I took a seminar at the University of Montana, led by Bill Bevis, on Postmodernism. He described the idea of "postmodernism" or the "postmodern experience" somewhat like our experience of reading the front page of a newspaper— seeing bold headlines, photos, snippets of 4 different stories, all at once, and our brain processing all these disparate elements simultaneously. Expand this out to include our conscious and subconscious awareness of a hundred— or a million— other things (am I too cold? too hot? what is that smell? I might be hungry in an hour, the paper feels rough in my hands) all at once, and the idea of the processing we have to do continually in interpreting information and noise becomes obvious.
Contemporary artist, Matthew Ritchie, discusses this idea of information and noise in an interview with PBS Art:21 in relation to his work “The Universal Cell”:
“The way my work works is I’ve tried to build a model that can incorporate as much as it possibly can. It’s like this constantly expanding information structure that can just keep theoretically soaking up everything—but inside a way of seeing so it doesn’t just become this barrage. There are trillions of particles being discarded and bombarding our bodies right now, everything in this space has a meaning, a history, a story. We have to bank it all down, but I’m interested in, okay we’ve banked it all down but now can we bring it up a little, can we turn the volume up just a little more? Can we listen to everything a bit more loudly at the same time rather than selecting parts of the pattern? Can you tolerate, just for a few minutes, not just the physical information but the cultural information, the theological information, everything coming up together?” (http://www.pbs.org/art21/artists/ritchie/clip1.html)
Ritchie’s work is phenomenal. I have included an image of his work "Proposition Player.” The above is an installation view at the Contemporary Arts Museum Houston, Texas in 2003 (From PBS Art:21 Website: http://www.pbs.org/art21/slideshow/?artist=94).
To return to some of the origins of my considerations of the layered experience, or information/noise and how to represent it- one of the things that Bevis’ course led me to back to was Paul Hayes Tucker and Claude Monet. Bevis discussed Picasso and others, but I began to realize that Monet was not only a pathfinder in Modern painting, but in Postmodern painting as well. His incredible handling of paint in his later (20-30 years) paintings— and his depiction of the sky, the water’s surface (lilies), and the world beneath the water, or through the water (roots, silt, etc) had him painting at least four distinct realities simultaneously (the layered image of the scene and the surface of the canvas with loose “painterly” effects). Add to this the fact that much of what he was painting at this time was designed by him (his famous gardens at Giverny) and there is a preconceived reality— a building of reality (a staged scene through landscaping nature) and then an experiencing of it that was taking place.
See above for an example of Monet’s Lilies: “Water Lilies,” 1906 (from http://www.artchive.com/artchive/M/monet/waterlil.jpg.html)
As a former student (although I may always consider myself a student of his) of Paul Hayes Tucker, much of what I do in art returns itself to ideas on Monet and Impressionism anyway. It is one of my reference points that everything can grow towards or away from. Similarly, de Kooning, Rothko and Pollock operate in the same way. Although, in the case of Monet I think this is probably true for most artists operating now- his dramatic arc and development as a painter have been so instrumental in defining our relationships to contemporary art, he is an impossible figure to ignore.
Impressionism was a way for painters to capture a more “realistic” representation of what they saw. It blended budding scientific notions (if not led to them) and certainly displayed some dissatisfaction with the photograph. In the “real” world, things don’t freeze when you look at them. Even in a moment, light moves on water, etc. etc.
In my painting, I move toward taking this “impression” one step further. In what we see, we allow the light to cast and model the subject (and our relationship to the light determines what we see), but also our life experience determines what we see… not only in what we interpret but the inclusion of subconscious flashes of imagery that we impress upon the scene as well. Images of memories, cultural biases, associations, are included with this current information to present a layered set of visual data as a present reality to our consciousness.
Just as imagery is not, in reality, ever frozen— as light and air move imperceptibly fast— neither are we ever aware of a single image, but rather the imperceptibly fast— at times— processing of this visual information includes the bundling of other images. Our internal environment combines with the external environment in a multi-layered image that is pressed to the membrane of the eye. This is akin to the notion that if we are pinched, the skin itself does not “feel” the pain, rather it transfers this information to the brain. Ouch.
Similarly, the brain and the eyes are working together to render an image, that consciously or subconsciously includes a blender-like whirling and chopping and inclusion of numerous sources from our past. If not, the addition of the biases of the collective conscious as postulated by Jung.
But back to seeing. As the Impressionists were attempting to render a truer depiction— albeit a personal one— of “seeing,” so, too, do my new paintings strive to imitate this conglomeration of images that occurs in looking. No picture can be frozen, no image can be singular.
I think of Cezanne resisting the urge to put paint in places where he wasn’t sure and forcing himself to leave these places blank/white. Unless we consciously force ourselves, moment by agonizing moment, our brains will fill in the blanks— our brains will tell us from past experience how something looks; or is supposed to look.
As with my painting, “Sources,” the experience of a woman looking into a mirror might conjure images of how she was supposed to look, or her visions of what a woman should look like, from comic book imagery from her youth alongside critical media opinions of various celebrities as spied in a supermarket tabloid during checkout. It isn’t just the light, or our position that determines what we are seeing, but also our experience— or visual bank— that determines what and how we see things and creates the actual layered image we record moment by moment.
I keep thinking while painting these works “What are you looking at?” And the ideas range from the most terse and argumentative projection “WHAT ARE YOU LOOKING AT” to the most inquisitive and timid, “what are you looking at?”
What are you looking at over there?
Just what do you think you’re looking at?
Ooooo, what are youuuuu LOOKING at?
The word “looking” has even begun to “look” weird.
All that said, these current paintings hope to bring into question the true nature of what we are all looking at, and a representation of this layered experience that is both accurate to some possible degree, visually stimulating, and emotionally and intellectually compelling.
Finally, it occurs to me that in all this filtering of information and noise, much of what we filter out is necessary. Not necessary to filer it out, but rather, it may be necessary to take a closer look at. In a culture where we are bombarded by imagery and information it is all too easy to filter out and accept the things that go whizzing by without giving their impact and message full consideration (which our subconscious is doing with or without our permission).
Contemporary artist, Matthew Ritchie, discusses this idea of information and noise in an interview with PBS Art:21 in relation to his work “The Universal Cell”:
“The way my work works is I’ve tried to build a model that can incorporate as much as it possibly can. It’s like this constantly expanding information structure that can just keep theoretically soaking up everything—but inside a way of seeing so it doesn’t just become this barrage. There are trillions of particles being discarded and bombarding our bodies right now, everything in this space has a meaning, a history, a story. We have to bank it all down, but I’m interested in, okay we’ve banked it all down but now can we bring it up a little, can we turn the volume up just a little more? Can we listen to everything a bit more loudly at the same time rather than selecting parts of the pattern? Can you tolerate, just for a few minutes, not just the physical information but the cultural information, the theological information, everything coming up together?” (http://www.pbs.org/art21/artists/ritchie/clip1.html)
Ritchie’s work is phenomenal. I have included an image of his work "Proposition Player.” The above is an installation view at the Contemporary Arts Museum Houston, Texas in 2003 (From PBS Art:21 Website: http://www.pbs.org/art21/slideshow/?artist=94).
To return to some of the origins of my considerations of the layered experience, or information/noise and how to represent it- one of the things that Bevis’ course led me to back to was Paul Hayes Tucker and Claude Monet. Bevis discussed Picasso and others, but I began to realize that Monet was not only a pathfinder in Modern painting, but in Postmodern painting as well. His incredible handling of paint in his later (20-30 years) paintings— and his depiction of the sky, the water’s surface (lilies), and the world beneath the water, or through the water (roots, silt, etc) had him painting at least four distinct realities simultaneously (the layered image of the scene and the surface of the canvas with loose “painterly” effects). Add to this the fact that much of what he was painting at this time was designed by him (his famous gardens at Giverny) and there is a preconceived reality— a building of reality (a staged scene through landscaping nature) and then an experiencing of it that was taking place.
See above for an example of Monet’s Lilies: “Water Lilies,” 1906 (from http://www.artchive.com/artchive/M/monet/waterlil.jpg.html)
As a former student (although I may always consider myself a student of his) of Paul Hayes Tucker, much of what I do in art returns itself to ideas on Monet and Impressionism anyway. It is one of my reference points that everything can grow towards or away from. Similarly, de Kooning, Rothko and Pollock operate in the same way. Although, in the case of Monet I think this is probably true for most artists operating now- his dramatic arc and development as a painter have been so instrumental in defining our relationships to contemporary art, he is an impossible figure to ignore.
Impressionism was a way for painters to capture a more “realistic” representation of what they saw. It blended budding scientific notions (if not led to them) and certainly displayed some dissatisfaction with the photograph. In the “real” world, things don’t freeze when you look at them. Even in a moment, light moves on water, etc. etc.
In my painting, I move toward taking this “impression” one step further. In what we see, we allow the light to cast and model the subject (and our relationship to the light determines what we see), but also our life experience determines what we see… not only in what we interpret but the inclusion of subconscious flashes of imagery that we impress upon the scene as well. Images of memories, cultural biases, associations, are included with this current information to present a layered set of visual data as a present reality to our consciousness.
Just as imagery is not, in reality, ever frozen— as light and air move imperceptibly fast— neither are we ever aware of a single image, but rather the imperceptibly fast— at times— processing of this visual information includes the bundling of other images. Our internal environment combines with the external environment in a multi-layered image that is pressed to the membrane of the eye. This is akin to the notion that if we are pinched, the skin itself does not “feel” the pain, rather it transfers this information to the brain. Ouch.
Similarly, the brain and the eyes are working together to render an image, that consciously or subconsciously includes a blender-like whirling and chopping and inclusion of numerous sources from our past. If not, the addition of the biases of the collective conscious as postulated by Jung.
But back to seeing. As the Impressionists were attempting to render a truer depiction— albeit a personal one— of “seeing,” so, too, do my new paintings strive to imitate this conglomeration of images that occurs in looking. No picture can be frozen, no image can be singular.
I think of Cezanne resisting the urge to put paint in places where he wasn’t sure and forcing himself to leave these places blank/white. Unless we consciously force ourselves, moment by agonizing moment, our brains will fill in the blanks— our brains will tell us from past experience how something looks; or is supposed to look.
As with my painting, “Sources,” the experience of a woman looking into a mirror might conjure images of how she was supposed to look, or her visions of what a woman should look like, from comic book imagery from her youth alongside critical media opinions of various celebrities as spied in a supermarket tabloid during checkout. It isn’t just the light, or our position that determines what we are seeing, but also our experience— or visual bank— that determines what and how we see things and creates the actual layered image we record moment by moment.
I keep thinking while painting these works “What are you looking at?” And the ideas range from the most terse and argumentative projection “WHAT ARE YOU LOOKING AT” to the most inquisitive and timid, “what are you looking at?”
What are you looking at over there?
Just what do you think you’re looking at?
Ooooo, what are youuuuu LOOKING at?
The word “looking” has even begun to “look” weird.
All that said, these current paintings hope to bring into question the true nature of what we are all looking at, and a representation of this layered experience that is both accurate to some possible degree, visually stimulating, and emotionally and intellectually compelling.
Finally, it occurs to me that in all this filtering of information and noise, much of what we filter out is necessary. Not necessary to filer it out, but rather, it may be necessary to take a closer look at. In a culture where we are bombarded by imagery and information it is all too easy to filter out and accept the things that go whizzing by without giving their impact and message full consideration (which our subconscious is doing with or without our permission).
All of this is beautiful, and I am honored to even try to capture its beauty.
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