Man is Naked (1965) is from of a series of Poem Machines that Liliane Lijn (1939, New York) began in 1962. The series is emblematic of her work with kinetic art, light, motion and text. Inspired by research into light refraction by French physicist Augustin Jean Fresnel, Lijn wanted to create a work in which the energy of sound could be seen. In the first Poem Machines, motorised metal drum spins so fast that the viewer is confronted with the vibration of the words rather than a legible text. Man is Naked – the first work in the series to employ Lijn’s own writing – turns more slowly, allowing the words to float, interfering with the linear syntax of the poem. Created years before she used a computer, the work can be seen to anticipate the interrelation between the machine and language and computers and code. The work also recalls early computation machines that employed a system of wheels to perform calculations.