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Iterative Abstraction : E-print Paintings
The Order of Iteration
By publishing, in 1936, "The Work of Art in the Era of its Technical Reproducibility" Walter Benjamin opened the way to a reflection on the new existing conditions of Art now dominated by technological advances. The arrival of computer science and, recently the possibility for a greater number of people to use a PC was a decisive step - that Benjamin could not foresee. Hence the legitimacy given to the passage from the concept of technical reproducibility to the concept of technical productability.
The works of art here presented have benefited from this new productibility.
On the other hand, if you accept, by reference to the famous definition of painting given by Maurice Denis, in 1890, as being, essentially, color pigments assembled according to a certain order on a flat surface, then the works here displayed are, no doubt, paintings.
I wanted to place this exhibition under these two references, which, in my opinion, are not contradictory: on the one hand an operation mode (a modus operandi) resolutely modernist, and on the other hand, that of traditional materiality, that of a painting you "hang against the wall like a shooting gun or a hat" (Heidegger), a flat surface indeed on which there are colors assembled in a certain order.
But this is not sufficient to give to works a foundation under the certain latitude of an Art that has been somewhat renovated. All depends on the nature of this order. Here, the order that governs the assembling is not that of representation, nor that of personal expression, nor the evocation of the forms of sensible experience, nor that of a message to the social or political sphere. Here, the order is that of repetition, or, even better, that of Iteration, that is to say a differential repetition whose capacities to produce forms have been pushed to the extreme limits of computerized tools, created for the occasion and exploiting the resources of combination as never before.
The Order of Iteration is not a sort of composition or subjective arrangement of pictorial elements according to their mutual relations. It exercises its power on a whole that is perpetually moving, these E-prints being only actualizations.
It must be regarded as a true general regime under which the works, in their conception as well as their reception, are submitted to a different aesthetic identification.
Thus, the passage from one art scene to another took place where works can enjoy their free appearances and affirm themselves in their sensible singularity. In the world where they deploy they have the ambition of being a sort of beginning.
- Christian de Cambiaire.
ABOUT CHRISTIAN DE CAMBIAIRE:
Christian lives and works in Toulouse France where he began a career in Political Science. He turned to artistic creation after the revelation, in the fifties, of American abstraction and "Art Informel" which influenced his first non-representational works. Yet, he gradually aimed to free himself of this first influence Around 1960, in order to "structurer l'informel" (Michel Tapié), he used repetitive procedures by superimposing calligraphic grids and started to move away from a certain subjectivism in painting, using the spray gun. At that time he took part in the activities of the Lettrist Group.
From 1968 forward his work was supported by the art critic Michel Tapiè who was then interested in the concept of "set of signs" and "abstract spaces". Tapiè organized exhibitions of his work in Paris and in Italy. In Paris he also took part in the creation of the "V art" group and its exhibitions. In Toulouse he co-founded the "Peinture-Itération" group (1975-1979) whose purpose was to revisit the conceptual basis of abstraction that seemed by then to have exhausted some of its potentials.
In 1978 he created pictorial reliefs taking up the third dimension, already perceptible in his superimpositions. Starting in 1983 he turned to more radical solutions by substituting the concept of algorithmic distribution to that of composition, which is of heuristic nature. In the former, the part played by the artist shifts from the spontaneous aesthetic reactions to the use of systems that generate the work of art. Since 1990 he has used a personal computer program corresponding to his own thematic approach.
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"Something has been captured in motion and has kept a trace of this dynamic."
Christian de Cambiaire, Theoretical Position
"Christian read a prepared statement declaring his freedom from the influence of Duchamp and the tyranny of post-modernism."
Anna Conti, Working Artist's Journal
"Is it art? You betcha."
Alan Bamberger, Art Business.com
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