Zoltán Szegedy-Maszák
Steganogram: Stereogram
series of c-prints, 2002

Related works: Blockdiagrams, Variations on Steganography, Cryptogram, Studies on Autostereography


STEGANOGRAM: STEREOGRAM I/1 – “SUSPECTSGBEH”, c-print, 100x70cm, 2002


STEGANOGRAM: STEREOGRAM I/2 – “INTHEIMAGE”, c-print, 100x70cm, 2002

During my research of visual messages that are imperceptible at first sight, I started to study images depicting the characteristics of human vision, and especially the image types associated with Gyula Julesz’s name: block diagrams and autostereograms. Whereas the former are only recognizable from a distance with squinting eyes, through which the amount of information getting to our eyes is limited, the latter will reveal the hidden spatial order within the random dots when viewed from up close, with relaxed eye muscles: a relief-like stereoscopic view. In the Steganogram: Stereogram series I applied these two methods on a single pictorial surface. These images of double meaning and double view have to be observed from at least two aspects, with two modes of eye movement and gesture, so that the intended information becomes perceivable. If you keep the necessary distance and ignore the details, you will be able to recognise half of the image. Then, when you walk quite close and view it cross-eyed, you will see the spaces, the stereoscopic reliefs hiding behind the surface. By reading them together, you can reconstruct the message literarily hidden behind the image.