THROUGH THE MISTS OF TIME

Through the Mists of Time Gouache and watercolour on paper 56 x 75.5 cm 2017

As regular readers know, my recent paintings have been influenced by my M. Phil research into contemporary militarised technology. Recent work has featured the figure of the unmanned air vehicle, commonly called the drone, often in juxtaposition with my interpretation of the age-old transcultural/religious tree-of-life symbol. 

However...

This new painting Through the Mists of Time does not feature a drone. Rather, it focuses on humanity - unplugged from all cyber and digital technologies.

A result of my research focusing on contemporary militarised technology, is a counter balancing re-focus on questions associated with what it means to be human in the 21st century. That's why the tree-of-life figures so strongly in my work, with or without drones! The tree, as an age-old transcultural/religious symbol 'speaks' of all life and its systems. 

In Through the Mists of Time I wanted to place humanity, as represented by the male and female figures, in a cosmic seemingly timeless landscape. The figures seem to 'cast' a tree-of-life shadow, or new root system, at the same time as they project a tree-of-life into the sky - the endless future. A 'stream' of leaves gives the impression of time passing, the white oval shape alludes to renewal and birth, while the small round tree hovers like a fire fly, ready to illuminate, play, guide, tease. Small dots make up various parts of the painting - are they stars, new universes, energy particles, past and future histories? 

I am interested in investigating human agency in an age where unseen algorithms influence so much of our lives. I suggest that in an age of increasing automation, and developments in robotics and artificial intelligence, questions about human agency are important.

POEM

I was a fare way into completing this painting - and it did take some time - when I decided to re-read some of my Mother's and Grandmother's poems in their joint anthology Out There (1986). Well, one of my Mother's poems 'sang' to my new painting. In fact, I took its title from a line of my Mother's poem. The poem is:

Grafting Time

by Elsie Brimblecombe 

Published in Out There by D. E Ross [my grandmother] and Elsie Brimblecombe, Elise Publishing, Dalby, 1986.

If I squeeze the golden fruits

Of time, and suck the juice

Till from the leathered skins

The pith and core and rind

   fall free

The seed beyond the centre

Of that fruit will score

Their mark and drop

Beyond the pearly orchard gates

   and grow

There is this land crossed by days

And falling within the season's drop

Those fruits will bear

Upon the hour, the stop

And go of earth's frantic measure

But if I could graft the trees

Of time and from that union

Spring a growing season

Rooted in the current flow

I would grow and tree of life

   beyond record

A tree whose branches spread

Beyond our lives and those gone by

A tree which blossomed

Through the mists of time

And set its fruits to ripen

In the thinking of the wise.

______________________________

Please check out recent and older posts for more on my work figuring the drone, the tree-of-life and cosmic landscapes.

Cheers,

Kathryn

www.kathrynbrimblecombe-fox.com

ONE

                              One oil on linen 90 x 200 cm 2009
This is the painting I have been working on for the last couple of months and now it is ready for the conversations which will provide its [possible] multiple completions. I have decided to call the painting 'One'. I wanted to create a work which simultaneously captured vastness and intimacy through revealed patterns. I have used the tree-of-life motife to create a 'map' which illustrates connectivity within difference ie: the connectivity being fundamental similarities which underly life [which includes death].

An article in The Guardian newspaper entitled 'Can Artists Save The World', by Paul Arendt struck me as timely. http://www.guardian.co.uk/culture/2009/jul/05/can-artists-save-the-world The article discusses the plethora of art, in the broadest sense, which deals with 'issues' such as the environment and climate change. He says, 'Artists' attempts tend to fall into two categories. There is the celebratory work reminding us how nice nature is; and there is the dystopian approach, which paints a stark picture of humanity's future.'


I have thought about this question of 'issue' driven art for awhile. Readers of my BLOG would recognise that at one level I am a quiet activist, but I am very careful to steer well clear of the didacticism I perceive in a lot of contemporary culture. For example I do not see the point in recreating or reminding people of disaster when the popular media does such a great job at it. Some contemporary art is trapped in an unwitting complicity with the popular media which stalls art's potential potency to penetrate the psyche at deep levels. Some of this 'dystopian' imagery falls prey to 'black' decor desires, and thus propels itself to what is considered the unforgivable fate of the 'pretty picture' ie: decoration!

I have written on this BLOG before about my thoughts on 'positive or celebratory' art. All may not be as it seems! Modern aptitudes in deciphering symbols, meaning and context are scarily limited especially as visual literacy skills are determined or honed by mass media and didacticism [especially in a lot of children's literature]. I am aware that there is a 'pretty picture' element in the artworld. However, I choose to paint what could be called utopian images, but with a conscious acknowledgement that disaster, pain, suffering exist or are all immanent. By consciously eliding the negative, it exists in absentia in my work.

'Reminding us how nice nature is...' is not my goal. Simple 'reminder' is not effective or potent because it does not necessarily cause change either within or without. I hope my work engenders, through the conversations it stimulates with oneself or others, a potential for discovery of something new. As readers of my BLOG are aware, I am intensely interested in perspective especially as a metaphor for how we view ourselves and others. The possibility of finding new perspectives and/or experiencing multiple perspectives simultaneously are far more exciting... and scarey than simple 'reminder'. Living locally in an increasingly globalised world is also exciting and scarey....but heightened perspectival abilities will make the dance of distance between the global and local far more fun and productive.

Can artists save the world? No artists alone cannot save the world, but maybe art's agency can contribute to the collective endeavour through stimulating the kind of wonder and imagination that uncovers new ways of doing things. Where does 'reminder' of good or bad fit here?

Now to my MUM, Elsie Brimblecombe who is having a solo exhibition called 'Invisible Cities' inspired by Italo Calvino's book by the same name. The exhibition will be at the Upfront Club, 31 Maple St, Maleny, Queensland, Australia opening August 27 @ 6 pm. The exhibition will continue until September 22. http://www.upfrontclub.org/

Below is one of my Mum's paintings The City of Euphemia. It is acrylic on canvas and about 60 x 40 cm.