + Organic + Visual + Art

Neural (Machine Learning)
Organic (traditional, human-made)
Visual
Art

Why NOVA?
A supernova represents a powerful, transformative event. The Nova art movement is explosive creativity and immense potential when machine learning and traditional art collide.

⚡ NOVA Philosophy: A Fusion of Intelligence and Intuition

NOVA is more than an acronym — it’s a creative philosophy. At its core, NOVA explores the convergence of artificial intelligence and human expression, celebrating the interplay between code and craft, logic and emotion, digital precision and analog imperfection.

Just as a supernova marks the explosive end of a star and the beginning of new cosmic forms, NOVA symbolizes a radical transformation in creativity — where human and machine collide not in conflict, but in collaboration. It is a call to rethink authorship, aesthetics, and meaning in the age of intelligent tools.

NOVA is built on four pillars:

🧠 Neural – The AI-Driven Dimension

Harnessing the power of machine learning, generative models, and neural networks to push creative boundaries. AI is not just a tool here — it's a co-creator, bringing unexpected forms, generating new styles, and challenging traditional processes.

Tools: Generative AI (ChatGPT, DALL·E, Midjourney), StyleGAN, RunwayML, machine learning frameworks (e.g., TensorFlow, PyTorch), prompt engineering

🌱 Organic – The Human, Traditional Essence

Celebrating the intuitive, imperfect, emotional aspects of traditional artistry — the hand-drawn line, the brushstroke, the lived experience. NOVA honors the organic roots of art while integrating them with modern tools.

Tools: Sketchbooks, pigments, photography, physical collage, analog film, handwriting, fiber , sculpture

👁️ Visual – The Language of Perception

Visual art is how NOVA speaks. It's the shared language between the neural and the organic — a space where machine-generated and human-created imagery co-exist, clash, or merge. This pillar prioritizes aesthetic impact, visual storytelling, and sensory dialogue.

Tools: Digital design software (Photoshop, Illustrator, Blender), traditional media (ink, charcoal, acrylic, beeswax ), video and motion tools (After Effects, Premiere), data visualization, AR/VR platforms

🎨 Art – The Intent, the Message, the Soul

Art is the reason NOVA exists. It is the bridge between technology and humanity. Art in NOVA is not defined by its origin, but by its intention: to move, provoke, connect, and reveal. Whether it begins as code or charcoal, it becomes art when it invites reflection or reaction.

Tools: Conceptual frameworks, curatorial strategies, installation methods, digital galleries, community spaces, narrative structures

✦ The NOVA Art Movement

Neural + Organic + Visual + Art

"The future is handmade with code."

1. We Believe in Connection, Not Division

Art is no longer separate.
The brush and the algorithm are not opposites,
but partners in a dance —
each learning from the other.
Each one shaping the other.

We are not bound by borders,
but drawn together by possibility.

2. We Embrace the Unseen

The machine sees what we cannot,
but we feel what the machine cannot.

From pixel to paint,
we create from the raw beauty of both.
The organic and the neural —
not opposites, but symbiosis.

3. We Honor Imperfection

Art is not about perfection.
It is about the moment —
the crooked line,
the glitch in the code,
the unfinished thought.

Whether created by hand or machine,
it is the humanity of the work that speaks.

4. We Make for the Sake of Creation

We are not content creators.
We are dreamers,
explorers,
builders of new worlds.

We don’t create to fill spaces,
but to give breath to something new.
We cherish the process as much as the result —
for the journey itself is the art.

5. **We Believe the Machine Can Dream,

But Only the Human Can Feel**

The machine can imagine what we can’t.
But only the heart can understand what it means.

We bring the sorrow, the joy, the longing, the memory —
we bring the depth.
The machine brings the vision.

Together, we make something greater than ourselves.

6. We Are Creators Beyond Boundaries

This isn’t AI against the artist.
It’s AI with the artist.
Not digital or organic,
but both — together.
Not machine or soul,
but soul and machine.

We are creators beyond the binary.
We are the future of art.

7. We Create to Connect, to Feel, to Be Alive

Art is not a product.
It is a conversation,
a quiet call to the world.
We make because we must —
to share, to communicate,
to bridge the gap between heart and mind.

We use the machine,
we use the hand —
to make something that speaks louder than words.

✧ NOVA is a new beginning.

A moment of sudden light,
of breaking,
of becoming.
A place where we tear down old walls
and rebuild something alive,
something that could never have existed without both sides.

We no longer choose between the digital and the organic.
We are both.
We are everything.

Welcome to the NOVA Art Movement.

Voice and Tone:

Philosophical yet grounded
Experimental but accessible
Nature-meets-tech aesthetic
Human-centered despite the tech

Terms like hybrid, organic, generative, crafted, dialogic, layered, poetic

Tropical Haze

2020-03-05T05:41:00.002-08:00

"Tropical Haze

I see green,

I see blue,

I see careless clouds,

Fleeting about in hues;

I see sparkles of white,

I see days full and bright.

And then it comes,

The haze that blinds,

The sun scorches down,

The green turns brown;

And though the illusion of mist;

No more do I see.

The birds stop their song,

I wonder why,

The hills turn brown,

And again I wonder;

If anyone cared,

If anyone sees.

I pave my way through the crowds,

As I breathe through cloth,

Up and down,

Left and right,

Everyone seems to be,

Trapped in this tropical haze "

Richard B Sebastian 

The Stone Pan on the The Lost Virgin

2020-03-04T07:36:00.002-08:00

The Stone Pan on the The Lost Virgin ... the most beautiful hidden beach in the world... two hour switchback jeep ride across a mountain ridge then followed by a plain of thorn trees so thick you could walk across the tops of them. Once you pick the spikes out of your shoes you drop down into a remote cove teeming with life and no signs of humanity except an occasional piece of jetsam ... I could spend the rest of my life in this cove and never leave...

The Blue Wildebeest

2020-01-29T07:25:00.005-08:00

Blue Wildebeast Photo Credit Tom Bollinger © Thomas Bollinger Arts ...

Blue wildebeest

Connochaetes taurinus

The blue wildebeest , also called the common wildebeest, white-bearded wildebeest or brindled gnu, is a large antelope and one of the two species of wildebeest. It is placed in the genus ''Connochaetes'' and family Bovidae and has a close taxonomic relationship with the black wildebeest. The blue wildebeest is known to have five subspecies. This broad-shouldered antelope has a muscular, front-heavy appearance, with a distinctive robust muzzle. Young blue wildebeest are born tawny brown, and begin to take on their adult colouration at the age of two months. The adults' hues range from a deep slate or bluish gray to light gray or even grayish brown. Both sexes possess a pair of large curved horns.

The blue wildebeest is a herbivore, feeding primarily on the short grasses. It forms herds which move about in loose aggregations, the animals being fast runners and extremely wary. The mating season begins at the end of the rainy season and a single calf is usually born after a gestational period of about eight and a half months. The calf remains with its mother for eight months, after which time it joins a juvenile herd. Blue wildebeest are found in short grass plains bordering bush-covered acacia savannas in southern and eastern Africa, thriving in areas that are neither too wet nor too arid. Three African populations of blue wildebeest take part in a long-distance migration, timed to coincide with the annual pattern of rainfall and grass growth on the volcanic soil short-grass plains where they can find the nutrient-rich forage necessary for lactation and calf growth.

The blue wildebeest is native to Angola, Botswana, Kenya, Mozambique, South Africa, Swaziland, Tanzania, Zambia and Zimbabwe. Today it is extinct in Malawi, but has been successfully reintroduced in Namibia. The southern limit of the blue wildebeest range is the Orange River, while the western limit is bounded by Lake Victoria and Mt Kenya. The blue wildebeest is widespread and is being introduced into private game farms, reserves and conservancies. For this reason, the International Union for Conservation of Nature and Natural Resources rates the blue wildebeest as being of Least Concern. The population has been estimated to be around one and a half million and the population trend is stable

The Fall of Rome

2020-01-15T22:47:00.000-08:00

"Rome will exist as long as the Coliseum does;
when the Coliseum falls, so will Rome;
when Rome falls, so will the world."
-The Venerable Bede

Cloud Rim

2020-01-07T09:17:00.002-08:00

Somewhere in the Utah Desert that makes one feel as if they have landed on the surface of Mars ... red sand & dust devils with a sky so big it swallows you whole . All you can hear is the wind and your heartbeat rhythmically as the clouds drift across the horizon like giant sails in the sky.

The Woyote

2020-01-04T06:34:00.000-08:00

 Little Red Riding Hood and the Woyote Woods .... Woyote is an informal term for a canid hybrid descended from coyotes, eastern wolves and gray wolves. All members of the genus Canis are genetically closely related because their chromosomes number 78, therefore they can interbreed. One genetic study indicates that these two species genetically diverged relatively recently (around 55,000–117,000 years ago). Genomic studies indicate that nearly all North American gray wolf populations possess some degree of admixture with coyotes following a geographic cline, with the lowest levels occurring in Alaska, and the highest in Ontarioand Quebec, Atlantic Canada as well as New England.

Woods Hole , An oasis on the edge of ocean wilderness.

2020-01-03T08:45:00.001-08:00

Woods Hole, © Thomas Bollinger Arts

Historically, Woods Hole included one of the few good harbors on the southern side of Cape Cod (i.e. Great Harbor, contained by Penzance Point). The community became a center for whaling, shipping, and fishing, prior to its dominance today by tourism and marine research. Much of Woods Hole centers around the enclosed harbor of Eel Pond. The Eel Pond Bridge a Bascule bridge drawbridge at the mouth of the harbor allows boats to enter and exit the harbor according to a fixed schedule posted on the side of the bridge.

The lighthouse at Nobska Point is operated by the United States Coast Guard, and the accompanying house is the home of the commander of the Coast Guard base at Little Harbor.

Local landmark The Knob is a rocky outcropping that overlooks Buzzards Bay and Quisset Harbor. It is a part of the privately owned Salt Pond bird sanctuaries.

Woods Hole, Massachusetts
Census-designated place

Location in Barnstable County and the state of Massachusetts.
Coordinates: 41°31′36″N 70°39′47″W Coordinates: 41°31′36″N 70°39′47″W
Country	United States
State	Massachusetts
County	Barnstable
Town	Falmouth
Area
• Total	3.9 sq mi (10.1 km²)
• Land	2.1 sq mi (5.5 km²)
• Water	1.8 sq mi (4.6 km²)
Elevation	20 ft (6 m)
Population (2010)
• Total	781
• Density	366/sq mi (141.4/km²)
Time zone	UTC-5 (Eastern (EST))
• Summer (DST)	UTC-4 (EDT)
ZIP code	02543
Area code(s)	508
FIPS code	25-81245
GNIS feature ID	0617060

It is the site of several famous marine science institutions, including Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution, the Marine Biological Laboratory, the Woods Hole Research Center, NOAA's Northeast Fisheries Science Center (which started the Woods Hole scientific community in 1871), the Woods Hole Science Aquarium, a USGS coastal and marine geology center, and the home campus of the Sea Education Association. It is also the site of United States Coast Guard Sector Southeastern New England (formerly USCG Group Woods Hole),the Nobska Light lighthouse, and the terminus of the Steamship Authority ferry route between Cape Cod and the island of Martha's Vineyard.

Collectables that Spark Memories

2018-02-23T10:53:00.002-08:00

French Corks © Thomas Bollinger.com

What could be more fun than a Champaign Cork Collection ?
A Beautiful collection of color and memories...

Nature Calls & Medieval Armor

2018-02-23T09:07:00.005-08:00

The art of what to do when nature calls https://www.metmuseum.org/toah/hd/aams/hd_aams.htm

Winter Moon

2017-01-03T21:06:00.000-08:00

Winter Moon , Cape Cod @ Thomas Bollinger

The symbol of a crescent moon and star has been used since antiquity. The Greeks used it to represent the goddess Diana, the Carthaginians used it to represent their goddess Tanit, and it was used in orship in Central Asia and Siberia. The symbol has been used by cities and to commemorate battles. It has been imprinted on coins, flown on flags, and approximately one thousand years ago, it was painted on the ceiling of a rock canyon in the American southwest. Some of these artifacts may also record the supernova that created one of the jewels of the night sky, the Crab Nebula.
There are several records that document the supernova in 1054. In the records of the Chinese Sung Dynasty, a “guest star” was observed in the constellation of Taurus. A Japanese observation describes a nova as bright as Jupiter and in Arizona, New Mexico, and Baja California, Mexico, indigenous people were painting a crescent moon near a star on canyon walls and boulders

North By Northwest

2016-06-05T04:49:00.000-07:00

North by Northwest © Bollinger Arts

Cotuit (/koh too it/) is one of the villages of the Town of Barnstable on Cape Cod in Massachusetts, United States. Located on a peninsula on the south side of Barnstable about midway between Falmouth and Hyannis, Cotuit is bounded by the Santuit River to the west on the Mashpee town line, the villages of Marstons Mills to the north and Osterville to the east, and Nantucket Sound to the south. Cotuit is primarily residential with several small beaches including Ropes Beach, Riley's Beach, The Loop Beach and Oregon Beach.

Apocalypse Wow

2016-01-01T20:44:00.004-08:00

Apocalypse Wow © Tom Bollinger Photographer

This is the end, beautiful friend
This is the end, my only friend, the end
Of our elaborate plans, the end
Of everything that stands, the end
No safety or surprise, the end
I'll never look into your eyes, again

Can you picture what will be, so limitless and free
Desperately in need, of some, stranger's hand
In a, desperate land

Lost in a Roman wilderness of pain
And all the children are insane, all the children are insane
Waiting for the summer rain, yeah
There's danger on the edge of town
Ride the King's highway, baby
Weird scenes inside the gold mine
Ride the highway west, baby
Ride the snake, ride the snake
To the lake, the ancient lake, baby
The snake is long, seven miles

Ride the snake, he's old, and his skin is cold
The west is the best, the west is the best
Get here, and we'll do the rest
The blue bus is callin' us, the blue bus is callin' us
Driver, where you taken us

The killer awoke before dawn, he put his boots on
He took a face from the ancient gallery
And he walked on down the hall

He went into the room where his sister lived, and, then he
Paid a visit to his brother, and then he
He walked on down the hall, and
And he came to a door, and he looked inside
Father, yes son, I want to kill you
Mother, I want to...

C'mon baby, take a chance with us
C'mon baby, take a chance with us
C'mon baby, take a chance with us

And meet me at the back of the blue bus
Doin' a blue rock, on a blue bus
Doin' a blue rock, c'mon, yeah
Kill, kill, kill, kill, kill, kill
This is the end, beautiful friend

This is the end, my only friend, the end
It hurts to set you free
But you'll never follow me
The end of laughter and soft lies
The end of nights we tried to die
This is the end

Black and White Photography as a Philosophy

2015-12-30T11:52:00.002-08:00

“The world is in color, you have to work at black and white.” – Andrew Maclean

“Colour is everything, black and white is more.” – Dominic Rouse

“To see in color is a delight for the eye but to see in black and white is a delight for the soul.” – Andri Cauldwell

“Black and white are the colors of photography. To me they symbolize the alternatives of hope and despair to which mankind is forever subjected.” – Robert Frank

Paris Follies

2015-12-18T19:45:00.001-08:00

The Belle Époque was a period of peace and optimism marked by industrial progress, and a particularly rich cultural exuberance was about at the opening of the Moulin Rouge. The Expositions Universelles of 1889 and 1900 are symbols of this period. The Eiffel Tower was also constructed in 1889, epitomising the spirit of progress along with the culturally transgressive cabaret.Japonism, an artistic movement inspired by the Orient, with Henri de Toulouse-Lautrec as its most brilliant disciple, was also at its height. Montmartre, which, at the heart of an increasingly vast and impersonal Paris, managed to retain a bucolic village atmosphere; festivities and artists mixed, with pleasure and beauty as their values. On 6 October 1889, the Moulin Rouge opened in the Jardin de Paris, at the foot of the Montmartre hill. Its creator Joseph Oller and his Manager Charles Zidler were formidable businessmen who understood the public's tastes. The aim was to allow the very rich to come and 'slum it' in a fashionable district, Montmartre. The extravagant setting – the garden was adorned with a gigantic elephant – allowed people from all walks of life to mix. Workers, residents of the Place Blanche, artists, the middle classes, businessmen, elegant women and foreigners passing through Paris rubbed shoulders. Nicknamed "The First Palace of Women" by Oller and Zidler, the cabaret quickly became a great success.

Life On Mars

2015-10-27T16:19:00.000-07:00

Rain Buffalo

2015-09-29T21:10:00.000-07:00

On the Backside of the Beartooth Mountains. Wind , Rain , Fog and a Lonely Buffalo. Pure Magic.

Welcome Cowboy

2015-09-29T20:44:00.000-07:00

Nature Calls

2015-09-29T20:18:00.000-07:00

36.9833° N, 110.1000° W

2015-09-10T09:49:00.005-07:00

This year is the 21st anniversary of my first moving to Cape Cod in the 1990's. I just landed here by serendipity after circling the globe for several years on a steamship before returning to dry land. I immediately fell in love with the light, landscapes, the bountiful sea life. Summers on the Cape are a never ending series of delights and wonderments. This series of landscapes barely starts to scratch the surface of this wickedly wonderful piece of New England Heaven.

Final Originals Works will be Hand Painted Encaustic Vegetable Pigment Photographs on Birch Panels, The archival process should eclipse almost all traditional photography by centuries ... This Indian Summer series will consist of approximately 50 original landscape images with limited edition reproductions.

Best Little Whorehouse in South Beach

2015-08-15T06:11:00.000-07:00

The Pelican / Architectural study ...
A very unusual hotel owned and designed by Diesel.
Every one of the 25 rooms you see is completely different from the other. All have been daringly and wittily designed by the Swedish interior decorator Magnus Ehrland and they all come with their own titles. For instance, Room 309 (a standard room with a queensize bed) is called “Psychedelic (ate) Girl” Room 302 (the gorgeous ocean-front suite with a queensize bed) is called “Big Bamboo”. Room 201 (the fabulous ocean-front suite with the king-size bed), is called “Executive Fifties”. The rooms are tooled after their themes. Thus the hotel’s most popular room (Room 215) “Best Whorehouse” looks like a bordello the hooker madam Heidi Fleiss would envy.

Storm Warning

2015-08-10T12:01:00.003-07:00

Nagasaki: The Last Bomb

BY ALEX WELLERSTEIN , The New Yorker

At 3:47 A.M. on August 9, 1945, a B-29 Superfortress took off from the American airbase on the island of Tinian, in the North Pacific Ocean. Operation Centerboard II, the mission to drop the second atomic bomb on a Japanese city, had begun. Already things were not going as smoothly as they had three days earlier, in the run over Hiroshima. That attack had been textbook—“operationally routine,” as a classified Army history later put it. The Enola Gay had reached its target and returned home without complication; an announcement sent out under President Harry Truman’s name had trumpeted its success. But Bockscar, the strike plane chosen for Centerboard II, had been delayed on the tarmac because of fuel-pump problems. Only the day before, four B-29s in succession had crashed on takeoff, causing extensive fuel fires. As one of the scientists on Tinian wrote, “We all aged ten years until the plane cleared the island.” But clear the island it did.

http://www.newyorker.com/tech/elements/nagasaki-the-last-bomb

The Art of Staying Safe in The Wilderness ... or this advise just might save your life.. part 1

2015-07-31T12:13:00.003-07:00

After 50 years of being really lucky on ridiculously stupid adventures I have become very conscious of how fragile the human shell really is. Having personally used up my allocated 9 lives several times over I'm really overly cautious about stepping out onto the front lawn without being properly prepared..

If I could redesign myself to protect myself from injury I personally would happily be part grizzly bear, part leopard, part lemon shark, with a whole lot of sea turtle mixed in. I particularly like the option of a hard shell. OK , I'd also like to fly and stay dry like a pelican too...

Since this is not an option in this lifetime and since the older I get the more concerned I get when traveling remotely into both the terrestrial and ocean wilderness I know take quite a few redundant precautions:

Even when I travel upriver behind my house on a three hour jaunt( one of the few places I can run into a bull shark, big gator, wild boars, africanized bees or something else larger than a house cat all within a few hundred yards of each other) I take a pretty extensive yet lightweight bag full of survival items along.

My "Oh Shit Kit" consist mostly of Field Communications / First Aid / and Primitive Survival Gear ... with these items anyone with some basic wilderness knowledge can survive almost any challenge until their luck changes or the calvary arrives. My personal kit has quite a few interchangeable items depending on environment and distance from the modern world.

Over the next few weeks I'm going to share what I take along and why I take it. I'm going to start right now with the number one item, If you take nothing else or send your kids or loved ones out with nothing else . this is the one item to take along.

Nothing will increase you long term chances of survival more than this one item along with healthy dose of common sense.

#1 : A Personal Locator Beacon : The best 200.00 you ever will spend ...

My recommendation :

( IPX7 WaterProof ) Spot / Gen 3 http://www.findmespot.com/SummerSavings/index.html?utm_source=Google&utm_medium=text&utm_campaign=2015SummerGen3

a great review of various devices:

http://www.outdoorgearlab.com/Personal-Locator-Beacon-Reviews .

Here is all you really need to know about this. If your lost or injured and have the ability to push a button. This beacon will from almost anywhere on the planet notify rescue personal that you need help. It also sends your exact location that is absolutely priceless at any cost.

I have been recommending these for years for friends and families with adventurous loved ones. No one I know has ever had to push an S.O.S. button, but what a marvel of modern technology to have this ability in an emergency.

I really love the tile tracking devices for kids, pets, and spouses ( all for non nefarious purposes) individual locations traceable with a smartphone to 6 meters...

Next up in the " What's in the bag series" two way communication devices.. t.b.c...

Thanks for the inspiration Mr Poe or Beating a concept to death ( Literally )

2015-07-24T08:19:00.000-07:00

Late last night I started playing with an old three dimensional found object to see how it could be transformed into something a little more interesting on a flat 2 dimensional plane. Somehow some Port Wine and a little Edger Allan Poe for inspiration this is what emerged well after the midnight hour...
Although we were born many generations apart our lives seemed intertwined in both a geographical and spiritual sense in both in Maryland and Virginia. I'd have to say my work has some darker tones and I owe that to my love of all things Poe.

Summer of 69 / Hyper Series,

2015-07-17T07:34:00.003-07:00

"Art changed in a big way in the 1960s; it was no longer something just to look at and appreciate for its aesthetic qualities. The traditional ideal of connoisseurship was out; art as consciousness-altering experience was in. Boundaries between conventional media such as paintings and sculpture stretched and dissolved. Hierarchical distinctions between high and low culture became irrelevant. Weird new forms proliferated. Would art have developed as it did in the past fifty years, would it be the way it is now, if psychedelics and psychedelic culture had not been so popular?" Ken Johnson . New York Times art critic