The author creates images of neurons using computer software, prints them and tries different approaches, such as adding soft layers of colour or images over the printed surface, to create multilayered reveries and the illusion of a multidimensional relief-like space.

"This fresh series that I have been working on for the past year is inspired by videos and microscope photographs
(created through immunofluorescence microscopy) of neurons damaged or altered due to the use of various substances (e.g. coffee, drugs, etc.) or neurodegenerative diseases (e.g. Alzheimer's, Pick's, Parkinson's and ALS). The series, entitled “Neural Entropy”, is based on research measuring the diversity of configurations in the system of neurons and synapses. Recently the concept of brain entropy was defined as the number of neural states, and the present series deals with those states. Formally, I am intrigued by the optical illusion that I build by incremental layering with a new software tool, one specifically designed for transferring a magnified image to a large-format printer (i.e. plotter). (Technical description of the process: a vector image based on several images is created using Inkscape software and then transferred to the canvas with a plotter spraying tiny droplets of ink. The second coat is drawn manually with the plotter, offset a few millimetres away from the base layer. I use the plotter to facilitate the transfer of the image, which would have been much more difficult with a projector due to the darker colours on the image.) Artistically, I explore the possibilities of optical illusion and the ambivalent relationship between photograph and drawing, an approach which has great potential in terms of complementing and blending the automated vector image with a manual one, and also with a brush stroke.
The artwork on canvas is a synthesis of microscope photographs taken as part of neuroscience research and my vision of the photographs as vector images that I transfer in layers onto the canvas with the help of an interface and then complete manually. My goal is to conceal the use of modern technology and machinery, because it is merely one of the ways of exploring contemporary drawing practices I use, and I intend to maintain the underlying autonomy of painting and drawing."
Jasna Samarin

Jasna Samarin was born on 19 January 1966 in Ljubljana. After graduating from the Ivan Cankar secondary school, she studied at the Academy of Fine Arts and Design, Ljubljana, in the class of Prof. Emerik Bernard, earning her degree in 1989. During her postgraduate studies with Prof. Bernard at the same faculty, she spent the period from 1990 to 1991 at the École nationale supérieure des beaux-arts in Paris as a scolar of the French Government. Samarin held more more than 30 solo exhibitions at home and abroad. She has also participateted in number of national and international group exhibitions. She has been a member of the Slovenian Association of Fine Arts Societies (ZDSLU) since 1989. Samarin has received several awards including the distincion from the French Governement 1991, an award at the Ex-tempore in Piran, Slovenia, in 1992, the honorary distiction at the ZDSLU May Salon in 2007 and in 2023 the bronze award at the International Biennial Etikete in Novo mesto. Her works are featured in some important collections. She lives in Ljubljana.