Artist Statement
Writing into Painting
This current body of work consists of 45 artworks that deploy ecriture, the French term for “writing” and also for “the movement of the hand,” to produce the marks that constitute these “writings which are paintings.” My work uses what I am calling writing or ecriture to explore memory, contemplation, ritual, and devotion to convey my love for and, at times, frustration with all of these territories. These “writings” appear at first to be asemic in that they are not legible, yet the structures of these works do in fact express an intention to communicate. . They are the speech space in which I “say” that which I have not yet found the words or the language to express as speech sound or poetry. This “writing” is visual language that is other than literary.
This work also takes from Martin Heidegger’s discussion of language and the work of art and finds a location both in poetry and art making—a speech space—wherein these works are made visible. The work addresses drawing and speaking as well as the circular studio practice in which a work begins and completes itself.
I would like to express through my work an unexpected glimpse of myself, a sense of contemplation, beauty, mystery, an investigation of being, acts of devotion, prayer, acts of frustration, both my rebirth and at the same instant my destruction, and the idea that it is better to understand than to be understood, even as hard as that is for me.
Writing . . .
Ecriture, the French word for writing, also means “the movement of the hand.” Like many artists before me, such as Leon Ferrari, Cy Twombly, Hedda Sterne, as well as contemporary artists such as Charwei Tsai, Il Lee and many more, I too use writing as a catalyst for my works. All of the artists mentioned employ or deploy the “writtenness” of their work differently and for different ends, but each has chosen this manner of expression—the recognition of script, a written form that commits thoughts to marks—to invite the viewer to contemplate their meanings. I seek to understand myself through this mode of writing-into-painting, that is, this mode of the hand marking a surface to record without speaking. For me this mode of drawing and painting explores the cadences of poetry and prose, the repetitions of ritual and devotion, and the meanings of technique and patience, as have many of my predecessors in this work. Kirk Varnedoe said of Twombly that his work often sought its own poetics by invoking the heritage of literature [ecrit]. (Varnedoe, 9) Ferrari’s script-based work owes a debt to music and ritual, as does the work of Hedda Sterne and Joseph Beuys, among others. Charwei Tsai writes the Heart Sutra repeatedly on perishable items, such as tofu, fruit, and flower petals, invoking the apparent permanence in repetition and the transitory impermanent nature of life.
The thoughts, the words, seem at times to roll about my mind—and I mean this in the sense of water, fluidity. It is not that I am not cognizant of what I am doing; it simply means that at times the language fails to escape as the flowing entity it is: I must enter the space of the leaf, the surface, to enact this fluidity. This space is both a repository for memory as well as a reflective device. As a repository of memory, the space takes or receives or holds the marks, the writing, and absorbs that moment for me. Much like memory when looking back upon itself or, if you will, when forcibly dug up, excavated, the remembered may not always be recalled as it was when it happened. As reflective device it not only reflects back the intention but also serves as a space for reflection. It is in that space that I can allow myself the freedom to express that which otherwise I do not have the words to say. This is how I make known that which pains me to think and cannot speak, remembered things that I do not want to admit but nonetheless are true. The Bible says that Moses was slow of speech and that he had his brother Aaron speak for him. These works are my Aaron —they speak for me. I find that what comes closest to what I want to say is found in poetry and other such writings. The works in this body of work are nonverbal enunciations in rhythmic cadence that come closer to poetry than other forms of conveying meaning.
Works
The works are an invitation to the viewer to look intensely and contemplate them closely. My intention is that through subtle, nuanced use of the materials to make the line that the viewer would question not only its meaning but “see” the patience and devotion to the gesture as a rendering of myself, as self-portrait as refrain.
