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Paul Laffoley
PAUL LAFFOLEY
(b. 1940, Cambridge, Massachusetts)

LAFFOLEY, Paul (b. 1943 Cambridge, MA)
Geochronmechane: The Time Machine from the Earth
1990
Serigraph in colored inks, with corrections by the artist in colored pencils
Coventry acid-free rag
No. 19 from an Edition of 75
Paper: 32 x 32 in.
81.4 x 81.4 cm
Image: 28 x 28 in.
71.2 x 71.2 cm

Exhibitions:
Science and Science Fiction Castle Art Gallery, College of New Rochelle, NY 6 February thru 1April,
2001.
The UFO Show University Galleries, Illinois State University, IL.
The UFO Show Arts & Science Center for Southeast Arkansas 29 September - 27 November, 2000.
The UFO Show University of Colorado 15 December - 2 February, 2001
Architectonic Thought Forms: a Survey of the Art of Paul Laffoley. A Traveling Exhibition organized by the Austin Museum of Art, TX. 1999
Paul Laffoley: The Tree of Sephiroth and Other Drawings, Kent Gallery, N.Y. 1999
Paul Laffoley: Building the Bauharoque. Kent Gallery, N.Y. 1998

It is now just five years since the centennial celebration of the 1895 publication of the famous novel by H.G. Wells (1866-1946) -The Time Machine. The subject matter of science fiction has long been recognized as a fruitful source of ad hoc research and development. However, it was not until the mid 1950's (the period of the beginning of the maturity of our vision of technology) that this recognition became widespread and socially obvious. The concept of the Time Machine, in short, has been considered by its nature impossible and absurd.

Wells gave the impression of the Time Machine as being essentially modern, while its theoretical structure is Neo-Medieval. Neo-Medievalism became one of the strongest creative forces to permeate 19th century Europe and America. It encouraged a taste for purpose and the exotic in places, religious and manners of thought. Eventually it culminated at the end of the century in the International Symbolist-Mystical movement.

Since the early 1940's to the present various theoretical physicists have been offering solutions to the equations of Einstein that postulate the possibility of time travel. The space shuttle program has been discussing the launch of an earth satellite-based experiment known as the "Gravity-Prove-B." This experiment will be an attempt to test Einstein's "General Theory of Relativity." This, of course, is Einstein's "tough" theory (the one that predicts the possibility of time travel.

What has made the difference about the intellectual reaction to Wells from his time to ours is that the nature and definition of the intellectual has changed. Wells worked in a world populated by men of purpose and action, like Alexander G. Eiffel (1856-1923), Washington A. Roebling (1837-1926), Louis Sullivan (1856-1924), Nikola Tesla (1856-1943), Le Corbuster (1887-1965), Frank Lloyd Wright (1867-1959), and Albert Einstein (1879-1955). While each active in their own pursuits, they also managed to maintain a perspective of the world.

From 1973 to the present, I have been working on ways to further the design of a feasible Time Machine. I have placed the main mechanism at the geostationary orbit of the earth for several reasons, the most important of which is that to me the geostationary orbit of the earth is the inertial frame reference of the earth. It is said that if the Time Machine really existed, we would already know of it. I say it has always been here, and we are beginning to become aware of it.