Completed Painting: 'Deleuzian Cartography 1'

 

'Deleuzian Cartography 1', Paper Collage & Mixed Media, 300 mm x 300 mm, x 1 2024

This is the first small panel to emerge from all my messing about with maps over recent months. As mentioned in my previous post, this imagery emerges from a period of sketchbook experimentation, in which recurring motifs and working methods were allowed to evolve in a fairly organic manner without too many constraints. For all that may feel like a new phase of activity, I now realise that this kind of thing superficially resembles some of the street plan-derived work I made a few years ago.

'Map 2', Acrylics & Paper Collage on Panel, 600 mm x 600 mm, 2015

I guess that's how it goes sometimes - we set off in what we feel is a new direction, only to discover we've actually looped back round on ourselves without really knowing it. I'm going to tell/fool myself that this is hopefully less of a resort to some stifling comfort zone, and more of a re-statement of the central concerns within my work. As stated many time before - it's pretty much always about an interaction with my immediate (largely urban) surroundings, and the various ways in which it becomes codified and freighted with numerous tangled narratives. In this case, a conscious use of appropriated texts encountered at specific locations has given way (I think) to certain implied philosophical underpinnings - such as might be encountered in the work of Gilles Deleuze or Michel De Certeau, amongst others. 

There's far too much nuance there (and let's be honest - baffling complexity) to detail now. So, for the time being, I'll hang on to the hope that, rather than merely circling back to some earlier starting point, any movement achieved here is more representative of a spiral. Just as each time we pass through a certain location on the map - we may experience it in a slightly different way, so perhaps any return to possibly familiar creative territory may might contain the experiences, knowledge and insights gleaned since the last time we were there. Perhaps we can hope for a little more finesse too?

Yes - it may be another map-like yellow painting, but I've certainly torn up a load of paper, and read a lot more confusing books since the last one, so here's hoping...

Completed Painting: 'space_time_07 [Wave Function]'

 

'space_time_07 [Wave Function]', Acrylics, Paper Collage, Ball Point Pen & Paint Pen on Panel,
300 mm x 300 mm, 2024

Here's the latest of my 'space_time' panels. As is often the case, anyone needing an explanation may find certain clues below...

"Conceptually, the Schrödinger equation is the quantum counterpart of Newton's second law in classical mechanics. Given a set of known initial conditions, Newton's second law makes a mathematical prediction as to what path a given physical system will take over time. The Schrödinger equation gives the evolution over time of a wave function, the quantum-mechanical characterization of an isolated physical system. The equation was postulated by Schrödinger based on a postulate of Louis de Broglie that all matter has an associated matter wave. The equation predicted bound states of the atom in agreement with experimental observations" [1.].

"Schrödinger himself suggested in 1952 that the different terms of a superposition evolving under the Schrödinger equation are 'not alternatives but all really happen simultaneously'. This has been interpreted as an early version of Everett's many-worlds interpretation. This interpretation, formulated independently in 1956, holds that all the possibilities described by quantum theory simultaneously occur in a multiverse composed of mostly independent parallel universes" [2.].

“In order to give an account of these practices [of everyday life], I have resorted to the category of ‘trajectory’. It was intended to suggest a temporal movement through space, that is, the unity of a diachronic succession of points through which it passes, and not the figure that these points form on a space that is supposed to be synchronic or achronic. Indeed, this ‘representation’ is insufficient, precisely because a trajectory is drawn, and time and movement are thus reduced to a line that can be seized as a whole by the eye and read in a single moment, as one projects onto a map the path taken by someone walking through a city. However useful this ‘flattening out’ may be, it transforms the temporal articulation of places into a spatial sequence of points. A graph takes the place of an operation. A reversible sign (one that can be read in both directions, once it is projected onto a map) is substituted for a practice indissociable from particular moments and ‘opportunities’, and thus irreversible (one cannot cannot go backwards in time, or have another chance at missed opportunities). It is thus a mark in place of acts, a relic in place of performances: it is only their remainder, the sign of their erasure. Such a projection postulates that it is possible to take the one (the mark) for the other (operations articulated on occasions). This is a quid pro quo typical of the reductions which a functionalist administration of space must make in order to be effective [3.].

West Leicester, January 2024

[1.] & [2.]: Wikipedia, 'Shrodinger Equation'.

[3.]: Michel de Certeau, 'The Practice of Everyday Life', Berkeley/L.A./London, University of California Press, 1984/1988.