Circuits & Structure, 2014, 60″ x 60″
Océ VariaDot UV inkjet print on .125″ 6061 Aluminum plate
with random orbit finish and UV protective matte clear coat finish

Fourth of eight artworks that tell the story of Silicon Valley,
installed at the San Jose Marriott, Ballroom Pre-function Area (Mezzanine Level)

Circuits & Structure reflects the architecture and design of integrated circuits or microchips, and the resulting physical structure and look of the devices and components they are used in. This artwork includes a view of the first Apple printed circuit board shown to me by Daniel Kottke, who wired it himself. The silicon wafer based integrated circuits came out of work done at Silicon Valley companies like Fairchild Semiconductors and Intel and led to the concentration of semiconductor companies that gave rise to the term Silicon Valley.

An integrated circuit is a set of miniature electronic circuits, which may include billions of transistors and other components that replaced the old vacuum tubes, printed via photolithography and other techniques, onto a plate, wafer or chip of semiconductor material, normally silicon. Integrated circuits can be made much smaller and more efficiently than a so-called discrete circuits made from independent components.

Integrated circuits, the origins of which originally emerged from Silicon Valley, are used in virtually all electronic equipment today and have revolutionized the world of electronics. Computers, mobile phones, and other digital home appliances are now inextricable parts of the structure of modern societies, made possible by the low cost of producing integrated circuits.

The Silicon Valley Series

#1
Land
&
Transformation

#2
Humans
&
Machines

#3
Founders
&
Visionaries

#4
Circuits
&
Structure

#5
Bits
&
Bytes

#6
People
&
Work

#7
Products
&
Consumers

#8
Growth
&
Value

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