Extinctions and the destruction of objectivity…………
Over the past few months I have been working through and finalising a series of paintings that I have called Extinctions – the process has been an attempt to clarify a number of contradictory influences and motives that have at times come into conflict within my work that have left me feeling uncertain – this is possibly something that we all feel at times in relation to our painting, so perhaps the following may be illuminating and maybe of some help.
Perceptions of space in the artists world are almost instinctively led by the tradition of scientific linear perspective – developments in abstract art, beginning with cubism (the view from everywhere), were, in effect, aberrations or destructions of that linear conception of the space around us – however, they have relied on a tacit acknowledgement of that constructed visual space.
I have long been fascinated with maps and have been trying to develop and visualise in the Extinction series a subjective mapped view that has, at its centre, the concept of the unpositioned viewer and the plausibility of a view from nowhere. Dispensing with the positioned viewer allows for a pluralism which can transform the mapped view into a variety of modes and narratives and allows for the geography of the mind to enter the geography of the landscape.
I began to explore these ideas many years ago with paintings like Seal Bay and Braer in particular, in a conscious effort to break with my own legacy of linear representative work.
Recent flying adventures have reinforced the ideas with easily accessible concrete examples of how perspectives and scales can warp, overlap, and contradict themselves.
Linear perspective is not just the process of binding the picture to vision and visual perception but for centuries it supplied the definition of what we term a picture; it is not just a surface but a plane serving as a window that assumes a human observer whose eye level and distance from that plane were the essential factor in determining its rendition. The making of the picture is therefore defined by the positioned viewer, the frame and the definition of the picture as a window through which an external viewer looks. The consequences of affording the positioned viewer the central determining role were the dissolution of any pictorial equality and the establishment of a qualitative process in which each planar direction and each object were measured in terms of their own intrinsic worth. This process however was more than just the provision of a technique for the organisation of pictorial space – it was also the triumph of a sense of reality which is founded on a notion of objectivity and on the creation of a distance between subject and object.
The increasing refinement of linear perspective allowed for a fixing and a systematisation of external reality. Abstraction and modern art moved away from this to some extent but still held onto the notion of the positioned viewer as the determining factor – the whole artistic notion of composition relies on the off-stage presence of the viewer.
The legacy therefore is the construction of a world view which is founded in notions of objectivity and rationality and the recognition of a central viewer who possesses these qualities and reconstructs the world according to their rationale. Within such a reconstruction there is little room for a plurality of narratives or view points or the recognition of realities constructed through the opposition of differences. The logocentric reconstruction of space appropriates that space and insists on anchoring it to the viewer
The mapped view on the other hand suggests an encompassing of the world, without, however, asserting the order based on human measure that is offered by either abstract or representative painting. I have referred often in the past to discarding notions of composition and ‘aesthetical constructs’ – What I have attempted to do with these paintings is fill them with presences, themes, metaphors and cartographic texts, which signal fundamental absences and challenge the conventions of the relationship between perception, verification and representation.
They (hopefully) have a strategic resistance to being read empirically. I have foregone the domination of a fixed position in an attempt to disrupt normative codes of empirical verification and create an interior tension and debate on the nature and validity of representation. The sheer variety of ‘readings’ that my friends here at RB have applied to the paintings has given me some hope of success.
The Extinction series is almost at an end – in the next series of works I hope to expand some of the narrative elements, beginning with the addition of calligraphic texts……….which should help to confuse things even more……….
Alice in Under...
Sounds exciting, man! I love your extinction series already, but it’s interesting to hear all the contextual clarification straight from the horse’s mouth (by no means a slight on your personal appearence btw).
I get what you’re saying about maps and how they rob (or relieve) us of the ‘responsibility’ we normally bear as a subjective viewer. Personally I love topological maps more than topographical (i.e. the tube map as opposed to the Ordenance Survey No. 73) because they demonstrate a series of relationships. They are ‘read’ rather than ‘viewed’ and I find a pleasing profundity in that (though i can’t quite explain what it is).
Looking forward to seeing what you cook up next! :¬D
kafka replied
I love the way that maps can draw you in and, as you say, read you a multi-layered narrative – they seem to be able to create another space for the imagination to explore. Transposed to painting I have tried to use the mapped view to bring in narrative elements that themselves evolve and interact as the work progresses – It’s a bit random at times, you never quite know what will happen when you combine a map of an idea with a map of a physical landscape – when you throw half a dozen together at once the result can be chaotic……..and colourful, when you then include my natural tendency towards abstract expressionism and add some soul to it, the results can either end up as pea soup – or blow you away – you just never really know.
peter
The role of logic and rationality in my life has been one of convenience. It is the dominant paradigm of our age … yet it denies much of our humanity and my very nature. For me the most logical concept that we possess – numbers – are things that I ‘feel’. I am inspired by your journal to now look at numbers, for which I have a great passion, to seek out the ‘mapped view’ equivalent. Numbers are, after all, just another language for painting the world. They can be used to portray a ‘linear perspective’ ... but I can’t yet think of how they can be used to ‘map’ a perspective. But it’s an interesting challenge.
kafka replied
You are so right Peter – rationality and logic have never been my strongest suits either!
I can’t help feeling that a world that runs on tracks is somehow missing the view.
One of the problems I have with this is that the rules that lay out the tracks are themselves proscribed by rationality – questions posed by art or faith which challenge the rationale, be it in the logic of a painting or the logic of real life, seem to be dismissed as being outside the rules. Numbers are another map that describe our world – the gap between the numerical and the visual….........that really would be an interesting space to explore!........go for it!
Carson Collins
As always, your writing is provocative and gives one a great deal of food for thought. My first reaction is this: Painting as we know it is a form of visual communication in which scale and viewing distance are irreducible elements. One might succeed in creating an art that would somehow negate or eliminate these fundamental elements, but could such an artwork legitimately be called “a painting”?
As concepts, and technology, continue to evolve in the new century, I think we will all have to re-evaluate just exactly what the definition of a “painting” currently is, or should be.
kafka replied
Hi Carson – as you know from previous conversations we have had, I have a slightly different take on the ‘communication’ question – my personal approach is that the primary relationship is between the artist and the painting – the communication between painting and viewer is a separate narrative which often differs from the original. At one time I virtually disregarded the viewer completely (I still do when I am actually painting) but directly as a result of the many conversations that I have had with you and other artists here at RB, I have modified my opinion on the role of the viewer – which has, in part, contributed to the evolution of the Extinction series – the old adage ‘it’s good to talk’ has never been truer!
I’m in complete agreement with your second sentence – these are exciting times for painting with many changes being brought about by new technologies – some defining of boundaries is overdue (if you don’t know where they are, you can’t break them!:-)
mxsara
there was another thread that wondered how the painting would look in 4D …. with kafkas ok i had a go in 3d here are the results of my experiment
and the side view
mxsara
well that didnt work
mxsara
and front on
Mufa3
Wow mx – those are mind-blowing. A painting becomes a sculpture and takes on a whole new dynamic. I know these sketch-stretch programmes exist – but I’ve never actually seen one performed on a painting before.
Utterly fascinating discussion.
I wish I had something spontaneous to add, but I haven’t – this is totally thought provoking.
The only problem I see is the Wittgenstein ‘impossibility of a private language’ argument. If you manage to break down the ‘linear/rational’ hegemony, and escape the dominant conceptual frameworks that we use to make sense of the world – don’t you run the risk of simply producing an amorphous mass that only you have access to perceive?
kafka replied
Thinking of the works as declarations of subjectivity replacing pretences of objectivity within linear work, they are an attempt to defy the traditional view of human control over the world through knowledge, skill and articulation. The grand narratives that we have spoken of in previous discussions are supplanted with narratives of memory, of dislocation and incoherence in which the recognisable element is set floating in a dark expanse of an evasive continent, each elements location gives it neither continuity nor coherent identity, thus removing the positioned viewer and the vast bodies of rational knowledge at his disposal to construct and chart a coherent narrative.
The details do indicate reflected realities of the mapped surface, but they also formulate an illusionary cartographic language and deploy it for purposes of obfuscation (or veiling) rather than enlightened clarification. The fact that the images do not agree to function in the way they might be expected, hopefully alerts the viewer to their real discourse, which stands in for bodies of knowledge which perpetuate assumptions about verifiable realities. They also refer to atmospheric qualities, contributing a dimension of individuation to these undefined continents. The dualities enacted out on the surface of the work are also open to limitless redefinition, hopefully suspending rules and conventions of transmitting knowledge visually – Are those white lines the tracks of ships on an ocean, or are they world-lines, are they economic forecasts or the contrails of aircraft……or are they all of these at the same time?
Foucault makes the claim that visual language is discourse, not reality and that the way in which one alludes to the other within late-Modernism has to be carefully rethought, particularly when it is harnessed to images which are supposedly self-evident conveyors of objective information. Artists like Neustein and Mendietta have already trodden these paths – I am trying to adapt and absorb the ideas within the physical limits of the painted canvas, which is one of the reasons for the multiplicity of painted ‘layers’ and the corresponding narratives they trigger.
There is, as you rightly point out, the very real possibility that the works become entirely unreadable – this, as you know, is not something that I am likely to lose much sleep over. Given your own pleasure in re-reading works as ‘viewer’ this possibility of limitless redefinition is something that you should enjoy, and something that I have developed within my work and allowed for following our discussions here – in other words; If you can’t work out what it is, you’ve only got yourself to blame! ;-)))
mxsara
as Kafka’s painting was already a disscussion on the layered landscape it was possible to ‘pull it apart’ into layers both conceptually and actually … without the reflections and shadows though it would be a diagramme not an object …
i doubt you could do the same thing with a painting/image that was not already a view
of spatial relationships in some way
mx
kafka replied
mx – thank you for making some sense out of all ;-) it is a fascinating development of the work and one that will set me thinking some more!............x
Mufa3
K.
Very commendable objectives.
However the deeper I read into your ‘project’ the more I am convinced that it essentially (here I go again) post-structural. You dismantle so many ‘discourses’, replace them with deliberately ambiguous alternatives, reconstruct the two dimensional space within an uncertain and indistinct narrative and then (despite your protestations) present it to the viewer.
There are then two possibilities, we aim to achieve your ‘discourse’ and therefore gain access and possibly obtain an insight into the ‘artist’ – or we sit tight and evaluate in terms of our own little ‘un-deconstructed’ worlds – and think “hmm – that Kafka certainly knows how to spread the blue around”.
I’m very much with you on the attempt to break down accepted norms of viewing…......
kafka replied
Meant to add the below as a reply…......hit the wrong button again (duh)
kafka
Two quick points (I have very little time this week)
1 – the question of a private language.
I am not sure that maybe all painters do this to a certain extent (some more than others).......Klee, Miro, the big P himself, Dali etc. – the visual elements may be common language – the colours, shapes etc. – but the meanings imparted to them by the artists are very much ‘private’ – it would be virtually impossible to decipher any Dali (for example) without a knowledge of the symbolism that he used….......even harder to work out a Miro….............. The question this begs is – does it matter if the work is made in a language that we do not understand (?)............
2 – The post-structuralism
You may be right about that. I have still not gone into that aspect of the changes that have taken place in my work over the past year – I do know that the whole Extinction series marks a shift in my approach – I only have to go back and look at the dogmatic convictions that I held a year or so ago (I’m sure that you remember our very first encounter about abstract art…......what a little shit I was !:-)) to realise that I have made some fairly major adjustments to the conceptual structures in my work (I like to think of it as an advance….........I may be kidding myself)
I do know that the new series, which will be called Annunciations, is well an truly started and my sketchbooks are filling up with ideas at a rate of knots.
The one thing the Extinction series did was bring together a loose bunch of ideas into a structured working proposition – I’m not wondering an more, I know where the next mark has to be made.
It could well be post-structural…...........the question is – does that really matter either(?)
Mufa3
“does it matter if the work is made in a language that we do not understand”
Not to the post-structuralist, who would say that any language is incapable of being ‘understood’ – as it is necessarily filtered by subjectivity.
“It could well be post-structural……........the question is – does that really matter either(?)”
Not in the least – I only pointed at the implicit suggestion because of your explicit reluctance to go the last step and concede objectivity as myth.
“what a little shit I was !:-))”
I think they call it ‘perceptual salience’ when an individual interprets their own actions in terms much stronger than others would notice – I certainly don’t recall this…... but now I will have to go and check!
“Annunciations”
I had to get the dictionary out for that one – ah! that discourse….............