Theatre of War Gouache and watercolour on paper 56 x 76 cm 2020
This new work Theatre of War was inspired by thinking about Derek Gregory's idea of 'everywhere war'. If war is everywhere, then the whole world is a 'theatre of war'. Everywhere means just that - geographical landscape, cyber and digital worlds, space and everything in-between. It can also mean time. This is possible if you think of everywhere as being about space/place as well as time/history.
Readers of General Carl von Clausewitz's famous book On War will be aware that he writes consistently about the 'Theatre of War'. Written during the early nineteenth century, and published posthumously by his wife in 1832, it is clear von Clausewitz's 'Theatre of War' differs from twenty-first century ideas of war operation. For von Clausewitz the 'Theatre of War' was a defined geographical situation or place. Depending on offensive or defensive actions, landscape and topography played important roles in strategy, preparation, and battle.
In the twenty-first century war has morphed beyond earthly geography and topography into discrete spaces of the cyber world, algorithms, and light speed signal transmission. It has also extended into space, where orbiting satellites are now drawn into war's network. The network helps to blur the lines between military, policing and security activities. As civilian activities collapse into militarised zones, war insidiously infiltrates everywhere. The lightspeed signalic interconnected character of contemporary war operation allows for escalation or de-escalation - perhaps war of degrees - not of a duration between declaration and end (Virilio inspiration here!).
In Theatre of War I have set up a global 'stage' with a sky/space backdrop that could extend beyond the painting, and thus, everywhere. The lines painted over the landscape's foreground 'speak' to computer geolocating graphics. The real and virtual become inseparable. In the distance an array of different types of civilian and military drones 'act' as both audience and actors. As an audience, are the drones watching us perform? This kind of dual witnessing draws everything onto the everywhere war stage/theatre. It is a place where networked systems direct everything and everyone in what could be called a tragic complicity. With war's duration consumed by the everywhere, a curtain is no longer needed.
Do not be fooled by what might seem beautiful.
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