Date: 2019
Author: Martim Brion
Art and religion have always been linked, even if in antithetical ways; this continues to be the case. Art has been used as decoration, aggrandisement, propaganda, etc.; later on, it tried to contradict this support system and declare its independence in terms of subject and mentality. Nowadays, both currents intermingle. Artists continue to draw inspiration from old master paintings with religious subjects and produce works of art for religious organisations, while at the same time, often the same artists continue to protest these organisations and their views.
This proposed work is a step in this direction, meaning this dual sense – it is not being made for a religious organization or with any religious intent, but for a space which had, until not so long ago, been a place of worship – a chapel with an altar. Hence, I believe it is of interest to acknowledge this history and the debate between the religious and the non-religious and between art with and without a specific practical purpose.
The work proposed – Window – is positioned in the place where an altar would have been. An altar is a location where sacrifices and thus rituals were performed: a window to spirituality and to the gods. It is a place of worship, contemplation, and communication, mostly indirect. And so is art in many aspects, it is worshipped by its fans or followers (mainly if the artist is famous, but also when the love for an object is high enough), it can inculcate a sense of contemplation, a semi-meditative state as it makes one think and rationalise but also feel, to be in tune with one’s thoughts and beliefs, either disagreeing or agreeing or both, with the work’s statement or its representational idea. And, most importantly, it is a window of communication, as it promotes a debate about what is addressed by the work and what it represents or does not represent. On a more mystical level, it offers introspective communication with the inner self in a rational way or in a more spiritual way, if one chooses to be a believer.
A window to form and colour – the form does make the altar, which could be made of dirt or stone, as the first altars were, or with the many more materials that sculpture has appropriated over time; in this case, PVC and polyurethane paint. Its colours can also vary; here, they are the colours of the sea, some of them as at sea variety is ever-present. Thus, Chapel, Altar – Window – a view of the colours of the sea.
Martim Brion 