George Widener

American artist George Widener (born 1962) developed a passion for calendars, numbers and numerology, historical data, population statistics and mathematical calculations early on in life. His clearly structured drawings combine actual historical events with his own computations, analyzing both world affairs and his own biography, and developing codes for super-intelligent computers of the future. Influenced by the theories of Ray Kurzweil, a leading scientist in the field of artificial intelligence, Widener believes that in 2045 high-performance computers will fuse with the human brain and transform consciousness into software. For Widener, numbers and data are part of his inner structure, the fundamental system of his perception of the world. This fourth volume in the Secret Universe series on outsider artists provides insight into Widener's complex vision, presenting his most important groups of work as well as a series of new autobiographical drawings.