modernism

As watershaping moves toward new creative frontiers, the trade is approaching a point where it’s tough to set a boundary between craft and art. One who clearly has crossed the line into fine art is modernist sculptor Barton Rubenstein, who uses water to create a range of intriguing aesthetic experiences. They might not look like other watershapes, but he insists that the physical and aesthetic principles he applies are all quite familiar.

Fluid Expressions

It's an age-old paradox, this relationship between art and science. On the face of it, things artistic may seem solely the realm of high-flying thinkers and philosophers who spend their days at the far reaches of interpretation and meaning. By contrast, engineers and scientists would seem to be dealing purely in the certainties of what is quantifiable and real. The truth is, I don't know of a modern art form that doesn't involve technology of some kind. Conversely, most branches of modern science call upon researchers to apply a great deal of intuition and creativity to the processes of exploration and discovery. In other words, neither the arts nor the sciences could exist without ideas and disciplines derived from the other. That's especially true when it comes to water systems. Whether created for aesthetic or recreational purposes, art and science can come together here in a particularly compelling and interesting way. By combining technical disciplines with