A big thank you to Lapsking Hamed Dehnavi for creating my new Wikipedia page. Here is the link:  http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Artista_Eli

Thank you to the Tehran Stuckists for showing my art work on their International Stuckism site. Here is the link:  http://www.tehranstuckism.ir/stuckismonlinegallery.htm

Just to let you know my article about Stuckism has finally been published by the Artiscape magazine. Here is the link: http://www.theartiscape.com/articles/stuckism-revelations-revolution

Sorry about the delay in producing my new painting. Like all wars it has taken longer to finish than expected.

This is the title of the new book I am writing, which will accompany my painting and explain the reasons for my choices of subject matter. It will be a combination of psychology, sociology and art. I’m not sure when it will be available in print, but hopefully this should happen sometime next year.

Sorry to keep you all waiting but my next painting will be available to view, on this site, soon. The expected due date for finishing it is the 1st of January, 2012. It is called ‘The Battle’ and it is an allegory of Fear and Love. It has taken me some time to paint but I hope you will find it will be worth the wait.

Also I would like to say a big ‘THANK YOU’ to the Tehran Stuckists, for adding me to their International Stuckism page. It is an honour to be included amongst so many talented artists from around the world.  Here is their link: http://www.tehranstuckism.com/stuckismonlinegallery.htm

Angel-of-Death-Artista-Eli-2011

Angel of Death.

This image was done for a painting swap with David Bishop. I asked him what subject matter he wanted and he said ‘Death’.  So I started to think of all the things I knew about death. Here is my list:

1. Death is universal and affects all matter.
2. The opposite of Matter is Anti-matter/ Dark Matter.
3. Upon death particles of energy are released from living matter and dead matter, of the living thing, returns to the soil.
4. Lightening is:  the electric breakdown of air by strong electric fields, which produce a force on charges. When these charges move through a distance, a flow of energy occurs. The electric potential energy in the atmosphere then is transformed into thermal energy, light, and sound, which are other forms of energy.
5. Energy is always equivalent to the ability to exert pulls or pushes against the basic forces of nature, along a path of a certain length. The total energy contained in an object is identified with its mass and energy (like mass), cannot be created or destroyed (It is never ‘born’ and it never dies’. It just ‘is’).
6. In particle physics antimatter is the extension of the concept of the anti particle to matter, where antimatter is composed of antiparticles in the same way that normal matter is composed of particles. For example, a positron (the antiparticle of the electron or e+
   ) and an anti proton (p) can form an anti hydrogen atom in the same way that an electron and a proton form a “normal matter” hydrogen atom. Furthermore, mixing matter and antimatter can lead to the annihilation  of both, in the same way that mixing antiparticles and particles does, thus giving rise to high-energy photons (gamma rays) or other particle–antiparticle pairs. The result of antimatter meeting matter is an explosion.
7. There are nutrients in this matter which can be recycled into new living forms.
8. We are 80% water, which also goes back into the atmosphere.
9. Essentially we do not ‘end’, we are just ‘recycled’ without a brain and therefore do not perceive in the same way as we do now in our present form.
10. We are one with the universe. Our life cycle is just part of our presence.
11. Time does not exist outside our concept of it. It exists only as an indication of our own life span and the life spans of living matter around us.
12. Our purpose is to reproduce and nurture our species in order for the survival of the species.
13. In order for our species to survive, we also need to make sure our planet and other species of animal and plant life survive. Without these we will die along with them.

14.  Death is often communicated in art by ‘The Angel of Death’ who is seen as a merciful character, delivering us from pain and fear.

15.  The Personification of Death (The Grim Reaper)  in it’s male form is seen as a destructive character and carries a scythe  to ‘sever the last ties between the body (matter) and the soul (energy)

16.  In Hinduism the Kali is a goddess of death who clears the path in order for new life to be created. She is traditionally depicted with blue skin.

17.  In art, Post Modern conceptual art often uses dead matter and exhibits it as found objects.

18.  Anti –art comments of the destruction of society and art and discusses the meaning of life using dead matter, whereas Re-modernism movements, such as Stuckism: ‘re-modernise’ art, incorporating ‘a renewal of Spiritual values for art, culture and society to replace the emptiness of current Postmodernism’  (An Antidote to the Ghastly Turner Prize, The Stuckists, Victoria Press), using matter which has been recycled from it’s dead state into something new. For example, oil paint, acrylic paint and charcoal are materials made out of dead matter but which are reborn into a new form owing to the passing of time and the chemical reaction methods involved in their making.

19.  Spirals are symbols of the workings of the universe and also a symbol of the process of dialectic. They are also found on ancient tombstones.

20.  Sunflowers grow seeds in an angle of a spiral. In Spanish the Sunflower is known as a Girosol (literal translation: ‘turn to the sun’).  This angle is: 137.5 degrees. It is known as the Goldern Angle  and is part of the Goldern Ratio. Ziesing wrote in 1854:

‘The Golden Ratio is a universal law in which is contained the ground-principle of all formative striving for beauty and completeness in the realms of both nature and art, and which permeates, as a paramount spiritual ideal, all structures, forms and proportions, whether cosmic or individual, organic or inorganic, acoustic or optical; which finds its fullest realization, however, in the human form’.

21.  In 2010 Juliette Bingham, The curator of the Tate modern said ‘Ai Weiwei’s Unilever Series commission, Sunflower Seeds, is a beautiful, poignant and thought-provoking sculpture’. Yes, thought provoking because walking on the porcelain man made seeds which were supposed to discuss ‘Life’ was banned because the powder that was kicked up during this process actually was carcinogenic and could cause ‘Death’. Lol.

22.  Mounds in the landscape are often ancient burial places.

23.  Death is associated with pain because accidents and illnesses which cause death are painful.

24.  The subject of death in the arts is often represented symbolically as a skull.

25.  Death is unknown and, like Anti-matter, is a missing piece of a jigsaw that we will never know about because, on the point of death, our brain is destroyed and, thus, so are our thoughts and all previous knowledge we have learned, making our lives as individuals with egos futile, but elevating us as part of a bigger plan for the universe.

26.  The Death card in Tarot cards traditionally does not mean ‘Death’ it means ‘change’.

27.  The symbolism of purple in western culture is the meeting of the spirit with the body.

28.  Many people who have had near death experiences speak of entering into a bright light.

29.  People often speak of death as returning to the source of life.

30. Our death apparently occurs after 1 billion heart beats. See this link: FQXi Community. Our life span is controlled by the speed at which our heart beats and the speed at which our planet rotates (which creates the curvature of time Stephen Hawkins ‘The Universe in a Nut Shell’.

All of these ideas appear in this very small painting (15 x 20cm’s). See if you can spot where and how I have included them.

I am writing to say thank you for all your kind comments about my work. I am sorry I cannot reply to each individually. If you would like a personal reply, please let me know in your comment or email me at artistaelishaw(Replace this parenthesis with the @ sign)yahoo.co.uk.

I would like to mention one of my favourite quotes ”

“Be the change you want to see in the world.”

Mahatma Gandhi

I make art because my skills and contacts are limited. I am just one person and, as an individual, I have my limits. We, as humanity, however have so many resources available to us. When we join together we can achieve great things. Each one of has so much we can do to change the society in which we live. Look for your skill, no matter how small and insignificant if may seem to you, it is not insignificant to the world.  Use it to benefit the world and ‘be the change that you want to see in the world’.

Respect to all my artist, writer, film maker, design  and musician friends who are working away and highlighting similar important issues to myself. Don’t stop, together we can be the change we want to see.

Oh-my-Pod-Artista-Eli-2011

This painting is about architecture, overpopulation, divisions with society and alienation. There have been several programmes on television highlighting the difficulties about the affordability of property. The world recession is a direct result of people borrowing more than they can afford in order just to feed and accommodate themselves and their families. This has resulted in homelessness for many people around the world and huge debts that world governments are now struggling to pay off. There have been winners in this situation and they are the corporations and a few members of the elite who have profited from the misery of thousands. Everyone I know has struggled during this recession. Many of my friends have been forced to go back to their countries of origin and have had to live in cramped conditions with families who are still lucky enough to have a home. I read in the following article: http://theeconomiccollapseblog.com/archives/it-is-now-mathematically-impossible-to-pay-off-the-u-s-national-debt ; that although most people think the American government own the Federal Reserve that in fact they don’t. Apparently:

‘The Federal Reserve is a private bank owned and operated for profit by a very powerful group of elite international bankers.’

It also stated that it is now impossible to pay off the National debt. The result of this will be that we will all struggle even more in years to come unless these corporations share their money or a new system is set up to right these inequalities, neither of which I see as being likely.

I have also been viewing real estate programmes on the television where agents find people houses according to their budgets. A number of very small properties have been shown and it got me thinking about what it would be like in the future if this trend continues. I thought about the type of nightmare property which could be offered in the future and it appeared to me as a kind of ‘Matrix’ set up (as in the film ‘The Matrix’). I imagined it as not having any of the necessary requirements needed in order for it to be called a ‘home’. There is in my painting: no protection from the elements; there is no space for exercise; no room for friends, family or pets; no space for possessions or momentos, etc. My pod is a place of extreme alienation, where all the things we require, in order to have a nurturing environment, have been taken away. There are many in Social Science circles who say we are a product of our environment. I believe this to be true and what concerns me about our changing world is how we are going to adapt to this aspect of the human condition. There have been countless philosophers who have sort to find the sources of human happiness and contentment. Their discoveries have included: having friends, family and animals to assist and comfort them; having a comfortable, non threatening environment to live in, having meaningful employment, etc.   These sources lie in the areas which are being slowly taken away from us. Laws prevent us from meeting friends in groups. We are encouraged to spend our time in separate rooms from one another, watching different T.V programs (such as Sky’s new ‘Multi-room’ facility) or surfing the web. Our work is often repetitive, boring and serves corporations rather than ourselves or the needy (the best paid work can be found in the private, rather than the public sector). Those working in the public sector are being devalued and de-motivated. Short term financial gain is often highlighted as being more important than the quality of goods and services (Things break easily resulting in many of us feeling irritated that we have to constantly replace them).

My character in the painting is wearing clothing relating to the harlequin, showing the individuals ability to adapt. My character could be seen as a feminine male or a butch female. They could even be seen as some form of predatory animal. I have blurred these boundaries and the boundary of race. Who knows what kind of people we will become in the future. I have depicted an alcohol bottle to represent our society’s favourite way to escape social pressure. I don’t need to put statistics in, for you all know already the effects that this type of drug produces.

In the background I have depicted a sky made out of circles representing the cycles of life and formation of the universe. On the ground plane I have gone back to my expressionist roots regarding technique. I have depicted this part in a sad, cool blue and shown the areas of our world which sadden me – pollution, war, overpopulated ugly cities, the traffic ‘rat race’, etc. I have paid homage to Wolf Howard’s ‘Super Powerless’ hence, Spiderman can be seen on top of one of the skyscrapers. I included this to make a comment about fear and helplessness. My war scene is inspired by the way little boys often paint. It saddens me when I see these because it is as if they have been conditioned by society to fulfil their role not just as future protectors of society, but also as ‘canon fodder’ for the disputes of regimes. I feel that wars can be stopped, but they are not. Aggression is promoted in children’s T.V. programmes, in adult films, on the internet, in computer games. I sometimes wonder if we are being programmed to fight each other just to reduce the population. There are far better ways to control the population without harming individuals. A good education system and practical health care help would be beneficial. I remember reading about President Bush junior’s abstinence scheme in Africa. He pulled out of providing medical care and contraceptive services, in favour sending people to Africa to tell them not to have sex. This seems both absurd and cruel. ‘The will to live’ is so strong and our sexual drive is so strong that telling people not to have sex is ineffectual. Who are we as individuals to dictate our beliefs on others? While I believe we should all be entitled to hold our own beliefs, I believe that it’s about time we respected each other and cared for each other regardless of differences. By hurting others we are hurting ourselves.   This is a global world now and in order for our species to survive we have to awaken and work together to resolve the problems that effect us all.