Painting Seduction (Extract 2)
MA Fine Art Central St Martins thesis - 2007
Aesthetics?
Even though seduction is an illusion and an appearance, it represents memories and emotions, which have no physical matter. If seduction is to represent these memories and emotions, there must be a way of making it happen.In 1968, the American painter Philip Guston turned his back on abstract expressionism for figurative painting. Even though, from then on, his paintings represent an image, the viewer is destabilized. It is hard to define what one is looking at.This painting, entitled Head (fig. 4) illustrates Guston’s definition of a painting. In 1978, he gave a lecture on his work at the University of Minnesota saying:“ The painting is not in a surface, but on a plane which is imagined. It moves in a mind. It is not there physically at all. It is an illusion, a piece of magic, so what you see is not what you see”[1].
The magic is there again. Guston is attempting to describe the impossibility for the painter to explain the true essence of the work and for the viewer to express what he/she really feels. What one sees is what one wants to see. It might hide what one really wants to see but is scared of seeing. I believe in the idea of an ungraspable quality attributed to painting - painting as an illusion, a piece of magic. It makes me dream, it makes me believe that everything is possible…the act of painting is a precious gift: a gift which gives birth to several lives. These lives come to life through the seductive essence of the painting; an essence of appearance, illusion and magic.
How can this seductive essence be represented?
Aesthetics.
A word which raises so many doubts in me.
A word bound with tradition.
For a long time I have felt the weight of my Frenchness as an obstruction to becoming a painter.
I fought against my fascination for Ingres, Chardin, Courbet, Boucher, Watteau and Fragonard. I would not allow my work to be influenced by these painters. Today, the French art scene remains constrained by its long history of painting and conservatism, and therefore by a pejorative perception of aesthetics which is regarded as old-fashioned. Aesthetics are seen as the domain of the amateurish oil painter. A contemporary painter who considers aesthetics as a priority, is classified as ‘traditional’.
The contemporary art scene no longer exists within the ‘anti-aesthetic’ era of the modernist, nor does it exist within the post-modernist experimental era. Today’s art scene exists in an era which is uncomfortable with the notion of aesthetics. It is almost as if it is a banned word.
Marc-Olivier Wahler is the new director of the Palais de Tokyo in Paris - a space described as “A space of reference dedicated to the emerging contemporary creation.”[2] It seems that this concentration of words tends to emphasize its difference from the rest of the French art scene.
Wahler, born in 1964 in Switzerland, is a curator, art critic, tutor and philosopher. Thenew director is described as someone who is willing to be as close as possible to contemporary creation, to multiply a variety of collaborations and to develop structures which place the artist in the centre of the decisional process.
In other words, Wahler is the man who wants to make contemporary art even more contemporary, and there is nothing wrong with that. What I do not agree with is his confused relationship with aesthetics. In an interview published in l’Express, a French magazine, he says: “Today we are not interested in aesthetics anymore, which fixes some rules and gives solutions […] The interest of a piece of art lies in what I call its ‘schizophrenic quotient’: for me a piece is interesting because of its multiple approaches and readings […] Hence what matters is not what is seen, it is not the aesthetic.”[3]
When he is asked about the aim of his exhibition at the Palais de Tokyo titled Cinq Milliards d’Années (Five Billions Years), he mentions the reference to a cosmic reshuffle, which he wants to apply to creation, and concludes:“The aim is to provoke crossed gazes, to facilitate multiple readings scenarios, and not to create a new aesthetic.”[4]
Marc-Olivier Wahler seems really confused with this notion of the aesthetic. He contradicts himself, he is not interested in the aesthetic, nor does he want to create a new one. He ignores it, and at the same time he acknowledges it. What is he afraid of? What is so threatening with one saying that one believes in it? Is there a reason to be ashamed of it? It must be considered as a weakness for Wahler, the evidence of a ‘non-contemporary’ approach; the proof of an attachment to the past. He does not want to consider it. One cannot be a curator and reject it as a statement because it exists no matter what is said. In art, the idea and the aesthetic cannot be dissociated.
Hegel, in his monumental writing on the subject Aesthetics, gives a very accurate definition of the concept:“Concept of beauty, as well as in the beautiful objects and its subversive contemplation, the sphere of the beautiful is withdrawn from the relativity of finite affairs and raised into the absolute realm of the Idea and the truth.”[5]
In other words, the aesthetic is the path to the idea, and in this matter, it retains an immense power - the power to convince. One is afraid of being convinced by an unknown and uncontrollable power, a magical power.
I believe in the aesthetic, and I believe in its power. It is this power which frightens: the power to feel, the power to unlock emotions, to allow emotions, the power to let go. The same power that seduction implies.If seduction is a conscious illusion/appearance of the memory of emotion - the unconscious -then in order to create that space, to open the door to that space, I believe that painting should retain a certain aesthetic: a persuading, charming, tempting, captivating, magic aesthetic. The power of the aesthetic to guide the viewer into a world of memories, of recollected emotions.
If seduction is a question of mastery as power, how can it be applied to manipulation? Mastery is the subtle, hidden manipulator which gives power its different faces. For Jean Baudrillard, the strongest power of seduction relies on its weakness:“To seduce is to appear weak. To seduce is to render weak. We seduce with our weaknesses, never with strong signs or power. In seduction we enact this weakness, and this is what gives seduction its strength.”[6]
Weakness is used as a means, a lure. Hence, it is powerful.
I feel freer now…I do not have to fight anymore against my desire to use the aesthetic as a means of engaging the viewer in a dialogue with my work. Even if the aesthetic is weak, it is actually powerful…this is all I need…I allow myself …
I feel I have the right to…More importantly I know why I allow myself.I am slowly deconstructing the brioche I paint, it is somewhere between form and formless. The pleasing roundness of the brioche is fading; another brioche appears…my real brioche full of memories and emotions. What becomes important is not the image as recognisable, but the image which can generate an infinity of images… I am painting a brioche au beurre - its taste is mine - but it may taste differently for each person, as my paintings may be perceived differently as well.
.[1] Philip Guston, London: Timothy Taylor Gallery, 2004, p.22.
[2] www.palaisdetokyo.com
[3] L’Express, weekly magazine, Paris: 28/09/2006 – Translated from the French
.[4] Ibid
[5] Hegel, Aesthetics, Oxford: At the Clarendon Press, 1975, Volume 1, p.115
.[6] Sartre, Jean-Paul, Sketch for a theory of the emotions, London: Methuen, 1971, p.83.