In the series To compound the small differences Gabriel Rico sources several photographs of deep space taken by the Hubble telescope in 2004. This data becomes the basis of each tableaus in which the artist creates new configurations of the original photographs. They are divided into quarters and then mixed together to suggest new universes and new possibilities. Rico is influenced by the Greek Atomist School or Atomism, specifically Democritus who believed in the configuration of reality by very small blocks they called atoms. As such the artist uses his own ‘atoms' in the creation of these new realities with very small glass beads or spheres. It is a technique employed by the Huicholes in northern Jalisco used to represent their cosmology and deep spiritual beliefs.
The Huichol people are taught this technique at a young age and it is passed down by their parents. It can take an artisan one day to complete a single line and roughly 18 to 20 days to complete each work. For this particular piece Rico worked with Manolo Castro Montoya “Muwieritemay” who interpreted the digitized images from deep space. The work becomes a blend between a sophisticated technology and an old and significant technique of the Huichol people. As the artist puts it "in this way Manolo becomes the creator of new universes, possible only by our inability to confirm whether they can be or not.”