João Silvério |

Insomniac

Insomnia takes us to that dysfunctional state of neverending vigil that is associated with pathological and psychosomatic causes such as stress, anxiety and depression. It can also be brought on by abrupt changes in geographical latitude and is experienced when one is suddenly forced to cope with radical differences in the average number of hours of sunlight one is exposed to per day. 1 Insomnia is marked by disruptions in a person’s regular sleep patterns and these disruptions affect the person both psychologically and biologically by depriving us of the soothing rest we need to function stably. It is the diametrical opposite of replenishing slumber. This restores, through repose, the average level of a person’s capacities, so that one can react appropriately while awake, make correct choices, reason well, and perform actions whose truth is not questioned: to act as an autonomous, and thus free, human being. People experience doubt when their comprehension becomes muddled and blurred, or when in the act of observing, thinking, or acting, uncertainty and external disturbances cause imbalance and cast doubt on the reality of their experiences. In Andy Denzler’s series of paintings “Blur Motion”, the paintings act as a critical metaphor of the alienation that is sparked by the uncontrollable flow images. It is as if the world were a raging torrent information that carries adrift a multiplicity of languages, meanings, and points of reference that morph in real time, creating a blurred, indecipherable horizon. They act like a screen that both affects and blocks the ability to see clearly and discern things, and thus confront us with the impossible. Andy Denzler has sought out his models and has found them in images gleaned from the world of photography and cinema. His kinship with this world images also extends to mass communication and the media and was built on the foundations of the fascination he holds for light and cinematic effects that can be used to produce meta-reality. Denzler has grasped the fundamental principles behind of the Fall of Man and has realized that every single image obeys a certain system of ongoing recycling. The close-ups faces are taken out of scenographic context and are denuded of any narrative. They are the very obstacle the production of meaning and deny any hint as their psychological or social nature. On the other hand, his latest works, which he has entitled “Figures and Landscapes”, reveal a world that is even farther from reality. These paintings use an intense color palette and the characters wander through strange landscapes that are somewhere between cinematography, imagination, and the reveries of disenchantment. The pictorial treatment of these works is completely different. The figures are well-defined and the drippings and transparencies are the diametrical opposite of the portraits in which color is virtually absent. The faces and bodies are like icons whose symbolic essence has been muted. Through his use of “false” erasure, which creates a smear effect, the artist blurs the detail and removes the reference points whose associative value would have served as an important memory aid. Thus memory has now been stripped of its time-relational function. The artist’s hand, which used the brush with such virtuosity and portrayed these figures, now uses the spatula in a violent action on the thickness and the density of the still-undried oil painted surface. It is the final gesture in the process of constructing the painted image and it sparks the illusion of motion and distance as we attempt to recognize the model. What we end up seeing does not remind us of anyone (a reference) we can definitely identify or localize. The portrait, which is a form of representing someone and his or her psychological identity in its transitory and unstable state, has been twisted in these paintings and lays bare a face or a figure that is only recognizable as being that of a human or a soul-stripped spectre. These paintings are like a false palimpsest 2 that were not intended - and do not serve - for reinscribing; they are rather the result of mutilation to which that inscription has been subjected. In “Matter and Memory”, Henri Bergson brings to life the moment when remembrance is sparked by memory and turns into the present. Thus the past is no longer a potential record of memory but is brought to us as a vital presence, as perception. In Andy Denzler’s paintings, there is a moment of inertia in our ability to recognize, to rewire the connections and meanings that make up identity. This dimension of the real then wanes to a stop as we successively attempt to recognize and associate elements and are then thwarted by the relentless whirlpool of images from our daily lives and obstructed by the action of painting as a medium that questions the ways we perceive the floods of images. The insomnia that we are subjected to holds us hostage to a persistent light at the zenith of the heavens; a light that keeps us from awakening to a state of watchfulness; a light that washes away our ability to overcome a profound sense of repetitious namelessness. None of the models in these paintings is really anyone, even though a faint trace of human expressiveness almost imperceptibly lingers. 1 In 1997, the Norwegian director Erik Skjoldbjaerg debuted his first feature film entitled “Insomnia”. The film is a psychological thriller that deals with a murder investigation delving into the death of a young woman from the north of Norway. Because of the Midnight Sun and the involuntary manslaughter he himself commits while pursuing the suspect, the main character, Detective Engström, is not able to sleep and starts to have hallucinations. In 2002, Christopher Nolan directed an American remake of the film that takes place in Alaska. 2 A palimpsest is a manuscript page, whether from scroll or book that has been written on, scraped off, and used again.