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THE BOOK
James Stanford utilizes the latest in digital art technique to create mesmerizing mandala designs from digital photos of historic Las Vegas neon signage, and architectural elements from the 1950s and 1960s. Stanford's group of intriguing digital montages convey and respond to the potency of the mandala as a symbol, and its influence and importance to Asian culture worldwide. Shimmering Zen consists of over 150 of Stanford's original works created over the past 20 years.
Shimmering Zen invites viewers into a world of wonder. Each of the works offers us a fresh opportunity to explore a unique, optically complex and thoroughly transfixing visual sensation. Stanford’s mandalas reach back in time, putting us in touch with the a pre-modern era when people would gaze transfixed into still and sacred pools of water or polished gemstones as a means to achieve an enhanced state of consciousness. Today, we find optical enhancements like these just as engrossing as they must have been for earlier generations. In gazing deeply and becoming visually saturated by the seemingly magical spaces, we can lose site of the actual visual field we are contemplating; in the process, we discover new insights and new wonders about ourselves and the world in which we live.
Jim Stanford’s visual compositions, too, are filled with wonder and surprise. They embody the endless struggle to incorporate infinite variables into our own lives as we seek to make sense of our own existence and the world around us. What we find in Stanford’s imagery, however, is not tangible. His photomontages are abstract, in the sense that no familiar subject is evident and no representational narrative is present in his compositions. Working on the two-dimensional plain, the artist has not attempted to represent our light and shadow; nor has he created an inaccessible syntax or secret vocabulary. Instead, he has boldly confronted the difficulties we face when we try to comprehend phenomena that remains stubbornly inexplicable. - Jeffrey H. Rosen, Ph.D., Vice President for Accreditation Relations and Director, Open Pathway. Higher Learning Commission
The book format is 300 x 300 mm, hardback, 264 pages, limited edition, printed in Verona, Italy using high quality stock with specially formulated inks. The resolution of artwork is over 600 dpi and rivals actual fine art prints in both sharpness and saturation. The book may be purchased at Amazon, Barnes and Noble, Foyles and many other book stores around the world.