My name is Nathan Selikoff and Digital Awakening Studios is my company.
I am a professional designer and developer seeking to utilize a broad range of technical and creative skills on contract or part-time web development projects.
I am looking for teams with a global perspective, a passion for quality, and a commitment to work that matters.
Design and Development Philosophy
In the summer of 2009, my wife and I traveled across the country via bicycle, eventually making our way to the Bridges Conference in Banff, Canada. Among the many joys of the conference, one highlight was being able to participate in the creation of the world’s largest Zometool construction.
An excerpt from the text accompanying a flickr set of the process reads:
Golden geometry is a universal language bridging art and mathematics, that transcends cultural, political, economic and geographic boundaries. 150 mathematicians and artists from all over the world (and several of their children) have been assembling the small plastic Zometool components into superstructures that will become the final sculpture… Although it is built entirely from points and straight lines (i.e., nodes and struts) the model looks like a 3-dimensional “spirograph” drawing, with organic curves that mimic life forms. The underlying structure is derived from a shadow of a 6-dimensional cube.
Reflecting on this experience and this quote, I see a lot of parallels to the kinds of projects I love to work on.
“Golden geometry is a universal language…”
Though we were already united by a common love for all things math and art, the shared experience of building the Zometool sculpture brought us even closer together.
Design is another universal language that transcends boundaries. In addition to being harnessed to create the visual artifice of a web application, design is also an essential part of its underbelly – a well-designed application will be a joy to use (not to mention maintain and expand).
“Bridging art and mathematics…”
I love projects and people that bridge the gap between design and development, form and function, creative and technical, right brain and left brain. In fact, this is one of the themes of my artwork.
“Transcends boundaries…”
The very nature of the web as a medium involves the transcendence of cultural, political, economic and geographic boundaries – most web development projects are accessible throughout the world by design. During my travels, including to the Bridges Conference in Banff, I have always been challenged and energized by my interactions with artists, mathematicians, architects, educators, and musicians, and I believe the most exciting and influential undertakings are challenged and energized by crossing, or at least stretching, boundaries.
Superstructures, nodes and struts
Day after day, we built “lollipops”, “tripods”, “wheels” and other such building blocks out of the individual nodes and struts that comprise the Zometool system. Building blocks became structures, which became superstructures, which were eventually united into the overall sculpture. Programming mirrors this pattern, as we jump from abstraction to higher abstraction and back down again, working on the big picture or the small detail in order to bring the whole to completion.
“The shadow of a 6-dimensional cube…”
To me, a web application often feels like merely a shadow of the initial concept that drove design and development in the first place. Experience, collaboration and the honing of our skills push us closer to our goal, but in any deep project we strive to capture the immaterial.