The (Greatest) Painting of (All) Time (2)
When Cezanne, the father of modern art, said that ('There is nothing to say about art'), he knew it was not the whole truth, for there's plenty to be said about art. They're the words of an artist who knows Time is short, who wants to get on with the next painting and not waste time joining the conversation with those who spend their time saying things about art. There is not a lot of time to do art and to write and talk about it. (And that is the peculiarly human dilemma; we don't have enough time - not to do all the things we can and would like to do. Animals may be different, for they can do limited things and therefore do all the things they can do in their lifetime, but creative humans can only wish they had the time to do all they could do).
The artist is aware that if you say anything about your art then it may fixate it inappropriately, for the world wants to put labels on everything, to put into boxes and categories and to limit it, while the artist knows/feels that whatever you say about the work is not quite right, and saying one thing excludes so many other things and meanings, which then, to be fair, also have to be said (in a multiversal perspective). And so the conversation should go on and on (accompanied in some places by smoke, coffee and bottles of wine) - but then talking about the art makes it 'important' as a conversation piece / device for communication. When something is the focus of time and attention it becomes important, even if in artistic terms it has little merit, or if the time spent talking could be considered time wasted .
The truthful artist also knows that the meaning of the work can't be entirely known by anyone. The artist is channelling something and expressing it without knowing exactly why and what for. In retrospect one may see things better (or lose sight of what was once true).
So the time-is-short artist may be a little impatient when people routinely ask: "What is it about? What is it (supposed to be)?"
It's not supposed to be anything more than some paint on canvas, or some consciously decided arrangement of matter, That is all it needs to be; something that exists in time. But then in calling it art we say it's something we want you to give a little more attention and contemplative time. We want to inspire your mindfulness to render this art, this time or moment, as special or sacred. For your time is special, its limited.
But why is that the cosmic order of things? Why should our time be limited and too short when the universe may be infinite and eternal? Now I will say something about the symbolism in the painting (and maybe answer that question).
The Eternal and Infinite Universe 1994
The painting is an apparently simple image, painted with the awareness that simple forms have many co-operative symbolic meanings, all of which can be embraced and considered in the multiverse that the text in the painting talks of.
The most obvious symbol is the circle painted in blue, looking like a blue sun or planet just above a horizon.
The circle is a symbol of Time, the clock face, or time as a cyclic thing, perhaps ever recycling itself, eternally. One cycle is a limited time, like a life, but also an end that comes back to a beginning (and in the eternal and infinite multiverse there is no absolute beginning or end, no ultimate creation or destruction of energy; all is recycled).
Just above the horizon, as a sun, the circle symbolizes a point in time. But then you don't know if the sun is rising or setting, is it the end or the beginning of the day? Can it be both? The superposition of two should-be-exclusive realities? This setting-or-rising sun (in a painting) symbolizes the inherent duality in things, a mystery, the mystery of Schrodinger's cat or the wave/ particle duality. The circle or sphere, represents the particle, something with a boundary, while at the bottom of the painting we have the wavy lines (to extend beyond the painting). And to explain the wave particle duality, we need a text (between the two) that would have to be the beginning or ending of a theory of everything. And that is what the theory is here, a beginning and an ending of the day. A necessary precept that also leads to the same ultimate realisation, in a self reinforcing cycle. A reality that regenerates itself. If you combine the circle with duality then you have the double circle symbol for infinity
The circle symbolizes a combination of infinity and limitation that represents this theory of the multiverse (as explained in my booklet "the Pi Universe").
I say the universe of space and time is infinite, but that the scope of any reality can only extend so far, and be limited, for in an infinite universe there should be no absolute all-encompassing reality, hence an infinite universe must be a multiverse. We know that in a flat circle the ratio between the diameter and the circumference is Pi, whose digits stretch on infinitely without recurring. Pi is then impossible to realise. But with a very slight distortion of space then the pi ratio changes to something that can be realised locally. So here comes Gravity, that can perform that gentle distortion of geometry and allow a local realisation of things (a cosmos or world). Gravity is here the condition or agent of the making of a formal reality. It pulls things into spheres and circles, planets and suns. In my understanding, Time without gravity would mean all formal realities in a multiverse would dissipate or evaporate, re-merge with formless infinite background energy. Gravity added to Time puts a hold on that, it fixes the reality and provides it with lasting cyclic conditions (on the multiverse scale). But if this is the explanation for gravity, and if the universe is infinite and eternal, then here is a boundary beyond which hard science cannot prove or venture, we can only imagine. So then we move towards the realms of art and the imagination, texts in paintings rather than scientific papers seeking publication, freedom of expression rather than very formal guidelines, rigid conformity, inaccessibility to most.
So this painting also represents something of a counter culture against what is asked for. And as it succeeded in predicting something the formal scientific community failed to do, its a great victory for the spirit of that counter culture. Nor is it conforming to the expectations of the art world. It is not establishing credibility, or commercial seriality, but one-off uniqueness (for no other work will predict the accelerating expansion) and incredibility.
By counter culture I mean that necessary movement that gives an alternative or balance to other global trends that seem to be going in a soulless direction. In the world of music for example we have all that is electronically produced and marketed, sold digitally globally on the internet. As well as markets for TV evolved performers. The counter culture is the acoustic world of open mike (without a mike) or the rise of festivals and live music, experiences and times rather than products. Art is or should be a realm for the counter culture, against the world of AI, computers and machinery. Art should define itself as whatever cannot be easily defined or done by a robot, and as such be the last refuge of human beings. But some artists or the art world see more money or ease in art that can be done formulaically. The art world generally wants neat clean interior design friendly art (for wealthy apartments) and doesn't like the naïve stuff (that reminds the artworld /buyers of the soul that it's losing or has ignored).
The counter culture by contrast seeks to be more in harmony with nature, and the inner nature of a human being.
In this painting the reference to nature and soul is in the use of wood that is not obscured with paint, but tinted and showing the grain. The grain of the wood combines with the colour to make a unique image, unrepeatable. It is important, in my conception of the multiverse, that every life being is unique (there are not multiple copies of you in the infinity but infinite variation (as explained in the Pi universe). This for me makes the universe much more fascinating and meaningful, while repetition would be pointless and soulless. Each letter of the text is also intentionally painted with unique character, as opposed to a strict font. That means each letter is a decision. Decision is important in art and also in my understanding of the universe (see last paragraph). If a work has no conscious decisions in it then it is not art, and what may define a ready made object as an art object is perhaps just a decision (by an artist) to define it as such. And in making that decision the artist calls on you to look at the object in a different way, the key thing being to pay it some attention with some extra TIME. Normally we walk past or glimpse the mundane object with minimal awareness. But investing time in looking at it changes the feeling and impression. Indeed it's the decision to look at something as art that makes it art, more than the object itself. A painting on the wall can be something you don't notice other than as background scenery, while a ball of string can become art if you decide to look at is as such. And that way of looking is very similar to taking an out-of-this world viewpoint. That is, here on Earth you can scoff at the significance of a ball of string, but in terms of the cosmos, well to find a ball of string somewhere would be a miracle. The art world of course is slightly at odds with this message; that you can make the world art by merely looking at things in a different way. It underlies a lot of contemporary art, but at the same time commercially devalues it, for they want to say this experience should be yours only if you go to galleries, and it belongs only to objects that artists have made the decision for. Every day you can see a pile of bricks somewhere, a urinal or an unmade bed and get the pleasure of seeing art and the wonder of the universe without having to go to an art gallery or buy anything.
The characters/letters in the painting are in rows like the seedlings in a furrowed field. The field being the field of knowledge (as the intention was to express and encapsulate the ultimate piece of knowledge, from which further knowledge will grow and grow, like seedlings grow). An infinite eternal multiverse is the ultimate knowledge for there can be no greater realisation, and at the same time it means knowledge can grow endlessly, for we will never 'know it all'.
The sun/circle has a vague border, like a cell wall of a living organism, and the blue colour is symbolic of life and awareness, from it being the colour of skies or atmosphere or the seas that we joy to see and need for life generally (as we know it) here on Earth. And life, of course, is very important, in the universe. Some may think that life is an accident, or something that emerges by chance out of the emergence of the cosmos. Others may think that the universe was created for life; so that life would inevitably emerge. The ultimate implication of a multiverse however, in agreement with that of quantum physics, is that any reality may not exist without an awareness there to perceive it. Perception proactively realises the reality. The multiverse, in my understanding, starts from and goes back to an ever present background of infinite formless energy, from which no specific reality can be derived or maintained without some decision-maker / intent being ever present (not just once upon a time). That means the principle of life /awareness has to be inherent in the existence of things, or inherent in the existence of time itself, long before the things we identify as life emerged out of time. We see the spooky hints of that awareness in the behaviour of fundamental particles such as electrons that we cannot understand (because they behave as if they are aware everything everywhere all at once).
Retrospectively, I can also say that the blue colour is symbolic of the awareness of the coming future, for the light of things that are coming towards us is blue-shifted. (The browner colours of the background represent the cosmic microwave background radiation)
So the painting symbolically predicted it's own predictive success. For me it further predicts a future of greater awareness, given the new paradigm of a multiverse (as I suggest in the 'New Prize' blog entry)
Time will tell.
