Palimpsest talk in Paris

Last Thursday, March 15, the talk / lecture about the Palimpsest I could present once again at the Ecole Nationale Supérieure des Beaux-Arts in Paris. The same lecture I did in February 2010 at the PhDarts conference in The Hague. The lecture was organised by Gilgian Gelzer, teacher from the drawing department. Many students showed up and listened quite concentrated. The next day, Friday March 16, individual talks with several students about their drawings made the ENSBA visit fruitful.

Within a reasonable time I have the plan to publish both texts, about the Palimpsest and about Idolatry & Iconoclasm, here on this blog.

setting surface research final exhibition

installing the book table

alphabet and 9 palimpsests

30 A3 papers with the blog items monthly ordered

alphabet and 9 palimpsests

research output on palimpsest and golden ratio

end of palimpsest year, beginning of creation and destruction year

creation and destruction chapter

c & d chapter and blog items

blog items on 30 A3 papers and book table

curator Alexandra installing the films

opening on Saturday January 15

opening on Saturday January 15

new surface with fertilised soil

To get grip on the matter of art and destruction I would like to start up a new cycle of palimpsest drawings. The photo shows a drawing on Epson photo paper with the proportions of the golden ratio. The triangle of Kepler is drawn and with a small letter template letters which form words are sown to fertilise the surface.
To do some theoretical study on the subject this afternoon I have to go to the library of the Rijks Academy in Amsterdam. To borrow the book "the destruction of art" by Dario Gamboni.

encore trois semaines

Within three weeks my Surface Research project has had it's first year. Much too short and it passed away like a cigarette in smoke. Fast, pleased with the prospect but finally dissatisfying when the end is near. Why? Because many questions aren't answered, the subject of the destructive element in creating art pieces isn't yet clear to me. The palimpsests and the specific texts used in the palimpsests were a start that dealt with construction and destruction. Precise construction by drawing the texts in grids using a ruler and compasses, well kept in hand destruction by scratching out the texts with a cutter.
After that I made a step backwards by working with specific conditions of a surface which is going to be used for drawings. It was necessary that dimensions had a reason and that is why I worked with the Golden Ratio and the Triangle of Kepler. Again many possibilities in drawings and the destruction of the drawings has been invested.
In the final three weeks I am going to make some new "destructed" drawings to complete the exhibition I am planning for Monday May 31 till Thursday June 3 in the Rietveld pavilion.

Invitation card will be posted soon on this blog.

Kepler Triangle

Last Wednesday Jan Andriesse gave me a A4 sheet of paper with the construction of the Triangle of Kepler and the rectangle where the triangle is the half part from. The ratio of the edges of a Kepler triangle are linked to the golden ratio and can be written approximately as 1 : 1.2720196 : 1.6180339. The German mathematician and astronomer Johannes Kepler (1571–1630) expressed in the following quotation his deep fascination for the Pythagorean theorem and the golden ratio: "geometry has two great treasures: one is the theorem of Pythagoras, the other the division of a line into mean and extreme ratio. The first we may compare to a mass of gold, the second we may call a precious jewel".









Four photo's of the evolution of the same drawing with the construction of the triangle of Kepler. Next week the drawing will evolve into a more complex drawing. I think it is going to be a first drawing of a series of drawings where the palimpsest principle of drawing and scratching, of creation and destruction, will be practised.

the surface and its dimensions

The surface, I am trying to focus on the surface and its dimensions. For that reason it is nice to be able to use the balanced proportions of the golden ratio. The dimensions of a golden ratio sheet of paper that is locked up in an A4 sheet of paper is quite smaller than an A4. The photo up here shows some A4 sheets of paper, 2 golden ratio sheets of paper and three sit, lie & stand sheets of paper cut to proportions with the same square centimetres. An A4 has the dimensions 29,7 x 21 centimetres, a golden ratio sized sheet of paper cut from an A4 sheet of paper has the dimensions 29,7 x 18,4 centimetres.



To construct the golden ratio rectangle it is necessary to use a square. The square is an integral part of a golden ratio rectangle. Drawing the construction lines already there through connecting edges and continuing drawing from crossing lines is easy, no inspiration or special skills are necessary. The drawing is in the paper like the sculpture is in the stone.







Drawn on Epson Premium Glossy Photo paper with its glossy coating. Playing with the possibilities is started, erasing and scratching into the paper is part of the game. Golden ratio and palimpsest techniques are subject of research, of practical artistic research.

another 4 states

Closing this palimpsest by ornamenting the alphabet.



Graphite colouring after Tuerlinckx.



Alphabet after Broodthaers.



Bricks after Magritte and Broodthaers.

palimpsest drawing

A new attempt to produce, by drawing and erasing, a palimpsest. It isn't very clear what to do and how to continue. The palimpsest chapter was more or less clarified after the lecture in The Hague. Now it is possible to go further and deeper into the concept of palimpsesting. It isn't clear to me why I want to force the concept of making palimpsests into the direction of Belgian artistic heritage with René Magritte, Marcel Broodthaers and Joëlle Tuerlinckx as a small family of artists where I would like to reflect on. Probably by making drawings, writing on this blog and by reading certain books it is going to be clear...

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.

to erase

to scratch
erase
delete
wipe out
undo
damage
destroy
and
to hoover a drawing

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.