Music is never an expression of a phenomenon, but of the inner essence, the private reality in each phenomenon; an expression of the will itself.
Arthur Schopenhauer
Laszlo Otto
The quest for the Absolute-Concrete
In earlier periods of the history of art the idea of absolute art was repeatedly raised and interpreted. In the field of music clear definitions have emerged from diverse polemics and paradoxes as to what may be called absolute music; the formulation of this creative vision goes back to Richard Wagner.
In fine arts, and more specifically in geometric art, it was Friedrich Vordemberge-Gildewart (1899–1962) to address the problem of absolute art; and his painting is normally regarded as concrete art.
As for music, the term concrete music does not have the same definition as concrete art in fine arts. Absolute music, in the late nineteenth century, was distinguished from programme and vocal music; and in fine arts it finds its parallel in concrete art, which distances itself from abstract and constructivist art.
Ever since my earliest years as a painter, since 1991, I have been creating geometric images, although at that time I could not be fully aware of the exact boundaries of the specific genres. So, even my less crystallized early paintings were characterized by the concrete artistic endeavour, that is, an attempt to show my inner images by means of a direct structure, instead of abstracting the composition from the sight. As years went by, I have conducted several experiments within the framework of geometric painting. This was a peculiar quest for the way in which I could show, in the most convincing manner, the ideas living inside me. In my Düsseldorf studio, in 2007, I realised that new perspectives had opened up with the necessary reduction and clarification of the different layers of subsequent periods I had been treading: I realised that my work belonged to the flow of concrete art. The heightened experience of this realisation has led me to extensive studies. I have been travelling to many places in Europe to deepen my knowledge about geometric painting. By visiting exhibitions in Germany and Switzerland and by studying relevant literature I have become more and more acquainted with concrete art, and I have also had such exhibitions.
I wished to explore what concept Vordemberge-Gildewart had about absolute art, so in 2009 I visited his birthplace in Osnabrück. I have also come across an important theoretical writing. Antje von Graevnitz contends, in a theoretical paper of hers, that one can only guess, retrospectively, to what extent the master was aware of the concerns of German idealism and contemporary theory of music. In her view, he was less likely to rely on the direction of the Wagnerian absolute: the absolute and pure art of Bach and Busoni was more relevant to him. Vordemberge-Gildewart had a romantic relationship with the ideal of absolute art; and he even argued for the similarity of this perfectionist idea in music and in visual arts. In his Manifesto of Abstract–Concrete–Absolute Art he points out the connection between absolute art and absolute music.
I am saying all this because my own relationship to the absolute has evolved somewhat differently; and thus my philosophical and art historical approach to it is somewhat different.
By bypassing the romantic and idealistic approach, I have formulated my views on the basis of universal ontologies. I have been combining the extensive study on Eastern ontologies with the ideas of European philosophies about the absolute. European identity is quintessential to me, yet I like to search for non-European forms of knowledge too, and to compare these with each other.
As a painter, the most important experience for me is my studio activity, while the theoretical research provides an opportunity for self-reflection and further inspiration. I chart new ways and renewable methods in concrete art, while the spiritual–metaphysical meditation sharpens my awareness. This way I can lay foundations for my paintings that allow me to create universal screens and organically cosmic structures.
Such motivations induce me to keep looking for absolute art, which is wholeness, perfection, order, universality, prudence, awareness, self-organization and the will of the self. To me it is freedom itself, stripped of the seductive and self-destructive relations of “private mythologies” and exaggerated individualism. By painting I want to show the highest potential of the human condition, to myself as well as to others. My paintings are intended to be road signs towards completeness. They are objects of meditation, mandalas. In amongst centred images promoting spiritual immersion Eastern yantras are “final”, essential and summarising geometric diagrams; one might say that they herald the sacred beginnings: they “speak” the unspeakable, they depict the undepictable. The artist, this way, creates a bridge between the person seeking spiritual wholeness and the feasible states to be achieved. Thus, through the aesthetic experience, man can become his natural self.
In concrete art it is important for the piece of art to be itself, and to unravel through its own internal dynamics, without being determined by external laws. The same can be said of certain Western and Eastern ontologies which require man to seek his own internal laws, to acquire self-knowledge, and gain his freedom pursuant to the order he achieved; that is, not to be defined by external events. In this sense, the actual conception of art as an “-ism” here would appear to be less provisional than in the other avant-garde trends, given that man here is connected with universality, as Theo van Doesburg also stated in his 1930 Manifesto.
For these reasons, I strive for strict editing, order, precise workmanship; and at the same time these principles grant me the freedom to keep creating. The titles for my paintings are complex, on the basis of what has been said above, consisting of Latin (Western) and Sanskrit (Eastern) words. Let us consider, for instance, the title ‘Yantra-ipsum-līlā’. ‘Yantra’ means device (promoting spiritual meditation); and I use it in this broader sense, although in the West it is known as a magical geometric shape. ‘Līlā’ is a divine, cosmic game; while ‘ipsum’ means ‘itself’.
So the title means “a contemplative device or image, which is ‘itself’, a ‘cosmic game’”.
Being itself has multiple meanings. A major tenet of concrete art is that the work should be ‘itself’, that is, non-symbolic, not the abstraction of something else. In other words, it should not mean anything but itself. The images may also be viewed this way; that is, the spectator may get involved into the sight, experiencing the works of art while interpreting them openly. So the piece of art might not have a meaning, but its purity does have one. On the other hand, there may be more tenacious seekers looking for further explanations. Being itself may also relate to the viewer who, intensely contemplating the work, may experience intuitively that his own innermost being is analogous with this orderly, concentric or axially symmetric world. The specific painting is built, on the one hand, from its own laws, yet on the other hand, these laws are the same as the ones governing human existence and the human experience. Accordingly, the visual world is not an abstraction from another world, but in itself it is the concrete identity.
In my perception, the absolute orientation of concrete painting is the exploration of principles. The world of Absolute–Concrete art is quite far from the fleeting self-expressions of the individual. However, this world is still characterized by the above mentioned ‘game’, līlā. In some paintings I locate the coloured elements spontaneously on the metric background screen based on the Fibonacci scale.
While the rules for editing and drawing the lines are strict, selecting the colours is a series of lighter decisions. Such mastery of the game of consciousness and spontaneity presupposes my will. I need to mobilize will so as not to fall out of the scope of the game, in order to stay free within the complex and far-reaching, colourful bond of the game.
In this regard, real art is a suitable helper for man. In this cosmic “private reality” it does not deal with surface phenomena, but with the essence, and it imports into the space the “playful” will of the Creator with its subtle instruments, music and painting.
This is how I am seeking the Absolute–Concrete.
Budapest, January 2014
Aphorism
The high-order organizing principles of Axiality and Centrality bear analogous references to the origin, the beginnings of Existence, and to their own primeval basis: the Beginningless. It is in Geometry – by means of the orderly Empire of Numbers underlying the visible world – where invisible worlds become visible.
2014
Black pigment – which colours sink into.
Black – like being beyond the visible world.
The emptiness of Black – like Non-existence.
Black – which antedates Light.
Black – like death whose meaning is unknown to modern man.
The transcendence of blackness – like the unity of Universal Knowledge prior to religions, the Secret yet undifferentiated.
The quest for the meaning of the World and Existence – by means of Art.
The quest for Tradition, Real-metaphysics and the Origins – by means of Painting.
Black lightening up – like Knowledge.
The images of the Beginning – by means of Black.
2011
From the abnormal state into the world’s primeval state, towards Space, and then into primeval pre-createdness, which is the potentiality of unfolding Creation.
This idea of beginning virtual creation becomes visible in the duality of emanation.
The universal possibility reappears in the Apocalypse, in revelation: absolutely pure and cosmic order of the new Light-Beginning.
2009
The hierarchically structured states, setting out from the centre of the Beginningless, build up an orderly arrangement even on the periphery.
From the organically cosmic state, built up on the periphery, it is possible to arrive in the beginningless Origo.
2014
Gradualness within the hierarchy means an interdependent progressiveness which will eventually lead to the transcendent Centre.
However, starting from this Zero point, through the various degrees of the levels, it is possible to keep Peripheries integrated in the organic process.
2014
The complexity of the screens as the auto-regulative organizing principle of consciousness. The qualitative structure arranged around the centre results in Unity, a unity or organically connected system on whose analogy it is possible to found a city or to establish a civilization.
2014
Laszlo Otto
Colour, geometry and being.
Hidden behind the world of appearances, the orderly world of numbers takes form in geometry. In other words, the invisible worlds become visible through geometry. Sometimes, as I work on geometric paintings, I find myself in a state of mind of extreme and contemplative concentration, where I percieve being in a special way. This strictly systematic and regular method of construction is naturally completed by colour, the most sublime medium of expression, which in my view represents the colours of life and its diversity. I think that the world and being are born only in my own consciousness; I am myself the world I perceive. (In the titles, the Latin word ipsum means oneself, and the Sanskrit word Yantra means way of meditation.) I would like to create images which enable viewers to experience a spiritual and intellectual content, for this is the greatest challenge of concrete art: the work of art in itself, without reference to any other reality, and which, beyond symbolism, sums up the reality of the human personality and being. The work of art has reached a high degree of perfection and purity when both the artist, during the creative process, and the viewer, experiencingthe image, take in a sense of what man himself is. Thus, through consciousness comes perfect harmony: the aim of life and being.
Laszlo Otto
Budapest, October 2009
Couleur et Géométrie
ACTUALITÉ DE L'ART CONSTRUIT EUROPÉEN
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2009 Musées de Sens, SENS (F)
2010 Kunsthaus Nürnberg (Farbe und Geometrie), NÜRNBERG (D)
2010 Kunstverein Talstraße (Farbe und Geometrie), HALLE (D)
2011 National Museum (Kolor i Geometria), KIELCE (PL)
2011 Centre d'Art Contemporain Frank Popper (Couleur et Géométrie), MARCIGNY (F)