'SAD THINKINGS', RISK AND IMAGINATION

Scary Research?
I am often asked if my research into contemporary militarised or militarise-able technology makes me scared. A few people have said they feel fearful when they see my paintings. I have even had some fearful people say they don't want to hear about my research!

Fortunately for me, most people genuinely appreciate an introduction to issues associated with contemporary militarised and militarise-able technology. If they happen to be already informed about issues, they are interested in how I visually scrutinise drones, signals, connectivity etc. The topic opens up discussions that include, for example, the potential mal-appropriation of militarised technologies by state or non-state protagonists. Many people say they enjoy being challenged by my work. Some quiz me for ages.

But, truthfully, the topic is a sobering one. Through mal-intent, accident or design, contemporary technologies pose potential serious risks, even existential risks*. If they are militarise-able or weaponisable is some form or another, the risks are arguably heightened. Astronomer and cosmologist, Lord Martin Rees in his 2002 book Our Final Century: Will Civilisation Survive the Twenty-First Century? makes a clear argument that like at no other time in human history, 21st century humans are creating technologies that could cause global catastrophic impacts.

Yes, it is a bit scary!

Speed
For me, the scariest aspects of 21st century technology are the speed of technological development and the speed of technological operation. Legal, regulatory, social and cultural responses to technological development have difficulty keeping up. And, when interconnected and networked systems operate at near light speed signaling, human dimensions of time and space are excluded. To keep pace with light speed transmissions, artificial intelligence is increasingly used to monitor, react, respond. After all, it can keep up! So, where will that leave us humans?

My imagination goes into overdrive when I think about these things - and - paintings are created!

* Check out the work being done at the Centre for the Study Of Existential Risk, University of Cambridge.

Occupied Landscape Oil on canvas 76 x 76 cm 2018

POEM

My grandmother D. E Ross, wrote the above poem about me. I suspect I was not having 'sad thinkings', but at nearly four I did not know how to say 'philosophical or existential thinkings'! As a child I remember thinking about the end of life - not just mine - but all life. How far was the universe, what happened after people died, where did they go? Were we humans alone in this vast universe? What was time? I remember being a bit scared by my thoughts. As I tried to imagine, I remember feeling like my imagination would burst!  I am sure many readers remember having similar ponderings.

I love that my grandmother wrote 'long distance in her eyes', because distance is a recurring theme in my life and work. From the literal spatial distance of the landscape of my childhood and its influence on my work, to understanding how distance works in creative painting practice, to inviting viewers to fly with me in imagination in my paintings, to the distance of painting [by a human] from the contemporary technological system ie: painting can be used to critique the contemporary technological system without using digital, cyber or electronic platforms for creation, exhibition and storage.

Maybe this poem is an indication that risk analysis was possibly one of my strengths!

Maybe my grand mother's poem indicates that I would be an artist?

MY EXHIBITION 

OCCUPIED LANDSCAPES: EVIDENCE OF DRONES

DOORS OPEN TUESDAY 27 AUGUST 10 AM

POP Gallery, 381 Brunswick St, Fortitude Valley, Brisbane.

More details are available HERE

I am getting ready to install the exhibition. So apart from the paintings I also need a tool kit.

 Tool kit ready for installation day 

Some of the smaller paintings packed, ready to go.

Cheers,

Kathryn

SEEKING PERSPECTIVE

Seeking Perspective oil on linen 92 x 102 cm

LAST POST AND PHOENIXES

For those of you who read my last post Sometimes Things Just Do Not Work Out you will be pleased to know that my painting mojo returned. For those who have not read my last post, it was about a painting that was just not working. After some reflection, and a few weeks of  painting, it had to be wiped.

Seeking Perspective [above] is not the 'phoenix' of the painting I wiped out. The would-be-phoenix is resting. The wiped-out phoenix-in-waiting painting rests near my easel, as evidenced by the photo below...it's the red one on the left. As I work, keeping it in sight helps the percolation of new images and ideas. It's 'wings' are fluttering!

In response to my last post I received many comments about how interesting it is to see how an artist works. Thus, another reason for the photo below and the one at the bottom. The photo
below shows that I placed the 'failed' painting in sight of where I work. Other paintings are in the studio for all sorts of reasons eg: they need coats of varnish or the sides of the stretched linen need painting etc.

Can you tell my 'studio' is also known as a garage! I dream of.....

So, let's discuss SEEKING PERSPECTIVE.

In the photo below you can see me painting Seeking Perspective. The underlying coats of paint had been applied weeks ago. So, last week when I wiped out the other painting, I turned to this new one. Even while I had been working on the other one, this prepared linen kept drawing my attention. I should have decided to work on it first! As I have written before canvases, even blank white ones, speak to me. I should have paid earlier attention to the one that has now become Seeking Perspective!

 Me in my studio working on Seeking Perspective. On the right is Life Calling: Anyone There? On the left is the wiped out painting and behind it is Birth Of Light

TREE-OF-LIFE - PERSPECTIVE
My much loved age-old transcultural/religious tree-of-life cascades across the canvas. Is it cascading across the vastness of outer space or is its existence an intimate microscopic world...or does it harken to something in between vastness and seeming invisibility? Perhaps, it exists in all perspectives at once?

The title Seeking Perspective can be interpreted a couple of ways. Maybe perspective itself is seeking, maybe it implies that perspective is sought?

With recent atrocities that have happened around the world, the use of the transcultural/religious tree-of-life has given me some solace. Indeed, it is a shared symbol across many cultures and religions and yes, it is closely shared by the three Abrahamic religions of Islam, Judaism and Christianity.  

The tree-of-life, as a symbol of all life, is a conduit for perspective itself to seek out new ways of 'seeing', at the same time as inviting...even demanding...us to seek these perspectives too. As the tree reaches into unknown spaces of close and far distance, especially in partnership with cosmology, we can 'slide' along the branches, revelling in 'in/sights' never imagined. Well, we can...if we go seeking! Are we brave enough? I think some are...and some are not. And, perhaps some deliberately 'climb' a 'tree' that has been poisoned.

Seeking Perspective's cosmic potential, draws the viewer across many dimensions. As I was painting, I imagined the red ball as Earth, maybe 'bleeding', maybe hot with potent potential, maybe just plain HOT. The tree-of-life provides vascular-like energy in 'empty' space, almost cradling 'Earth'. But, it may not be Earth at all. In a Multiverse...yep that's right we may exist in not one Universe, but many...maybe the red ball is our Universe?

Taking a cosmic perspective makes it abundantly clear that we humans, for the foreseeable future anyway, only have one home...Earth! It also makes war, killing, terrorism and fundamentalism of all kinds, seem pretty puerile.

You might like to read Team Humanity

RECOMMENDATION
I highly recommend the Boston Goble's Art Critic, Sebastian Smee's essay Confronting The Unthinkable In Goya's Art  Its trigger is the Goya exhibition at Boston's Museum of Fine Arts, but Smee, with amazing dexterity, weaves contemporary themes into an analysis that prods re/thinking about our perspectives of humanity. It is a sombre read, but eloquently illustrates the power of art to provoke analysis.

Here's a 'close distance' photo of Seeking Perspective...in progress.

PANDORA
And, here's the link to the official notification that my BLOG, yes this one, has been selected for archiving [in perpetuity] on PANDORA, Australia's official archive of online sties of significance and long-term research value. Please click HERE I am really pleased to have my work acknowledged in this way.

Cheers,
Kathryn
www.kathrynbrimblecombe-fox.com

LIFE TAKES A COSMIC PERSPECTIVE

 

Life Takes A Cosmic Perspective Oil on linen 91 x 137 cm 2014

 

If the entire history of the Universe were rescaled to one year, humans wouldn’t appear until 14 seconds before midnight on December 31. Big History Project

 

This certainly puts things into perspective!

 

Regular readers will know I have written about the Big History Project before. It is an education program designed to stretch our understanding of the Universe and humanity's place within it. Such a broad perspective lifts our gaze so that we see all the close and far distances of the micro and macro. My previous posts are Time Travelling  and Complexity

 

Life Takes A Cosmic Perspective

In this new painting I have imagined life, represented by the age-old transcultural/religious tree-of-life, taking a journey. It weaves its way into Space, travelling around a planet before seemingly turning back to reflect upon where it has come from. The tree is firmly grounded on a Mother planet. Will it release itself once it knows more about itself and the 'environment' it has explored? Will it return with new knowledge, insight and wisdom? Is the Mother planet Earth? Or is the green planet Earth? Maybe neither is Earth? Maybe both are Earth? One representing a denuded landscape, a result of an apocalyptic event and the other Earth's past fertile glory. There are many alternative interpretations. Just the way I like it! Playing with perspective!

 

So, as you imagine life taking a cosmic perspective what do you see?

 

My reactions to imagining a cosmic perspective are a mixture of comfort, frustration and hope. Comfort that I am part of something much bigger than me and that one day I will return to its source. Frustration that contemporary society seems to be developing habitual responsiveness to the short distance between computer or phone, thus very often missing the opportunity to appreciate a broader perspective on issues. The short distance between a person and a phone, according to an optometrist I spoke with, is causing myopia at younger ages. As a metaphor for myopic understanding its pretty frightening! But, I am hopeful too. Hopeful that contemporary cosmology, the study of the close and far spatial and temporal distances of the Universe [maybe even Multiverse], will catapult perspective, in its multiplicity of dimensions, into everyday thinking and experience. It is far too fascinating and inviting to not look up, out and beyond our phones. Crossing fingers!

 

The tree in Life Takes A Cosmic Perspective not only explores new perspectives of its original environment and its wider Universal environment, but in turning back on itself it also sees itself differently...or maybe its the first time it has reflected upon itself? Perspective is not just about seeing our world and our universal environment differently, but also ourselves.

 

TREE OF LIFE

Regular readers will know of my fascination with the age-old transcultural/religious tree-of-life symbol. I believe age-old symbols hold truths that are meaningful across ages. The tree's symbolism of life transcends time. I attempt to unleash the tree-of-life from traditional visual interpretations to extract and reveal meaning that is relevant in the 21st century. I see the tree's branches as representative of systems of all kinds both natural and human-made...but all promoting and sustaining life....revelling in the awe...shifting our perspective...dancing across the Universe. The tree helps me create what I call cosmic landscapes...acknowledging that concepts of landscape need to be untethered from Earth-bound horizons...to help shift our horizons and add to our understanding of perspective.

 

The tree is both a conduit and a connector, to past and future history, to our Earth and to the energy forces of the Universe. As a symbol of the urge for life it goes way beyond the 14 seconds before midnight on December 31.

 

 

Detail of Life Takes A Cosmic Perspective - Work in process

 

 

STANTHORPE $20,000 ART PRIZE

My painting Super Earths Discovered is a finalist in the award.

 

The exhibition of finalist paintings and some 3D works is really good. I am pleased to have been chosen to be a part of the exhibition. My painting 'Super Earths Discovered' hangs with some great company. However, I did not win the prize. An artist from down south, Dena Kahan won...and a big congratulations to her! You can see details of the exhibition, the Stanthorpe Arts Festival and an image of Dena's winning work by visiting the Arts Festival page HERE

And here's an article which appeared in the local Stanthorpe Border Post

 

Cheers,

Kathryn

www.kathrynbrimblecome-fox.com

SURRENDERING HORIZON

Surrendering Horizon Oil on linen 100 x 150 cm 2014

 

I return to the concept of 'horizon'. Yes, the concept...horizon as a metaphor as well as a literal element of landscape. But then again 'landscape' can be used as a metaphor for our internal psyches. The dance between the literal and metaphoric entices, excites, probes and ultimately extends the 'horizon/s' of our thinking.

 

I wrote a post recently called The Universe Draws You Out Like A Multi-Dimensional Horizon The painting and the post were inspired by well known Australian author Tim Winton's speech The Island Seen and Felt: Some Thoughts About Landscapes: presented at the Royal Academy in London, November 2013. You can listen to it at the Royal Academy's site HERE  The idea that horizon exists within us, to be drawn out by the Universe is really exciting. It alludes to the fact that we are part of the landscape, not separate from it, physically, emotionally or spiritually. After all, when we die we literally return to 'landscape' in burial or cremation. And, when our planet finally reaches its demise, a few billion years away, we and Earth return to the stars...to the 'landscape' of the Universe.

 

In Surrendering Horizon [above] I have 'torn' the horizon line away from the landscape. It now seems to draw the landscape towards new perspectives, as it enjoys relinquishing its tethered state. It almost playfully entices the landscape to reach out, and in this process, lifts its 'eyes' towards Universal [possibly even Multiversal] distance.

 

The untethered horizon offers the opportunity to look back from its playful place...to look back at Earth...and to look back at Earth placed within its Universal environment. Indeed, from a distance, not only is the planet visible for scrutiny, but so is its position amongst other celestial bodies. I wonder how important manmade borders and boundaries appear from distance that places Earth within a Universal perspective? I wonder how vulnerably beautiful our planet looks...this vulnerability and beauty imploring us to think more expansively about how we live on, love and share Earth?

 

Regular readers will notice my tree...the age-old transcultural/religious tree of life. Notice that I have painted it the same colour as the mountainous horizon and the untethered one. I'll let you think about that!

And, something else to think about. The title Surrendering Horizon ...is the horizon surrendering itself or are we surrendering it...or both?

 

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And, more about landscape. My brother Wilfred Brimblecombe has recently taken some amazing photographs of the landscape surrounding the family farm, which was sold in the 1980s. Please visit his website WILFRED BRIMBLECOMBE: Photography, Stories, Ephemera future and past  There are a couple of terrific photographs of rain falling but evaporating before it hits the ground.

 

 

Cheers,

Kathryn

www.kathrynbrimblecombe-fox.com

 

 

DIZZYING PERSPECTIVE

Dizzying Perspective [inspired by Tim Winton] Oil on linen 50 x 50 cm 2014

 

 

Dizzying Perspective relates to my last two posts and their accompanying new paintings Falling Out Into It and The Universe Draws You Out Like A Multi-Dimensional Horizon Yes, again the terrific speech The Island Seen and Felt: Some Thoughts About Landscapes by Tim Winton at London's Royal Academy in November 2013 has struck a chord of inspiration in me! You can hear the speech HERE

 

Dizzying Perspective is deceptively simple....so say myself! For me....there are many questions-Are we drawn towards the dark circle? Are we propelled away from it? Is it the only point of reference? Is it solid or is it a new portal? Where am I in relation to the 'scape' before me? Is it a vast 'scape' or a microscopic one? Is the dark circle Earth or is it a galactic body seen from Earth? Or, maybe Earth is nowhere around in this part of the Universe? Where am I?

 

I am sure you might have even more questions.

 

Words by Tim Winton, which I previously quoted in my earlier post Falling Out Into It, have again inspired me:   At night in the desert the sky sucks at you, star-by-star, galaxy-by-galaxy. You feel as if you could fall out into it at any moment. It's terrifyingly vertiginous.

 

VERTIGO

This time the bit that got me excited is It's terrifyingly vertiginous. Why? Because, I sense that Winton uses the word terrifying, not simply to suggest a scary physical experience where loss of balance and dizziness induce stumbling and nausea. Metaphorically speaking terrifyingly vertiginous may be more about the revelatory possibilities of new insights and perspectives revealed in the process of letting go...falling out into it.

 

But, I want to return to my previously mentioned ideas of untethering landscape from Earth-bound horizons. The terrifyingly vertiginous experience of falling out into the Universe is provocative, because it invites us to let go of Earth-bound horizons. It actually demands us to leave the safety of the known to welcome new perspectives of ourselves, our planet and our Universal environment.

 

FEAR

Essentially, I think, Tim Winton suggests we confront fears of letting go, fears of the unknown, fears of shifting perspectives. I've been with people who are literally fearful of the distance in the Australian landscape. These people, mainly city born and bred or from Europe, actually expressed their fears in words and with real physical reactions. They felt more than uncomfortable with the open skies and the vast often desolate distances. Their physical reactions were obvious: strange tiredness, gripping themselves or anchor points in a vehicle, normally confident gaits affected by trepidation, eyes darting hither and thither...all signs suggesting a sense of vertigo. But, maybe we need to place ourselves at the mercy of distance, fall out into it, let go...and in the terrifying vertiginous experience we may discover new ways to live and be, new questions and thus possible answers to problems that are plaguing us with their intensity and danger. Who knows? But, I suggest it is worth trying!

 

Dizzying Perspective is similar to an earlier painting which I called Where? This painting asks questions to, indeed its title is a question. It asks about time and space. Both paintings, I sense, move beyond their physical limits of size ie: 50 x 50 cm. There is something quite satisfying about painting an image of Universal vastness on a 50 x 50 cm canvas! A bit like the size differential of Dr. Who's marvellous Tardis.

 

 

Where? Oil on linen 50 x 50 cm

 

 

GOOD NEWS

My entry for the biennial $20,000 Stanthorpe Art Prize has been selected as a finalist. This means that the actual painting now gets sent to Stanthorpe to hang with the other finalists and to be considered for the prize which is announced at the end of February. I shall keep you posted!

 

Cheers,

Kathryn

www.kathrynbrimblecombe-fox.com

 

FALLING OUT INTO IT

Falling Out Into It Oil on linen 70 x 120 cm 2014
[Inspired By Time Winton]

At night in the desert the sky sucks at you, star-by-star, galaxy-by-galaxy. You feel as if you could fall out into it at any moment. It's terrifyingly vertiginous.

[Quote: 'Wild Brown Land' an edited transcript in 'The Australian' December 14, 2013 of The Island Seen and Felt: Some Thoughts About Landscapes by well known Australian author Tim Winton, presented to the Royal Academy, London, November 14, 2013.] You can listen to the speech HERE

AMAZING WORDS
Tim Winton's words are amazing. When I read them, and others, images popped into my head and resonances were deeply felt. In a recent post  ENCOUNTERING LANDSCAPE I write more generally about the speech and my reaction to it. However, there are some phrases that have stayed with me, their words mulled over, eliciting the kind images in my mind that asked to be painted.

I grew up on a grain farm on the flat treeless Pirrinuan Plain, outside Dalby on the Darling Downs, Queensland, Australia. I remember vertiginous feelings when, as a child, I'd lie on soft clover staring at the sky. I remember my Dad had a marvellous vegetable garden that also grew the lushest clover. I'd lay down on it and immediately feel like I was flying and sinking at the same time...that is until the day I noticed the prickles had started to form!

The vast sky of my childhood, uninterrupted by mountains or trees, has stayed with me. During the day it was mostly a relentless blue. But, now and then storm clouds would roll majestically across the plain. These clouds, nuanced with colours of grey, black and indigo blue were sometimes tinged with a green hue, a sign of hail. At night the sky, if uncluttered by clouds, glittered with the Milky Way, a swathe of jewel-like lights. My grandmother, a keen star gazer, often took my brothers and me out into the night to see various constellations, our necks bent back so we could take it all in. However, a stormy night sky was another experience. Lightning giving momentary spotlight to features we knew well, as if demanding us to take notice.

'...FALL OUT INTO IT.'
So, the quote from Tim Winton's speech grabbed my attention! The significant bit is fall out into it. Not fall out from it, but fall out into it, as if gravity might release its grip on us. These beautifully simple few words capture so much of my thoughts about perspective, distance...and the possibilities that new ways of seeing, new perspectives, can reveal different questions and answers to the issues that plague humanity.

We possibly need to feel a sense of terrifying vertigo in order to disrupt the norm, to recalibrate senses, to disturb the status quo, to re-ignite awe and wonder...and more. To deliberately welcome this kind of disruption, and even agitate for it, is quite subversive, don't you think? Agitation does not have to be outrageous, aggressive or in-your-face. Indeed, maybe a deliberately
contemplative state leading to a kind of dizziness that helps to ultimately shift perspective is more revolutionary than trying really hard to make a point via didactic means, aggressive and not? Maybe, lying down on the grass to stare at the sky, welcoming that sense of falling into it, is all we need to do, both literally and metaphorically. Yes, let's look up from our smart phones and computers!

I love the idea of 'falling out into it' for another, but related reason. Regular readers will know of my interest in untethering notions of 'landscape' from Earth-bound horizons. The idea of 'falling out into it'...into the Universe...is a way to assist imagination to grasp the concept! The cosmos is calling, imploring...

Falling Out Into It Oil on linen 70 x 120 cm 2014
So, to my new painting. With Falling Out Into It I wanted to create a 'landscape' that was ambiguous in orientation and locale. I wanted a sense of transparency where parts of the landscape revealed the cosmos through itself, as if the viewer could move into and beyond the 'landscape', like a traveller through time and matter, ultimately becoming time and matter... or maybe remembering them? I wanted to create a sense that the viewer was literally falling out into the night sky, the Universe. Yet, there's a possibility of grabbing onto the 'landscape' of mountains too, before letting go and travelling further...! Metaphorically speaking...think of the possibilities for psyche.

Falling Out Into It is similar to another painting I did last year. Multiple Landscapes [below] also has a sense of disorientation. It's a painting that explores the possibility of seeing multiple perspectives, even simultaneously. And, I'd suggest that in a vertiginous state one would see multiple landscapes especially if you kept your eyes open! Now there's a clue....

Multiple Landscapes Oil on linen 80 x 140 cm 2013

Happy New Year to you all!
Cheers,
Kathryn

ENCOUNTERING LANDSCAPE

The Beginning of Everything oil on linen 90 x 180 cm 2010

 

In this post:

1. A reflection on an excellent speech made by well known Australian author Tim Winton

2. Good news about some sales! 

 

 

The Island Seen and Felt: Some Thoughts About Landscapes:
by well known Australian author Tim Winton

There's an article in last weekend's Weekend Australian Review [Dec 14-15] called 'Wild Brown Land'. It is an edited transcript of The Island Seen and Felt: Some Thoughts About Landscapes by well known Australian author Tim Winton, presented to the Royal Academy, London, November 14, 2013. It was a fascinating read. But, even better, you can hear the speech by clicking HERE The speech/article is a heartfelt and important reminder of why we need to take note of landscape, paying attention to writers and artists who continue to be preoccupied with it.

So much of what Tim Winton said/wrote resonated with me, even his first encounters with the European landscape during the 1980s. I too was travelling to Europe for the first time, with excited anticipation of seeing the landscapes I had only seen in paintings and photographs. I totally understand what Tim Winton felt when he says, In the first instance I struggled with scale. In Europe the dimensions of physical space seemed compressed. The looming vertical presence of mountains cut me off from the distant horizon. I remember driving from Italy into Switzerland and feeling locked in, as if the intense beautiful green mountains would swamp me. I remember remarking to my travelling partner that I longed to see distance.

Winton not only describes European landscapes as compressed, but that they are also humanised ie: evidence of human activity and presence is everywhere. This is definitely something I noticed and felt on my first encounters with the European landscape. The landscape space was occupied, often transformed. Whereas the Australian landscape of my childhood, living on a flat treeless black soil plain, and early married life, living further west with prickly plants and red dirt, certainly did not feel dominated by human forces. Indeed, there were always reminders that nature held the upper hand...flood, drought, wild storms, insect plagues, searing heat. The built environment of houses, homesteads, sheds, tanks etc did not provide spaces that could wilfully ignore the outside. Yes, they could be refuges, but not enough to obscure the elements. Flyscreens only kept out a percentage of insects, snakes could slither under and into houses and sheds [even tractor cabins]....whirlwinds spread dust into every cavity, fire sent soot and smell, cracked earth shifted building foundations, the heat blistered paint and varnish...So, I really, really 'get it' when Winton says, Australia is a place with more geography than architecture, where openness trumps enclosure.

Through The Flyscreen oil on linen 80 x 100 cm 2002

The distance in the Australian landscape is not empty, but replete with life forces and a spirit. They rise from the primordial dust. For me this distance, both intimate and vast, holds clues to dextrous understanding of  perspective. As regular readers know, I am fascinated by perspective, especially in an age where new cosmological research is revealing horizons never before dreamed of. For me, the Australian landscape is a preparatory teacher of perspective, even my much touted multi-perspective experienced simultaneously...but are we brave enough to listen and learn? There is certainly a kind of 'safety' in the closed distances of cities, but it's the myopic distances of technology that concern me more. By this I mean the literal distance between a phone, computer, tablet and user...where 'entertainment', 'community' and 'connection' are 'experienced'. Metaphorically speaking this diminished distance perhaps does not bode well for imagination, laterality, independence.

Cosmic Dust oil on linen 120 x 160 cm 2011

Even, buildings have windows to look out of, but where are the 'windows' to create a textured experience in the distance between person and phone? I am reminded of my recent posts where I discuss the metaphor of 'looking out the windows'...please check them out: Looking Out The Windows and Looking In The rear Vision Mirror - Cosmically Speaking

Now to something else Tim Winton said...On my island the heavens draw you out like a multidimensional horizon...I just love this! Can I repeat... the heavens draw you out like a multidimensional horizon. The cosmos has the ability to draw out of us a multidimensional horizon! Regular readers will know why I am excited by this sentence. To me this is perspective teasing out the potency that exists within and all around us. The potency that an Australian landscape is replete with. Distance connecting us to the cosmos. We are the essence of horizon, like everything else...and not just one horizon, but a multi-dimensional one! And, if this is the case, learning skills in multi-perspective should not need to be learnt, but remembered...don't you think?

And, again from Winton At night in the desert the sky sucks at you, star-by-star, galaxy-by-galaxy. You feel as if you could fall out into it at any moment. It's terrifyingly vertiginous. I need to repeat another short and excellent phrase...fall out into it... Note Winton does not say 'fall from it'. That would be far too simple for a being who has been drawn out like a multidimensional horizon!

Galactic Horizons and Beyond oil on linen 85 x 150 cm 2012

Winton ends by discussing the sense of patriotism that is born from a reverence for land. He says, Patriotism has evolved to include a reverence for the land itself, and the passion to defend the natural world as if it were family. I am reminded of the passionate displays of protest regarding the environment that reverberate around the world. In Australia two issues [related] that excite passion are potential threats to the Great Barrier Reef and coal seam gas extraction, a process that certainly does transform a landscape, both on top and below. Winton goes on to say that this reverence for land, and defence of the natural world, are reasons for why artists and writers, especially Australian ones, return to it. If he's right about the drawing out of us a multidimensional horizon then we also have the capacity to defend with cosmic perspectives...!

SALES:
Over the last few weeks I've had some painting go to lovely homes: Three in fact...!
The two most recent sales are Sending Love and Night Time Electric Storm

Cheers,
Kathryn
www.kathrynbrimblecombe-fox.com

DISAPPEARING LANDSCAPE?

Disappearance Gouache on paper 37.6 x 28 cm 1995

This is a post about landscape...so just wade through the car bits at the beginning...there is a context...I promise.

WINDOW SHOPPING
I have been 'window shopping' for a new car. Regular readers will know that this is something I do from time to time. For years, in fact...and as yet no new car!

In an earlier post about cars 'Looking Out The Windows' I wrote about the propensity for sloped backs, as a design feature, in new SUVs and station wagons. Damn annoying when you want to pack an exhibition of paintings.

My latest window shopping exercise has frustrated me for a different reason. This time it's the diminishing size of  rear and rear-side windows. Various bulk heads and side panels seem to have taken up more space than in the past. The result is reduced vision...of eye ball and pupil kind.

But!

All is not lost...apparently. When I mention my concern to car salespeople I'm told cameras, parking sensors and more, not only compensate for smaller sized windows, but provide the driver with much more 'visibility'.

Then, when I ask, 'But, what if systems fail?' the response is close to incredulity...how could I even think that this might happen? To confound the issue more, and to the embarrassment of my car-loving daughter who window shops with me, I ask, 'But, what if systems do fail and humanity has lost the ability to look out the windows and therefore has lost all the accompanying dexterities of spatial distance, understanding of speed, ratios of all kinds and general environment awareness?' In response to this, I am normally given a what-are-you-talking-about-mad-lady stare by the salesperson... and a death stare from my daughter.

LOSS
But, seriously...if we don't think to look out the windows [literally and metaphorically]...I'd suggest there's a plethora of things that would be lost. One of these is landscape. Yep, landscape, the very thing we drive in, on, about, into, over and under! As technology increases its infiltration into our everyday lives, to the point that we rely on it to remember for us, orientate us, entertain us, drive us and more, an insidious disappearance of environment occurs...because we are no longer conscious, or as conscious, of it.

Hidden Secrets Oil on linen 120 x 160 cm 2005

The disappearance of landscape is an interesting notion. But, possibly more so if one can sit outside the 'disappearance' as an observer. And, I'd suggest that the Universal perspectives revealed by contemporary cosmological research provide us with the opportunity to observe from a multitude of viewpoints.

UNTETHERING
I have previously written about my ideas of untethering notions of landscape from Earth-bound horizons. Maybe we need to do this to save landscape...like a kind of 'cloud storage'...so it can be retrieved in the future? If contemporary scifi and dystopian cinema is anything to go by, the future of Earth's landscape is far from promising. Think of the recent film 'Elysium'. In contemporary writing think of Cormac McCarthy's 'The Road'.

Yet, there is always hope! In 'Elysium' hope is represented by the distant perspective photograph of the Earth shown to our young hero. In 'The Road' it's represented by the beauty of the prose.

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To read my earlier post about 'Elysium' please click HERE and to read about 'The Road' please click HERE

 Hope Oil on linen 80 x 140 cm 2013

 

 

 

* I have written about landscape many times since I started my BLOG in August 2006.

 

Cheers,

Kathryn

www.kathrynbrimblecombe-fox.com

LOOKING OUT THE WINDOWS

Landscape of Everything oil on linen 80 x 140 cm

I really like the car enthusiast show Top Gear! The reason I do is that I am on, what is transpiring to be, a multiple year search for THE right new car. I started looking about 8 years ago, when my car was about 14 years old. That's right, it is now nearly 22.

PACKING PAINTINGS 

My car...is...a...Volvo station wagon. AND, I love it because it has plenty of room for my paintings. I can easily carry my 120 x 160cm paintings in the back, as well as my 90 x 180cm ones. Anything longer than 180cm goes on the roof racks...only for short distances...no open highway driving...and yes I wrap them tight. I can pack my car with an entire exhibition of variously sized paintings...around 24 of them!

So....I want a car that carries my paintings, but as the years have passed, station wagons and many SUVs and 4 wheel drives have shrunk. PLUS, the designers have sloped car rear ends, so that the inside back space is dramatically diminished. AND, visibility is also. WHY, OH WHY?!

My Volvo has a strong square back and I can stack and stack...easily. But, even Volvo has taken to sloped backs in their later model cars and SUVs!

MORE PHILOSOPHICAL MEANDERINGS

In Jeremy Clarkson's vehicle review in the Weekend-End Australian A Plus 4-5 May [page 15] he wrote about a journey he made in a 1999 BMW 5281wagon. The journey was across Rwanda, Tanzania and Uganda. He made a strong argument for not giving up on your old car!

He made another short remark that made me giggle.

He wrote about the 1999 BMW:

Yes, it wasn't equipped with other modern features such as parking sensors, but I solved that when 
maneuvering by simply looking out the windows.

Well, I had to laugh. I tell my children that people have to be careful not to abdicate their brains to technology because come the apocalypse [natural disaster, space debris hitting an important satellite or whatever] when GPS systems, computers and a plethora of other technology stops working, people won't have the practical skills to survive...OR... even think to simply look out the windows, literally and metaphorically!

I get told...Mum you're so weird...! Yes, but I can parallel park, without parking sensors....first go!

LOST SKILLS
I may be weird, but if people don't look out the windows what skills, of all kinds, are we losing? And, from an artist's point of view what will we miss and what will we have to do to get people to look at our work? I imagine a future where people 'look' at 'art' with media devices embedded into their glasses... or even implants, while their driverless car sweeps across landscapes that no-one sees. I suspect short-sightedness [literal and metaphoric] will be a problem...but maybe only if people think, or are lead to believe, they do not need to look out the windows. Conspiracy?

And, what about not needing to look in the rear vision mirror*...now that's also a powerful metaphor!

COSMOLOGY AND CARS!
Regular readers know of my fascination with perspective, distance and cosmology. But, I sense a collision between dexterous visioning of perspective and a myopic romance with the kind of technology that purports to be 'helping' by making it seem unnecessary for us to look out the windows.

In an age where cosmological research is discovering more and more about the close and far distances of the Universe [Multiverse] a population afflicted with myopia will not be a great asset! Navel gazing never has been. What would be preferable is a dexterous ability to see multiple perspectives, even simultaneously. No, not a driverless car kind of programming, but a human capacity that embraces all aspects of imagination and practicability. The kind of capacity that stretches boundaries in all directions.

The image of someone sitting in a driverless car, not ever having to look out the windows [which are probably tinted black anyway] is a powerful metaphor. AND imagine if there are a number of people in the car...all being 'entertained' by technological devices, embedded or not. No-one talks, no-one looks out the windows...the physical boundaries of the car are obvious and emblematic...as are the imaginational ones. The screen is mistaken as a window. The boundaries are crushing.

****

I hasten to add I am not anti-technology per se. I grew up in a house where we always had the latest and greatest new gizmos...my Dad is a HAM amateur radio enthusiast...need I say more?! After decades of exposure to technology and seeing how people relate to it, I do not see it as the proverbial 'lolly shop' of sweetness.

Yes, and I 'get' the irony of me writing this on a computer screen and you reading it on a screen of some kind.

RELATED POSTS

*Posted Jan 2014: I have subsequently written a post
LOOKING IN THE REAR VISION MIRROR-COSMICALLY SPEAKING

and added May 2014
WAITING FOR THE BEEPS

Above is a photograph taken in 1979 by my brother Wilfred Brimblecombe [copyright]. [He was up a tree] It is the main farmhouse on our parent's grain farm, our childhood home. The place was sold about 25 years ago. Notice the small hut-like building on the right of the main house. This was my Dad's HAM shack, full of all kinds of electronics and in latter years, computer equipment. Also, notice the tall aerial just in front of the HAM shack...its various antennae sent and received many a communication. This included getting a signal from Sydney so we could watch the TV Dad made in the early 1960s - long before many Queenslanders had access to television. The tall aerial was transported to my parents' new home when they retired.

Cheers,

Kathryn

www.kathrynbrimblecombe-fox.com

LANDSCAPE OF EVERYTHING

Landscape of Everything Oil on linen 80 x 140 cm

 

Calling a painting Landscape of Everything is either brave or ludicrous. I can live with both!

 

 

SO MANY THOUGHTS

 

When I was painting this image I had many many different thoughts going through my head, cascading in and out, provoking panic, excitement, fear, wariness, joy and more. There were so many thoughts that when I came to give the painting a title, nothing seemed adequate, until I came up with Landscape of Everything.

 

So, what were the thoughts going through my head? Well...here we go.

 

I wanted a cosmic appearance, but an ambiguous one in terms of perspective, orientation, place, and consciousness. The viewer can variously see many things...well that's the plan! Are you looking from a space ship back at the Earth? If so, which coloured ball is Earth? Are you on Earth looking out to space? Or are you peering into something much smaller? Or is the image a play on imagination, dreams? Maybe it is a 'landscape' of the subconsious, that place where dreams are conjured?

 

Maybe the painting dances with imagination and postulation? Indeed, at one stage I imagined each  of the balls being other universes. The concept that we live in a multiverse is really very exciting. I've written about this before in a post called MULTIVERSE and in another called MULTIVERSE POSSIBILITIES  Whilst modern cosmologists postulate about a multiverse, the idea provides wonderful metaphoric possibilities for individual human psyches, plus the whole of humanity's psyche/collective [sub]consciousness. Maybe the painting is a 'landscape' of humanity's psyche, a promise of a far more multi faceted dimension and fate than we have ever dreamed?

Landscape of Everything also relates to my previous post and painting On My Travels I Saw

 

Now for a bit of fun....maybe the coloured balls in Landscape of Everything are the other universes hinted at in my earlier painting Multiverse [below]. In Multiverse you will notice the little portals/eyes dotted around the tree-of-life...portals to other universes!!! Maybe we have travelled through them... or about to?

 

 

Multiverse Oil on linen 80 x 100 cm

 

SPACE IMAGERY AND SIMULATIONS

 

I was also thinking about the space imagery we see in books and on the internet. Some are photographs taken by various means, artists'/illustrators' impressions, and others are computer simulations. These images can be beautiful with a sense of reality and a non-reality. The play between these states is intriguing. I was thinking about this 'play' when I was painting Landscape of Everything. Rather than re-create something that looked 'real' I wanted to stimulate recognition, without a sense of surity.

 

The interesting fact that many images of cells etc under a microscope appear 'cosmic' [and vice versa], also got me thinking. The repetition of pattern across the vast scale of the universe is extraordinarily exciting. Yet, merely recording and showing the replication, for me at least, does not embrace its potential to go beyond the interest factor into realms where new ideas/insights maybe generated. Whilst Landscape of Everything is not a 'landscape' in the traditional sense, I have tried to elicit a sense of recognition of an 'environment' at the same time as stimulating fun, questions, debate and more...conversation maybe?

 

PERSPECTIVE AND LANDSCAPE

 

Regular readers will know of my keen interest in perspective and the potential for us to see multi-perspectives, even simultaneously. Certainly, modern cosmology has provided us with ample new viewpoints, which keep expanding, into vastness, the quantum and possibility. It also, I think, compels us to develop more sophisticated ideas of literal and metaphoric perspective that may lead to new skills and insights. Indeed, I argue, that notions of 'landscape' need to be untethered from Earth, especially in an age where, for example, we literally have a glorious amount of new visions of Earth from outer space.

 

In an increasingly globalised world, a cosmic perspective may afford us the opportunity to avoid [or stop] navel gazing. Planet Earth is our only home, for the foreseeable [and beyond] future and we need to work together to look after it, as well as collaboratively ensure that our immediate space environment is managed in a sustainably appropriate way. As I have written before...Earth maybe our home, but the Universe is our environment.

 

DOTS

And, it did occur to me that my new painting could be just a bunch of coloured balls painted onto an interesting background. But....

 

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Here's a few earlier posts which might interest you:

 

UNTETHERING LANDSCAPE...REVOLUTIONARY?

TOWARDS A COSMIC LANDSCAPE

CLOSE AND FAR DISTANCE

NOTIONS OF PERSPECTIVE

 

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 My next solo exhibition

 

COSMIC ADDRESS

 

will be in 15- 27 October

Brisbane

 

 

Cheers,

Kathryn

www.kathrynbrimblecombe-fox.com

 

 

MYTH

Towards The Past and Future Gouache on paper 21 x 29.7 cm 2013

 

I am re-reading a wonderful book I bought and read in the early 1990s. It is Joseph Campbell: The Power of Myth with Bill Moyers. The book is a transcription of a series of conversations which took place between the two men in the years leading to Joseph Campbell's death in 1987. Joseph Campbell 'was the world's foremost authority on mythology', a scholar with deep insights into the interconnnections between mythologies and how they might 'speak' to contemporary society. For more information, please visit the Joseph Campbell Foundation website HERE 

 

Regular readers will know of my long and deep interest in perspective and the potential to develop skills in seeing multiple perspectives [even simultaneously]. Coupled with this is a keen interest in cosmology and the new insights, and perspectives, humanity gains from the unveiling of distances that seem to be getting both smaller and larger. By taking ourselves away from, and outside, Earth- bound perspectives we have an opportunity to 'see' ourselves and humanity in new ways. As I have written before, for me, the most significant realisation is that we all share the one home...planet Earth. In fact, for the time being, and probably into the unforeseeable future, Earth is our only home. There is nowhere else to go! For humanity to survive, and for Earth to provide a continuing and sustainable home, we all need to work to-gether. My recent short story Stirring The Star Dust is an allegorical story about this very issue.

 

So, back to Joseph Campbell. Apart from many many profound observations and insights, I was struck by an answer Campbell gave to a question asked by Moyers.  

MOYERS: What kind of new myth do we need?

CAMPBELL: We need myths that will identify the individual not with his local group but with the planet.

Remember, this conversation ocurred in the mid to late 1980s. We now have people like Prof Joel Primack and his wife Nancy Ellen Abrams calling for the same thing, but from a perspective that is steeped in contemporary cosmological research, as well as an understanding of story, myth and the arts. I have previously referred to their recent book, which I have read, keep beside my bed and highly recommend, The New Universe and The Human Future: How a shared cosmology could transform the world. Currently environmental issues, already apparent in the 80s, are now manifesting in noticeable outcomes that threaten food production, climate, water quality and quantity and more. It seems to me that Campbell's call for myths that vision us as dwellers of Earth, and not just by nation, region, religion or race, is vital.

 

 

Seeking The Past and Future Gouache on paper 15 x 21 cm 2013

 

The basic premises, or resonnances, of age-old symbols can be visually re-articulated to 'speak' to us today. As regular readers know, this is what I search to do in my paintings, particularly with my much loved transcultural/religious tree-of-life. More recently I have been stirred to paint the ouroboros, the age-old symbol of a snake eating its own tail. This symbol was used by the ancients to visually describe the Universe, as they understood and observed it. Today, modern cosmologists also use it to visually describe the Universe and the relationship between the quantum and cosmic worlds ie: as we understand and observe. For more on this aspect of the ourboros please check out my previous posts COSMIC ADDRESS and SNAKES EATING THEIR OWN TAILS 

 

Symbols can speak across time, history and space. It is up to us to listen, ask, seek and explore. Imagination is a key! Why? Because, imagination draws upon human race memory and sensation, not just individual impulses. Imagination can stir the past, present and future. It agitates and stimulates. It is a gift to humanity...a gift of the stars maybe? If you believe we are all, like everything else in the Universe, are made of star dust...remnants of the Big Bang...then imagination is definitely a key! 

 

You might be interested in a 2009 post I wrote called FAITH IN IMAGINATION

 

All Of Us Gouache on paper 15 x 21 cm 2013

All of Us inspired me to paint Eternity's Breath

 

I've just reworked my COSMOLOGY GALLERY on my website. Please click HERE to see it.

 

Cheers,

Kathryn

www.kathrynbrimblecombe-fox.com

TOWARDS A COSMIC LANDSCAPE

This Is A Landscape Gouache on paper 30 x 42 cm 2001

 

 

I was rummaging through my map drawers, where I keep my unframed works on paper, and found this painting [above] This Is A Landscape which I painted in 2001. When I painted it I remember my intention was to be more obvious than obvious, by writing 'This is a landscape' across the entire page. The words give form to the 'landscape' between the tree trunks.

 

Regular readers will know of my interest in untethering notions of landscape from Earth. In 2001 I had not really formulated my ideas, but I remember wanting to disrupt landscape. I wanted to question our complacency towards landscape painting, to unsettle the ubiquitous traditions of landscape, to postulate whether we humans find vulnerable sanctuary within landscape. 

 

When I lived out west, in Goondiwindi, there was an expectation that I'd paint landscapes. This expectation irritated me a bit, because city dwelling artists were not expected to paint cityscapes. Some did and others...most....did not. It seemed such a simplistic attitude. Yet, the 'regional artist' label hung heavy with expectation around my neck. I was angry with landscape!

 

I remember having an exhibition in Brisbane in 1995 or 1995...can't remember the exact date, but my second daughter was still a baby...where the paintings were my early tree-of-life works. Golden Lives [below] was in the exhibition. Back then for me, the tree-of-life was more of a familial tree, rather than the cosmic/universal one I dance with now! The tree, or my motivation to paint it, was about family and connection across generations. Regular readers will know that my ideas were vastly broadened when I exhibited in the Middle East in 2005.  

 

 

Golden Lives Mixed media on paper 1993

 

But back to 1994/5. At the opening of the exhibition a person from a Queensland government Arts organisation kept referring to the trees as gum trees! He was not the only one. I was more than a little irritated! My Goondiwindi address seemed to stick to me like mud!

 

When I moved to Brisbane in 2000 I found there was no expectation to paint landscapes. The irony is that, without the expectation, I began to feel much freer to paint landscapes ...or my versions of them!

 

And now, after years of being immersed in landscape, literally and artistically, I am suggesting we need to untether notions of landscape from being Earth bound, because whilst Earth maybe our home, the Universe is our environment. Looking beyond Earthly horizons provides new and different perspectives, which may reveal new pathways for the future, act as catalysts for co-operation, provide alternative insights...and more.  A cosmic context is really very exciting...new horizons, frontiers and places to explore, at closer and farther distances of space and time. Landscape is no longer 'safe' or expected! I think it is now expectant! And, that's an exciting challenge for us.

 

 

Galactic Horizons and Beyond oil on linen 85 x 150 cm 2012

 

 

 

 

FROM MY BROTHER'S BLOG

'Solo Sunflower'

 

Absolutely beautiful!!!!!!!

 

Solo Sunflower photo taken by Wilfred Brimblecombe

 

 

Cheers,

Kathryn

www.kathrynbrimblecombe-fox.com