The Graduate.

I find myself once again writing on here that its been ages since my last post, and as usual I have an excuse…That being that I have been buried under my course work for the last 3 or 4 months since I last got around to posting something. HOWEVAH- I am now the proud owner of a Bachelors Degree in Visual Arts and Design- FINALLY, it’s only taken six years BUT I made it and that’s the most important thing… The last few weeks have been fraught with peril, including some rather late nights at the studio- which actually I don’t know if I mentioned this in previous posts but I am now a member of the most awesome MINT artist studios family (www.mintartiststudios.com)- I am lucky enough to be ensconced with a posse of some of the best and brightest art types in this here town. Its located in a top secret facility just off of Waymouth street in the city. This was integral to my ability to be able to work late and on weekends, as I had found that many of the people I studied with were unable to stay as late as I would have liked, as often as I would have liked (being that at the art school I attended, the rule was you could stay until 9pm but only if you had a second person with you…) and also my school wasn’t open on weekends so when I was offered the opportunity to take an outside studio space, I jumped at the chance and was very happy to find a place where I could paint on any day until the wee small hours if I so desired…And it was great to know that I would be in a group studio with a great gang of very talented like-minded cats beyond the end of school… So as a part of the whole finishing thing, we had the Graduation show at the beginning of November, in the Light square gallery at AC Arts…It all went off very well with all of the class working very hard to get things organized…I ended up kind of MCing the show, thanking all and sundry and introducing our guest speaker and generally encouraging people to drink the free wine, from our wonderful friends at FOX CREEK wines in McLaren Vale, a free plug there just in case they are looking to perhaps, sponsor a certain artists studio (www.mintartiststudios.com)?? All in all, it was a good shindig and now, I, like many of my comrades now shift our attention to the Helpmann Graduation show early next year. This is a show that selects the best artworks of the graduating students to go into a kind of all star showcase, which I will hope to be a part of.

This is me with the 2nd of the 3 paintings at the Graduation show. The finishing of one course invariably leads to people asking the obvious question, What Next? And in my case I have my fingers in a few pies…I have applied to Adelaide University to do some more study because lets face it, too much punishment is barely enough…I have a notion to perhaps start leaning toward art criticism and arts journalism, so I have applied for a graduate diploma in Art History that would, all going according to plan, lead to a masters in Art History. Yes I know, Im an Art History geek but I just cant help myself…I’m also looking at some residences both local and overseas, so I’ll let you know what happens closer to the date. So I’ve got some reasonably average photo’s of the finished paintings to share with you and give a little background on the works and where they came from. I ended up calling the paintings the Life/Time series, as an overall title and then, because I think I was possessed by the spirit of Damien Hirst, all the individual paintings ended up with titles as long as your average essay… So the original idea for these paintings started at the end of my last body of work- as a part of it I had done a large monochromatic piece which got me thinking about the idea of using the technique I had been developing to create monochromatic black paintings- that is using primary colors to make black. I happened to visit the planetarium at Mawson Lakes with my son and whilst there I had my mind summarily blown by considering the utter vastness of the universe. It made my head hurt to think of the distances between planets and stars, and I left feeling somewhat insignificant. After that a lot of things on the human realm- life, death, religion, politics- didn’t really seem to mean so much and it occurred to me that it almost seemed that humans were kind of arrogant to think that in comparison to the rest of the universe, any of that stuff had any real significance. Someone suggested that I read Cosmos by Carl Sagan, which I’ll be honest, I tried to do- I mean I found some of it interesting but more often than not I was bored to tears- even though it was recommended to me by someone who said that it was a landmark book because it made popular science easily readable…not real sure about that one…So I guess I got a little something out of it- The ridiculous fact that one light year equals 10 trillion kilometres and then these science dudes casually say that something is so many thousand light years away…This led to the realization that a light year doesn’t measure time, it measures distance…ah the tyranny of distance- one of my favourite lines from a Split Enz song (im a 70s kid who grew up in the 80’s and yeah, I wore flouro socks)- oh sorry where was I??? TIME right…this was the turning point for my paintings I guess in that the next discovery was to really solidify my concept. So there I am at work, funnily enough, (I work in a department store) and I began to think about the nature of time and how a lot of people have a fear of death. I understand that people have a fear of death but it’s the why that puzzles me. There is one thing that is guaranteed to happen to you in this life- you may or may not get married, you may or may not have children, you may or may not climb Mt. Everest but I can say at this stage, unequivocally, without a shadow of a doubt, you will eventually die. Not if, not maybe but it is a guaranteed certainty that you and everyone you know, including your esteemed author, will die. You can’t escape it, you can’t outrun it, you can’t pay it to go away. So this is what got me thinking, why fear it? Why be afraid? And beyond that as well, if you know there is a definite end, why live as if there isn’t one? Why waste time? Why spend your time doing insignificant, menial shit that amounts to nothing? When people find out they have a terminal disease, often their first reaction is to set about doing all the things they had been putting off- the bucket list deal- They found out they were going to die and so they suddenly sprung into action…However- our time is ticking away- you as you sit reading this and me as I write it- our time on this big green rock, hurtling through space is limited…so why do we waste our time? I mean, I wasn’t interested in being existentialist or depressing or anything and ultimately when I found out what I found out, it actually made me feel more at peace with the idea of death. What I did was, that day when I was standing there, wishing away the hours at the retail emporium where I am employed, was I thought about the average human life, which I found out was, in Australia, 82 years of age. Then it occurred to me, how many minutes is that? How many hours is that? How many days, weeks, months is that? And what I came up with was this: An average 82 year human life breaks down to- 43,099,200 minutes 716,852 hours 29,930 days 4264 weeks 984 months It was amazing people’s reactions when I would tell them about this- many would tell me to stop, that they didn’t want to hear- others said- is that all? One in particular was- 43 million minutes?? Is that it?? To which I replied that it was all a question of perception. If I was to give you 43 million dollars would you say, is that it? Is that all? Well some might say that, but you get the picture. So I got to thinking about the preciousness of time- and more than that, the idea that every single minutes is important. That you only get so much time so you better get to it and live now, not tomorrow or next week or when I finish the latest grand theft auto game but NOW.

So the paintings I made in response to this are in three parts- the first part is called, get this: 43,099,200 minutes- the freedom that comes with the realization that death is inevitable.

To look at this first painting, you can see a few things…A line that runs from top to bottom- looks like a break in the action that is going on throughout the rest of the painting, that the painting is made up of marks in the primary colors- red, blue and yellow, applied in layers and parts of it look almost black, other parts you can see the separated colors. I will say that this is my interpretation of what I painted, but this is in no way binding- part of the idea of these paintings is that people look at them in relation to themselves and the world around them- this idea of perception again- and draw their own conclusions. In my mind, this first painting in the bigger scheme of things represents birth, an ascension. I called the first one the realization that death is inevitable- without being too depressing about it- because in essence, once you are born, the clock is ticking and the sooner you realize that your time is limited, the sooner you will get on with the business of living. The reason I chose the palette relates mainly to the idea of elements, of atomic particles. When they combine they end up the same- just like us. We may be different races, religions or have different political leanings but all human beings. Which I know sounds incredibly naïve- but I don’t see it that way, I just see it as the stripped down, pared back truth. So when you look at the painting and you see these layers and layers of colours melting into black and then you see the break, it’s as if it’s a moment of clarity- when you see through all the confusion and make your realization, when you find your truth. The second painting is called: 716,852 hours- the freedom that comes with the realization you were free all along.

I think this title really came to me after I considered the implications of what I was doing in relation to my own life. I am now, as I was when I started these paintings, 41 years of age. So I’m at the half-way point. When I consider my life, thus far, I have spent time and energy on things that really were of no benefit. Not for me or anyone. When I think that I used time that could have been better used on something else it made me realize the importance of my time. Now don’t get me wrong, I still get caught up in time wasting, resentment and regret and all of that stuff, however, now that I have an awareness of it, I feel as though I’m learning, making progress. The second or middle painting represents life itself, you travel through, keep your eyes on the horizon and rise above the negative, taking from it what it has to give you and on to the next thing. Onward and upward. The third and final painting is: 29,930 days- the freedom that comes with the realization that everything is everything.

Everything is everything is a phrase you would probably know if you listen to hip hop. Lauryn Hill wrote a song with the title and used it in the chorus- Everything is everything What is meant to be, will be After winter, must come spring Change, it comes eventually And often people like the RZA from the Wu Tang clan talk about it representing something of the order of the universe, which I agree with. For me it also goes further to the idea I talked about before- the idea that we are all human beings and realistically all the same. I don’t necessarily agree with the fatalist aspect that seems to come through in Hill’s lyric, but I certainly like the sense it has of the inevitable. This last piece of the puzzle, for me is the dying of the light, to paraphrase Dylan Thomas- who wrote, do not go gently into that good night, rage, rage against the dying of the light. This is the painting that shows the inevitable death, or the descent. The coming of autumn and winter after summer, the inevitable changing of the seasons, which is of course a well-worn metaphor in literary and art circles. With these paintings, after looking at the work of my master and mentor, Barnett Newman, I wanted to make paintings that showed the beginning and the ending all at once- that is in the individual paintings themselves, but also in the works as a group. I feel I have achieved my aims with this series and hopefully they will have a similar effect on the viewer as they did on me when I was creating them. I found with these Life/Time paintings, I invested myself probably more than I ever have in a painting. When I presented them to the class, I actually got very emotional when I was trying to reiterate how much I had put into these works. I put everything I had into these paintings, every shred of my being- there was no separation- nothing left in reserve, nothing held back. I personally believe, for me, this is the only way to create- to give anything less than everything is to cheat my audience and myself. This is my truth- show me yours. Until next time….