ART PROJECT Lost and Found Artifacts – “Take it or Leave it”
A project started with the Reveille website in the spring of 2017 involved losing small talisman art in various locales and leading the discoverer to the Reveille website. Although this was not successful in the respect of the artifacts being found and reported on the site, the project is staged for a second phase linking the works to the We’re Wonderful website.
The 20th century Bauhaus artist Paul Klee described his paintings as evocative of lost treasures that were somehow discovered. Klee’s paintings exhibited primitivism, otherworldliness and a sense of mystical wonder. Needless to say, Haj is a great admirer of his work.
There is a contemporary movement where the artist “loses” his or her work by burying or otherwise hiding the piece, but I am unable to identify what this is called. Regardless, the discovery of this movement along with a lifelong love of Klee has led Haj to pick up this project.
The original lost artifact was called Yorick and was lost somewhere in the Vieux Carré probably in late April of 2017 (posted on Reveille May 3). A somewhat obvious quote simply attributed to “WS” was included: “Where are your gibes now?”
In a feature on Turner Classic Movies this month (October 2018) and in celebration of the 200th anniversary of the publication of Frankenstein, the artist Ross Rossin said, “Every portrait I do is, to a large extent, a self-portrait”. Yes, and each work is a piece in the greater jigsaw puzzle. Yorick, of course, is a portrait of us all as, below our masks…our very skins…where we look so very much alike.
The second piece was lost in May of 2017 near one of the oldest settlements in North America and was called The Thirst of a Scarab’s Work. The image was posted on the Reveille website on June 1. This artifact included the epitaph from Adi Newton’s lyrics for Clock DVA (I am uncertain now which song and album), “In desolate dream I walk alone through the centuries of hunger.”
Here, one of humanity’s earliest civilizations’ ancient artifact-insect is transformed by its work from the base earthiness where we all originate into fire and light. The ceramic artifact is practical and can serve as a sweet’s dish or a simple ashtray.
Here’s a detail of the piece.
The third piece lost sometime in late June or early July of 2017 was titled Black Lagoon and was lost in a dingy sitting by a bay in St. John’s USVI. Here’s a picture of the locale.
What more to say about the timeless image of this missing link that emerges from the murky depths to haunt our sense of divine right.
Creation and destruction are dual forces stemming from the same artistic source. Art must tap into the darkness even when it wishes to portray only light.
Finally, Haj lost this piece only called totem rot no. 16. This was lost in our home base during a march of resistance. It’s epitaph is from the great Pollock who this piece pays homage to: “there is no accident…”. Primitivism, verdant chaos and the anxiety dance may be evoked.
Stay tuned brothers and sisters.
Image of Fish Magic (1925) by Paul Klee (1879-1940) from the Philadelphia Museum of Art.