By Chris DeMento
Jonathon Keats did not fail philosophy by any stretch. But it failed him. Frustrated with Science’s inability to account for the very uncertainty it breeds, disconcerted by elaborate, infinitesimally ornate re-explanations of theoretically problematic anomalies embedded in the canon, tired of the validity namegames and the cyclical limits of Rationalism, the scholarly Keats has turned away from the strictures of logic and embraced another mode altogether: making art of his arguments.
Keats’ latest installation at Modernism Gallery, “Miracle Works,” demonstrates the boundlessness of his curiosity. During a recent interview, he talked about quite a few intergalactic possibilities and the cosmic multi-dimensionality of his work, which means I listened with one ear open while the other received, through an earphone, a half-hour-long sonata for astral organ, which simulated the pressure-sound of stars decaying (they thrum away at about 30,000 octaves below what the human ear can process).
Using math chops, a working knowledge of astrophysics (both its literature and its tablature), his formidable imagination, and a little program Steve Jobs likes to call GarageBand, Keats has arranged what he calls “an opus for the spheres,” transposing heretofore inaudible frequencies into a listenable key, collapsing lightyears and making them both intelligible and accessible.
One of Keats’ orbit systems (print)