The Original Referent

Mixed-Media auf Leinwand

Technik:

Malerei

Versand:

Die Arbeit wird aufgespannt auf einem Keilrahmen versendet – inklusive Echtheitszertifikat und Signatur auf der Rückseite.

Concept:

This painting is the result of work. It affirms that originality is only truly possible in the absence of an author—not by creating, but rather in the process of doing.

I asked my college mates to write a sentence that holds an important meaning for them, that represents their individuality or originality, something so personal that it would “hurt” if I painted it over. Each sentence, quote, or saying they contributed was a signifier of a complex abstract idea—one that was itself a derivative or appropriated expression of their individualities. Each text is neither the idea it represents, nor the person using that idea to express themselves.

I wanted to see if it was possible to reverse that dynamic and get something original from references—a referent. At first glance, the process may seem like just another example of pastiche—a collage of symbolic texts. But each time something is written, I overpaint it to disrupt immediate intertextuality—simultaneous contrast of meanings, that might suggest an author’s intent.

By overpainting those short texts, I also erased meaning from the painting—designified it. In doing so I ended up with something original, “unique”—something that is not a copy. The work aims to challenge the separation of theory and praxis, mind and body, and by extension—intellectual and manual labor. The over-painting can be regarded as an act of destruction, which according to Jean Baudrillard is a more innate behavior (together with gift-giving, festivities and sacrificing) than production. One can make something original by destroying the copy. To break signification (Shklovsky’s defamilarization, Brecht’s Verfremdung, Derrida’s différance), is to break free from habituation and become/experience original for the first time. Again.

Of course it is impossible to completely escape signification. The end result here will still be recognizable as a painting, seemingly inspired by Abstract-Expressionism, with all the semantic baggage that come with it, such as the lone (white male) “genius-artist”, a vanguard theorist, an investment vehicle, an interior design staple, and so on.

However, the real inspiration comes not from 1940s New York studios, but from the streets—specifically, from buffing—the overpainting of graffiti by the communal services. It is fascinating on two levels: first, by graffiti being an act of resistance to capitalist branding and urbanism (to signification); and second, as a visualization of a dialogical activity between graffiti artists and the city. It can be regarded as a trace of city’s own agency—the totality of city planning and clean walls provokes its inhabitants to act by spray-painting it with tags and graffiti, which in turn forces the city to react by covering them up with abstract shapes. Neither strives to make art, yet the resulting images often have that striking “drunken master” elegance, something most of the celebrated examples of Abstract-Expressionism lack.

In this case texts break the totality of painting and painting resists an imposition of meaning onto it. By overpainting the meanings, I also erase authorship, and by doing the work almost mechanically I abstain from mine. I’m not just copying a buffing. It’s not a simulation of overpainted graffiti, it is an overpainted graffiti.

It’s not an artwork—it’s an original.