New Perspectives on Physical Space

I have been thinking about Friday's discussion on Malcom Andrews' "Land into Landscape" and the manner in which landscapes are culturally constructed. Making land into landscape outside, we slot experience into culturally concocted readymade molds, thus divorcing ourselves from authentic experience. This struck me as similar to the ways in which, as Merlin Coverley argues in "Psychogeography," we repeat the same routes as dictated by the construction of our cities and thus eliminate free will and chance from our interactions with our surroundings. In terms of the landscape painting, the goal is often to simulate power over the unknowable, distancing "humanity" from nature and controlling it by devising an orderly scheme of nature according to cultural tastes and fears. The landscape painting becomes an opulent mown lawn. Outside of class I found myself thinking about this notion of domination in terms of perspective, specifically considering the contrast between its application in Renaissance and Medieval art.

In chapter one of “Ways of Seeing,” critic John Berger comments on the evolution of perspective within the tradition of oil painting: “The convention of perspective, which is unique to European art and which was first established in the early Renaissance, centres everything on the eye of the beholder. It is like a beam from a lighthouse - only instead of light travelling outwards, appearances travel in. The conventions called those appearances reality. Perspective makes the single eye the centre of the visible world. Everything converges on to the eye as to the vanishing point of infinity. The visible world is arranged for the spectator as the universe was once thought to be arranged for God.” The Renaissance’s obsession with masterfully rendered figures was later a way to exemplify humanity’s ties to God through idealized physical beauty; human proximity to the divine came from the recognition of being made in God’s image. Artistic virtuosity was itself an exercise in worship. Thus, as Berger implies, the perspective that emerged within painting saw the viewer assume the role of God. We assume the universe hinges on our eye’s perception of it. Still, as Berger notes: “The inherent contradiction in perspective was that it structured all images of reality to address a single spectator who, unlike God, could only be in one place at a time.” In attempting to replace the all-encompassing force of the universal with ego, we limit ourselves.

While the skewed proportions of Medieval art are often derided as evidence of the period’s ignorance and degenerated art, the style was a reflection of the period’s values rather than of artistic incompetence. Like with the Renaissance, Medieval art’s ties to God are seen in depictions of the physical body. Conversely, however, this is done by reveling in the grotesque. Where the Renaissance’s spiritual center was aesthetic, the art of the Middle Ages was ascetic. Rather than being brought closer to God by containing a piece of him within, serving as his reflection, one expressed devotion through suffering. Looking at the art is necessarily representative of this piety. Beholding it could not be a window into a world of order, serenity, and beauty; it must also be an act of penance. It’s no wonder that so much of the art reads as unpleasant. Although there is a joy to be found in it, it is a dark humor rather than the easy smile of Renaissance art. In terms of perspective, there is no reassuring single point on which to rest. Medieval art rendered humanity as feeble and ignorant compared to God. More than just seeing everything, God is everything. Fractured planes and tunnels of slanted line suggest a God who is all seeing and everywhere. At the beginning of the 20th century there was a rise in playing with warped perspective. How could we assume the role of God if such a figure were "dead?" Movements such as Post-Impressionism and Cubism challenged the authority of perception and reality itself.

Within my own work I want to break out of the single-point perspective landscape that orders itself according to the eye of the viewer. Subverting the way in which landscapes are often a manner of managing nature, a futile attempt at subduing a force greater than ourselves. There is an uneasiness to doing this, a kind of uncanniness that comes up in the work. I want to lean into this. Not in a Medieval sense of self-flagellation or the agony of a physical body, but in the sense of just letting the work unfold as it's presenting itself to me.

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