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• 1 2018-07-16T20:24:26+00:00 Signifying Stones 19 plain 735 2019-03-03T23:19:50+00:00 non_branching_parent_page

  As words composed of rocks, 'petriverse' refers to petric texts inscribed in a landscape-oriented-page-space for perusal by a perambulatory public.
  
  Over the years, Pierre Jardin has amassed a collection of 'signifier stones,' pebbles suitable for forming letters. The bulk of the stock of these rocks are Palos Verdes beach cobble, ranging from cylindrical to squat or squarish in shape, and from six inches to an inch in size.They are predominantly blueish gray or beige-brown in color.
  
  There are smaller collections, or limited editions, of other 'fonts': sharp, polished black volcanic shards from the Yuha desert; brown petrified wood pieces from many sites.
  
  Petriverse is a highly constrained genre. Constructing texts for display in the Petriverse, Pierre Jardin must meet several criteria:
  1) Because their audience is primarily passersby, texts need to be short and the letters need to be clearly formed.
  2) Texts need to be pithy and pack a punch, preferably with a pun.
  3) Most texts are designed to refer to rocks, stone as a substance, or the garden in general. Petriverse texts therefore are often self-referential.
  4) The ideal text creates a specific kind of delicious delay between signs and sense: 
  clearly legible words should be grasped in a glance; 
  cleverly composed messages should be gotten after a short moment.

• 1 2019-03-02T22:32:58+00:00 The Petriverse as Screen 2 plain 2019-03-02T22:36:39+00:00 A signature facet of Pierre Jardin's Petric Poetics entails using the garden space as a pseudo-screen on which to write stony text messages.  Judging by the reactions of strollers-by, Pierre’s poetic practice of replacing pixels with petri-verse perplexes or pleases people.  Jardin’s petri-text messages pose as propositions planned to provoke profound pondering of pronounced and comprehensive questions such as: How is texting changing the way we think about language?  What new ways of writing are evolving from texting?  There is an immediacy to texting–people often write about what they are doing (“I’m just leaving”), or the effect that a received message had on them (“LOL”).  Similarly, Pierre’s petri-text points to itself; it not only boasts that petri-texts are cool (they are “rocking”), but also suggests that texting with stones could be called “rocking” rather than writing….
  More conceptually, Pierre’s petri-text messages focus on the physical dimension of messaging. Text messages are sent and read quickly and then disposed of; consequently, they create an impression that they have no materiality. Text messages are weightless, impermanent, quickly discarded or deleted. But they are not immaterial, in many senses. Text messages cost money and use energy, something to which Pierre points by saying that (unlike the i-Phone) his rocking text app and i-Stone technology are free and green. Text messaging is also far from immaterial in the sense of being insignificant in impact, as they can cause fatal car crashes. (The latter fact inspired Werner Herzog to make a documentary!)
  
  Perhaps Pierre’s petri-text messages may precipitate a passerby to consider the material world dimensions of text messaging.   And if not, well, hopefully the person will enjoy the "121" chat and walk away thinking that passing the petriverse is "aap" ("always a pleasure").