THRESHOLDS OF PERCEPTION
Reception: Saturday, January 3rd, 6-9 pm
JAMES FLYNN
THRESHOLDS OF PERCEPTION
JAMES FLYNN
JAMES FLYNN
THRESHOLDS OF PERCEPTION
James Flynn’s recent body of work emerges from a philosophical paradigm informed by Quantum Physics, which suggests that Consciousness—rather than Matter—constitutes the underlying fabric of Reality. His paintings engage in a widening dialogue across physics and philosophy, in which the Observer is understood not as a passive witness but as an active participant in shaping what becomes visible.
Flynn credits Pedro Friedeberg and Peter Lobello as his principal artistic influences, having studied closely with both. His visual language is structured by Friedeberg’s intricate pattern complexity and geometric illusionism, along with Lobello’s disciplined
abstract minimalism. Evolving from this lineage, Flynn extends the perceptual innovations of the 1960s Op Art movement particularly Vasarely, Yvaral, Soto, and Agam—while reframing their ideas through Quantum Theory and non-materialist models of Consciousness. Within this expanded framework, perception becomes an active medium in which awareness shapes the very image that appears.
In Thresholds of Perception, Flynn explores the shifting relationship between Observer and Observed, between perception and what we call “reality.” His paintings operate as observer-activated perceptual fields in which images continually reorganize as the viewer changes vantage point. Each shift in perspective reveals a new visual configuration unique to each encounter.
Each painting remains fluid until the viewer’s engagement “collapses” it into a temporary state, echoing the way observation in Quantum Theory collapses a range of possibilities into a single state. Wave-like fields appear to condense into particle-like structures as patterns converge, shift, and dissolve. Colors coalesce into new chromatic effects, and two-dimensional shapes oscillate into three-dimensional illusions. The image remains purposely elusive, continually reconfiguring itself through the dynamic interplay between painting and viewer, revealing how perception itself gives rise to the world we see.
These perceptual effects arise from Flynn’s manipulation of ambiguous geometry, evanescent color harmonies, and the spatial dynamics of chromatic induction, further intensified by strategic use of iridescent, metallic, and ultraviolet-reactive pigments, collectively heightening the optical reactivity and instability of the surface. Flynn ultimately confronts the viewer’s perception of perception itself, a pivotal insight that leads directly to the quantum concepts that animate his work. His optokinetic experiments parallel key principles of Quantum Theory, including the Observer Effect, Heisenberg’s Uncertainty Principle, and the dynamics of Young’s Double-Slit Experiment. Flynn’s visual fields do not merely allude to these ideas—they enact them.
His optokinetic experiments parallel key principles of Quantum Theory, including the Observer Effect, Heisenberg’s Uncertainty Principle, and the dynamics of Young’s Double-Slit Experiment. Flynn’s visual fields do not merely allude to these ideas—they enact them.
James Flynn
The Luminal Field at the Threshold of Perception, 2025
UV reactive acrylic on wood panel
62h x 62w in
James Flynn
The Stochastic Emergence of Aphrodite from the Cosmic Muonic Veil, 2025
UV reactive acrylic on wood panel
37h x 37w in
James Flynn
The Stochastic Emergence of Aphrodite from the Cosmic Muonic Veil, 2025
UV reactive acrylic on wood panel
37h x 37w in
James Flynn
The Aetheric Incandescence of Nothingness, 2025
UV reactive acrylic on wood panel
47h x 47w in
James Flynn
The Liminal Heart of the ONDA Field, 2025
UV reactive acrylic on wood panel
35.50h x 47w in
James Flynn
The Liminal Heart of the XIS Field, 2025
UV reactive acrylic on wood panel
35.50h x 47w in
James Flynn
The Mutable Heart of the IOI Field, 2025
UV reactive acrylic on wood panel
35.50h x 47w in
James Flynn
Venus at the Threshold of Particle and Wave, 2025
UV reactive acrylic on wood panel
17h x 17w in
James Flynn
A Sudden Glaring of Schrödinger’s Cats in Superposition, 2025
UV reactive acrylic on wood panel
37h x 37w in
James Flynn
A Sudden Fever of Spotted Eagle Rays in Superposition, 2025
UV reactive acrylic on wood panel
62h x 62w in
James Flynn
The Harmonic Ocean of Quantum Waves, 2025
UV reactive acrylic on wood panel
35.50h x 47w in
James Flynn
Nathan Fields of Quantum Entanglement, 2025
UV reactive acrylic on wood panel
31h x 31w in
James Flynn
The Bohmian Explicate Order at the Threshold of Particle-Wave, 2025
UV reactive acrylic on wood panel
44h x 74w in
James Flynn
The Tremulous Liminality of the Particle-Wave, 2025
UV reactive acrylic on wood panel
47.50h x 47.50w in
James Flynn
Cosmic Muonic Manifestation of Mona, 2021
UV and metallic acrylic on wood panel
37.50h x 37.50w in
James Flynn
The Aetheric Incandescence of Nothingness, 2025
UV reactive acrylic on wood panel
47h x 47w in
James Flynn
The Stochastic Emergence of Aphrodite from the Cosmic Muonic Veil, 2025
UV reactive acrylic on wood panel
37h x 37w in
James Flynn
A Sudden Fever of Spotted Eagle Rays in Superposition, 2025
UV reactive acrylic on wood panel
62h x 62w in
James Flynn
The Liminal Heart of the XIS Field, 2025
UV reactive acrylic on wood panel
35.50h x 47w in
James Flynn
The Liminal Heart of the ONDA Field, 2025
UV reactive acrylic on wood panel
35.50h x 47w in
James Flynn
The Mutable Heart of the IOI Field, 2025
UV reactive acrylic on wood panel
35.50h x 47w in
James Flynn
All the Seas I Have Sailed, All the Rivers I Have Known, 2025
UV reactive acrylic on wood panel
47h x 47w in
James Flynn
The Luminal Field at the Threshold of Perception, 2025
UV reactive acrylic on wood panel
62h x 62w in
James Flynn
A Sudden Glaring of Schrödinger’s Cats in Superposition, 2025
UV reactive acrylic on wood panel
37h x 37w in
James Flynn
The Tremulous Liminality of the Particle-Wave, 2025
UV reactive acrylic on wood panel
47.50h x 47.50w in
James Flynn
The Tremulous Liminality of the Particle-Wave, 2025
UV reactive acrylic on wood panel
47.50h x 47.50w in
James Flynn
The Bohmian Explicate Order at the Threshold of Particle-Wave, 2025
UV reactive acrylic on wood panel
44h x 74w in
James Flynn
Nathan Fields of Quantum Entanglement I, 2025
UV reactive acrylic on wood panel
31h x 31w in
James Flynn
Nathan Fields of Quantum Entanglement II, 2025
UV reactive acrylic on wood panel
31h x 31w in