Bratsa Bonifacho remembers the first time his Apple computer got a worm.
The Yugoslavian-born artist's monitor was scrambled with letters and numbers and symbols "and God knows what else," he said. "It was incredible and beautiful and I liked it."
It was then that Bonifacho started to play with the idea of creating a visual art series based on the power of the computer, "how incredibly important the instrument is for everyone but, of course, what damage it can cause everywhere."
And within his abstract expressionist pieces, Bonifacho placed hidden sentences in an attempt to get the viewer to think about the message the computer was sending.
A dozen years later, the Vancouver resident - with the help of his curator, Ann Rosenberg - is showing a mini-retrospective, called Inside Habitat Pixel, at Coquitlam's Evergreen Cultural Centre. The exhibit, which runs until April 7, includes works from his series Habitat Pixel and its more recent manifestations into three other series: Human Farm, In Nucleo and Inside the Pixel.
Rosenberg selected 23 paintings for the Evergreen display - two of which were created just before they were to be delivered to Coquitlam, Bonifacho said - all of which show his distinct style and the evolution of his project.
As well, the exhibit is complemented by a weighty statement by Rosenberg describing the history, starting with Dictionary of the Khazar (2000) from Habitat Pixel; in that painting, the alphabet runs in a straight forward, grid-like formation.
But his later works, such as Domini Canes (2010), become more chaotic, transposing Bonifacho's fear that computer viruses, worms and Trojan horses will cut off global communication. Rosenberg writes: "Almost all appear to have suffered from invasions by image-destroying worms and other cybemetic ailments."
The Evergreen Cultural Centre art gallery is open from Monday to Saturday, noon to 5 p.m. For more information, call 604-927-6550 or visit www.evergreenculturalcentre.ca.
