Natural Singularity: An Exploration in Daoist Philosophy and Painting to Represent the Fabric of the Universe

Here's a little preview of my thesis:

Abstract

This body of work, like the world, is the result of an additive process with infinite possibilities. It is a continuous effort to translate abstract ideas into visual images; thus opening a world of conceptual landscapes beyond the tangible world. The work primarily relates to string theory, Daoist and Buddhist philosophy, and forms found in the natural world, making the process both spiritual and scientific. The spiritual half, Daoist philosophy, believes that all things influence each other, creating an ever-changing balance. String theory, the scientific half, proposes that all matter is composed of the same material: immeasurable vibrating strings. In order to express these ideas, the oil paintings are built from abstract line, form, and color referencing aspects of nature, movements, and the interconnectivity of all things and/or events.

Introduction:

Over the next several pages, I am inviting you on a journey through the mindsets and processes I have been exploring for the past year. It all started with the awakening of various abstract ideas: cycle, fundamentality, elementals, rebirth, causation, interconnectivity, singularity, and motion. Mediation on these ideas resulted in a new way of seeing the world around me: the breaking down of form, expressive color, the disintegration of reality, line, and, to put it simply, abstraction.

From these points, I began to establish an idea of the world: it is an enormous and beautiful living landscape that is constantly moving, breathing, and in flux. Each part of it, from trees to oceans to microbes to humans, is drastically different yet made of the same basic structures to form a seamless, infinite reality. If you look closely enough, you can see and feel these things in motion: when a star shoots across the sky, when a fire burns, or when the sun rises and sets. All of this exists in infinite motion on a macrocosmic and microcosmic scale, as beings interact with each other to share space and time.

While working primarily in oil paint, my work talks about process, movement, and the materiality of paint. In meditating about the interconnectivity of the world, while keeping in mind philosophies of Daoism and Buddhism and the scientific of string theory, the work naturally develops and establishes a certain flow. I am using the flow of energy as a vehicle to think about the ‘why?’ and ‘how?’ of the world, to help answer questions about existence. The act of making these paintings is very spontaneous: they are rarely planned but instead fall into place. The process is based on instinct as each painting builds up in material. I am exploring and creating my own landscapes of what the fundamental make-up of the universe looks like.