Life LearNING

Painter: Hami
Series: Hybrid Cryptic (1998-200) Hybrid Cryptic Revision (2005)

Life LearNING, commissioned by Andrew Cooper (ACe) in 2005 explores the idea of a life of ear learning. Listen and learn. 

Where as in the Hybrid Cryptic series each painting features two disciplines.
In the Hybrid Cryptic Review each painting features two ideas.

At the center front of the painting 'Life Learning' sits the pianist Bill Evans.  Many other musicians are in the painting; Beethoven, Charlie Parker, John Coltrane, Miles Davis, Sonny Rollins, Wes Montgomery, Charlie Christian and others. All the musicians listed above created wonderful music and contributed stylistic elements into the musical vocabulary we know today.
Musicans' works are what musicians leave behind after they are gone and thus musicians can be thought of as exemplar models who live a disciplined 'life of lEARning' - music.

I nearly finished the painting's architecture and form however detailing wasn't started.

written by
Hamish Maynard Stokes

Mathematics and Biology

Painter: Ham
Series: Hybrid Cryptic 1998-2000

Each painting in the Hybrid Cryptic series feature two disciplines. The above painting Mathematics and Biology contains images from both those subjects.

Math and Biology are two disciplines that have become powerful enough, in common knowledge, to shape our world. Reflecting upon and meditating, with ideas and concepts present in everyday life, is the process I use to generate paintings. Math and Biology inform us with knowledge about living bodies and their environment. Concepts and ideas learnt in Math and Biology allow us to think in a disciplined way so as to organize our lives.    

Mathematics
In the upper left hand corner of the painting is the word mathematics. Under Mathematics is a sphere shape representing earth in which we can see a clock, representing time, and the lines of longitude and latitude representing space. Time and space are two concepts we use to locate and organize ourselves with, in everyday life. Without Math we would not have the knowledge of time and space that we have today.

Biology
On the left we can see two hands playing with hair. In the middle of the painting we can see a pair of legs and on the right we can see a torso and head. Clearly this body is divided, split up and seperated across the painting. The idea of splitting the body up into parts represents a biological view of the body, as a living organism, that can be studied in parts. Where as the traditional, enchanted spiritual view of a sacred body being the house of a soul is very different to the biological view. Some argue that biological interpretations of the human body, developed in depth since the enlightenment movement, challenges many traditional spiritual doctrines. In fact, over time an unenchanted biological labelling of the body and all its parts has emerged independent of religious thought. Therefore, ideas about disciplines of knowledge and their power to inform us in organizing human life need be understood, not just in an abstract way, but also in a social and political context. The French author Michel Foucault explores not only how things have come to be, but also how we have come to be things. An interesting idea indeed.

It may be argued that thinking with disciplines in mind and being able to realize a philosophy of existence, in abstract thought independent of spirituality, is a rather modern phenomenon.   

Censorship and the Imposition of Form

Censorship and the Imposition of Form, 1997, Oil On Canvas

Painter: Ham
From: Poly-morph series.

Censorship and the Imposition of Form like the other paintings from the polymorph series is constructed from repeating shapes. The characters and the environment are largely created from fruit shapes.

Using  circles, rectangles, squares and triangles is more than enough to create an interesting composition. The cherry present joining the main characters in the foreground is then repeated across the center of the painting in the shape of the mountains.  The cherry is comparatvely sublime in the back ground compared to its foreground counterpart, still it looks like a cherry nontheless, however if the painting was painted without the cherry in the foreground would one notice the cherries as mountains at all?  The association between the shapes and their analogous form is the essence of the painting, as if, it is two things at once. In short, the cherry shape of the mountains echo the foreground image, repeating it and hinting at a metaphor with both shapes remaining to be their own things and yet they are so similar in shape they appear similar. Alternatively, they invite the realisation that we may think the imposition of the triangular form in the foreground is analogous to the repeating trianguar forms present in the background.  Similar forms and shapes allow us to realize similarity and metaphor or analogy come to mind, but distinguish their difference and reveal details present in one form compared to the other and then to make sense of the image we must censor one thing as not being the other. Thus censorship and the imposition of form is realized as a distinguishing function of thought.

French author Pierre Bourdieu wrote two books that inspired this painting they are 'The Feild of Cultural Production' and 'The Rules of Art'.

Bubble Economy, 1998, Oil and Canvas.

Painter: Ham
From: Poly Morph series.

In this painting I used the same idea I used in the Fruitface Guardian painting. I used fruit and other objects to make a face. I call this idea 'Poly' because I use many things to make one thing.

In the Bubble Economy, on the right handside of the painting, one can see ant hills and buildings. I imagined the ant hills were (structures functioning) like buildings and people (functioning) like ants. Implying that one thing is like another (metaphor and analogy), potentially deepens the paitings meaning.  Painting living things such as ants living in ant hills just as people live in buildings, invites the viewer to see an obvious common connections between both people ants. People cooperate, to build structures to live in, and so too do ants. Structured communities both above and below the ground. Human colonies + ant colonies = common structures and functions.  In this respect we can say hay this looks like that or that is similar to this and use these ideas to create general meaning and understanding.

From the common comparison, once recognised, we can then deconstruct by distinguishing differences and define details. In other words we can recognise general shapes and their place in a bigger picture of understanding.

Paintings can tell stories. When we look into paintings they enter us through our eyes. The more we look the more we might see this is like that and that is like this. 

Look more what else can you see and what does it mean in relation to other things.
Why do painters name their paintings?
What is a 'Bubble Economy'?

Hamish Maynard Stokes

The Fruit Face Guardian, 1997, Oil on cavas

Painter: Ham
From: Poly-Morph series.
This is the first painting in which it is easy to see how things such as fruit are used to make other things. In this case, food is used to make a face. Many artists use this idea. Eggs are used for eyes and bananas are eyelids etc.

The Fruit Face Guardian is from my Polymorph series of paintings, being the series in which I created my polymorph characters. These characters were then further developed over the next ten years populating the Hybrid Cryptic. The basic idea of using objects or things such as fruit to make other things, increases ones appreciation of shapes; how can I use these shapes to represent shapes that define a face; will this fit with that; how can these pieces fit together? etc.Working with questions, such as those just stated, in mind, softens ones perspective towards looking into things in order to realise how they may be used together.  In short, such practical application of shpaes in art exercise a deeper (subcinsious familiarity) understanding of things.

The idea of looking into ones self in order to learn more about the world one lives within, is a concept art shares with science. An important step in learning.  The idea of reflecting upon; reviewing; thinking through the knowledge one has obsorbed is like working out a puzzle. , by taking abstract shapes and organising them into recognisable forms; taking many small things and arrnging them into on e big thing; using objects such as fruit and using them to make a face, etc What is the point? Learning how to connect things (shapes) together is an abstract art form called thinking. It is very healthy!

Exercise the mind.

Recognising and knowing how things fit together is confiedence.
Being able to creatively think through problems by bringing the parts together to form a solution is intelligence. 

Likewise reflecting on what one is seeing by recognising smaller things within bigger things and their relationship to the whole is the exercise used to create The Fruit Face Guardian. It is an esay puzzle to figure out because it is obvious. You can easily see bits of food forming a face. Take a look. 

Whether one reflects upon what one is looking at or not, all my paintings are created with my love of finding things within things. So if you look into them you will find a story being told about a journey within that is detailed the joining together of things. 

A magical maze of characters and their creation unfolds.

Hi my name is Hamish.
1. I am a teacher and I enjoy - love  - teaching.
2. I am a student and I enjoy - love - studying.
In other words, I love to share things I study with others.
My favorite things to study are art, music and social science subjects.
My greatest joy is being a father.
:)