Ars Occulta

Ars Occulta, 'the art of the hidden' or 'hidden art'. I do enjoy the palindromic wordplay that Latin grammar allows for. I think it helps to elucidate the duality of meaning that appears in essentially every artwork I make. This piece is no different. The artist's hand is scraping away the surface of the piece to reveal underneath some strange mechanical world that the 'art' was hiding. Beneath every finely crafted artwork are many mechanical skills and practical material concerns. Behind the viewers vision lie many unseen mechanics as well, the mechanics of our non-veridical perceptions. The 'work' being scraped away is the pure white humanity, the subjective sense, the beauty which so often obscures the intent. But, of course, this too is a work of art, and neither the receding mechanical space, nor the figures trapped in thick paint, nor the hand which scrapes them away are truly here. It is a look behind or through a painting, but also a painting in itself. It is the art of the hidden, Ars Occulta, and the true meaning is for the viewer to find.