Rozendaal explores the abstraction of everyday objects and scenes through the lens of the early internet’s innocence and optimism, whereby positioning the internet as a place waiting to be discovered, rather than one used as a political or commercial tool. The Mechanical Paintings additionally play with the beauty and perspective of early video games. The abstraction of the images leaves the viewer with the suggestion, or even creation, of movement, as though the places represented are waiting on something to happen in them. The viewer is left captivated with anticipation, much like before the start of a videogame, or as the artist puts it – ‘the suggestion of movement is actually more interesting than animating it’. The works are somewhere between digital and physical, between movement and still, between abstract and figurative.
Rozendaal’s choice of colour stems from the digital too. The artist’s visual language includes bold colors with high contrasts and saturations. The artist recalls the necessity for this color choice at the beginning of his career – when as a net artist one had to consider the quality variations of the devices the viewers used to interact with the works of art. Where the colors of screens change over time, increasing in brightness and resolution, enamel is a very old technique that creates permanent colors. They are supposed to last forever, even in bright sun. The heavy, metal works contrast with the spontaneous and playful compositions. Rozendaal herewith emphasizes the different qualities of physical and virtual life, which increasingly overlap.