BIRTH OF AN IDEA THAT DEVELOPED
FILLING IN THE BLANKS (MY PROCESS WITH SOME THEORY)
As an artist, I have developed a unique process of creation that involves the contemplation of dualities in nature, such as the past versus the study of the relationship between family and self, in order to establish one's identity through reflections on the past versus the present, results in nostalgic tendencies that appear as recurring motifs in my work. Also, I cannot deny the parallels drawn by the psychoanalytic theories that underpin my creative work process, especially Melanie Klein's interpretation of "art as reparation".5 The status of my subjects as essentially kin to myself, but physically disconnected, give my unconscious an attempt to correct the past and formulate these connections.
As a result, Klein's idea of the process of making art as a way of repairing is essential to my painting practice. Despite the fact that these psychoanalytic theories support my painting process and thesis, I do not consciously delve into the theories of the inner mind. Instead, I will focus on my personal feelings about the painting process and how it has informed my thesis project.
Also, Klein refers to the process of making art as a "constructive guilt." See more in Anna D'Alleva's Methods & Theories of Art History. Basically, the traditional practice of the medium of oil paint welcomes the effect of what I like to call "slow burning". This unhurried trajectory offers space for contemplation and a meditative state where emotions and admiration for a painting are brought about by different visual experiences that are built up over time.
WHO ARE YOU? AND WHERE DID
The change in my idea of home occurred when my family moved from my childhood neighborhood in New Jersey to Rochester; it was traumatic for me. It was my first semester of my freshman year and I wanted to create a device that could act as a surrogate home. Nicoletta explains Bourgeois's ambiguous tendencies in relation to Lacan's theory, which she states: “The Femmes-Masisons illustrate the difficulties of communication between people through images rather than words.” 367.
She used the form of the home to refer to the notion of domesticity and the suffocating restrictions that come with the oppression of women; furthermore, the structural requirements that come with the home take shape in these works of the woman's head and mind, which Bourgeois draws on top of the female naked body. Lacan's approach to the unconscious can be briefly summarized as follows: “the meaning created by the signifier/signified is again displaced through (A) metaphor, a masculine conception that works through similarity and substitution, and (B) metonymy, a feminine concept . that works through contiguity (closeness) and displacement.”8 A primary idea is that a signifier's meaning can never be stabilized. Kate Dimitrova's lecture "The Art of Louise Bourgeois through the Lens of Lacanian Psychoanalytic Theory" she summarizes that Jacques Lacan's understanding of the unconscious as.
For example, my red painting called Another Red Room (2015) (fig 2) was my interpretation of my primary childhood home in New Jersey. Conversely, memories on the table and the hanging plant are left underdeveloped to draw attention to my imaginative process and elevate the well-rendered fruit bowl that is the centerpiece of the image. My aesthetic has evolved to leave portions of the canvas blank, in a state of being undeveloped.
Yet I tried to overpower that sense of nostalgia that attracted the viewer by using expressive formal qualities that allow the viewer's attention to be overwhelmed by the obvious brushstrokes, intense color quality and powerfully defined line work. As the first painting in my series, this is intended as an introductory piece, as a stage or backdrop for the viewer to think about for themselves, alongside the other paintings in the series. Dumas talks about her relationship with her rejections in comparison to her other works: “The rejections are mine and they are ghosts, so I can change them.” (For more information, see: Tateshots: Marlene Dumas talks about rejections) This.
Although her mother is holding her, I have provided a separation/addition to the image based on my own associations and relationship with her. The second image, which I layered on top of the initial one, was simply to skew the initial image further, showing the same young boy, but floating in space and wearing glasses. I deliberately entwined his figure, with whom I have no emotional connection, with that of the figures of the first.
This superimposition of two images and the utilization of the layering effect on Photoshop translated very differently to the painting. The colors chosen are red, orange, yellow, green, blue and purple; each part of their own world and yet part of my painted series of six works through the use of an overall monochromatic scheme. In conclusion, my self-realized logic resulted in me making up the majority of my family history.
Ultimately, my research explored the structure and psychological and philosophical implications of my painting or “filling in the blanks” process.
HOME AS A SIGNIFER
AMBIGUITY IN PORTRAITURE
Bourgeois's ambiguity and the multivalent meaning of her Femmes Maisons serve as a counterpart to my play with my subjects. More so, my penchant for such opacity in portraiture comes from the South African-born artist Marlene Dumas (b. 1953). Dumas's approach to drawing her subjects is remarkable, especially in Rejects a collection of portraits, which she rejected from her previous series of works.
Schutz talks about her artistic practice at the Saatchi Online Gallery: “My paintings are loosely based on metanarrative. This allows for a distance between her subjects that is evident in her shameless technique, where the figures' jumbled faces are given juices for flesh. Also, the translucency of the pigments results in most of her subjects retaining a ghostly and eerie quality.
Furthermore, Dumas' use of ink on paper results in a shade of gray, which in turn speaks to her photographic references. Measure Your Own Grave (2008) is another series by Dumas with seventy paintings and thirty-five drawings. Once again, Dumas merges themes such as race, sexuality and social identity with personal experiences and art through the human figure.
10 By accepting her subjects as rejected, Dumas gives herself complete curatorial freedom to display her subjects however she pleases, without fear of the ridicule of an outsider. With such a status, her subjects can be both serious and playful, some of which are cut and pasted over other rejects, completely transformed from the original. This random selection of drawings began in 1994 to 2014, the evolution of its rejections took 20 years in the making.
TateShots, Marlene Dumas, Marlene Dumas: Talks About Rejects, directed by Rudolf Evenhuis., published 5 February 2015, accessed 1 May 2015. For example, my purple painting entitled Purplexed (2015) (fig. 4) represents my reasoning about to present my figures through an ambiguous filter. The images obtained for this image were created from two overlapping images, using my Photoshop skills to create a digitally enhanced image (Figure 5).
COLOR AS A SUBJECT
The two images used for this painting come from my father's photo album from his first marriage. Additionally, knowing that, I intentionally distorted her face to look like she was wearing some sort of mask, similar to that of. This evolution led to an expression of nostalgic tendencies and functions as an indication of our universal ability to retrieve and construct memories (fig. 4).
The process of choosing a single color for a painting was instinctive, but I found that each color choice evoked an unconscious emotion expressed through object, texture, line and shape. Choosing one color for each scene is a logical order that resulted in bridging all my seemingly disparate scenes.
REACHING A POINT OF RESOLUTION
Storytelling took over my own ancestry and their representations or signifiers took on a new form. I seek to provide a collective consciousness in the dynamic fields of relationships that surround us through the scope of the family tree. The future will only carry more past experiences and associations with people, places and things and there will always be a story to tell or one to fill in the blanks for.
