happenings | December 13, Impermanent Vessels at Dog Rocks

The latest installment of Michael Morgan's Impermanent Vessels  took place at the artist's studio/residence in Batesford a few hundreds meters from Dog Rocks. The theme of the transformation of the cast of the artist's head was transition of matter from ice to water. The ice head slowly melted in a sunlight reflecting swimming pool, accompanied by the transition of the sun from daylight to the night darkness. Three cameras surrounded the ice sculptures, to record a time-lapse sequence of light-matter transition. Two other ice sculptures from the same mold were part of the Melbourne COP21 event held at Arts House two days earlier.

Making Art | Vessels of Pain and Healing

 

Thirty spokes join in one hub

In its emptiness, there is the function of a vehicle

Mix clay to create a container

In its emptiness, there is the function of a container

Cut open doors and windows to create a room

In its emptiness, there is the function of a room

Therefore, that which exists is used to create benefit

That which is empty is used to create functionality

Lao Tsu, Tao Te Ching

It is extremely rare to encounter art which speaks to the heart in the contemporary art world; therefore I was particularly engaged by two engaging different exhibitions —Michael Morgan's Impermanent Vessels and Ruby Rumié's  Hálito Divino  (Divine Breath)— which have definitely the power to bring our emotions to the surface, with art interventions invoking cathartic action

The works were shown in two different 2014 exhibitions, a few months apart: Impermanent Vessels opened in Geelong (Australia) in May, while Hálito Divino is currently on view in New York. The Australian Michael Morgan and Colombian Ruby Rumié's art/existential explorations are different in media and message yet present uncanny similarities: both evolved in the Southern hemisphere, and are motivated by art as a healing means —but most of all, both art practices  use, in a multitude of media,the emptiness of vessels to symbolize and even literally represent the reality of impermanence and the presence of absence: to ultimate find solace, or perhaps just reconciliation from pain, with art motivated actions. Michael's interdisciplinary work is probably more conceptual, and deals with the Buddhist concept of change, cosmic interconnections and  transition. The re-birth of his head molded vessels was from a tragic life loss.

Ruby's exhibition, as many other of the artist's multimedia works, is also a social commentary, more specifically on domestic violence, resulting from " a workshop conducted in 2013 in the neighborhood of Getsemani, in Cartagena de Indias, Colombia". Continuing from the exhibition press release:

The project focuses on the experiences of 100 women between the ages of 18 and 72, who have been victims of domestic violence. Hálito Divino (Divine Breath) uses pain and trauma to create and express, restore and heal.
At the beginning of the workshop, each participant chose one of 100 white pots arranged for them. They then exhaled their pain inside the pot, as an intimate and individual exercise that culminated the experience of breath as a force of life. At the end, the pots were sealed and marked with the initials of each participant, a symbolic gesture to encapsulate their pain. Each of them was given the figure of a woman, cast using the ancestral lost-wax technique, as an amulet, a token symbolizing her participation.
The exhibition reflects the three phases of the project: photographs of the white pots used in the workshop, black pots representing a stage of mourning, and 32 pots of different sizes crowned by delicate gold metalwork resembling the amulets the women received as a symbol of their rebirth.

I was particularly touched by the exhibition as well as the personalities of both artists, warm and engaging. But most of all, I was intrigued by the commonalities, which I share in my own work, of how a processed based art practice can serve as therapy. I am dealing with my own demons and an art practice in its multiple aspects, from physical engagement to cognitive explorations, has offered emotional solace and promoting healing.

HÁLITO DIVINO - DIVINE BREATH

on view at Nohra Haime Gallery

730 Fifth Avenue,New York

September 10 - October 18, 2014

Interviews | Marita Batna: A conversation with artist Michael Morgan

 

This conversation is taking place upon the conclusion of Michael Morgan’s exhibition ‘Impermanent Vessels – Rebirth’ (8 – 25 May 2014). The project is a milestone – not only for being his second major exhibition (the first was held in 2011) but also for bringing together his conceptual explorations in a new format – an immersive installation of sculpture and its interplay with digital imagery, video, sound, as well as smell.

Focused on the fragility and decay of all material things, the exhibition presented the recovered legacy of the 50 artist’s head casts in raku clay that were subjected to a year-long interaction with the environment of ocean water. Curating this exhibition was a unique experience for me and a privilege to follow the stages of the objects’ creation, placement and recovery.

Presently, Michael is working towards completion of a mosaic wall – the second of his thematic studio walls composed of cut out fragments of numerous dishes, tiles and kitschy souvenirs – modern but old and mostly unwanted representatives of the 20th century consumer culture.
The relative and overlapping formats of Michael’s work is painting, print, ceramics, mosaic, sculpture, and most lately – video. ‘Impermanent Vessels’ introduced his interdisciplinary practice engaged with physical processes.
More than the scale (which is often present in his work) – the honesty and directness were the qualities that first struck me about his art. It has estranged others. Indeed, the usual system of knowledge through which one tends to screen various modes of art expression seems to be irrelevant. Free from didactic, the essence of his work appears descriptive of reality, of idea. His ongoing focus–interrelationships of the human and nature is engaged with deconstruction of the intellect. The beautiful is always ambiguous in his work, and the dramatic always resonates with the beautiful. Our conversation touches some of the themes that informs Michael’s work – the issues of the human animal and the collective mind in the context of the globalized world.

A glass mosaic wall, in progress

MB: The interesting feeling with your mosaic walls is that they appear as chaos of tens of thousands of elements and yet you have been using this chaos to create some order. Which is more prevalent for you – chaos or order?
MM: I am trying to create a rhythm. The only order that I am aiming for is energetic flows, and I am using different textures in different places of the surface, so that creates order, but even within that order there is a chaos.
MB: To what extent is it important to achieve a completeness of the image: if I look at the Tree of Life – its composition reflects wholeness, even a metaphorical representation of the universe.

"Tree of Life" mosaic

MM: This [glass mosaic] is more like a complete portrait, here I am coming back to the Rorschach dream (an earlier painting using reflection symmetry of image around human figure – self-portrait – MB).  Everything is reflective: I am wanting to mirror the images, use the principle of self-reflectiveness. You see bits of your own light reflected back off it. That interests me.
MB: Does this relate to the dynamics of fractals which you have been referring to as inspiration?
MM: Yes, the self-reflectiveness and patterns within patterns. I am not trying to create fractals, it’s about that process happening naturally. We create fractals unintentionally. It will be full of fractals and I didn’t intend that.
MB: So what you are dealing with is the natural order, natural rhythm?
MM: Yes, it probably is. Perhaps it is similar to what Jackson Pollock was exploring with an absolutely chaotic surface that developed a rhythm within it. Whether that was intended or not, it turned out to be incredibly harmonic way to generate images. I think this is what it is about – the harmony of the surface through the rhythm.
MB: What I see in the first place is the expression of the beautiful.
MM: True, I haven’t tried to make it an ugly thing, I have been aiming to make the wall into something like an Aladdin’s Cave. That makes the surface look quite precious I suppose – as a jewel cave.
MB: And there are some elements – jewels – that speak for themselves creating very special dynamics.
MM: Every part can be looked at in isolation. I am painstakingly working through each part – I can’t rush it. It is like painting a picture and just damping on one brush full of colour using an incredibly large surface. I love the textures and different types of surfaces. What I am working with is the energy.
MB: What would be the ultimate mosaic?
MM: I don’t know if there is an ultimate of anything. I think you are always just exploring, aren't you? If I could cover the whole house with this surface it would be fantastic. But even that will be just a step to something else. Even bigger. I have seen somewhere something about a mirror house – in landscape it becomes almost invisible – reflecting everything around it.  I am doing it in my studio, so I am creating a space which also makes it interesting.
MB: What was the first interest for you – science or art?
MM: Probably, both. I have one bright memory from my childhood: I was lying and feeling this incredible vastness...  That epiphany of the world and the universe I experienced when I was five or six – scared the hell out of me. I loved both those things – science and art simultaneously. Art and science are both about exploring the world by different means of experimentation. Maybe we get too much hang up on differentiating things, putting different labels on them and not understanding that everything is part of the same thing – ourselves and life. All these things are about being creative, whether you have a maths mind, a science mind or an art mind, but you are going to be bits of everything. Our knowledge is limited but that is what makes life interesting – you can explore your space.
MB: Is this what experimentation is about – being directed to truth?
MM: It is about curiosity and making connections. Maybe that is related to truth, but from my perspective I am attracted by reality. When I was young and was hunting with my father, I found it a very natural thing to be doing. When you are out in the wild, you see the animals and you also see dead animals, and you observe the way farmers work. In general, it’s a very practical approach to things – if the animal is sick, they put it out of its misery, they need to deliver a lamb – they deliver the lamb, they need to kill it to eat it – they kill it to eat it. The reality of nature can be quite brutal but I also found it amazing – such a small part in a vast existence. I was just thinking of the natural beauty of nature, and the truth about how things really were, not some contrived way people might have imagined it.
MB: We can assume the animals can sustain natural order in life, but if humans are involved, they can also manipulate nature and parts of it die out.
MM: They can, but you are straight away taking the high ground view that the humans are disconnected from the animal world, but we are not, we are part of it. It’s only when you become intellectual and moral about it that you start thinking about it differently.
MB: Right, so a human is just another form of animal with advanced brains…
MM: We think we have special brains but it does not seem to be that way. Today’s massive humanity suggests that it must have termite mind, and it is driven not just by food, but greed as well. Our collective termite mind is very animal-like, very herd, and easy to manipulate especially by politicians and media who use this mind.
MB: Obsession, passion, urge for power – is that what differentiates humans? We don’t strictly follow the rules of nature?
MM: The natural world is all about that power and control and that natural hierarchy about where you sit in the food chain and what dominance you have over someone below you. But as long as this system is founded on practical reasons it is not cruel.  I don’t think animals are generally cruel to each other – they just do things out of the need for survival. Whereas, humans can be completely brutal, and there are huge contradictions [with nature] in that. They can be the most cruel animals in existence really – considering what they can do to each other. Fundamental to cruelty is apathy – an apathetic person doesn’t have any empathy to relate with another person: they just don’t bother.
MB: A lot of your paintings seem to refer to that human mentality: dark and unnatural sides of it that you use in an allegorical way.
MM: All my art is about the human condition, human impact, and human beauty. I explore different things that are relevant at a particular time, depending on what’s going through my mind, but it’s usually about how people are treating other people or how they are linked – as termite mind. I am interested in this unseen connection and how it creates morphic resonance – something that transmits through: one person comes to an idea, and the others come to that same idea. It is like ripples in the pond – it just goes out. Same generation, almost instantaneously. This knowledge goes to deeper understanding of nature and our place in the world. It could be positive or negative knowledge – any sort, say, some scientific breakthrough – suddenly it all makes perfect sense for everyone else.
MB: Is it the distorted evolution and utopian development called progress? Do you believe in it?
MM: I am not sure whether we might have real evolutionary change for ourselves – that might be intervention. Like the eugenic manipulation, for example. Progress… Progressing towards what? Complete extinction? More than likely – at some point. A big aspect of evolution is extinction. At this moment, all is driven by economic development. As long as they [politicians] keep talking about ‘sustainable growth’ – to me, it’s just emphasizing the inevitability of extinction, driven by short term views of politicians. They don’t need to think about a hundred years in the future as they are elected for few years.


MB: The tension between communism and capitalism is over but we continue to experience the negative sides of globalisation.  How do you see the world’s ideological picture now?
MM: As extreme polarisation. Extreme Islamic philosophy – total simplicity and brutality towards people and the orgy of capitalism which, in the name of profit, exploits everything it has its hands on. It’s really just the opposite reflection of the actual extremes. The Islamic extreme philosophy is almost like an ultimate communism I suppose – all is controlled by Sharia Law, whereas, the capitalist governments quite clearly refer to Christian fundamentalism. When you hear about serious consequence of capitalism happening in, for example, the US – it is all seen in light of ‘god’s blessing’. Capitalism and extremism are gone insane. They make people powerless and defenseless, and I find that a scary progression towards the future.
MB: You have admitted having observed the cruelty of people, and being an outsider as a child paralleled your interest in art and science.
MM: Being an outsider is my earliest memory. I only had a few friends, and they were just as much outsiders as myself. I enjoyed doing things that other kids didn't generally enjoy – such things like art, hunting, and shooting. And when people knew you were hunting they were a bit confronted by that. My view was different – I didn’t think it was some cruel thing. In earlier generations it was understood that the whole purpose of having an animal is to consume it. Now people don’t like to have that direct connection, they just want to imagine things remotely. Someone kills animal in the factory and you just pick it up.
MB: Now people minds are influenced by various environmental protection movements.
MM: I think that this influence comes to making people feel guilty about existing and interacting with the environment. The whole agenda of any ideology is to make you feel guilty about being alive – so you change your way. Ideological figures instinctively go for that approach because it is quite effective. That’s a cruel way to treat people: by guilt or fear. Being aware of what’s unacceptable is one thing but then making you feel guilty is different.

MB: Economics is probably based on all that – guilt or fear.
MM: I suppose, it is how both capitalist system and Islamic groups –in fact all religious groups – are working. Catholicism is based on making you feel guilty about the original sin. It works quite well for religious groups, it works well for lobby groups too. It’s all about control.
MB: It is interesting when you think of us – humans as being same as animals. But inquiring about being, and, for example, making art – that is supposed to be only human ability.

Chemo Boys

MM: I think we make ourselves too sophisticated. But we are just a very simple organism. Very frail – skin and bones, living organs, breathing lungs, beating hearts. Exactly the same as every other mammal. The collective mind of termites builds a termite mound – is that art? If you are trying to analyse the intellect of the termite – I don’t know if you can do it, but there are millions of them and they have the capacity to do amazing things. That’s why I find insects, like ants quite fascinating. I think that separating what is considered art is a superior view – it is just an innate need to express yourself, an instinct. Procreation might be art and all animals have forms of it. Not every human is born in the ideal way or perfection but this magnifies the animal instincts we have such as to procreate, to protect yourself. And probably the reality is that everyone is quite capable of killing in the right circumstances, purely to survive. Instincts have taken modern ways – which I realized as a kid by seeing that there were bullies and predators. The predators frightened me – some of them, the most dangerous ones, are almost invisible: they look for the vulnerable and are brutal in how they would take an advantage of them. Whatever the motives, predators are contradicting the nature. To me, it is natural to have networks of people who look after each other: when you are in a position to have a good influence on people, that’s easy, you don’t have to be cruel.

"Crystal Azan" time-lapse video still

Michael in his studio, working on "Impermanent Vessels"

exhibitions | Michael Morgan "Impermanent Vessels - Rebirth"

One of the fifty head/vessels. Photo by Michael Morgan

During my daily walk to the Waterfront Campus I encountered Michael Morgan's "Impermanent Vessels - Rebirth" an exhibition important for its content and remarkable for the beautiful multimedia installation. A very unusual dialogue of video projections, sculpture and sound installation (the Muslim Call to Prayer) brings to life the notion of replication of the self (the artist's head) subject to time in space. The two-year project  (2012 to 2014) is a an artist meditation on "the transient and evolutionary nature of all aspects of existence and life."  

More from the artist statement: 
The Story of Vessels
50 copies of the artist's head produced in raku clay, significant through its use in Japanese tea ceremony, were placed in five locations along Corio Bay and Port Philip Bay - Swan Bay, Wedge, Point Lillias, Welsh's Jetty and Point Henry Back Lead. The vessels were subject to nature's forces to transform them through interaction with underwater environment.One year later, the artist began to recover the vessels leaving at least one at each site to symbolize the ultimate return of all things to nature. A total of 38 vessels have been recovered, while others were missing or left to continue their journey.
The Exhibition 
The exhibition presents the recovered vessels and the existence (or non-existence) of the lost vessels by the coordinates of their sites.The small screens rotate the images of vessels at four stages of their evolution: upon production, just as they were placed underwater, then a year after placement underwater, and finally after recovery in their present state.The vessels reflect the unavoidable change in the light of fundamental connectedness of all things as described in Zen Buddhist teachings. Fragile and impermanent- they are also the 'vessels of life' and part of something beautiful. The Muslim Call to Prayer is the spiritual reference to the sound resonating in vessels. A digital projection onto sculpture features the artist wearing hard hat diving equipment with the sound overlay of breathing and heartbeat as the helmet represents the 'vessel sustaining life'.'Impermanent Vessels - Rebirth' is artist's dedication to his late wife Carolyn.

The heads/vessels in the artist's studio. Photo by Michael Morgan

Excerpts from the opening address by Dr. Felicity Spear:

The entire cosmos is a cooperative. Lord Buddha was spot on when he made this observation all those hundreds of years ago, and while contemporary science also finds this to be true, and Michael and I would agree, sadly the politicians who run our lives mostly ignore it. Michael has had enough experience of life to understand something of the nature of this cooperative interconnectedness between things, but also the way things always change, how nothing stays the same,'how everything is in a state of flux. This exhibition Impermanent Vessels- Rebirth could be described as an autobiography in which Michael. through the experience of the tragic loss of his wife Carolyn, attempts to come to terms with the fragility and impermanence of life. His fifty vessels pay homage to the journey he has made in coming to understand the underlying web of connections between all things and their transient nature.Working with his own image, Michael has created what could be described as self portraits, fifty of them, one for each year of his life. He refers to them as vessels of life, fragile, subject to change, impermanent. He draws together the strands of time, memory and transformation in a process which he likens to archaeology, where objects scarred and marked by time are rediscovered, retrieved and rebirthed in another time. The transformative elements in Michaels' work are expressed through the tactile materiality of raku clay, its weathering over time beneath the sea by the flow of water and weed, and the experience of diving in a silent womb-like world.Beneath the sea he returns to an intimate world, connected like an umbilicus to a life line above, hearing only the sound of his own breath and heartbeat, and the flow of water over his body. Retrieving these vessels after a year in their underwater locations enabled their rediscovery, their reinterpretation and their rebirth. They reveal the changes that time has wrought on their surfaces by the process of chance. They are the material evidence for the inevitability of change and its unpredictability.To be an artist takes courage and perseverance. Artists who push the boundaries step outside the mainstream and dare to see the world with other eyes. This can be challenging or fascinating for we cultural consumers depending on what we bring of ourselves to the experience. But for an artist it is not only about courage. It's about a certain sensibility and sensitivity, it's about being attuned to things, and it's about the need to transform experiences into images while drawing attention to different ways of viewing the world. Michael's work raises our awareness of something absolutely fundamental about the cosmos and our own experience. It reminds us that we are more alike than different. We are all in the same boat. He engages with and celebrates the Buddhist observation of the cosmos as a cooperative, the melancholy beauty of the Muslim call to prayer, and the rationality of western science which demystifies the physical world. In doing this he pays respect to cultures other than our own and acknowledges our shared human experiences. This is the legacy of these thoughtful and beautiful vessels as they interact with each other and play with light, our medium of contact with the cosmos. They reflect Michael's courage, his determination and his talent.

Michael Morgan "Impermanent Vessels - Rebirth"

Deakin University Geelong Waterfront Campus

9-25 May 2014