Author: pavszymanskiart

Current research issue - Hypnotic Repetition Pav Szymanski Painter Biography: I am a fine art painter and video artist with 30 years of experience. My current research project is based on creating visual responses to my observations of people, who are suspended in the vacuum of hypnotic repetition. I have travelled the world interviewing and recording individuals, who genuinely struggle with their existence in the context of their survival. I have gathered substantial primary sources and evidence from destinations across the globe. Perhaps, the most significant research findings were from Haiti and Myanmar and resulted in the production of the most spectacular paintings. They have inspired me to develop new and innovative ways of working and experimenting with image making, which are appropriate to the subject. They combine the best of traditional achievements and the power of contemporary thinking and deep reflection. I work full time as a programme coordinator for Art & Design at a large institution offering a broad range of FE and HE qualifications. I am also an external examiner for the UAL and AQA. Artist Statement: Through my projects I feel that I discover my inner fears, longings and re-evaluate my uncertainties. My work seems to be an attempt to explore and question by metaphorical presentation my response to the hidden truths of the world. The essence of the value of these works is in their inherent meaning and an atmosphere, which manifests itself in the dusk of the space portrayed, thus the light may appear, where the hue of colour fulfils clarity and sounds with harmonious melody. https://hypnoticrepetition.com/ https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCOq7lHQlrOnKozGz95Hq2CA?view_as=subscriber https://www.instagram.com/pavszymanski/?hl=en https://spark.adobe.com/page/fQ9VytzHNpWq9/
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Refined Version of Three Burmese Monks

This is quite a new approach to image making for me.  I started by creating a multi-coloured background layer.  This under image was than continuously reworked and refined.  I was using un-primed calico as a background material for this process.

The layers continued to grow and overlay, creating an exciting and dynamic environment.  I felt ready to introduce the Three Monks as realistic characters – right in the middle of the colour composition.

The next stage involved further over-printing and blasting of the new layers away.  I used the previously tested pressure washer and simply rags, sponges and dirty and soapy water working on a horizontally positioned canvas and allowing the water to interfere with the drying paint freely.  This resulted in a number of washes and bleeding of colours.

Subsequently, I started to paint on top of the existing surface using relatively large brushes and a small squeegee.

My intention was to create a sense of isolation and division between the characters and the world.  I wanted for the Monks to become totally oblivious of their external environment.  They appear to be detached from their surroundings and this contradiction echoes the essence of my observations.  The monks are suspended in a hypnotic repetition of their daily task, routines and rituals. They have little understanding of hunger and hardship.  Their entire focus is on how to satisfy the superiors.  Although barefoot, they ware immaculate silk gowns, robes and hats.

The aggressive fight for survival, which is present everywhere around them, is just a distant illusion.  The mundane reality is far beyond their area of interest and abilities to comprehend.  Their lives are artificially sheltered.

A further reflection needs to take place, before I am able to formulate a range of meaningful quality improvements.  The are, however, two immediate tasks ahead of me:

  • stretching the canvas on a purpose made frame
  • working with water soluble pastels into the surface to refine and enhance detail.

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Updated – Three Burmese Monks.

A more refined version of this large-scale piece is below.  It includes a range of overprints in gold.  This colour is of specific significance to Myanmar and their Buddhist tradition and religious beliefs.

I have also experimented with adding further colours in order to reduce the effect of chiaroscuro and, simultaneously, increase the dramatic effect in the sky area.  This has resulted in the monks being surrounded by action and dynamism in the peripheral parts of the composition.

This arrangement seems to have worked well and introduced a sense of balance and hierarchy to the piece.  The focus is firmly placed on the three characters.

Monks in Gold

The image below portrays an intermediate stage of the overprinting process.  The work havily relies on contrast and chiaroscuro, bringing all attentiuon to the centre part of the piece.  The monks appear to be positioned behind, in a peaceful and fully lit place.  My intention was to bring them back to the surface and engage them in interaction with the birds.

Monks in Umber

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Sworn of Birds – Yangon Monks.

I have been busy experimenting with a new approach to painting and layering colours. The process started with painting the under image using a rug and large scale brushes. The composition was inspired by the Burmese Monks series. I used large unprimed canvas and started to jot the colour down using expressive movements and gestures. The image begin to grow really rapidly and soon, the overall colour scheme was ready. The second stage was to overprinting the background with a screen, which o developed recently. It portrays a swarm of birds ‘dancing’ around the monks and creating a beautiful flow and rhythm. The printed layer was subsequently watered down with sponges, robbed with dry towels and paper to revel light and the colour, which got trapped underneath.

The entire idea for the new pieces is to experiment with layering of images and colours before making any commitments to the narrative content of the work.

I have included a range of photographs of my experimentation and, at the bottom, a single print of the screen itself.

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Assessment Feedback Tutorial

Skype – video call with Jonathan Kearney.

Wednesday, 4th December at 3 p.m.

Following recent assessments of Unit 1, I received very encouraging feedback from the assessing team. My work was complemented at this interim stage of the course. This, in turn, gave me a lot of intrinsic energy and motivated me further to continue to improve and develop my projects. I was really touched by a range of highly positive and helpful commentaries, which I received.

During our Skype conversation, Jonathan had reassured me and reinforced the potential of my continuing efforts. Subsequently, I was in a position to form a solid foundation for further improvements and refinements.

Jonathan was particularly interested in a layer based structure of my work. As previously discussed, a supporting spoken narrative could create another element by adding background information and explaining the context of the work to an audience.

This suggestion was very constructive.

Indeed, I need to detach myself from my primary knowledge, assumptions, bias and consider the opposite perspective.

Will a viewer have a full understanding of what I am trying to achieve and communicate; my creative intentions?

“How do you add a meaning to an image?”

Jonathan Kearney

This was definitively a superb question, which gave me a new avenue to explore further and extend on the impact of my work.

I really like the idea of an accompanying narrative voice, which creates another layer to my work.

However, Jonathan had also suggested something additional and, I see this suggestion, as an alternative to my current explorations.

“Make your work more explicit, yet simultaneously, do not loose its ambiguity”.

On reflection, I think that this comment had allowed me to make pivotal changes to my perception and thinking. The answer is to add a narrative layer to my work and do it in a measured, sensitive and balanced way in order to avoid visual description.

Initiating a dialogue, discussion and critical questioning are the only constructive ways forward.

My creative intentions are to initiate a debate and extend on the sophistication of my questioning. How does one deal with mundane rituals of hypnotic repetition?

We moved on to discussing a range of changes to the focus of my enquiry. The shift is from a focus on the process of waiting in the context of uncertainty to being suspended in hypnotic repetition. This can be perceived as a form of a coping mechanism. However, the starting and end points are the same. Therefore, there is absolutely no room for making progress and value added. Hypnotic repetition means returning to the same place – the location of departure, over and over again, perhaps, until the end.

We concluded this very helpful and constructive dialogue by focusing on my recently revisited ideas with using machine intervention.

My plan is to experiment with filming in a commercial laundrette. There is something special about observing a spinning motion of a washing machine!

Tutorial concluded at 15.36

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Symposium Part 4 – HYPNOTIC REPETITION & My Observations.

1. One Legged Pool Player

The One Legged Player is totally on the task. Her appearance looks frivolous and theatrical to distract from her determination and the fact that she cannot afford to miss any shots. Her outwards image portrays glamour and fame, but the reality is diametrically different.
The One Legged Player is frozen in a stretched position, suspended in the vacuum of repetition. Every shot is executed in an identical posed pose in a hope to attract attention and increase the stakes, hence maximise profits.
I am hesitant to come to conclusions that there is something repulsive about it. The first impressions of wonder and curiosity are replaced with laughter and astonishment.
The performance continues regardless.

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https://wordpress.com/post/pavszymanskiart.wordpress.com/2120

2. Coach To Myiek

This piece portrays a coach driver. He is preparing to leave Kawthoung for a 20 hour long journey to Myiek. The road is terrible and unpredictable. His old coach must be in a top condition before the passengers are allowed to board.
The driver looks very tired and substantially overweight. He spends his life driving his coach between those two distant cities in Myanmar.

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https://wordpress.com/post/pavszymanskiart.wordpress.com/2072

3. Burmese Captain

This work portrays a Burmese captain in charge of a long boat. His job is to transport people and cargo from Ranong in Thailand to Kawthoung at the furthest southern point of Myanmar. His main clientele are poor illegal workers from Burma trying to earn a few baht in Thailand.
Following a long conversation with him, I become one of his passengers. To maximise income, he accepts as many people as possible. He even travels on the very front of the boat to save valuable space. This place is very uncomfortable and rocky. He is also fully exposed there to the power of the tropical sun. He tries to get some relief from the burning heat by hiding under a colourful umbrella.
The image is very clashing in colour – very kitsch. This is further enhanced by his crude and cramped body position.  His ankle reveals a massive tumour.
There is a gigantic growth on his leg, perhaps caused by prolonged exposure to the sun and continued contact with polluted water in the port.
My creative intention was to portray him in his usual setting, while crossing the same water many times every day.
The focus is on him. The beautiful surroundings no longer matter. He cannot see the landscape. He is trapped in his daily routine.
The colour of his shirt blends in with the orange stripes of paint on the boat. The umbrella is feminine and looks absolutely ridiculous.

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https://wordpress.com/post/pavszymanskiart.wordpress.com/1884

4. Three Monks Begging

Mixed media on unprimed canvas.
168 cm x 118 cm
This new piece portrays three Burmese monks taking a break from their money collecting duties, while entertaining themselves with a large group of pigeons.
In the area, there were large numbers of child monks present. Most of their days are spend extorting large amounts of cash from the hard working, fearful and deeply religious market community.
They are immaculately dressed in pink robes and sarongs. Simultaneously, they walk bare foot to project an image of poverty and humbleness.
However, the truth is different. They have got daily targets to fill their metals trays with a mixture of coins and bank notes to satisfy the needs and expectations of their superiors.

https://pavszymanskiart.wordpress.com/2019/12/02/three-monks-new-gif/

 

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Symposium Part 3 – Repetition and Ritual.

 

Life tends to deal with these problems naturally through repetition and obsessive engagement in distractions.

An excellent interpretation of this concept was developed by Zbigniew Rybczynski(1981) and his Oscar winning piece titled ‘Tango’.

and his subsequent 1987 animation called ‘Imagine’

Both are characterised by identical starting points and their destinations.
This would imply that there is no room for progress in hypnotic repetition?
Roman Opalka, seems to be a master of this phenomenon in his ‘Counted Paintings’ series, which consumed his life.

He began painting numbers from one to infinity in 1965, in his studio in Warsaw and continued until his death in 2011.

ROMAN OPALKA–

  • Daily rituals, work and religion.
  • Time, procedures and commuting.
  • Breathing, heartbeat, sustenance and sleep.
  • Everything is done to order.
  • Retirement, loss of purpose and death.

Entrapment in hypnotic repetition.
Suspension in the vacuum of life.
Charlie Chaplin questioning industrial repetition as a lifestyle:

We live in an industrialised society and are compelled to take part in this repetition.

Points for discussion:
• What is your entrapment?
• Do you find it comforting and reassuring that tomorrow is going to be there?

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Symposium Part 2 – Isolating the Key Elements of Life.

There appears to be a sense of cohesion between life and science.
When one considers my visual responses in my project, it becomes clear that the predicament is universal.

In some small way, we are all trapped in the cycle of work, life, and existence; oscillating between certainty and uncertainty.

This can be, perhaps, best interpreted by Bruce Nauman in his ‘One Hundred Live and Die’, 1984. He boils down the essence of our being to the basic activities of life, without location or possessions.

BRUCE NAUMAN

When analysing my primary sources, I made some exciting observations:

– The less you have got the more certain your life appears.
– Contemporary life in a western society superficially looks certain.
– In reality, it is full of surprises and the most certain things become a nightmare.
– The more you have the more you want, and the less satisfied you are in life.

Points for discussion:
• Can uncertainty become inspirational?
• If the future was predictable would you have less motivation?

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Symposium Part 1 – Contextualisation of Progress.

The Principle of Uncertainty by Heisenberg (1927)
Hilgewood (2016) proposes that Heisenberg devoted most of his professional life to the study of quantum mechanics, especially the Uncertainty Principle. He proved his theory through a long process of mathematical elaboration. When his famous article was first published (Heinsenberg, 1927 in https://plato.stanford.edu/entries/qt-uncertainty/), the title contained a German term: “anschaulich”. The meaning of this word contradicts preciseness and roughly translates as visualisable, intuitive and lucid. The defined and exact language of science has suddenly become very vague and ambiguous.

Points for discussion:
• Can science be imprecise?
• Does everything need to be measurable, therefore certain?

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Current Map of Progress.

Today, we had the last Skype meeting before Christmas. We were introduced to the new brief, which is full of exciting challenges. I am very motivated and committed to producing a body of exploratory work and questioning my creative intentions with reference to their meaning, sophistication of my concepts and the overall use of the visual language in my projects. I really appreciate the life-changing impact of this course and am very eager to realise my full potential, while investigating new possibilities and discussing alternatives through risk taking and further experimentation.

In the light of both, my recent written feedback and the requirements of Unit 2, I have decided to seriously reconsider the direction of my research journey and create an updated map of progress. The diagrammatic format of this chart gives me a clear overviewed my current position.

I have also worked hard to design a solid structure to my presentation for the forthcoming symposium. Participation in this event is a requirement of the assessment. However, I would also like to maximise all benefits from this process and, in turn, enrich my visual practice through both, insightful feedback and the experience of preparing for and presenting work to an important, visually trained and sensitive audience. The entire process can be crucial in my continuous search for identifying meaningful quality improvements and building on the overall awareness of self perception, quality of thinking, critical analysis and art work.