THE ARTISTIC LANGUAGE

 

The creation of my art work focuses on abstract, minimalistic and materialistic paintings that explore the line between two-dimensionalism and three-dimensionalism art, through an examination of the spectrum that lies between the post minimalist and expressionistic art. 

The paintings rely on modernist traditions while at the same time constantly challenging them, thus forming a discourse on abstract expression through the monochromatism of primary colors. It is composed of expressive textures that explore the various parts of the painting, while creating an interaction between them. The various parts of the painting are formed as flat textures or occasionally as a relief, and meet in a single pictorial space as if they were separate spaces, meeting against their own will. The pictorial space presents itself as one of the various parts which constitute the painting, thus creating a minimalistic relationship – an encounter between the expressive materialism and the huge space which, remaining partially blank, summons a similar encounter between the work and the space in which it is presented. 

The works are created mostly on a large scale in order to emphasize the proportion between their size and the size of the physical body of the observer who is  interacting with the painting space as well as its various parts, becoming an additional part of it, a complementary part, if he or she chooses it to be so. 

 

THE MATERIAL, THE SURFACE, THE OBSERVER – FROM OBSERVING TO UNDERSTANDING 

 

The language of my works – along with its various parts – which being formed through the works, expresses

a sensual and emotional world based on observation and reliance on various insights derived from the realms of philosophy and additionally from the world of Jewish Kaballah. 

The Tzimtzum, a Hebrew word which can be translated  as constriction, condensation or withdrawal, is mentioned in the Kaballah teaching of “Ha’ARI” – Rabbi Isaac Luria Ashkenazi – as a void, an empty space. According to  the Kaballah, the human creature, confined within the  limits of his narrow world, can become creative and grow out from his or her narrow base - ’the tzimtzum’ (’the tzimtzum’ can be interpreted as "to be reduced" or as void).

The void of 'The tzimtzum' seems empty but has a base to become creative and grows from it, this happens through an encounter with other worlds. Thus the void is a space of concise essence, containing within itself

a whole and entire universe which leads towards creation, completion and evolvement.  

In the writings of the philosopher Gaston Bachelard whose book “The Poetics of Space” refers to  an endless, hypothetical and imagined space, in which neither its ending nor its boundaries can be grasped, Bachelard claims that the result of human beings encountering a vague space is "pure imagination". It is exclusively associated with physical sensations and  historical memory (this historical memory is mentioned in Bachelard’s 

writings and is explained as a kind of memory that exists within the human psyche and is shared by 

society as a whole and derives support from collective/cultural knowledge). An encounter between a human being and the void, is  the one enabling the completion of the vague spaces in our world and

gives meaning to the surface of the known world. According to these philosophical modes of thinking, 

the presence of a human being within a certain space, enables him or her to complement the boundaries

of the vague space. 

My work of art as noted, is characterized by fragments of expressive materialism and additionally by a void,

 just as a Tzimzum, and vague boundaries, create an interaction between basic humanity and the basic properties of the painting. In this way, the encounter of the observer with the fragments of the worlds represented in the painting and additionally, with the void, forces the  viewer to confront his or her sense of Tzimzum. This narrow base, and what is lacking enables him or her to be present, accepting and eventually to become a part of the art work and to complement it. The encounter elicits the observer’s historical memory and his or her complementary imagination. Thus his or her ability to complement and find meaning evolves out of his or her personal void and creates a whole and  entire universe, but only when he or she chooses to do so. 

While observing the work, the viewer is enabled to complement the various parts of it through his or her

sensual imagination, complementing each part of the painting which struggles to express itself and establish its presence with the whole in which it exists. He or she complements the work and becomes complete, creating 

and growing as a 'whole', derived from a void.