Work Series:
K4, 2000–ongoing

The development of the K4 sign script began in the mid-1990s. To this day, it is constantly being expanded with new signs and now comprises around 400,000 individual elements. Strictly speaking, K4 is not a “language” but a complex writing system that can encode existing written languages in compressed form.

K4 is ruled by an order in the details that can be traced by anyone willing to learn an unspeakable language. The individual signs of K4 are formed starting from the letters of the Latin alphabet and on the basis of a matrix of 16 (4x4) or 4 (2x2) squares and one horizontal line, which is the equivalent for the consonant “K”. Each sign connects the value of up to four Latin letters, which are arranged as horizontal and vertical short dashes (mostly for vowels) and circle arcs (mostly for consonants) around the horizontal line of the “K”. The line running centrally through the entire matrix forms the basis of almost all K4 signs. Vowels are characterized by short, horizontal extensions at their beginnings or ends. The consonants are subdivided according to phonetic features into groups determining their formal genesis. In each group, one of the letters specifies attributes by means of which all others can be derived. The sequence of letters within a sign is defined by variations of the matrix and additional tags. The matrix can be shifted by one half of a square unit, placed over the original form, and thus be divided into 48 squares, enabling a host of new combinations: currently there are about 400,000 elements. To form sentences, the texts intended for translation are restructured and broken down into columns of four letters each. Commas and periods are represented by spacing one or two letters before or after the respective punctuation mark. In this way, each sentence starts and ends with an individual cipher, and each comma is surrounded by two connected ciphers. “Der Traum der Vernunft erzeugt Ungeheuer” must be changed to: “D ERTR AUMD ERVE RNUN FTER ZEUG TUNG EHEU E R”, when transforming the phrase to K4. The semantic units that are familiar to us are, in this way, first divided into graphic sequences, forming a sort of “concrete poetry”.

With complexity increasing, the rules for K4 were in part substantially modified and supplemented by exceptions. Even though each sign therefore adheres to a comprehensible logic, there is no one who could use and ‘master’ all elements. The meaning remains concealed in the immense vastness of the character strings, although each individual sign indisputably carries a meaning. Just like in the rest of the world that is dominated by highly complex, specialist fields, the big picture moves out of focus because the pieces are too difficile.