Historical Reference

For the historical reference project, I was fortunately easily able to tie in my thesis show by making a work that I can also use in that series.

My thesis heavily references the book, Be Here Now written and collated by Ram Dass. I first looked into historical artistic influences for Ram Dass but could not find much. But I did know that the book was made in a collaborative effort by various artists who used stamp blocks, text, "graphic design" and of course illustrations.

Throughout my thesis I have taken snippets of text and imposed them onto the canvas alongside a visceral representation of the statement using paint, surface, technique and so forth. Though I keep the textual compositions true to their placement in the book, I have collaged bits and pieces in order to provide new commentary and meaning that is all ironic, sarcastic, humorous, existential and strives for authenticity-- and also to remove specific pronouns the book uses that might make the viewer of my paintings think they are about anything other than universality. In other cases, I have incorporated specific illustrations or drawings onto the canvas surface.








One composition I put together is as follows...
Here is one of the pages I borrowed from :

















In the end this was my final composition:

I was thinking about these hands. & more specifically, how they have been reproduced again and again and again.. what is the original source?

I learned about the first iteration of these hands was done by Albrecht Dürer in 1508.

The piece is titled, "Studie zu den Händen eines Apostels" in German, or "Study of the Hands of an Apostle". And it is a pen & ink drawing on paper that the artist made. 

I learned a bit more about the piece which surprised me. Albrecht had 17 siblings growing up in Nuremburg, Germany. One of his brothers, Albert was too, very interested in the arts. However, his family could not afford for them both to attend Art School. Albert and Albrecht flipped a coined to see who would go and become an artist and who would go to work in the mines to make money. Albrecht won the coin toss, and after years of his education and success as an artist, a festive was thrown in his honor. He raised is glass and made a toast to Albert, who had gone to work in the mines in order to pay for Albrecht's education. He said to his brother, "it's your turn to go and study now". As much as Albert would have liked too, he could not, for his hands had withered away during his time working in the mines. Therefore, Albrecht drew his brothers hands in homage to him.







What struck me most was that over the years, these hands have been interpreted and reproduced in a religious context. For example, people assume that this emoji is praying hands, but in actuality it is just a high five. Dürer's hands have undergone the same treatment and so has the symbolic icon of the hands.

 



So in regards to my composition, I felt that the text I chose, which was composed from two different pages in the book, seemed appropriate. The notion of having faith, in general, implies believing in something no matter what. That's what faith is, supporting, committing and undoubting a person, a motive, an idea, and so forth. And I felt that in the same sense, people-- in general-- have had faith in the notion that these hands represented anything having to do with spirituality or religion-- faith in the icon itself. And it doesn't matter where the original came from, what matters is that its essentially just a symbol that stands in for something much greater. It also makes me think about simulacra and originality. So the painting is both sarcastic and serious at the same time. It sort of pokes fun at religion and the hands meaning anything at all, but simultaneously asserts that having faith is to have faith and that's that. It really makes no difference what the image is, it is the underlying belief that ultimately matters.

I thought that because I was using the Be Here Now reference, the way that I could reference my historical figure more so, was to employ his aesthetics in the Hands Study piece. I chose to make pulp from shop towels because I learned that Dürer actually made his own paper in his original rendition. I am no stranger to shop towels and they are very prevalent in any painter's sphere of familiarity. I used payne's grey acrylic paint and various glues to almost paper maché the pulp onto the canvas surface and it also gave it a nice dark stain. I then used white pencil, as the Dürer did, to cross hatch the image.

Here is a cute video on how to make paper that I watched:

& here is my final painting: