"In nature nothing is created, nothing is lost, everything is transformed," (Jean Renoir).
Things just are. We just are. Molded, altered, changed by our experiences.
As artists we tend to discuss our works or our processes as acts of creation. It is accepted that our role is to create or produce artworks. Consider though, that nothing is created, that in fact our job as artists is to alter, change and transform the material and media we work with. For example, when working on a painting, does an artist create an artwork? or does an artist transform the paint, alter its original state, change its form? The paint is still paint. Through the experience, talent and ideas of the artist the paint is applied in a new manner, its meaning changes, it is molded and altered. The paint is not created, the paint is not lost, the paint is transformed. By saying this, I'm not intending to devalue or undermine the creativity or imagination of the artist, rather arguing that the role of the artist is not solely to create: it is to change.
More broadly, I like to think that the challenge of the artist is to seek change, to question the state of being.
So, the artworks I present to you here, are not my creations. They are works in progress. They are transformations of ideas and materials. I hope that you will see change in my works, that nothing of myself or my ideas will be lost, rather that they become altered and transformed through experience and change.
Love that you've shed a light on this topic, I believe too that Artists are merely on a journey of representing the phenomena of daily experiences in their own unique way.
ReplyDeleteThough some may see artists as creators; in reality it seems that atleast in the field of contemporary Art the hard work goes into conveying the depth of those realities as subtly but also as powerfully as possible. That is when effort has to be applied beyond the act of just showing aesthetics and "talent"...if that made any sense or is relevant in anyway. I have a thing with taking tangents...forgive me
Words from my Aunt:
ReplyDeleteLynette Carroll :
I really am interested in thoughts of change and transformation through changing experience of paint and the artist. As a dancer I too find that the work I use cant be called an appropriation as on my body and movement through experience space and time the movement is altered altogether to become another event and then it is given to another for their ongoing change and transformation of the idea. We are in constant motion of change and experience with ultimate depths and levels in that desire to create or what we think we are creating. Life is an ongoing transformation of levels and depths of desire.