Study for Ethical Split


media/size: inkjet print on paper, inkjet print on transparent sheet, lenticular lens, wood frame/ 76 x 76 cm


This is a study for Ethical Split 1.
Ethical Split series has its roots in the series Painted Negativity made from 2011 to 2013, is the developed out of the conceptual approach of the latter series.

Painted Negativity is flat-screen work which was invented to make paintings without using hands. One of characteristics of Painted Negativity is the structure with paring of images, which is used as a analogy of fundamental structure of language; if there are more than 2 units like meaning=value, they are always defined by the each others' negative interactions between the units (when there are arbitrary propositions A and B, A+B⇔A=!B∧B=!A [‘!rsquo; means negation]).
As above, the other characteristic of Painted Negativity is the generated typical phenomena of painting like bleeding and blurring without hands, which came from the following thought of mine: now the images used in Painted Negativity exists as an analogy of language, the process must be separated from the artist's personal attribute.

In the series, I used only abstract images in 2011, and since 2012, I have started to use pornography in place of abstract images as a new approach. It has enabled interposition of ‘eroticism’ to the phenomena of paintings as analogy of language.
The additional thing as a new characteristic is following:
[a] Effect which enables viewers to feel it just beautiful, when they focus on its optical beautifulness only.
[a'] Effect which brings discordance to viewers' ‘aesthetic basis = ethical consistency’ that makes distinction what is beautiful or ugly, when they notice that the objects used on it are pornography like vaginas etc.
This is also an attempt to cause a split within indivisibility between ‘sign’ and ‘content’ (means ‘signifiant’ and ‘signifie’ in linguistics term), which is the universal structure of language.
In that sense, eventually the above effect(s) directly operate(s) function of language itself, not as metaphor or analogy.

Since 2013, I have started to combine paired two flat images into one layered screen. Concretely, I precisely printed an image 1 of 2 on the acrylic surface of the frame which is for the other unique-printed sheet. As the result, some sculptural aspect has come out not only as paintings.

And now, Ethical Split is the series of works which has been made since 2015 as more advanced version of the latest version of Painted Negativity.
This new series more focuses on the above mentioned effect [a'] : bringing discordance to viewers' ‘aesthetic basis = ethical consistency’ that makes distinction what is beautiful or ugly.
The one of noticeable differences from Painted Negativity series, is (on this study) using ‘dead bodies’ photo in place of pornography (in this instance, ‘dead bodies’ has been defined as an extension of pornography, because of the ‘anti-social’ properties which bring disorder to society which is well-ordered by labors. So, I can use the both ‘pornography’ and ‘dead bodies’ as issues which rooted in eroticism).
The other noticeable difference = discriminating materialistic feature of this new series, is using a 'lenticular-printed' board made with a lens in place of a printed acrylic face, which has a function to switch some images with different angles of viewers.
By this, in addition to semasiological deconstruction (means the same of the above-mentioned thing: an attempt to cause a split within indivisibility between ‘signifiant’ and ‘signifie’.), works from this series have equipped a new effect which directly impinges on physiological phenomenon ‘what viewers' retinas catch’. That is, when we are in front of the work, we can't understand what we see, or at least it's harder to understand it.




photos by Aisho Miura Arts

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