We stand before eternity, the awareness that such a concept even exists is

enough to break a mind. Those who dedicate their lives to the study of

existence a million years past, still find themselves awed by the sheer

magnitude of times scale, unable to ever fully comprehend something despite

possessing all knowledge of it.

We stand before emotion much the same, the notion of reality, of defined and

objective truth, all stand impassive even as we fling an entire arsenal of

thought against them. Yet all fracture beneath the paradox that they are only

defined by one evolutionary quirks desperate attempt to do...what? solve a

problem without definition, shape a tool for an unknown function, simply

survive and in doing so we have destroyed any notion of simplicity in our lives.

It is here in this clash of thoughts one can barely find words to define, against

the certainty of knowledge and past experience, that i find a fitting landscape

to discuss the 'Seven works of mercy' by @micalnoelson

Chiaroscuro forms fill each page, whispers of Caravaggio caress their edges.

You peer harder in to the darkness, looking for some certainty as to what these

figures are, is it the counter to turners seascapes? one of darkness and barely

discernible white capped waves beneath a slither of moonlight? Perhaps they

are blooms caught mid wilt, white roses on black decay? or are they... trash

bags.. filled to bursting in some cases, in others still free to shift and twist.

Impossibly arranged they pile higher than any New York alleyway on trash day.

Yet even as we grasp that certainty of form it is ripped from us. Are these

photos? sculptures? Found objects or formed in 3D? in truth they are all of the

above.

The question persists as to what is the artwork in truth, the one on your phone

screen, the one original working file, the memory of it, the version displayed on

the 55 inch screen or the 40 inch one with better colour calibration, the print?

the print on canvas or paper? Is the original work defined by its fragility, is it

more true as the original if it is failable or irreplaceable?

What if the artwork, the art object, is a reproducible digital work built from

digital scans of real mass produced obtainable objects then filled with

unreplacable paintings. Do the torn up paintings become the actual art object

as they are the only part of the process which is truly irreplaceable? Or is it all

meaningless until you reach the culmination of it.

This question is not new in the art world but it has perhaps never been more

pertinent on a societal level than it is now. What is the truth of a thing? In an

age of disinformation, overt government propaganda, astroturfing, bot farms,

dead internet theory and greater disillusionment than the sciences first bought

to religion, I can think of no better work than that of Micals current series, to

capture the sheer confounding feeling of seeking to create something beautiful

and authentic in a world so distorted, deceitful, and dull of questions too large

to ever fully read.

Celestial Body (@celstialbody) is a Typographic artist, Co-founder of @scenespaces, and regular contributer to romangraffiti.blog.

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