lecture PhDArts

Last Saturday the 6th of February I had the opportunity to give a lecture at the symposium "the artist as researcher". It was a two-day international conference on artistic research and PhD in visual art and design at the Royal Academy of the Arts (KABK) in The Hague. It was a well visited conference and a lot of discussion was going on the subject how to do a PhD in visual art and what the institution could necessarily ask, a written thesis and an artwork?
Herewith I would like to let see and read my lecture on "surface research". A point of view on the subject is to read in the text, enjoy it...



I am Henri Jacobs, Dutch artist living and working in Brussels, and I was invited to start the first Rietveld Research Residency.
In september 2009 the Gerrit Rietveld Academie initiated a Research Residency. The Rietveld Research Residency (RRR) is a cooperation of the Rietveld Academie and Fonds BKVB to create a research site for mid career artists. They are enabled for a period of 1 to 3 years to do a clearly defined artistic research project, within the framework of the Gerrit Rietveld Academie. The artist will work in the Pavilion of the Academy and will report twice a year on the research project. There are also an agreed number of educational projects foreseen.
This Rietveld Research Residency doesn’t foresee in a route during years to study and doing research for a PhD in Art. It is a residency for concentration on a specific aspect of the existing work by the invited artist. It is a possibility to create time to go deeper into theoretical and material details of the oeuvre. In the lee of the art market...

surface research results exhibition

On the seventh of January, three weeks ago, there was a first exhibition in the Rietveld Pavilion which was titled : surface research results exhibition. Nine small drawings on epson A4 premium glossy phote paper where exhibited. And it was possible to watch the 10 minutes video on whiting out a text and drawing a new text over it in ink. It isn't that much after 4 months of research residency at the Rietveld Academy. Because I meet a lot of interesting students and tutors, quite some time is spend with talking on subjects, ideas and plans. Also reading and writing for this blog is part of the research. Concentration and deep insight into drawing and the adventures while drawing are achieved. Within a few weeks, after having done a lecture in The Hague next week, it is possible to continue with drawing drawings. It's necessary to foresee time for drawing, otherwise all time is spend with visits, talks, social traffic and business. And because the Rietveld Research Resident is an example artist, an artist whom shows how to cook art in a transparent fish-bowl studio, it is a privilege to lock myself up in the pavilion and start making drawings again. I am looking forward to restart the actual drawing chapter.

civilisation

résumé

9. Content is a glimpse of something, an encounter like a flash. It's very tiny - very tiny, content. (Willem de Kooning)



8. Residues after erasing the texts of Sade, Cioran and Nietzsche.



7. To be far beyond terror and pity and to be the eternal lust of becoming itself - that lust which also involves the lust of destruction. (Friedrich Nietzsche)



6. After scratching the texts of Sade and Cioran.



5. Each of us must pay for the slightest damage he inflicts upon a universe created for indifference and stagnation, sooner or later he will regret not having left it intact. (Emile Cioran)



4. After scratching the text of Sade.



3. In actions of mankind we recognize rather than moral or criminal acts the irresistible natural laws of creation and destruction. (Marquis de Sade)



2. Scratched title.



1. Title.

ideas

Do you need an idea to start drawing or painting? Nice question, stupid answer. Therefore... Perhaps the answer can be : "no, you don't need an idea to start drawing or painting". For sure you don't need a big or huge idea, already a small, tiny, little and simple idea can be enough. About for instance the materials so close to the draughtsman, like the sheet of white paper. The difficult part is not to get an idea but to continue with a simple idea into the depths of the unknown, in opposite of getting bored already after half an hour. To continue with a simple idea means you have to explore it by making variations and failure as much as possible.
Emile Cioran (1911 - 1995): "What to do? Where to go? Do nothing and go nowhere, easy enough".