A Tribute to Gaia Print

A Tribute to Gaia During the pandemic, I looked for parallels in the history of art and rediscovered the Deluge and Maelstrom drawings by Leonardo da Vinci. I was always very interested in this series. I just liked the squiggly clouds that swirl and seem to dance with the earth. However, I now realized that these drawings were something special for Leonardo. He has devoted himself to this topic again and again with no real "reason". Basically, these drawings anticipate modern art because they were created without a special order and are also completely free to design. Perhaps they are testimony to the first free art because atypical for Da Vinci, they do not depict nature, but rather imagine its impossibility. Inspired by this rediscovery, I was interested in the possibility of viral “natural drawings” made of pure color, without the use of a pen or brush, and also without further aesthetic borrowing, that is to say quasi-abstract. Similar to the times of the Renaissance, we try to experience the world, or rather the earth, our planet, as a whole again. Climate change, pollution and litter pose a direct threat to us, and the results of our interventions fundamentally question all of our prospects. We get to the small point on the actor on the surface of the earth again, but we no longer command. We hope and try to avoid. We can even understand the countermovement and regret our guilt with a guilty conscience. Consider a penalty possible. The universe could strike back and make us disappear. But first of all, the view that could change is of interest. If nature does not take place in the laboratory or dissection box, who is looking at whom in nature? Who is sitting on the longer lever? Who dictates and who tries to understand? And what is “consistent” or sustainable with these other words? Either we swim or we drown. It is not a question of whether, but how. Latour proposes a reversible perspective on progress. In this situation I am interested in a diary description of everyday influences with the means of painting. I mark out the shape of a square in which the natural force presented should unfold. This spectacle is called landscape. In nature, perception goes hand in hand with aesthetics. It is astonishing to note that ugliness is hardly to be found in nature, and all this is rather a description of human perception, or simply its inability. We believe that we have tamed nature, Deluge & Maelstrom can decorate our rooms to please us. If there were horror in nature, it would retreat to the inside, to the smallest or invisible, in aerosols to which viruses are attached. The series originated in the impulse of life itself. The work largely avoids composition, may be based on structural changes, but takes place in a fast flow in which no conventional reflection can occur. It is not thought, it is simply allowed to create spaces; Eyes, hands and material as ambassadors of what was once called nature. Marc Schmitz, Berlin July 2020

Print:Giclee on Fine Art Paper

Size:10 W x 10 H x 0.1 D in

Size with Frame:15.25 W x 15.25 H x 1.2 D in

Delivery Time:Typically 5-7 business days for domestic shipments, 10-14 business days for international shipments.