The Materiality of Nothing

This was an interdisciplinary symposium, held at Lancaster University, UK, about the immaterial/intangible, which aimed to bring together people with different perspectives to negotiate the imperceptible.

The seminar was introduced by Dr Sarah Casey – Lecturer in the Lancaster (University) Institute for the Contemporary Arts but also an artist who explores the limits of visibility and material existence.

Sarah Casey Murmur #3 – http://www.axisweb.org/p/sarahcasey/ 

Sarah asked us why we should consider the materiality of nothing, answering her own question by saying that ‘no’ thing implies the lack of ‘some’ thing and suggested that we tend to step around the intangible rather than try and deal with it directly, as exemplified by the Romans who didn’t have a zero in their numerals.

But as Sarah told us invisibility and immateriality are different. On reflection I would have liked a bit more discussion about this. On her website she asks  “at what point does visibility disappear and drawing become immaterial?”

In her introduction Sarah asked us to consider how we create something out of nothing and used erased drawings as an example of work that focuses on space and absence. With just a little research I can see that this topic has exercised a number of artists. For example Robert Rauschenberg explored the extent to which art could be created by removing marks rather than making them (see Erased de Kooning Drawing, 1953) and a number of other artists have explored invisibility and aesthetic absence. Interestingly, during the day, as we listened to presentations I sat next to artist Gerry Davies who was almost continuously drawing in a small notebook. I was intrigued by how he used the rubber on the end of his pencil as much as the graphite, creating and removing marks in equal measure.

Sarah suggested that we need absence and space for imagination, interpretation and reflection. I found just this 10 minute introduction to the day fascinating and am grateful that Sarah and Lancaster University opened this seminar to the public.

There were many stimulating ideas to come out of the day, which I hope to find time to record in at least one future blog post. Although my understanding of much of what was talked about is very limited, I am intrigued by all the ways in which we can align ideas such as invisibility, absence, silence, immaterial, emptiness, speculative, contingency, indeterminacy, invisibility and nothing, to teaching and learning, particularly teaching and learning in the online environment where it is so easy to be invisible to each other. This has often been seen as a negative aspect of online learning, but maybe this is a short-sighted view.

For those who are interested in the programme for the day – here it is.

The Materiality of Nothing Programme 14th July

LJMU FabLab: A place to play, to create, to learn

Another highlight of the Liverpool John Moores’ Teaching and Learning Conference 2015  was a session in the FabLab (right opposite the Catholic Cathedral). I have already written about the highlight of Professor Ronald Barnett’s keynote (see Student learning in a turbulent age).

Liverpool Catholic Cathedral

 Accredited by the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, FabLab Liverpool  is a physical space located in the School of Art and Design which provides access to the tools and knowledge to educate, innovate and invent using technology and digital fabrication to allow anyone to make almost anything. (Source of text – conference Abstract booklet)

In the session we were introduced to 3D printers, laser cutters and 3D scanners, all of which were new to me. We saw a key chain made in a laser cutter for Frances Bell and demonstrations of 3D scanning and 3D printing

The FabLab session was billed as ‘A place to play, to create, to learn’ and there was certainly a buzz in the room. The aim was ‘to demonstrate how a creative environment and access to innovative technologies can assist pedagogic development with transferable, creative skills’. It was a fun session.

Right at the end of the session, I had a brief discussion with one of the presenters about the applications of these technologies. We already know that 3D printing has been used successfully for facial reconstruction after severe injury such as in the case of a motor-bike accident. And there are clear applications of laser printing, 3D scanning and printing for many design projects. I did wonder though what the implications might be for the fine artist.

An article by Randy Rieland on the Smithsonian website reminds us that ‘technology has been providing artists with new ways to express themselves for a very long time’.

In contrast Iain McGilchrist warns us against art that is too abstract, cerebral and generalized. In his book The Master and his Emissary: The Divided Brain and the Making of the Western World, he writes (p.96)

‘… works of art – music, poems, paintings, great buildings – can be understood only if we appreciate that they are more like people than texts, concepts or things’.

For McGilchrist, art is more than the creation of ‘something’. He writes p.308 …

‘Art …in its nature constantly impels us to reach out and onward to something beyond itself and beyond ourselves.’

… which echoes Ron Barnett’s words when he suggested that we see learning as ‘becoming more than you are, becoming other than you were’.

I feel fortunate to have had the opportunity to see Liverpool John Moores’ FabLab in action, but on reflection I have wondered what the implications of these advancing technologies will be for art and artists. What will we lose and what will we gain in terms of the art that will be created in the future, our understanding and appreciation of it, and its place in our world?

Art I have enjoyed in 2014

This year I have tried to take every opportunity to see an exhibition if it is in an area I am visiting. I am recording here some of the exhibitions and art I have seen and enjoyed in 2014.

January

In January I started exploring rhizomatic learning for research purposes. Through this I have discovered lots of drawings related to the idea of the rhizome.

When I used this wonderful drawing in a blog post the artist Mark Ingham commented:

The Image you are using from:http://socialdigitalelective.wordpress.com/groups/rhizomes/ is a drawing I made in 1999-2000 and is a multiple mapping of 12 of my Grandfather’s (The mathematician who supervised Alan Turing, A E. Ingham) transparencies. I call it ‘Boy Pool Rhizome’. More can be seen at my website http://www.markingham.org

More rhizome images that I have discovered in this research can be seen in this Prezi presentation.

February

A trip to Denmark with friends. We visited (clockwise from top left) the Johanne Larsen House and Museum in Kerteminde, the Copenhagen Art Museum, the Round Tower Exhibition, and the Copenhagen Design Museum.

 

April

The wonderful Sensing Spaces exhibition at the Royal Academy in London

This prompted a long blog post:

Sensitive Learning Spaces: what architects can teach us

And also in April

Textile 21 at the Macclesfield Silk Museum with Frances Bell and Ailsa Haxell. There was a wonderful exhibition of fashioned silk dresses

 June

Henri Matisse – The Cut Outs, live streamed from the Tate Modern http://www.fact.co.uk/matisse-live-from-tate-modern . I saw this exhibition in Preston. It stimulated me to write two blog posts: Matisse: life-long researcher and Learning from those who have gone before

And…    The BP Portrait Award at the National Portrait Gallery in London, which was a real treat.

And also in June ….the Silverdale and Arnside Art Trail in my local area.

This involves spending the day walking from small studio to small studio (usually in the artist’s own house) or to a slightly larger venue such as a village hall or a hotel. There is an amazing amount of artistic talent in this area of the UK.

July

Visit to Amsterdam and the stunning Rijksmuseum  (Rembrandt and Vermeer) and… the Van Gogh Museum

Rembrandt is one of those artists you just have to see for real, i.e. see the original paintings, in a gallery.

August

Art in the Pen, Skipton, Yorkshire. Over one hundred selected artists transform cattle pens into miniature galleries from which they sell their original works of art.

And …….

Mondrian at the Liverpool Tate. This had me thinking a lot about the relationship between horizontal and vertical.

September

A trip across Europe took in visits to museums and galleries in Zurich, Innsbruck, Vienna and Venice.

Zurich – The Swiss National Museum – a real treasure trove and the Chagall windows at the Fraumünster church.

 Innsbruck – the Cathedral, Imperial Palace and the Maximilianeum Museum

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Vienna – Egon Schiele and Gustav Klimt at the Leopold Museum 

 

 

Venice – Like Vienna, Venice is a work of art in itself; the architecture, the museums, the galleries, the churches and the Architecture Biennale.

 November

Ai Weiwei at Blenheim Palace, with Frances Bell

Edinburgh – The Scottish National Gallery of Modern Art  

http://www.inglebygallery.com/artists/alison-watt/

December

Rembrandt live streamed at Fellinis Ambleside  from the National Gallery, London and the Rijksmuseum, Amsterdam

A fitting note on which to end my visits for this year.

Learning from those who have gone before

Next week I will be going to the cinema to see the Matisse exhibition live streamed from the Tate Modern in London.

I live in the North of England, miles away from London. Occasionally I do get to London to see an exhibition (I wrote about the Royal Academy’s Sensing Spaces exhibition on this blog not so long ago), but the recent advent of live streaming exhibitions (as well as theatre, ballet and opera) has made such a difference to those of us who live ‘out in the sticks’.

My first experience of viewing an exhibition via live streaming was the Manet exhibition streamed by the Royal Academy last year. I saw this in Ambleside in Cumbria.

This streaming provided inside information about how the exhibition was mounted and in depth close-up information about most of the paintings in the exhibition. The experience is not quite the same as being there in person, but it comes a very close second.

In the run up to seeing the Matisse exhibition live streamed I have watched a short BBC4 programme in which the musician, actor and artist, Goldie, introduces the Matisse exhibition from a personal perspective.

I have watched this on the same evening that I have read a comment on Cristina Costa’s blog post – The web and the academic divide – which suggests that somehow the older generation do not have the experience needed to understand the younger generation and by implication, that the experience of the older generation cannot be taken seriously. But it seems to me that we are still learning from Matisse many years after his death.

Goldie starts his personal tour with a look at Matisse’s cut out – The Bees (1948).

It’s interesting that he talks about this cut out in terms of Matisse splicing and editing ‘in his own head’. He talks about how the cut out relates to graffiti, movement, video and brings method to the madness in the chaos of nature.

Goldie also talks about Matisse being ‘far ahead’ –  the paintbrush comes along and everyone is using the paintbrush – but all of a sudden Matisse comes along and says ‘let me just use a pair of scissors’ – the equivalent of aerosol use by graffiti artists. Two Dancers (1937-8) is a great example of the use of scissors.

In Creole Dancer (1950) Matisse brings order to chaos by balancing colours – ‘he balances the two oranges in the middle here, he has the two pinks here, he has these two blues here and he has this black weighing in with the blue there – it is so balanced – that is a real artist that can do that’.

Of Blue Nude IV (1952), Goldie says:

This was his colour, this was the colour that made him feel safe, this was the colour that made him feel at ease, this was his resonance, this was his ‘hum’ – the sound that a musician finds, it vibrates so much that it stays still, it makes you feel at peace with yourself. Goldie calls this the humming bird effect – that beautiful vibrant blue was Matisse’s humming bird.

And finally in A Thousand and One Nights (1950) we see Matisse ‘elongating his life’ – telling the story over and over again in a thousand and one cut-outs, which have become bigger, bolder and larger with his advancing years.

All this confirms for me the value of experience. We can learn a lot from the past and the experience of those who have gone before us – those who have learned to achieve balance in their lives and uniquely express themselves with confidence, without worrying about whether the paintbrush is a better tool than scissors or vice versa.

Update 31-05-14

I have been told by a friend that the point of this post is not clear. And on reflection, I see that perhaps it is not. The point I was trying to make was that Matisse, four years before his death in 1954 was using scissors to make these cut-outs, when the received wisdom of the era was that ‘art’ should made with a paintbrush. Sometimes the older generation are ‘far ahead’ (to quote Goldie) of the younger generation, despite their advancing years.