Black Mirror One, Soleil Noir, 2007
silicon carbide mirrors
limited edition
Industry has synthesized silicon carbide —a material that occurs in space but is only known on earth thanks to the discovery of meteorites—as a means of creating highly accurate photographs of the stars.
Silicon carbide belongs to the diamond family. It is polished continuously for a month, making it so highly reflective that the mirror’s surroundings appear comparatively less sharp than the reflection. However, if the mirror is not given a special coating, it only reflects twenty percent of the surrounding colors. Artists long strove to create the effect of a relative lack of color by studying their subject’s reflection in darkened glass to bring out its general shape and outline—a rough sketch of the subject that both flattered it and gave it a sense of portent.