Where you can find me (Whilt 19)

Remember this one of my series – Whilt – What Have I learned Today?

Trying to come back to it – little day-to-day discoveries of a starry-eyed kid, which lives in me (despite my daring attempts to evict it) and within all those interesting people I’ve met.

I followed that link – contemplating a personal story of a man close to me I bumped into that movie: “Into the wild” – loyal portrayal of a real drama of Christopher McCandless – a top student from a privileged background, who – bitterly disappointed by vanity and hypocrisy of his parents, by mindless brutality and shallowness of his society drops out of the picture trying to reclaim shattered identity and personal integrity. He does it through an impossibly romantic, extreme means of going into the wild of Alaska, living only from the land-resources and in a total isolation. Being only 24 and after two years of his adventure Chris dies out of starvation in his adopted ‘home’ – a wreck of a green bus. That bus in itself becomes a destination for dozens of McCandless’s followers, his uncompromising choices in life are being interpreted in equally extreme fashion – from glorifying the ‘hero’, who had to paid the highest price for an attempt of a noble self-discovery, to scolding the ‘spoiled, egocentric’ kid.

One of the most poignant discoveries this run-away’s parents had made was, that he didn’t want to be found. One can save someone who is temporarily lost, or help the one, who plays hide-and seek game out of lack of confidence or confusion or pain, but not the one, who makes a conscious decision of ‘disappearing’ from your life. Thinking about that I started to approach this question if I, indeed, want to be ‘found’ in this very wilderness of the Internet reality. Energy and dynamics of the Web-World acts as ever-expanding multiverse – once you lose the track of its actual demands and nature – you share fate of a micro-organism completely lost somewhere in a vast vacuum of a Tropical Forest. And it doesn’t matter, if your performance here is of a poor or great quality; or of any importance to humanity in general… who really bothers after all…

Here are the online services, where you can find me, except of this site (obviously) – join and use the fun of Facebook (my name: Katarzyna Skonieczna), where you can quickly connect with those you know, check the latest ‘what’s up’ with them, compete in various (deliciously childish) games and share your thoughts the moment you think them… Twitter (my name: skonieczna) is another, very immediate and natural way of sharing your online experience, you simply answering the one and only question: “what are you doing?’ – what are you doing right now – share the article, you’ve just read; picture you’ve discovered, new web-site, follow people, who make it all more fascinating and inspiring… There is where you can, if you want to – find me – the moment I will dare to disappear – you will be one of the first to know…

P.S.

Enjoy thoughtful song from ‘Into the wild’ above. Eddie Vedder signs ‘Society’. More about the philosophy behind this movie, which, I believe is worthy to explore – in my next posts

Studying Art (20) – some loose thoughts…

Being ‘graduate’… I mean, how ridiculous it feels…

Being ‘graduate’ in Fine Art… I mean, one cannot get it more absurd… There is no ‘graduating’ from art, unless one can ‘graduate’ in ‘being a human being’…

Having first show, first chat with a journalist, first reviews from the public – at once one’s is able to see what art is really for – I met with those attentive eyes… hungry for any sort of a thoughtful, emotional expression from another human creature…. ‘C’mon – show me a bit of yourself, prove that there is still that thing called ‘a soul’ in us, let me witness your humanity here and now, whatever’…

Looking back at past months without a shadow of any sentiment – I mean, only my innate stubbornness kept me digging in that hell… Guess, that meant I really had started to ‘study’ and ‘make’ art… Only guessing…

Getting really cross with myself due to my perfect failure to prevent my private life from taking over my studio work during the last year. How it calls to be called – a lack of ‘professionalism’, or rather opposite – daring attempt to ‘master’ human condition despite of all odds, or maybe – just the natural event in one’s life?…

Naturally observing art-life around and having those ‘improper’ yet intense thoughts, that art is not and is never going to be for everyone, just forget all that ‘democratic’ rubbish and populists’ talks… Classical music is not for everyone, hard-rock is not for everyone, learning Chinese is not for everyone and even driving cannot be mastered or even tolerated by some people… Some are driven by irresistible forces, some only let to be guided, sometimes only by one’s vanity or greed. Ethos of an artist needs to be re-established, made clear to all and supported at all costs. Otherwise, we don’t have ‘art’, we don’t have ‘artists’ any more – we have ‘art-world’, ‘occupation’, ‘business’, ‘creativity’; we have ‘professionals’, ‘graduates’, ‘MFAs’ and all sorts of folks having no idea whatsoever, how bl…y serious game they involved themselves in…

One needs a break even, or – especially – from the things one puts no price on, simply cos there can’t be any price… things one would die for, if needed… A step back instead of grabbing and gaining even more control, just letting go… I excelled in making things more complex that they probably are, now – I have to learn, by ‘letting go’, how to make simple choices and obvious statements.

Having tendency to ‘over-intelectualize’ my work, and  that’s surprising considering that I’ve started as a completely intuitive painter. Now, I build an entire elaborated construction of theories in order to touch the canvas with a brush. I guess, it’s a protective mechanism (as a shrink would say) – use your head when using your heart and instincts feels like a torture…

Keeping on exploring links between science and art – funny, how the questions and problems of both echo each other, not to mention that it all seems to generate from the major philosophical systems of the past and present. Everything is so deliciously cross-feeding and inter-depending that it seems crazy to chop up human culture on so many ‘self-sufficient’ institutionally defined parts.

Preparing for a hot summer in the Middle and East-Europe. Wishing you all fruitful escapades for fun, meaning and maybe some inspiration as well!

Studying Art (18) – Getting over it…

What a year it was… I mean – not easy one… In fact – bl…y difficult…

Studying art is a bit like diving in Le Grand Bleu… further down, the less light and more dense matter… Waters around get less inviting, more frightening and yet – strangely captivating, with that pulsating, magnetic force, which commands you to continue, in moments against your self-preservation instincts and despite of all…

It became a sort of my habit to use this web-space to express my gratitude to everyone involved (voluntary or by an accident) into my studying and ‘getting over’ it… It’s been always my ambition to present this site – its research and its ethos as a natural extension of everything, what had happened to preoccupy me in my ‘actual’ studio. I wanted it to be a virtual companion of my ‘real’ studies in ‘real’ life – yet, it came out as a sort of a separate project, fairly independent and inspiring – must say… What I only regret is that a real, stimulating link between ‘Terra Incognita’ online and the ‘unknown land’ in my studio has failed to be established… I mean, my work was either behind or ahead of my writing here, often pulling in directions, I couldn’t find the words for; or (even worse) – trying to ‘show’ the abstract thoughts and complex ideas expressed here. Also, I’ve chosen a low-key profile sharing this site with few… well, not very generous of me…

Generally, in this very moment, when my time as an ‘undergraduate’ is heading quickly to the end, I would strongly recommend to any art student to have his/her ‘grassroots movement’ online – to establish and take time in developing a site, a club, a gallery… a space, which is infinite and incredibly enriching, which gives freedom of expression and a great training in responsibility/persistence… Besides, where else you could tease your tutors publicly or discuss your view on art with visitors from the US, Trinidad/Tobago or Tbilisi at the same time?

Yes, that was a confusing year… I can’t remember the last time, when I was that intensely and unsettlingly aware, that carrying on the way I’d chosen would have cost me much more than the lost appetite or the minor melancholic headache… Omnipresent futility and fragility of life in its countless scenes unfolded with its cruel arbitrariness. An admirer of Shakespeare couldn’t help to tease his master: ‘where – on Earth – did you get your sense of drama from?… You’re a great charmer and a liar, nothing more… There is nothing truly dramatic or spectacular in one’s world going to pieces… Just a quiet surprise, being repeated as a mantra: ‘was it really so frail?… I used to think it will go on for ever…’”

Anyway… getting over it, emerging, transcending…

My traditionally big and sincere THANKS to you all guys – online and offline, accidental and doomed to meet me everyday – for your presence, your patience, your time, your support… it’s been simply priceless and won’t be forgotten, not easily anyway…

————————————————————————————————-

Studying Art (17) – Why do you paint?

I’ve been challenged with this innocent question recently, and though I came up with an immediate answer at that moment ‘of truth’, I still keep pondering over it now, as if looking for a deeper, fuller view…

Why do you paint? Why do I paint?

My photographs say most of what I want to convey, my writing could explain the rest… I enjoy constructing installations, and I’ve got a truly creative time exploring all the new media available… Yet, I’ve been coming back to painting like a prodigal son, despite,  or – perhaps – because of everything, that has been given and taken away from me, due to my pursuit of this particular way… That ‘everything’, which I find almost beyond any description…

I remember being praised for that ‘loyalty’ to the medium, and my answer – quick, almost sub-conscious, was:
- Well, we cannot escape ourselves, can we?…
And then I added:
- In forty years time, I will probably still be painting…

Strange, how sure I was about it at that time, having only few studies in paint executed and still being largely ignorant about the most basic things…

I’m far from crafting any cryptic messages about the mystical connections between a painter and his materials, between his psyche and that angelic ‘monster’ – the painting, which always proves to be stronger than its creator… There is something true about it and those, who paint can grasp it… Yet, there is much more…

Painting has got that power to create, and abolish, entire worlds… just now… And the responsibility for that is a part of an adventure… Just like the all  pain involved into it…

That was my ‘raw’,  intuitive answer to the title-question. I meant by that, that each time I take a paint-loaded brush to live a mark on canvas I’m in a charge of an universe, which is out there, waiting to be created in me, and – through me – in an artwork…

It can take a minute or years; it can cost nothing or life and health; it can result in generation-changing discoveries and it may end up in a private despair only… Yet – there is that creative, never-ending, always profound challenge no other artistic medium, I know, can offer to a searching mind and courageous spirit… The challenge to capture the essence of life and death, humanity and divinity, what has ever existed and what is possible yet…

Painting is my Theory of Everything – it aims at explaining and linking all the matter of my consciousness (and unconscious) into an independent, evocative system – a Cosmos taming and denying Chaos .

Painting is the projection of my humanity, it’s a story of a human being… No other medium (except maybe music) appears to be so close to the human nervous system – I paint with my nerves, I paint with my blood and cells… I paint as a living being – living organism to create another living organisms – self-sufficient microcosms.

I paint to save and to be saved…

And you – Why do YOU paint?…

———————————————————————————————-

“Fractal Ontology” – Blog on WordPress

Here is the new fantastic blog I’ve just discovered – FRACTAL ONTOLOGY. ‘Powered’ by a formidable erudition and the searching spirit by two young guys: Joseph Weissman and Taylor Adkins.

These two gentlemen – graduates of philosophy, have an ambition to.. and here, if I may dare to give the voice to them:

So, basically, our idea is this: it is possible to plot a complex path, tracing connections through both clinical and critical theory, towards a new kind of science — a de-centered, non-hierarchical science, capable of grasping and bridging the ruptures between cybernetics, language and society.

What we’ve been doing: mapping out connections between psychoanalysis and philosophy to other fields and disciplines, including theoretical biology, cultural studies and artificial intelligence. We also provide notes, outlines, translations and textual analyses of important contemporary theoretical questions, works and writers.

Above that, they use images – photographs, fine art paintings or digital art – in a way, that actually made me think about impossible – that pure art is made purely to… serve other reasons than its own sake – that it exists to illustrate and enhance ideas that science and philosophy convey in words, graphics and numbers; and vice versa – pure art can and should be made to inspire scientific breakthrough-s.

What a boring, small-minded talk after all – to preach self-importance and superiority of lets say – painting or sculpture – in a clear isolation from what may be regarded as its actual ‘womb’ – I mean all the dynamics of a particular TIME, a moment in the TIME – with all the theories (all major and affluent from the fields of philosophy, science, psychology etc), as well as the cultural and political movements influencing an artist with his/her consent or without it…

And what is that ‘fractal ontology’ after all, and how it may be interesting for visual artists? Well, those of you who may miss the points made by Weissman and Adkins or may find them too cryptic, I will try to explain in my next posts (without any promise though)…

Studying art (16) -Humility

It will sound like a pure didacticism, yet – this appears to be the new discovery of mine: art is one of the best teachers of humility one can find.

I’ve been going through stages of naive, dreamy escapism, of unconditional passion, of playing tricks and games; I’ve used artistic means to express how much I care about and adore human world and how deeply negative, even nihilistic  about it I may become… I’ve got mesmerizing and intimate moments of a discovery, metamorphosis and truly painful bits of going astray…

And I’ve experienced months passing like weeks and those weeks making me older like one would got in years; childlike and often purely vain self-importance has been interweaving with the periods of self-abuse and self-denial…I made great plans and watched them going to pieces in one small push of fate; I hoped and got disappointed; I gave hope and let others down… My entire worldview and personal identity has been challenged dozens of times and I’ve never felt so powerful and so meaningless in my whole life…

And that’s all because of one decision made over three years ago – to study/make art – decision being continuously and not without a struggle refreshed almost each day…

Yes, art can be and is a severe yet quite compelling mentor and a guide – it knows no masters, truths, rules or logic beyond its own ones; it crowns with immortality and it devours without a blink of an eye.

This period of my study – final months of going towards the first degree in fine art is the time of humility and humiliation – I’m being put down by my own work, simply because it reads me perfectly – that neither my head or my heart are in charge as they should have been… So I’m producing substitutes, broken cups – useless right from the beginning, still-born paintings which I desperately try to revive and the ‘display’ work – to convince myself (yet not my tutors) that I’m in a good shape… I’m not prepared for a defeat yet, I’m not prepared to paint bad paintings, to be rejected and to admit my impotency, the limits of my imagination and mental capability; I’m unable to accept any help and to give much more than is expected of me…

And that’s why I’m not ready to be an artist yet… I may become a graduate in art, I will not become a painter… Unless I will find a way to cease to be – me myself – the biggest obstacle and enemy of my own work.

Integrity and disintegration… (Whilt 18)

From time to time, and recently quite often, I catch myself as being innocently and profoundly ignorant as to the meaning of some concepts, ideas, words, phrases… It’s got something to do with the English as an adopted language; even if it’s used completely naturally and fluently – there is always that surreal quality of putting on a mask, a costume, going on stage each time I have to or choose to communicate in not-my-mother-tongue… What’s interesting, that after years of being cut of the sophisticated, literary and everyday usage of Polish I’ve lost that absolute ‘feeling’, that innate sense of my first language… So, I’m somewhere between; and even craving – I’m not able to create a decent fiction or poems in either of codes of expression… not yet, not without a considerable struggle, at least…

So, I’ve come across that concept of the artistic integrity – first I had to check in five different dictionaries (of three languages) extended definitions of the notion; each one had a slightly varying shade of meaning attached; so I felt like juggling between them composing the balanced outlook…

Then – the tougher bit came when I asked myself – But what exactly does it mean – to be an artist of integrity? Does it mean the same as being the man of integrity, or – can the professional integrity coexist with the personal disintegration and vice-versa? Is integrity ‘merely’ a virtue you possess or not like courage or modesty, or rather a fundamental component of any individual, without which a serious trouble creeps into your life?… And  how this noble talk relates to the contemporary postmodern ethics (or rather non-ethics) of making/dealing with art? Who has, who can afford now to keep his/hers artistic integrity over time, when sometimes one call from a hated curator or a critic you disregard may be a life changing event? And so on, and so on…

Quite recently I’ve unwillingly provoked one of my tutors (calling my new paintings ‘a mess’) to form and challenge me with ‘the tough question’: If you won’t have an integrity with your work – who else will? To have an integrity with one’s work – that means to be unified in terms of the intent, concepts and the general message; or does it? If I call my own work ‘a mess’ – publicly and honestly – isn’t that enough to prove my solidarity with it? My demanding, yet compassionate unity with a piece of art which happens to be as confused as its author? Does it always have to sound ‘assertive’ and ‘confident’; ‘positive’ and ‘grand’ – like in salesmen’ slimy talk where even obvious downsides are clothed in sweetish-easy ‘solutions’…

And why is ‘integrity’ such a sought feature in an artist after all? I bet it suits perfectly some particular ‘breeds’ of professions – lawyers, doctors, teachers, intellectuals – sure… I know men who are a book-like example of the whole phenomenon – they’re noble and loyal, creative and open-minded; yet there is something vital missing in them – a spark of imagination empowering to jump in the dark, to take bold risks and challenge barriers or even rules, if necessary; they’re the guardians of the gates – and no artist should aim at that domain (not only, not merely, not predominantly).

An artist is a man of integrity chiefly via the creative act – by doing what he was born for – in the best, most dedicated way he/she knows and can apply; what comes to the world from that act is another matter – yet so-called integrity has nothing, or little to do with that.

If my work’s integrity comes from its conscious and chosen disintegration and subversion who can prove it wrong, and on which grounds?

——————————————————————————————————————–

Art is no more… (Whilt 12)

Art is no more. It doesn’t matter any more. Few decades from now on, without any new input of any new visual expression would do us all great. We are all over-loaded, the world is over-saturated with pictures.

Conservators and museums do their best, and in 2500 the human race still marvels over Massacio, enjoys Matisse, gets confused wrinkles over ‘Mr. Important Conceptualist’.

In 4500 the most sophisticated communication between the members of the population flows in a continuous river of the perfectly balanced impulses from the brain-installed implants. No dream-catchers are needed, no thoughts brokers and emotions dealers allowed. Experience of living is a powerful, never-ending climax of meaning, yet no need/desire to use any kind of the ‘conventional’ language ever reaches that multiverse of sense and beauty.

I’m having now two simultaneous streams of images/concepts going through my head; one is obsessively evolving around the contemporary paintings I saw recently and the theory of art I have studied; the other flashes with a vivid recollection of Gaza war chaos and drama, some great death-escapes (as a heroic pilot lands the broken plane safely on the water), some very ordinary challenges of the everyday existence. And these two worlds seem to form two different orbits – visible for each other, yet never really meeting or interacting…

I would say, in theory it’s getting closer, in practice – you see art today, you think about your work, and you have that overwhelming feeling – the real stuff happens elsewhere.  Art in general, my art (in particular) is like a granny trying to break in a wild horse, its language and politics – no matter how ‘contemporary’ – are not exactly there yet, pretentious and impotent… And ‘yet’ is a key-world here. Since why to bother with all that after all… art is the null, but it’s got that privilege of being the ‘great null’. Its DNA is that of the Black Holes of the Universe – it compares to nothing from the world you know as a common bread-eater. By its superior genetics art is the space of a transformation and becoming, it can transform into its own antithesis…

And that is my lesson for today… Night, night…

—————————————————————————————————————————–

The IQ test… (Whilt 11)

Attention:

The original post has been deleted.

———————————————————————————————————————————

Well, what I have done was to participate in one of those frivolous IQ tests available in an abundance on the Web, than – being over-enjoyed with the results (haven’t you known, that you are a genius, after all – now everything is clear…) then (goodness gracious…) I have put the outcome on this blog, in this very section – what have I learned today (whilt)?…

Pardon me, that was pathetic – even done for fun – and this is, what I have really learned today – that you need to be highly critical about everything what you are about to publish, that the responsibility for your text/work online should be not less stressed and imposed than your taking charge for all your activities in the ‘real life’.

I have never removed a post yet… have you? Do you consider your published posts to be ‘set in stone’ – or maybe, you would rather come back to them to verify issues once firmly stated, and – to modify/delete if needed? How about the ethics – we share/borrow/lend/use each other property crossing the boundaries which would be much more difficult to cross in the ‘real life’. Can it be named as clearly ethically ‘wrong’ or ‘ok’ – if our intentions are those of the self- and the public education and promoting the values/thoughts we believe in – all without any financial profits?

I keep pondering over these issues. I feel bad and ‘right’ at the same time illustrating my post with an image/video of an artwork, that doesn’t belong to me. What, if the artist doesn’t wishes it; yet – how to reach him/her – that would make the blogging morbidly time-consuming (I have tried, of course) and free of any fun; just completely devoid of that very characteristic intuitive spirit of improvisation, which makes writing/reading blogs so rewarding. To cease to write about and to display art? Who, on Earth, would like to be confined to his/her productions only? I would rather prefer  to enrage or to disgust all the guardians of the web-ethics…

Well, have I passed my IQ test? What is all about, after all – to label my mental ability with the number assigned by a computer after some mathematical calculations? That in itself is insulting…

————————————————————————————————————————————————

More ‘commercial approach’… (Whilt 9)

What have I learned today (Whilt) ?

Always listen to your friends, even, or – especially when you disagree. My wise, experienced friend has the enjoyable approach of Renoir who was quoted to say to his dealer: I want to paint stunning pictures that you can sell for very high prices… When having a little argument I would say to him: Don’t talk to me money, when art is on a table. He would answer: I hope, you will grow up one day and adopt more commercial approach. I would never get what he meant, I would consider myself to be simply ‘above’ that.

Yet, adopting ‘more commercial approach’ for an artist translates into adopting the ‘professional’ manner – it’s inscribed into the nature of ‘being professional’ (making living out of the occupation); and one can hardly think about any great artist (except maybe for bohemian outsiders) who would leave his talent and his work at the mercy of a pure chance … Old Masters would cherish and indulge their patrons,  modern professionals would publish books, teach, join/launch movements and artistic groups, make friends with influential intellectuals… Contemporary, 21st century artists are found behaving like skilled entrepreneurs, some of them even adopting the business terminology and way of thinking.

To blame Michelangelo for serving the popes so timidly?  To blame Renoir for his (quoted) shameless approach? To blame X or Y today for seeking the attention at all costs? It would be like blaming Chopin or Beethoven for their eager seeking out any decent opportunity to play, to perform their art before an audience. What would their music mean (if anything at all)  if they had been ‘above’ any self-promotional activity?… After all, what really matters is the triumph of the great art – in most cases – made possible and enduring  only because of its creators’ strength of will, intelligence and an ability to keep their vain at bay.

And, as in life – what helps to distinguish between  the ‘lost’ and ‘won’ (at least, morally) cases are the intentions – you agree to serve the market out of love/passion (for your art, for art in general) or out of greed, vain – that’s the difference (yet never so B&W as you may know for an experience).

Therefore, I know that I need to start that ‘more commercial/professional’ thinking now and I need to improve in it just as I keep improving in other skills, which make artwork possible. I would like art to be become an actual force , transforming and influencing my life in the real existence, at least, to the extent that it shapes my personal, inner life.

As a talented poker-player, I know, would say: Good cards in your hand is not everything, is what you will do with them, that matters. Even great cards mean little, when you lack imagination and knowledge, and you don’t have decent opponents to accept your challenge… Well-said… Guess, I’m ‘growing up’….

—————————————————————————————–