III. The Sleep,
or, the Transformation
Hopefully the "meaning" of my work is starting to
become a bit more clear. Through
an approach to ontology and how that interacts with making things (be they
paintings, sculptures, or the basement stairs I just rebuilt) and living in the
world and ecosystem, I have found archetypal cycles. Obviously, these cycles have been thought about and written
about for years. Some of my
extracurricular research interests have to do with Gamelan, a Southeast Asian
orchestral music that is written in cycles based on the particular tone of each
instrument; Borobudur is an example of Buddhist architecture that is meant for
the visitor to experience the motion
of the cycle which is also a parallel experience (through carved stone panels
throughout the monument illustrating the Buddha's journey) to Siddhartha
achieving enlightenment. Mircae Eliade
and others have written and explored the idea of the eternal return. Eliade's writings often refer to a
doubling of action and existence are repeated archetypes of myth. The same is true for ancient
architecture, art, and dance, though modern personhood denies the mythological
meaning and doubling of history for its preference of fragmented time and
experience.
What becomes important for me to address now though is the
idea of poetics and transcendence, specifically how my view of poetics changes
and adds to the meaning present in my work (and, to some extent, things that
are made and crafted by human hands).
My interpretation of the word poetics certainly has a basis in poetry,
but I think it is worth it to define what I see as the important part of poetry
and its function. The beauty of
poetry is that the writer can put together two or more words, each with their
own distinct meaning(s), and create a new, transcendent meaning by putting them
together. In Auden's poem Funeral Blues he writes the words
'dismantle the sun' as a manifestation of grief and sorrow. I think it is obvious that dismantling
is typically though of as applying to something that is made of components,
like a machine, a clock, or something else that can be disassembled. The sun, in all of its physical and
metaphorical glory, would not be our first object proposed for a
dismantling. Somehow Auden puts
this phrase together (along with the rest of the poem, of course) to make a transcendent
statement of the dramatic thought process of grieving and accepting death.
Stop all the clocks, cut off the
telephone.
Prevent the dog from barking with
a juicy bone,
Silence the pianos and with
muffled drum
Bring out the coffin, let the
mourners come.
Let aeroplanes circle moaning
overhead
Scribbling in the sky the message
He is Dead,
Put crêpe bows round the white
necks of the public doves,
Let the traffic policemen wear
black cotton gloves.
He was my North, my South, my
East and West,
My working week and my Sunday
rest
My noon, my midnight, my talk, my
song;
I thought that love would last
forever, I was wrong.
The stars are not wanted now; put
out every one,
Pack up the moon and dismantle
the sun.
Pour away the ocean and sweep up
the wood;
For nothing now can ever come to
any good.
I strongly believe that this is an aim for art making: putting together different and
disparate ideas, objects, symbols, elements, etc to form new and transcendent
meaning. It is transcendent at its
best points, and transcendent in the sense that, while it still maintains the
ideas original meanings, it also creates something new, something that can
contribute to the history of the idea as it stands.
Poetics, therefore, are an absolutely essential part of my
studio practice. There is no
direct route to poetics, however.
Poetics comes from making and creating things, it is not something that
can be planned in my mind. I think
that it is necessary for artists to form studio practices that allow for
mistakes, exploration, and impulsive decision-making.
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