SOME/ART : 'CRUCIFIXION' BY FABIEN CLAUDE
I carried Fabien Claude’s his words, his piece and my interpretation. My flow of thoughts out if his. His thoughts mingling with mine. Forming new ideas and perspectives, but also forming the following way of reflecting on his piece. Open for any interpretation, like an extend of his piece.
The decay of painting
All decay holds a form of beauty that at one point loses itself. It touches every other truth in the world and at the same point becomes a lie. The truth and a lie are the same, but seen from another perspective. Once, like a young child accepting all. Now departing from its own structure. Denying everything, denying its existence. At the point of the final decay, like peace at the bottom of an empty heart, the search for our thoughts, emotions and desires is fulfilled. It is what we searched for in painting from the beginning.
After each step, there is always one in front/behind. Riding the same vessel. At one point in the wounds of the decay of painting we would plant our seeds. But now it is time for painting to open up, leaving not only wounds to put our seeds in.
Between the words I refer to elements like Jesus and the void. They are meant as a metaphor. Not only to explain the piece but also to underpin it.
On the piece, a recuperation of images, corrosion has grown and taken its place. Forming a balance which tells a story about development. Once about a long gone society, now about the modern days. About modern art. Alike alloy, easy in maintenance but after a long time it will be weather-beaten. Corrosion forms on its body, giving a dynamic and organic structure. Never deforming its origin but intervening with its meaning.
Jesus and his crucifixion: a metaphor for painting itself.
The deformation of him (Jesus/painting), a building stone of our society. The vision of strength and distance. We used to differentiate ourselves from it. And not let ourselves become the personification of the work. Alike how we put other humans in pigeonholes. Again differentiating, not ready to use it as reflection.
He was the blank piece of paper, but given to us were words. Not all words, only those fitting on his body. These words were dominant and sadly not able to carry free speech. The dominance was equal to another time. A time long gone. In the time after new words have formed. The spaces left blank are easily filled. These new words carry more freedom, more strength. As they are not very different, the main difference is the will to be interpreted more widely. The combination of past and current times, mixing what once was and is. Like taking a look at the stars of a clear summer night: they are the visible proof of our history. You can see what once was, and still is visible.
The base of the construction.
The cross proves no resistance to external forces. The image of a showpiece, on its shoulders a message without density, has passed. The construction proves that in its basis after all this time, it still is fertile for a new way of thinking. After all still connected to a strong fundamental basis.
No clear image is visible, to fill in our void. Most of the uncreated part is visible, we create it. Finding our own thoughts in our own image development. What do we see in this traditional base and add. What did we find, and thus need to reflect on ourselves. Elements like suffering and education are still available in the piece, but it is the piece and us revealing it together.
The empty void on the canvas.
Painting was poetic and demanded artistic attachment. It was the representation and reflection of current times, and what goes on. The result was a clear painting, for anyone. It was less or not self centered at all. Now, as specialization and individuality are words of our time, we feel the need to see work that is unfinished. Making it a piece of ourselves, mingling our thoughts with the piece. Finishing it.
The power of the current form of painting, depends on the force of its own destruction. It shall consume itself time after time, like a star consumes its own matter. Time after time providing enough energy for the next consummating of itself. Anything that is too heavy to be consummated, like in stars iron, makes this topic interesting. Where in stars iron takes more energy to consume, than it can produce. These heavy parts actually fill itself up with energy. Our image of the artform becomes too heavy. Like a star, it becomes a supernova for a short time. Interesting, but it has a short life. Because the artwork is uneasy to view as a total, smaller pieces are picked up. Going anywhere, exploding like the supernova. Sprouting itself into anything and anywhere. Who knows where it might be an influence. At this rhythm, we might see poetic and critical art on the same canvas.
‘Crucifixion’ is finished: viewing you. At both sides of the piece, the emptiness will not be filled. The reflection comes from the void. The piece itself hardly matters in its own ‘darkness’.
Painting still is a reflection on society, on us. Like a revolution; society changed and together we have put strength in the deformation/corrosion of painting. But at the same time we actually decipher art, we deform the corrosion. In our mind a clear painting forms, like once before. At a certain point we are able to appreciate the corrosion, perhaps like collecting a piece of the Berlin wall. The counterrevolution has already begun.
Text by Anthony Oliviero | S/TUDIO