Breaking up without breaking - from Cheryl Penn

[Marie Wintzer]

 

You might have seen similar pieces by Cheryl on IUOMA blogs all around the world, but the thing is, each of those booklets is a truly unique piece of art. An exploration deep into the flow of ideas, an idea in its own right.

 

 

 

The book contains photographs of a large painting at various stages of the process, and a "real life" piece of it, materializing an idea that was birthed way upstream of today, framing it into the present. A strange feeling of literally holding a piece of idea in my hands.

 

 

The flow of this particular idea follows the line that goes from constructing, layering, building up, to de-constructing, breaking up, dissecting out. Something has been created with the purpose of being dismantled.
The painting shouts out "don't break me please", but its existence solely relies on fragmentation (although on one of Cheryl's pictures the word Don't is lying in the shadow so that the painting seems to be begging to be broken).
Which made me think, can one break up without breaking?

 

 

Find a way through. I am thrilled the piece I got contains the wonderful word FIND. Layered onto a map. This to me is an indication that the process of breaking up does not end here, with this piece of painting. There is more in it and more to it, but a different person is now taking over. Up to the recipient to dig deeper and continue with the fragmentation and the (re)search. And forward in the flow of ideas, perhaps the branching of a small-new river from a much larger one?
Thank you for this fab 1/28, Cheryl! I certainly would like to have as many "ideas whose time has come" as you do! But I know from experience that your ideas always lead to other ideas. Inspiration, I think. So, thank you!!

 

 

PS* unnecessary quote of the day from Unknown: A half-baked idea is okay as long as it's in the oven.

[Nancy Bell Scott]

Yah, sorry Cheryl and Marie!  I should have rushed over and joined SH's Free Art and discussed all this there.  Maybe I was afraid it would be more about zombies, haha.

SH, i AM signing on to Free Art.  Just looked there and unknowingly went straight to an early discussion about leaving art around in public, free -- which gave me a jolt since that's exactly what I was in the process of planning to do when I found IUOMA by mistake and got sidetracked.  (no kidding, eh?)  My husband is going to do the actual leaving of my art in public places because I'm shy, but I'm writing on the back "A gift for you, whoever finds this," so they'll actually take it.  I sell work occasionally out of my studio or a show here and there, but I quit the gallery scene long ago because I don't want only people with money to be able to have art in their house or hands.

[1cgqtuoblpeqc]

cory doctorow is always good too! ;-D

he used to work for EFF!!

[Nancy Bell Scott]

I hear you clearly now and see the vastness of your concern, and I share it.  So much of my life was spent in only a barebones semi-digitized world that I'm still reeling from the past ten or so years, and haven't really been able to articulate very well the fears they've brought (and I do have them, strongly -- nightmare material).  You're doing that right now, thank you.  Envisioning the abstract as akin to what was done to the Indians here blows my mind, but I see what you mean.  Will check out EFF more thoroughly on an already-bad day. :--)

[1cgqtuoblpeqc]

you also have to consider projects like wikipedia and the many, many open source software projects out there which have had huge booms in development after being opened under a public license. openness promotes creativity; and a closed approach to thinking stifles it.

 

but we've probably veered off the original topic, this beautiful artwork.

i want to chime in that i've been thinking more about the deconstructional element and staring at my pile of plates for POSTmodernism, whih has been staring back at me for quite some time now. I think i'm going to try to send one each to marie and cheryl for putting up with my yakking on about FREE ART. ;-D

[1cgqtuoblpeqc]

i think the thing is that, although it has been around for a long time, its implications are far more vast the more digitized the general public becomes. and the more technology improves. when we were mass-producing cars it was different. people were still mainly paying for something that has a tangible existence. what we are moving into now is more like paying money to be able to use a number in an equation. it's an abstract, without tangible existence. it's like saying i own the color that is one part red to two parts each of green and blue; if you want to use it in your art, you have to pay a fee.

 

it is not too dissimilar to when the europeans came to the americas and took away the land from the indians. the indians thought land was not a thing to be bought and sold; it wasn't something you could own - but it was divvied up all the same, and taken out from beneath their feet. that will probably be the way with ideas in a digital world; the abstract may well be the new frontier.

 

i obviously don't have all the answers, i just know a lot of people in the free software world are greatly concerned with these things; most especially the EFF. You can check out their website if you're interested, i do now and again and find i quite intriguing. ;-D

[1cgqtuoblpeqc]

@kat: as nice as greece sounds, about the furthest i travel these days is 45 minutes away, by car. i think it will have to be ALL minus one. ;-D

[Nancy Bell Scott]

Yah, ok, you're talking about capitalism and the growth of the throw-away society with all its implications.  And it is a grossly flawed system, no question about it.  The only thing about its flaws that make it intellectually somewhat livable for me is the knowledge that all systems created by humans are flawed, so choose your flaws.  I know that doesn't make some things any more palatable; and I think watchdogs are always essential, so more power to you.

[1cgqtuoblpeqc]

by artist, i pretty much mean businessman.

[1cgqtuoblpeqc]

oh, i'm not talking about artists.

DVS is, but this reaches far further than art.

this applies to all thought.

and not just thought -

people are copyrighting DNA sequences and the like.

 

Basically it comes down to the fact that society is moving in the direction of black-box consumerism.

you buy a product, but you don't get what you used to, you aren't allowed to use i in any other way than the way the original "artist" intended it to be used. we're moving away from creative re-use, more and more into the realm of buy once, use once, toss it in the trash. repeat cycle.

[Katerina Nikoltsou (MomKat)]

Wow...this blog went up yesterday? And there are almost 50 comments...lively discussion!

Marie, you have the lower left corner "FIND", and I have the next section above that "WHERE THW".

Someone will get the edge:"WAY", and another person:"DON'T BREAK", etc,etc,etc...and we shall ALL meet in Greece in Spring, 2011 and put it all together again,for Cheryl clearly states:

"DON'T BREAK ME PLEASE"!