ABOUT THE DEPARTMENT

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The Department of Visual Paradox and Pataphysical Research was founded to explore the unstable relationship between the usefulness and uselessness of language used to decode images. Working through excavation, collision and the managed drift of interpretation, the department investigates how culture records itself - and how those records can be made to misbehave.

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The Departments primary instrument, the pataphysical collider, operates as both method and metaphor. Within it, visual art, literature, theory and broadcast debris are accelerated toward one another until fragments of new meaning (known as Quirks) appear. These Quirks are then catalogued, exhibited or allowed to decay naturally in the archive.

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STAFF

Paul Woodford.

Research Lead, Collision Studies.

Paul holds an MA in Contemporary Dialogues (Fine Art) from Trinity Saint Davids University, Swansea. His research explores the conversational space  between conceptual practice and poetic disorder. Within the department, he directs the Colliders fine tuning - guiding experiments, where the visual becomes linguistic and the linguistic becomes useless.

Max Isaik.

Chief Technician And Theoretical Maintenance Officer.

Max oversees the operational stability of the collider. His role involves  calibration of metaphorical voltage, management of irony containment and supervision of the Departments semiotic recycling protocols. Known for an ability to locate meaning in technical noise, Max maintains the delicate balance between research and playfulness.

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FUNCTION

The Department operates as a living archive of contradictions. It welcomes leaks, misreadings and spontaneous outbursts as valid forms of evidence. Research is carried out through conversation, deliberate miscommunication and the structured uncertainty of interpretation.

All reports are signed off under the departmental motto.

VERITAS EX COLLISIO

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