I am continually looking on the web for synchronicites. I believe that Western art is coming to a conclusion (at least for this period). There is always an ism, or what the critics consider book ends that will help them to figure out when one things ends and another begins. Is this always the case? Its hard to say whether there has to be anything at all that would describe these types of historic events.
I'm sure that there were plenty of artists that have fallen outside the book ends and have failed to receive adequate attention during their lifetime, or posthumously, as well put into perspective, repositioned and included in the faithful list of iconic artists from so and so time and ism. What happens when there are no more isms? Or worse, the lack of one is so blatant and troubling that they begin to try to fit square pegs into round holes.
During one of my surfing sessions lately I found an artist that shows his work in New york. Born 1959, painter. Normally this wouldn't mean anything at all if it wasn't for the fact that I found an image of a painting of his with an image that I used from a national geographic. Derivative comes to mind. Wait, that's what I do. In the words of the Fantastic Mr. Fox, Cuss.
The image was the exact same one that I had used in a painting called cinematic beginnings. When I say that I search the "cloud" for synchronicities I hadn't thought that it would pertain to my work. Though I should be more forgiving as there are quite a few artists making work in North America and that I shouldn't beat myself up about it. If people are working from popular or corporate images there is bound to be some overlap. This could mean one of two things however.
-One, that I am on the right track, that since this gentlemen is using these images there is something special about them that makes it worth while.
-Two, that I am on the wrong track and headed towards obscurity. The second, more dire circumstantial situation is the one that I have been dreading for years but have not had any indisputable truth to go by. This is an indisputable truth though. Cuss.
Obviously this gentlemen has been painting for a long time. I always thought that the found images game would be something that I would work out of. It has made me very sensitive to illustrative techniques and I am finding these recycled images everywhere. Ones that I have seen in my clippings of magazines and books and those that I have physically used in my art. The question now is what will I do. This gentleman's work was quite exhaustive and detailed. He projected the images and work from reference creating a very painterly style. I have gone in a similar direction where I attempted to make the image disappear while maintaining a sense of realism in the paint. I focused on the use of colour and composition rather than brushstroke and paint. This is perhaps the largest problem facing me at this point. I have a solution to this problem.
I have always been struggling with the direction of my work; where it was taking me, etc. I assumed that by simply working I would get there. That mediated steps would result in too much planning and would ultimately ruin my work. This is partly true. However if I look down the line I see a dead end. I have always assumed what it would look like, now I know what it is. If I am to escape this void that Western art seems to be spiraling into I have to look far ahead and escape before it is too late.
Even now as I write this I am talking as if I am a prisoner of some system. In an interview lately I actually said that I work with perspective because I feel that it echoes the system, but I am only perpetuating it by following it, whether I am pointing it out or not.
The only thing that I can think of that would save me from my terrible end at this point is to abandon structure and found images in favour of something that makes more sense. The only problem is, I'm not sure if I can undo the damage that has already been done.
3 comments:
I'm curious as to what you mean when you suggest that abandoning structure is going to make more sense. Do you mean make more sense in terms of planning your trajectory, make more sense to the viewer, etc.? Also, what kind of structure, specifically? Do you mean compositional structure, or societal expectations more generally?
Also, I wonder if there is a way to still utilize your found images while "saving yourself from obscurity". Your work is amazing, and you use found images in more interesting ways than I've ever seen, but you may be right in that the broader movement of art of which that method is a part may be coming to a close. You would know better than I, but it seems that the flirtation with 'mixed media' (or more specifically, 'found media') and its cognate projects either has to gel into something substantial (puns not intended, but I'll take 'em), or it has to fade away (i.e., found media for the sake of found media may not have enough staying power---not that this is your own motive, but it does seem to characterize much of the movement generally speaking). I've seen in your work a hope for the art form, and I think that it may be premature to give up on it. Perhaps you can work toward making it 'gel', or conversely, use its inevitable collapse as an opportunity to document and comment on said collapse. I am, of course, taking your word for it that a new movement (and ipso facto an end to this one) might be on its way.
I wonder if this might be a good opportunity to 'go meta'. Is there a way to use found images in a way that comments on the art form of using found images? Might this meta-commentary provide you the opportunity to depart from structure while still utilizing the substantial skills you've developed in the art form? What about a piece that specifically calls into question the assumptions made by artists about, or the normative constraints on, the formal structure of found-image pieces?
Of course, the danger of this approach is that the relevance of such a commentary is highly contingent on the viewer being embedded in this epoch of art history, and therefore may also doom the artist to obscurity. But if you could find a way to comment on the old practices by ushering in the new wave... that sounds like staying power to me.
have you seen 'men who stare at goats'?
walk through the wall of your cage.
no, run.
conventional images will always have a place; no matter what visionary dreams we can project, if they are not rooted in the real, there is a disconnect, and people may not relate: it seems to me you want to reach people with your art.
Are you knowledgeable on the principle of 'redefining convention and culture' known as 'ad-busting'?
Part Humour, part shock, part Truth... part inside joke that people nod at every time they are reminded by the conventions that still exist around them, that sometimes they feel powerless to change... even when they fell they cannot speak out openly, there exist still, the knowing glances, exchanged, between those who have Known and Seen.
It is leaving a landline near the rabit-hole, so that people who have dreamed of the space between the worlds we are shown and given, can find the secret door that leads them beneath the structures we feel trapped by; into their guts, where sense can be made of things, and other ways to navigate the world, and its ideas, can be found.
To abandon what is real, and even convention, in this world, whether we like it or not, may be to leave many people behind, without a guide, to these ideas that could help them escape this maze... to make their own spiritual journey's and find meaning in this world.
For, I think, in a very real sense, an artist is a guide in the realm of spirit. By sharing what and who you are, what you see, you can transcend the cage of words and convention, sometimes perverted into lies and deception, with a Truth that can transcend the language barriers so many of us are trapped by, our struggle with.
Language is a battle the mainstream have mastered deeply; but image and personal truth is not something they can own or distort so easily: they would have to understand it themselves first, and by so doing, have freed themselves from their own illusions.
So by its very nature it can defy oppression and enslavement in ideas of disempowerment, if used well.
I am better with words; but this will mean I will have to fight, to make their meaning my own. If you can fight with, and know yourself, then you will win your own battle, for the moment, even if scholars one day will fit the work you do into a box that more easily fits their whim.
Those who are hiding from their own truth, have difficulty predicting the power that another's truth can have.
Kind of thirteenth warrior, the strength that you 'cannot see'.
The space where something goes beyond any conception of monetary value, because it speak of the timeless, the indestructable, the essence of the soul.
Looking forward to see you art, but I can only do what I can do.
I think my mom might buy something though (if she can afford it), so one way or another, I may get to see something.
Your art is not the same digitally; it has three dimensional character. But maybe that would still suffice.
Later man.
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