October 16 to 23, 2016
Considering painting as a performative act.
[define- painting, performative, act]
A performative act that occurs in the studio between the artist and object.
[define- occur, studio, artist, object]
A performative act that occurs outside the studio between spectator and object.
[define-, space outside the studio, between, spectator]
The painting is both an object (work of art) and the documentation of performances (many, varied). The painting has no singular identity.
[define- singular as opposed to multifaceted or multiple within the context of identity]
Thus painting, both as a verb and a noun, is a metaphor for identity (noun) and the process of becoming an identity (verb).
Is painting (as metaphor) the methodology as well as the method (the act of painting)?
[define- painting as methodology, painting as method]
Painting as the (typically 2D) process of creating through the layering of images and information by applying a non-structurual approach as opposed to drawing (also typically 2D) which is a process of creating throught the development of structures.
Drawing is Creepy [essay from October 28, 2014]
The role of the alter ego.
Alter egos are brought to life, made living, convincing, real, through the layering of information (including images)- their fleshing out- and not (solely) through the development of an internal support structure- the bones, skeleton.
An alter ego is more than just skin and bones.
Does this mean that alter egos lack ‘bones’? That alter egos are just piles of flesh, raw meat? Having no structural support?
No.
Through the process of layering an ‘anti’ or ‘non’ structure is constructed; this is what supports the formation of identity.
Even bones can be dissolved into fragments which are cells, and the cells fragmented further into DNA.
This project is about acquiring a greater base for understanding how and why personal identity is what we know it to be as opposed to a simple acquiescene of additional knowledge on what personal identity is constructed of.
It is not a question of what the materials from which identity is created are, it is an exploration of how the materials are applied and why this can expand the basis of our understanding of identity.
This is about understanding personal identity as a multifaceted, fragmented and layered construction- supported not by a traditionally constructed internal structure, but by a structure created through the process of layering. This is neither a completely internal nor external structure...it is not to be understood as an exoskeleton.
Architectural metaphor
Balloon framing vs traditional timber or masonary framing methods of construction.
‘New World’ vs European methods of construction.
A favorite joke by a German friend, a musician, an ‘intellectual’, also trained as a harpsichord builder:
A German couple meet an American couple on the street.
The German couple says to the American couple ‘we’re building a house’.
The American couple replies ‘Really? We’re glueing one together now too!’
‘New World’(Popular, low) Culture vs European (Refined, high) Culture
Painting (Renaissance to …) built upon the ‘drawn’ structure.
Perspective.
Even imagined space adhered in some way to this system of structuring.
Perspective-Point of View
Painting (Impressionism to AbEx/Colorfield) a period of transition. The drawn structure is questioned. Perspective is shown to be illusionary and multifaceted. Painting begins to be built upon a structure of layers. The mark and the gesture are bones conected by soft tissue...paint. The paint itself, paint as a material form the structure.
Painting (Pop through Death of Painting). Is painting of the period since Rauschenberg, et al. perhaps the bastard child (and its progeny) of Dada and Surrealism? Is this part of the reason for the identity crisis faced by Painting in the period 196_ to 198_ which prematurely declared it ‘dead’? What DNA did the Dada and Co. (ok, M. Duchamp) bring to paintings gene pool that led to this?
Concept.
Theory has nothing to do with a work of art. Pictures which are interpretable, and which contain a meaning, are bad pictures. A picture presents itself as the Unmanageable, the Illogical, The Meaningless. It demonstrates the endless multiplicity of aspects; it takes away our certainty, because it deprives a thing of its meaning and its name. It shows us the thing in all the manifold significance and infinite variety that preclude the emergence of any single meaning and view.’[Richter, 2002. 55]
Is this why Richter loathes Duchamp. Is it his anger at the father for abandoning his bastard child, painting, robbing it of its name, its identity? But sattled with the DNA passed along to him Richter could only do what he could do: acknowledge concept, Paint.
Paint remains the core.
Are we less confused by this now than then?
No. Example
Is the confusion part and parcel of the identities of painting today?
Is it for me not so much about a rejection of the structural as it is about embracing the non-structural, the layer?
Even bones are held in place, supported and strengthend by a structure of soft connective tissue. This is what gives flexibility to the otherwise rigidity of our bodies.
Paint is flexible.
In the brain an external ‘net’ of cells covers the surface, holding the brain in place. A balloon frame of sorts. Like any net there are holes between the structure of the netting, the connective neuronal structure. These holes are vital to the function of the brain, it is in these gaps, holes, between spaces that the synapses that contain memory happen. [Roger Tsien’s Lab research]. These areas of ‘non-structure’ are not empty holes, but holes overflowing with material that forms layers of identity...memory.
What would I paint if I were not me?