Paine’s SCUMAK (Auto Sculpture Maker. 1998) used computer controlled machine to create polyethylene sculptures. Each sculpture was formed by rigidly scripted machine and identical parameters, however, due to the forces of chaos, the produced form are all different. The artist created the contrast between his personalized mass production and the depersonalized industry manufacture pipeline. Paine’s machine made sculptures with various forms driven by the mutation, similar as the identical embryos can be developed into different cells. This genetic-transformation philosophy can be traced back to his earlier projects like New Fungus Crop, and Amanita Field. Although they were created with totally different approach (SCUMAK is Mechanical and New Fungus Crop is botanical), these projects share a similar configuration that is heightened by examine the relation between individual and group, the contrast between the various outcome and predefined procedure. In Paine’s sculpture making machine, auto-mechanical and computer controlled manufacturing technology resembles nature such as Chaos theory, which was executed in the computer programming level to produce unpredictable geometric forms.


1990s was the era when art was under threat in an increasingly commercialized world and normalized mass production. These art works’ strength derives from the fact that Paine, as an artist, was not afraid of adapting new technology. He overcome the limits of manufacturing machines and employed these technologies as an interface between human being, science and nature.