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Beautiful Dystopias

~ Exploring the hidden impacts of the way we live – www.jacscott.com

Beautiful Dystopias

Tag Archives: philosophy

The Path to the Inevitable

15 Monday Jun 2015

Posted by jacscottstudio in ART, death, exhibition, PHILOSOPHY, RESEARCH

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Tags

being human, consciousness, death, philosophy, science

There is death in the air…always.

Death seen and unseen.

How do we reach the inevitable end in our conscious being whilst being spiked with the knowledge that our unconscious self has a part to play? This duality of being nurtures a quest for expansion to the physical and metaphysical worlds that we inhabit, but how? This initial impulse is where a new piece of work for the Fabrica Vitae exhibition in Ghent, Belgium is evolving.

“People do not die for us immediately, but remain bathed in a sort of aura of life which bears no relation to true immortality but through which they continue to occupy our thoughts in the same way as when they were alive. It is as though they were traveling abroad.” Marcel Proust

“I can remember how when I was young I believed death to be a phenomenon of the body; now I know it to be merely a function of the mind — and that of the minds who suffer the bereavement. The nihilists say it is the end; the fundamentalists, the beginning; when in reality it is no more than a single tenant or family moving out of a tenement or a town.” William Faulkner, As I Lay Dying

 “Death is no more than passing from one room into another.” Helen Keller

A beautifully shot film trailer for the exhibition Fabrica Vitae http://www.interaliamag.org/audiovisual/fabrica-vitae-film-trailer/

‘Time is a companion that goes with us on a journey. It reminds us to cherish each moment, because it will never come again.’    Jean Luc Picard

More

13 Sunday Apr 2014

Posted by jacscottstudio in CONSUMPTION, PHILOSOPHY, QUOTES, RESEARCH, SCIENCE

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Tags

art, consumption, environment, philosophy, possessions, science, waste

 

protect-sign-trees

 

More

I am a voracious consumer.

I hanker after knowledge that will provide insight into the way we live, so my consumption habit is not for material things, but rather for information.  The New Scientist is a favourite read so when it featured a nine-page special on The Meaning of Stuff  (29.3.14) I was captivated.

http://www.newscientist.com/article/mg22129620.900-stuff-the-psychological-power-of-possessions.html

http://www.newscientist.com/article/mg22129621.000-stuff-goodbye-to-the-disposable-age.html

http://www.newscientist.com/article/mg22129620.800-stuff-the-bare-necessities-then-and-now.html

My viewpoint on consumption is skewed by science – the questions why and how occur frequently – only ever partially answered in my research as theories become disputed and overturned by specialists.

“The rise of a biographical approach to things has documented the myriad of taxonomies, uses and valuing regimes that objects can move through before they reach the end of their lives, if they ever do.  Framing things as rubbish doesn’t just help us eliminate things from our lives, it also helps us experience the fantasy of self sovereignty and ontological separateness”.

Gay Hawkins, The Ethics of Waste (Rowman & Littlefield 2006).

Anthropologists suggest that our historical nomadic lifestyle prevented a great accumulation of possessions.  The first hunter-gatherers slowly evolved to carry fire, tools and clothing, starting to mark themselves out as individuals by garnering objects that reflected status and skills, as they travelled. This “extended phenotype” (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Extended_Phenotype) proposed by the eminent scientist Richard Dawkins, adds weight to those archaeologists who argue that our sense of self was established early and its sophistication distinguishes us from other animal species.  As a sedentary lifestyle developed it allowed the accumulation of possessions and defined hierarchies within communities.  This form of society nurtured a material culture where the display of tokens of grandeur and power reinforced respect and authority – evidenced in the wearing of fine clothes and jewellery.  The level of sedentariness drove settlers to accumulate more goods and more livestock to insure against disasters, which entailed acquiring containers for hoarding and buildings and pens for housing the animals.  The gradual sprawl of settlements can easily be linked to the history of food, as discussed by Carolyn Steel in Hungry City (Chatto & Windus 2008), whilst embryonic politics and economies emerged with goods being bartered to oil the wheels of peaceful relationships with neighbouring communities.

“The consumer age is predicated on the idea that we no longer consume to live, but live to consume. This ideology of consumption determines how individuals perceive and interpret the world around them; making consumption the dominant social paradigm.”

Hidden Mountain: The Social Avoidance of Waste , Edd de Coverly, University of Nottingham, Pierre McDonagh, Dublin City University Business School, Lisa O’Malley & Maurice Patterson, University of Limerick

http://trashethnography.wikispaces.com/file/view/Hidden+Mountain–the+social+avoidance+of+waste.pdf

OLYMPUS DIGITAL CAMERA

Today, we clearly recognise that the possessions we buy tell others about our extended selves.  It is not simply about owning things but which things – the right things – this of course changes depending on who you are.  Objects reveal “Who we are, where we have been and perhaps where we are going” states Russell Belk, York University in Toronto, Canada whilst Catherine Roster at University of New Mexico, Albuquerque suggests that they are “repositories of ourselves”.  She believes that the value can vary significantly from each individual and that its material value does not always influence the actual value to the owner.  Here an emotional underpinning is prevalent, starting very early in babies as revealed in their relationships to basic things such as a favourite blanket or toy.

Humans get emotionally attached to certain possessions – usually those that hold sentimental memories.  Scientists have found that triggering an emotional response to an object will lead to greater sales of goods.  The current innovative project Shelflife, run through Oxfam charity shops, is cleverly tapping into this theory by enriching an object’s narrative through the potential purchaser being able to digitally read the story behind it on an Oxfam app. http://shelflife.oxfam.org.uk/how_it_works/

Andy Hudson-Smith in the Bartlett Centre for Advanced Spatial Analysis at University College London originally devised the project in 2012.  Hudson-Smith reasoned that a digital society could connect with the story buried in the physicality of an object and thereby tap into an emotive thread, but through electronic means.  The idea has led to an increase in sales for Oxfam and a widening of the project’s scope to include more retail outlets.

So how does this information inform and guide my art practice?

My own struggle against the fabrication of ‘stuff’ is well documented, made particularly difficult as a sculptor driven to create yet not wanting to contribute to an already ‘over-stuffed’ world.  Consequently, my practice ethos is to work with existing objects whenever possible so not to contribute to the mountain of possessions but instead to seconder and reinvent.  The conceptual underpinning is vital leading an approach that demands the innovative use of found objects and a considerable amount of searching for that particular metaphorical ‘thing’. Cognitive battles ensue with a rewriting of the discarded and their repositories of memories redefined.

“We are embedded in our trash – there is no way to leap beyond it and build a utopia without garbage, to address the contradiction between the world’s limited resources and our seemingly unlimited ability to manufacture trash.  Its production is rooted in survival, represented in every culture, and magnified by economic success. To purge the earth of garbage would be to destroy our own reflection.”                                                  

John Knechtel, Trash (Alphabet City Media Inc 2007)

My passion for the tactile and the eroded emerges in sculpture that in its corporeality reveals brooding degradation: the peeling layers inviting a meditation on the narrative exposed.  The work appears in distress – juxtaposing incongruous matter to create visual poetry is precarious.  Balancing a metaphysical perspective to harmonise or argue with scientific evidence is challenging.  This disputed landscape is inhabited with vigour until I retreat leaving the work to command its own domain.

“Artists don’t aim for a reductive simplicity but they, too, have an encompassing sense of what Coleridge called ‘cohaerence’ – ‘the clinging together’ of all the elements in a work to make some kind of whole which is psychically satisfying.  This is not to suggest that there is an ultimate fixed reality to be found but the artist’s personal vision will re-inform and reinvent a view of it, sometimes honing in on things that are apparently redundant and inconsequential and paradoxically presenting us with a coherent reflection of a corner of reality that we perhaps should not overlook.”

Siân Ede, Art and Science (Taurius & Co ltd 2005)

 

 

 

Exquisite Dance

03 Monday Mar 2014

Posted by jacscottstudio in ART, ARTWORKS BY JAC SCOTT, PHILOSOPHY, QUOTES, SCIENCE

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Tags

art, environment, nature, philosophy, quotes, science

“Science is a quest for the most intimate understanding of nature.  It is an adventure of the free and enquiring spirit that thrives not so much on answers as unanswered questions.  It is the enigmas, the mysteries and paradoxes that take hold of the imagination, leading it on the most exquisite dance.”

The Rainbow and the Worm                                         Mae-Wan Ho 2008

rust-on-paper2-nest-webAre you a scientist?

Are you an artist?

What do you see?

I am currently reading The Rainbow and the Worm, or in truth I am trying to understand this scientist’s viewpoint to gain a basic level of the physics of microorganisms. The writing is quite poetic in places, as I hope this quote illustrates, but when Mae-Wan steps from the rhythmic prose to the real science of equations etc I involuntarily glaze over – my brain does not understand the language. This cognitive response is making me question whether I need to comprehend, or should I accept my role as an artist is different from that of a scientist? Both disciplines attract people with enquiring minds but with different strengths. So should I glean what I can from the study and focus on my skill set or push to fathom scientific phenomena?

Cling

21 Tuesday Jan 2014

Posted by jacscottstudio in ART, QUOTES, RESEARCH, SCIENCE

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Tags

art, philosophy, science

I have just finished reading Art and Science written by Siân Ede – have you read it?

The last chapter had the strongest resonance when she discussed the understanding of multiple realities and how the two disciplines approach this concept.

“Artists don’t aim for a reductive simplicity but they, too, have an encompassing sense of what Coleridge called ‘cohaerence’ – ‘the clinging together’ of all the elements in a work to make some kind of whole which is psychically satisfying.  This is not to suggest that there is an ultimate fixed reality to be found but the artist’s personal vision will re-inform and reinvent a view of it, sometimes honing in on things that are apparently redundant and inconsequential and paradoxically presenting us with a coherent reflection of a corner of reality that we perhaps should not overlook.”

Art and Science 2005  Siân Ede

monch_embranchementhttp://www.monch.fr/galeries2.php?content_gal2&galerie=1

This image from Monch beautifully illustrates the notion of fractured realities but which disfiguration on the link do you identify with?

In Situ

12 Sunday Jan 2014

Posted by jacscottstudio in ART, QUOTES, RESEARCH, SCIENCE

≈ 2 Comments

Tags

art, environment, nature, philosophy, photography, research, science

I am often asked where I situate my practice in the art and science collaboration model and what aspects of the dynamics between the disciplines entreat me – the answer is complex.  Firstly, both disciplines share an innate curiosity about the world – making them ideal partners despite different approaches – the scientist’s rigour and protocols versus the artist’s experimental wanderings and emotional uptake.

Secondly, the tension in the attempt by scientist’s to abnegate the personal, to make their research objective, is interesting and worthy of respect. Theoretical physics acknowledges that the role of the observer influences what is seen and that an amount of subjectivity is apparent. The reason this construct is fascinating is that it complicates the amount of reality out there.  As a firm believer that multiple realities exist for each individual, and that there is no other truth or reality outside of us, then the scientist’s challenge for objectivity is viewed as an intriguing conundrum.

“The eternal mystery of the world is its comprehensibility”.

Einstein, A. ‘Physics and Reality’, Journal of the Franklin Institute

Photographic artist Susan Derges is also interested in the idea of abnegation when investigating the natural world and how by trying to remove oneself from the process it might reveal a true reality.  She captures unseen moments through infinitesimal fragments that build to illustrate images with an otherworldliness quality.  Her practice is nocturnal – harnessing the darkness and the river as her study and photographic processing lab. An aluminium slide complete with photographic paper is submerged just below the surface of the river, and then a micro-second flash above renders a photographic transparency. The flow and dynamics of the river is imprinted transposing the river’s own viewpoint from below. The colour in each image is dictated by the nature of the ambient light present at the time of shooting.  These truly beautiful and inspiring studies can be seen at http://www.susanderges.com/

Giles Revell also employs photographic techniques to communicate natural wonders. He builds up multiple images of creatures like insects then layers them to create finely crafted two-dimensional works with strong three-dimensional qualities. The results, like Derges’ work, delivers scientific outputs highly charged with ethereal overtones transforming them from cold diagnostic renderings to captivating works of art that embrace both art and science. http://gilesrevell.com/projects/insects/

fly-1920

More art – less pay

16 Monday Dec 2013

Posted by jacscottstudio in ART, PHILOSOPHY

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Tags

art, philosophy, research

Pay less for art and receive more – philosopher Alain de Botton on form as usual – worth reading if art is in your world, or if it isn’t.

http://www.denverpost.com/books/ci_24709853/alain-de-botton-offers-radical-way-see-art

 

Shedding

20 Sunday Oct 2013

Posted by jacscottstudio in ARTIST-IN-RESIDENCE AT UCLAN, DRAWINGS and PHOTOGRAPHIC RESEARCH, HIDDEN IMPACTS, PHILOSOPHY, RESEARCH, SCIENCE

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Tags

being human, degradation, found, microscope, philosophy, photography, science, skin

Where does my body end?

When do my bodily excretions and deposits, both those visible and those unseen, not stay mine?

The boundaries between the world and ourselves are not as distinct as some imagine, for we constantly leave traces of our presence – a unique calling card – to be discovered.  The characteristics of these deposits manifest differently; including the obvious as in excrement, the discreet but still clearly tangible as in hair (one loses about fifty hairs a day), ear wax or skin flakes and the less visibly defined in saliva and sweat. What spray of microscopic human detritus explodes from a scratch?

Who owns these ‘sheddings’ – the imprints of ourselves?

Each shed particle is loaded with DNA – blood and semen are DNA rich with every millilitre containing 30,000 nanaograms whilst saliva contains a tenth of that. Perspiration leaves 11.5 nanograms per millilitre of DNA on a touched object, which is enough to identify a person.  These abandon traces are obviously highly valuable evidence for the forensic scientist in his quest to uncover the hidden passages of people’s lives.

From a legal, ethical and philosophical position are these parts still us and if so who owns them?

dust-particle-on-polyropylene-carpet-3000xImage shows a dust particle on a synthetic carpet magnified 3000 times using a scanning electron microscope at University of Central Lancashire – who does it belong to?

Creativity

28 Wednesday Aug 2013

Posted by jacscottstudio in DRAWINGS and PHOTOGRAPHIC RESEARCH, PHILOSOPHY, QUOTES

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Tags

art, artist, creativity, found, philosophy, photography, rust

“An artist does not create the way he lives, he lives the way he creates.”

Jean Lescure

Lapicque, Galanis, Paris p.78

rusty-metal-beijing-CUT

Human nature

18 Sunday Aug 2013

Posted by jacscottstudio in CONSUMPTION, PHILOSOPHY, RESEARCH, SCIENCE

≈ 3 Comments

Tags

being human, consumption, philosophy, photography, power, recycling, up-cycle

Human nature

I despair

mandarin in hole WEB

and then the heartfelt joy when I read about people being innovative like this

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/magazine-23536914

follow the link to find out why

_69195942_moser_montage

Enigma

01 Thursday Aug 2013

Posted by jacscottstudio in CONSUMPTION, RESEARCH

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Tags

consumption, drawing and photography research, environment, found, philosophy, photography, science

canal“The eternal mystery of the world is its comprehensibility.”

Albert Einstein    Physics and Reality” in the Journal of the Franklin Institute Vol. 221, Issue 3 (March 1936), Pages 349-382

Image

Fragile

31 Wednesday Jul 2013

Tags

environment, nature, philosophy

Fragile

“When we try to pick out anything by itself, we find it hitched to everything else in the universe.”
John Muir

Posted by jacscottstudio | Filed under RESEARCH

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A door ajar

18 Thursday Jul 2013

Posted by jacscottstudio in ARTWORKS BY JAC SCOTT, BOOK, QUOTES, RESEARCH

≈ 1 Comment

Tags

art, China, philosophy, quotes, sculpture

tatty-door-in-binham-cut-2

If a painting is a movie running on a screen, a sculpture is a drama playing on a stage. Sculpture gives an audience and the artist more directions to evaluate. The audience can go inside a sculpture or come out of it to look at it. The artist’s message is a key for the audience to open their own door to experience the sculpture in 360 degrees. Sometimes, the audience will become part of a sculpture or participate in it. There is no limitation of the imagination of what a sculpture means to each individual audience. Sometimes, the imagination can pass through the timeline to see the elements from a different time or space.

Gong Yuebin in conversation with Jac Scott, 2013

(I created the photomontage above from original photograph of a derelict house in a village in Norfolk)

Chinese born, USA based, sculptor Gong Yuebin is just one of 28 extraordinary sculptors from around the globe that I am writing about in my new book about mixed-media sculpture.  Find more of Gong’s work here http://www.gongyuebin.com/

Site2801_03

Detail of Site 2801, Gong Yuebin

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Who am I?

jacscottstudio

jacscottstudio

Hello! I am a visual artist focusing on issue-based work that investigates the environmental issues behind fractured realities. Exploring the enigma of our existence, revealed in our ways of being, our relationship with our environs and the marks we leave behind is my preoccupation. My predilection for collaborations with scientists and geographers has led to an informed body of work that reflects a world without a sense of equilibrium. The work aims to have an oblique potency that acknowledges the world’s dark underbelly, whilst acting as a catalyst for igniting debate. I am an innate researcher who has not lost the infantile curiosity and wonder about the world - the questions and answers are in flux - I appreciate other people's viewpoints so please comment on posts that interest you - I am always happy to hear constructive criticism about my artworks and hear more information about and/or debate issues I raise. Both as metaphor and in material selection, my artistic responses focus on brooding degradation: peeling layers inviting a meditation on the narrative exposed. I try not to create more stuff – our world is already over-stuffed – so I reuse and transform objects whenever possible to satisfy my environmental conscience. This blog was initially started to complement my residency at University of Central Lancashire in Britain where I was working with scientists in the School of Built and Natural Environment examining the hidden impacts of our way of life. The residency has now ended but due to the public response I aim to continue it as long as people are interested in my art practice. Thank you for taking the time to visit my blog. Visit www.jacscott.com for more information about my contemporary practice.

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