PLANT PLANET
Recording / recoding invisible energy via the lens of the land
Suzanne Heymans
Master of Fine Arts
2009 THE UNIVERSITY OF NEW SOUTH WALES
Thesis/Dissertation Sheet
Surname or Family name: HEYMANS
First name: SUZANNE Other name/s:
Abbreviation for degree as given in the University calendar: MFA
School: ART Faculty: College of Fine Arts
Title: Plant Planet: recording / re-coding invisible energy through the lens of the land
Abstract This research investigates the „earth / human equation‟, in which the land is identified as the indispensable nutrient for human existence. Observation of the ongoing processes of exploitation of the land and the images that result from this, leads to a questioning of some of the Western ideas and concepts that provided the legal and ethical framework for colonisation. A perceived connection between material form and energy as the fundamental paradigm for my studio practice informs my enquiry into theories about energy and its representation. I have chosen to methodologically allegorise and illustrate human dependence upon and connection to the earth by a series of references located in science and spirituality. Concepts of energy, codification and pattern are seen in the terms of „exchangeable currency‟, where organic models function as a „template‟ informing a philosophical framework, illustrative of the complexities of the relationship between earth and people. Within this hybrid structure, part hard science and part intuitive interpretation, some of the patterns formed in the exchange of energy between the earth and its peoples are interpreted in terms of a cultural stance and siting of the land in relation to the self.
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2 TABLE OF CONTENTS
Preface Common Ground 4
Introduction The Unified Field 6
Chapter 1 The Land and the Landscape 8
Chapter 2 Interference Patterns in the Unified Field 11
Chapter 3 Recording / Recoding 16
Chapter 4 Family Tree 20
Chapter 5 The Lens of the Land 23
Chapter 6 Plant Planet 27
Chapter 7 Organic Code / Text 30
Chapter 8 Spatial Fabric, Textile 33
Chapter 9 Organic Digital 38
Chapter 10 Energetic Terrain 40
Chapter 11 The Bottom Line – Ground Zero 43
List of Illustrations 48
Bibliography 51
3 PREFACE
COMMON GROUND
“The Land Grows Into Your Soul” 1
This research coalesces at the interface of the human organism and the land; it is a statement of humanity‟s dependence generally, and mine in particular, upon the earth.
Dependence in this sense is characterised by the reliance upon the earth for those things pre-conditional to our existence – air, water, and land. This is conceptualised in the term „relationship‟; in this instance that between two sentient, similarly constructed beings. The studio work proceeds from an engagement with this relationship while articulating and acknowledging my connection to and dependence upon the earth.
My research is influenced by the process of colonisation and the subsequent shaping of the land and its images by Western standards. It is informed, therefore, by a questioning of the culturally dictated modes through which this process was articulated, principally those locatable in the bible that historically underpin and validate the mainstream Western systems of law and government. The view, to “fill the earth and subdue it; (to) have dominion over…every living thing that moves on the earth,”2 is apparently taken literally, providing support and justification for the paradigm in which the earth is exploited as a resource in maintaining governmental / economic hierarchy.
Instead, my work emerges from a position in which the earth is identified in terms of a maternal relative upon whom we rely for the fundamentals of life. This context seems to resonate with the relationship to the land described by Yolngu elder Mandawuy
1 M. Ganambarr-Stubbs, in conversation with the author, December 2007 2 Genesis 1:28 4 Yunupingu in New Love Songs for an Old Land.3 Here it is referred to as giving
“meaning and structure and worth to our lives”; that it is the source informing and supporting human life and culture.
3 M. Yunupingu, New Love Songs for an Old Land, Eric Johnson Lecture, Occasional Papers Series, Northern Territory Library, Darwin, 1996, accessed 7 October 2008, at: http://www.territorystories.nt.gov.au/handle/10070/2 5 INTRODUCTION
THE UNIFIED FIELD
“Energy is neither created nor destroyed, it only changes form.” 4
My research and studio practice proceeds from the recognition that everything at its most fundamental level is a form of energy. This premise seems to find support in various arenas of knowledge: scientific and empirical, religious and spiritual. In a comparison of the ideas and theories of quantum physics, and those of eastern mysticism, Physicist Fritjof Capra gives a description of the quantum field
as the fundamental physical entity; a continuous medium which is present everywhere in space. Particles are merely local condensations of the field; concentrations of energy, which come and go...5 Quantum theory has abolished the notion of fundamentally separated objects…6
He quotes Albert Einstein:
We may therefore regard matter as being constituted by the regions of space in which the field is extremely intense…There is no place in this new kind of physics both for the field and matter, for the field is the only reality.7
In the generation of imagery, I have engaged with these ideas in an intuitive manner, utilising cross-cultural forms of abstraction and by extension, codification. I interpret the terms energy and the field as interchangeable, in the premise of an underlying, unified energy field, from which life emanates. Specifically, the work images plant forms as
4 “The first law of thermodynamics…is an extension of the law of conservation of energy, that energy can be neither created nor destroyed…however much energy there was at the start of the universe, so there will be that amount at the end.” P. Atkins, Four laws that drive the Universe, Oxford University Press, Oxford, 2007, p23 5 F. Capra, The Tao of Physics; an exploration of the parallels between modern physics and eastern mysticism, Harper Collins, London, 1991, p 233 6 Ibid, p 155 7 M. Capek, The philosophical impact of contemporary physics, D. van Nostrand, Princeton, New Jersey, 1961, p 319, cited in F. Capra, pp 233, 385 6 physical representations and manifestations of interactions in the field, „translated‟ as a
„codified‟, „organic digital‟ pattern.
These formal processes are mediated by reference to interference patterns.8 I use this paradigm in my work as a metaphor for the act of engagement with the land, and with theories about energy and its relationship to representation, which I have outlined above. I conceptualise my work therefore as a depiction of the energy field, and I make the interpretation that the land is the physical manifestation of this, and that through the
„lens of the land‟, the field is accessible and „visible‟.
8 Interference pattern: a wave pattern that emerges from the overlap and the intermingling of waves emitted from different locations. B. Greene, The Elegant Universe: superstrings, hidden dimensions, and the quest for the ultimate theory, Vintage, London, 2005, p 417 Interference of waves: The process whereby two or more waves of the same frequency or wavelength combine to form a wave whose amplitude is the sum of the amplitudes of the interfering waves. The interfering waves can be electromagnetic, acoustic, or water waves, or in fact any periodic disturbance. The most striking feature of interference is the effect of adding two waves in which the trough of one wave coincides with the peak of another. If the two waves are of equal amplitude, they can cancel each other out so that the resulting amplitude is zero…In optics this cancellation can occur for particular wavelengths in a situation where white light is a source. The resulting light will appear coloured. This gives rise to the iridescent colours of beetle‟s wings and mother-of-pearl, where the substances involved are actually colourless or transparent. B. H. Billings, McGraw-Hills Encyclopedia of Science and Technology, McGraw-Hill, New York, 2007, p 331 7 CHAPTER 1
THE LAND AND THE LANDSCAPE
In commencing, it is important to foreground the distinction between making representations of the land, and the historical genre landscape, where the relationship to the earth is usually evoked by terms such as „subject‟ and „view‟. This dichotomy is illustrated vividly in the song This Land Is Mine, the first and third verses outlining these opposing views:
This land is mine All the way to the old fence line Every break of day Working hard just to make it pay ... This land is me Rock, water, animal, tree They are my song My being is here where I belong 9
These lyrics bring into relief opposing definitions resulting from contrasting relationships to the earth, “telling in two voices the story at the heart of black-white conflict in Australia,”10 and elucidating the “debate over these diverse views of land ownership.”11 The first two verses of this song, from the voice of the pastoralist, disclose the Australian experience of settlement, which is described in terms of proximity and juxtaposition – the idea that “seeing and working is owning” the land.12
From this perspective, a patch of „ownable‟ ground, arbitrarily demarcated by pegs, is seen as an exchangeable commodity whose value is primarily articulated in terms of consumable resources and hard cash. The following verses tell of “alternative ways of
9 P. Kelly and K. Carmody, “This Land is Mine” One Night the Moon (original soundtrack), Mushroom, 2001 10 R. Flanagan, Liner notes for Cannot Buy My Soul, the songs of Kev Carmody, EMI/ Virgin, 2007 11 F. Probyn, C. Simpson, "This Land is Mine/ This Land is Me": Reconciling Harmonies in One Night the Moon, accessed 17 August 2008, at: http://www.sensesofcinema.com/contents/01/19/this_land.html 12 Ibid 8 viewing the land which are not based on an opposition or separation between land and self.”13 It describes the position that human life is inseparable from the earth; ergo, of the land.
Landscape painting reveals an observation from a position of distance, implying property, surveyed and owned.14 John Berger cites the “analogy between possessing and the way of seeing which is incorporated in oil painting”15; the “special relationship between oil painting and property…(which) played a certain role in the development of landscape painting”.16 These functions of the subjective, reconstructed image come together in the use of the painted landscape as part of colonialism‟s systematic mapping of „newly discovered‟ territories.
The mechanisms of neo-colonial economic occupation and exploitation of „new‟ regions
– outer space, virtual space – utilises these same tools. Advertising fuels consumerism, the engine of the „economic growth‟ machine, fed by the raw materials of the earth, merchandised to the consumer. In the dominant paradigm of the Economy, the stance17 – the siting of the earth in relation to the self – as a consumable resource, is now unsustainable in an epoch of sustainable development.
In this light, and that of the global carbon situation accompanying the wholesale exploitation of the earth‟s resources, the massive constructions and alterations to the landscape in attempts to commercially exploit the earth are telling of the state of our relationship to it, each other, and within ourselves. Crystal Island, a monumental
13 Ibid 14 J. Berger, Ways of Seeing, BBC/ Penguin, London, 1979, p 106 15 Ibid p 83 16 Ibid p 106 17 Berger talks about a “stance towards the world” depicted in the painting The Ambassadors by Hans Holbein (1497/8-1543), allegorising colonisation and its taking of resources from „new‟ lands. He holds that this stance was “general to a whole class…who were convinced that the world was there to furnish their residence in it.” Ibid p 94 - 97 9 example, approved for construction in Moscow is described as “possibly the world‟s first arcology…the merger of architecture and ecology, or, more precisely, the use of architecture to create a self-contained human habitat”18 (my italics). The concept of a
„self-contained‟ existence signifies the measure of humanity‟s inability to recognise itself as of the earth.
The ongoing global colonisation by the largely white, western systems of „economic growth‟ and „progress‟, uses the cheaper labour of less economically developed nations, and the raw materials from the earth to produce fodder for the insatiable appetite of consumerism. The „Economy‟ relies on the opposite of economy19 in the unbalanced equation of massive usage (and wastage) by a relatively small proportion of the global population.
In the contemporary global paradigm where the Ecology – the land – is seen as the landscape – a resource to sustain the Economy – the siting of the self in relation to the earth foregrounds the issue of energy. The relationships humanity forms with the earth in utilising its resources are seen as „patterns‟ in the field, leaving manifold traces of these „energy exchange‟ patterns in the physical realm of daily life.
18 K. Easterling, “New Monuments”, Artforum, Summer 2008, XLVI, No. 10, p 149 19 Economy: careful management of resources to avoid unnecessary expenditure or waste; thrift Collins English Dictionary, Harper Collins, Sydney, p 493 10 CHAPTER 2
INTERFERENCE PATTERNS IN THE UNIFIED FIELD
Interference patterns are implicit in my work as the superposition or layering of codified depictions of plant growth patterns, read as indices of interactions in the field and in various ways, a model for an imaging system with relevance to contemporary art. In
Family tree; banksia; interference pattern (Figure 1), the „points of light‟ in the areas of intersection can be read as areas of „constructive interference‟; places “where two
(wave) peaks (or troughs) meet, resulting in reinforcement.”20 The overlaid branch forms also suggest the „imaging‟ of energy as seen in patterns created by light reflected off the surface of water.
Figure 1: Sussie Heymans Family tree; banksia; interference pattern (detail), 2008
20 S. Singh, The Code Book; the secret history of codes and code-breaking, Fourth Estate, London, 1999, p 321 11
Figure 2: Sussie Heymans Family tree; banksia; interference pattern (detail), 2008
Interference patterns also inform the registration of each element comprising the layers in the pen drawings (Figure 2) where superimposed layers of lines also resemble the moire effect21 (Figure 3), a specific type of interference pattern.
Figure has been removed due to Copyright restrictions
Figure 3: Moire patterns Geometrical moire fringes caused by rotation and/or extension of identical gratings or mesh
21 The moire (or Moiré) effect is the mechanical interference of light by superimposed networks of lines…Such a pattern is formed whenever a repetitive structure, such as a mesh, is overlaid with another structure…Modern examples easily observed include the effect when two layers of coarse textile are brought together, the bars observed on television when the scene includes a striped shirt…Study of the moire effect uncovers a very striking and useful characteristic: a very large shift in moire pattern is obtained from only a small relative motion between the superimposed networks. A logical conclusion is that the moire pattern is a sort of “motion magnifier,” which might be used to give a highly sensitive measurement of relative motion…A quite different application is to use the moire effect to generate contour maps for all sorts of complex shapes. G. L. Cloud, Optical Methods of Engineering Analysis, Cambridge University Press, Cambridge, 1995, p 147 12 This method of drawing also illustrates the concept of duality, encompassing the idea of the macrocosm and microcosm – the whole reflected in each part, and vice versa – paradoxically describing oneness and unity, and simultaneously, individuality. This concept is allegorised by the Chinese symbol T’ai-chi T’u22 (Figure 4), a diagrammatic representation of the concept of yin and yang. It is observed in quantum physics where the paradoxical nature of
the subatomic units of matter are very abstract entities, which have a dual aspect… they appear sometimes as particles, sometimes as waves; and this dual nature is also exhibited by light which can take the form of electromagnetic waves or particles.23
Figure has been removed due to Copyright restrictions
Figure 4: The T‟ai-chi T‟u Symbolic representation of the concept of yin and yang; duality
This idea is illustrated in the pen drawings where each line, laid down in strata, can be read as representing both particles and waves, and is intended as a direct depiction, in codified form, of the underlying energy field.
Interference patterns (Figure 5) are instrumental in holography, which I interpret as further allegorising the concept of duality parenthesised by the recurrent terms macrocosm and microcosm.
A hologram is produced when a single laser light is split into two separate beams. The first beam is bounced off the object to be photographed. Then the second beam is allowed to collide with the
22 Capra, op cit., p 119 23 Capra, op cit., p 77 13 reflected light of the first…creating an interference pattern, which is then recorded on a piece of film. To the naked eye the (encoded) image on the film looks nothing at all like the object photographed, (and is composed of irregular ripples; interference patterns) … like the concentric rings that form when a handful of pebbles is tossed into a pond. However, when the film is illuminated with another laser, a three-dimensional image of the original object reappears. If a piece of holographic film containing an image…is cut in half and then illuminated by a laser, each half will still be found to contain the whole image…Unlike normal photographs, every small fragment of a piece of holographic film contains all the information recorded in the whole.24 (My italics)
Figure has been removed due to Copyright restrictions
Figure 5: Interference pattern Photograph of expanded laser beam showing interference fringes, displaying the similar appearance of waves, whether water or light
The holographic process and my working methodology are similar. The dualistic phenomenon described above – that a piece represents the whole – becomes evident in Family tree, banksia; interference pattern (Figure 6), where the representation of organic growth forms as a pattern in the field simultaneously represents other concepts and phenomena: constellations, woven forms, electrical currents, electronic circuitry,
24 M. Talbot, The Holographic Universe, Harper Collins, London, 1991, pp 14 -17
14 crystalline structure, synapses, nerves, veins, arteries, relationship. This drawing conceptually functions as a piece of holographic film, where the „whole‟ (the field), is seen via a „piece‟ or „image‟ of the field (growth patterns). Each piece of paper in the grid also functions as the whole.
Figure 6: Sussie Heymans Family tree; banksia, interference pattern, 2008
The macrocosm / microcosm relationship also has echoes in the pinhole camera and the image it captures. Light enters the camera through a miniscule circular lens, which acts as a metaphorical „window onto the universe‟, a dot through which the „world‟ can be viewed and imaged. This model conceptualises the foundation of the system of abstraction / codification based on the dot, which I, as well as others, utilise. The generation of images based on plant growth patterns, as representative of the field, using the „elemental‟ dot form, provides for me, a window or „lens‟ onto other aspects of the „field‟.
15 CHAPTER 3
RECORDING / RECODING
In my work the dot signifies a „building block‟, an elemental „unit‟ of energy, functioning as an inscription that „measures‟, records, and registers my own intuitive perception of energy / data / information. It simultaneously represents a seed, planet, biosphere, drop of water, bubble, cell, molecule, atom, nucleus, unit, point, coordinate, node, digit, bit, byte, textual character, tone, note, beat, interval, lens, aperture, an individual. The line is the trace of the movement, or the repetition, of the dot.
The dot is a universal symbol. “The human finger touches sand and makes a dot.”25
The world is visible through the aperture in the eye, the pupil, also coincidentally a dot.
Observed from distant space, the Earth is a dot; from the perspective here on Earth, the sun, moon, and stars appear as dots of varying sizes.
The thematic use of images of celestial bodies, aiding the „Romantic‟ depiction of the spiritual through the „landscape‟, is seen in Van Gogh‟s Starry Night (Figure 7), which art historian Robert Rosenblum describes as “a visionary, quasi-mystical translation of the data of the empirical world…transforming observed fact into ecstatic spirit, where palpable substance becomes flame-like energy” 26 (my italics). The description of the translation of data from the organic, the palpable, into depictions of spirit and energy, illustrates my own objective. In using the dot as a signifier of an elemental „unit‟ or
„component‟ of energy, I reinterpret and translate observable plant structure as both a codified and manifest form of the energy field.
25 S. Radok, Essay in exhibition catalogue for Hossein Valamanesh, Sherman Galleries, 8 September – 2 October, 1999 26 R. Rosenblum, Modern Painting and the Northern Romantic Tradition; Friedrich to Rothko, Thames and Hudson, London, 1975, p 96 16
Figure 7: Vincent Van Gogh Starry Night 1889
David Stephenson‟s long-exposure photographs Star Drawings (Figure 8) translate the interaction of the earth‟s rotation and the energy / light emitted by the stars – visible as points of light in the night sky – recording the trace of the effective movement of the dot as a line. These lines are etched into the emulsion of the photographic film, analogous to grooves cut by a stylus on a vinyl disc in making a sound recording.
Figure has been removed due to Copyright restrictions
Figure 8: David Stephenson Star Drawing 2006/1 (S + WNW+ ENE, 21/8/2006, Central Australia) 2006
17 In gazing at the stars, one must look back to the earth at what is beneath the feet, enabling this perspective. Stephenson acknowledges this in the title of each work,
“recording his geographical bearings as the anchorage point for each image.”27 In a review of this exhibition, critic Robert Nelson proposes that “if you didn‟t know how the lines were produced, you might assume that their graphic disposition were created by fine pens held out on long pieces of string to make curious patterns of energies in contention”28 (my italics). This description would seem to infer the idea of the interaction of energy in an interference pattern.
The use of the dot and line in my work as the basis of a system of codification arise as I have indicated from various sources. It is also visually evident in my own out-of-focus photographs of plant forms (Figure 9). Looking at these and other similar photographs I was able to correlate the blurring of the image with the idea of an energy field extending beyond physical form, from which the breaking up of the line of the branch form into dots proceeds, and with this the idea of „materialisation and de- materialisation‟, as matter as intense parts of the field.
27 J. Bridgfoot, media release, David Stephenson Star Drawings, 30 January - 16 February 2008, John Buckley Gallery, accessed 11 September 2008, at: http://www.johnbuckley.com.au/exhibitions/stephenson/stardrawings/index.html 28 R. Nelson, “Sublime infinity beyond the ceiling”, article in the Age, Wednesday February 6, 2008, Metro reviews, p 22, accessed 11 September 2008, at ibid. 18
Figure 9: Sussie Heymans Blurred photograph showing „dematerialisation‟ of branch forms into orb-like segments
19 CHAPTER 4
FAMILY TREE
The Family tree; callistemon; DNA series (Figure 10) is a „digital‟ translation of the growth pattern of the Callistemon flower / seed stalk. Made with droplets of watercolour deposited on paper with an eyedropper and left to evaporate, this process also arises from the appearance of growth patterns in terms of cellular components, as viewed under a microscope. This methodology inverts the idea of „de-materialisation‟ seen in the blurred photograph. Instead, plant forms are re-materialised, re-sequenced, as codified, patterned images, using the dot as a „building block‟, and as a depiction of an elemental „unit‟ of energy. In this methodology, the repetition of the dot (as opposed to the trace of the movement of the dot) generates a line.
Figure 10: Sussie Heymans Family tree; callistemon; DNA 2008
20 This formal means also references the appearance and processes of medical and scientific imaging modes such as DNA sequencing, where the map of the unique genetic „fingerprint‟ of biological matter appears a codified grid pattern (Figure 11). The model of a DNA strand (Figure 12), untwisted from the double helix, is echoed in the codified Callistemon pattern (Figure 13), which also suggests the twisting of fibres into threads.
Figure has been removed due to Copyright restrictions
Figure 11: A sequenced depiction of encoded salmon DNA on x-ray film
Figure has been removed due to Copyright restrictions
Figure 12: Model of DNA double helix
21 The title Family tree describes human existence as inseparable from the earth; we are different arrangements of the same organic, physical elements found in plants, rocks, the land. This meshes with a description by Yolngu woman Merrkiyawuy Ganambarr-
Stubbs of her relationship to her ancestral land: “the DNA of the land is the same as my
DNA.”29
Figure 13: Sussie Heymans Family tree; callistemon; DNA (detail), 2008
29 M. Ganambarr-Stubbs, in conversation with the author, 2007 22 CHAPTER 5
THE LENS OF THE LAND
The interpretation of the dot as a „window onto the universe‟ ties in with the established
„Romantic‟ notion that flowers / plants function similarly. Philipp Otto Runge (1777–
1810) used stylised flowers (Figure 14), as symbolic expressions of his conception of spiritual phenomena, considering their contemplation “a way to find the mysteries of the supernatural in the smallest of nature‟s manifestations.”30
Figure 14: Philipp Otto Runge Levkoje und Lilien
Runge‟s concern with conceptions of the supernatural and the spiritual, seen in his allegorised representations of the landscape, backgrounds the use of the flower as a symbol denoting the depiction of supernature accessible through nature31. This corresponds with the rendering of my perception of energy through abstraction of
30 Rosenblum, op cit., p 47 31 Rosenblum, op cit., p146 23 specific plant growth patterns. Embodying growth and the cycles of nature, plants operate in my work as a key to accessing the „bigger picture‟, the field. The „lens of the land‟ is therefore a filter for engaging with the field via plants forms; universal patterns made visible through specific, though generalised flora.
The symbolism of flowers as points of interface with the energy field is also seen in
Buddhist and Hindu philosophy and imagery as lotus flowers of various numbers of petals representing the energy centres or chakras in the individual human body / energy field32 (Figure 15).
Figure has been removed due to Copyright restrictions
Figure 15: Illustration of the positions of the individual human energy centres (chakras), symbolically described as lotus flowers according to the Kalacakra33 tradition
32 M. Brauen, The Mandala; sacred circle in Tibetan Buddhism, Shambhala, Boston, 1997, p 54 33 The Kalacakra tradition involves the use of the mandala as “the foremost symbol and allegory in Tantric Buddhism for man‟s relationship to the cosmos.” Ibid, front cover 24 The concept of organic pattern as a lens or window onto the field seems apparent in the „voice flowers‟ of Margaret Watts Hughes. Using the Eidophone, an “elastic membrane...tightly stretched over the mouth of a receiver of any form…” Hughes sang into the receiver and patterns would appear in a glycerine coating on the membrane34
(Figure 16). The circular shape of the membrane imparts a lens-like quality, embodying the idea of the „lens of the land‟, a window through which the field is made visible.
Figure 16: Margaret Watts Hughes „Voice flowers‟
I make a parallel between the intuitive process I use and the Eidophone; energy is received, then translated, re-sequenced and codified. Hughes‟ images embody the essential expression of my work; the idea that in my perception of the energy field, focused through plant forms, there is conveyed some type of information, a „message from nature‟ of an underlying structural pattern.
34 “… my experiments have been made as a vocalist, using my own voice as the instrument of investigation, and I must leave it for others more acquainted with natural science to adjust the accordance of these appearances with facts and laws already known. Yet, passing from one stage to another of these inquiries, question after question has presented itself to me, until I have continually felt myself standing before mystery, in great part hidden, although some glimpses seem revealed. And I must say…that as day by day I have gone on singing into shape these peculiar forms, and, stepping out of doors, have seen their parallel living in the flowers, ferns, and trees around me; and, again, as I have watched the little heaps in the formation of the floral figures gather themselves up and then shoot out their petals, just as flowers spring from the swollen bud – the hope has come to me that these humble experiments may afford some suggestions in regard to nature‟s production of her own beautiful forms, and may thereby aid, in some slight degree, the revelation of yet another link in the great chain of the organized universe that, we are told in Holy Writ, took its shape as the voice of God.” M. W. Hughes, „Visible Sound. I. Voice Figures‟, The Century; a popular quarterly / Volume 42, Issue 1, The Century Company, New York, March 1891 p 37-40, Accessed June 25, 2008, at: http://cdl.library.cornell.edu/cgi-bin/moa/moa-cgi?notisid=ABP2287-0042-7 25 The paintings of Emily Kame Kngwarreye (c.1910 - 1996) also depict plant forms
(Figure 17), specifically the growth pattern of her Dreaming and namesake, the yam
(Kame), as symbolic of a spiritual, inseparable relationship to the land; “the country
Emily is expressing is herself.”35 Her work concurrently expresses “spiritual power that maintains nature‟s fertility” and a “fundamental…understanding (of) the desert environment, and therefore survival”, informing and imparting “structure and order in a society so too that it will survive.”36 Through the „lens of the land‟, the organic information source, growth patterns provide a „template‟ for how to live on the earth.
Figure has been removed due to Copyright restrictions
Figure 17: Emily Kame Kngwarreye Yam Story XIII, 96H012, 1996
35 J. Isaacs, „Anmatyerre Woman‟ in Emily Kngwarreye Paintings, Craftsman House, Sydney, 1998, p 12 36 J. Holt., “Emily Kngwarreye at Delmore Downs 1989-1996‟ in ibid, p 155 26 CHAPTER 6
PLANT PLANET
Plants and flowers are indispensable in supporting the conditions for life as we know it on this planet, largely in the production of a breathable atmosphere and as a source of food and fuel. As such, they make a potent symbol for the relationship between the earth and those who are dependent on it for their existence. In The Weather Makers,
Tim Flannery surveys some of the effects visible in the environment, primarily those involving the matter of water and carbon. He refers to a description by Alfred Russel
Wallace, of the atmosphere as “The Great Aerial Ocean”; a conception of the state of the atmosphere as akin to that of water; as something in which waves, “currents, eddies and layers” 37 operate. Flannery describes our interface with the atmosphere:
It connects everything with everything else…It is in our lungs that we connect to our Earth‟s great aerial bloodstream, and in this way the atmosphere inspires us from our first breath to our last. 38
The aerial ocean – the delicately balanced spherical halo enveloping the Earth, with its currents and vibrations, is descriptive of the underlying energy field.
Family tree; casuarina; aerial ocean (Figure 18), based on the bony, segmented needle-like leaf forms of Casuarina cristata, symbolises the role of plants in sustaining atmospheric conditions. The use of blue pigment is a literal reference to the appearance of the atmosphere / sky, and its reflection in the polarised surface of water.
Droplets of blue watercolour indicate both air and sea, referring to the atmosphere as the Great Aerial Ocean, and the use of this description as a metaphor for the interconnected „sea‟ of energy, the unified field.
37 Wallace was a contemporary of Charles Darwin and co-founder of the theory of evolution by natural selection. Ibid p 12 38 Flannery, op cit., p 12 27
Figure 18: Sussie Heymans Family tree; Casuarina; aerial ocean (detail), 2008
The repetition of the dot is an equation, a sequence, a reiteration of elemental components assembled in the form of a line. The spaces between dots are progressively filled, formulating lines, and suggestive of a model of the molecular structure of water (Figure 19).
Figure has been removed due to Copyright restrictions
Figure 19: Diagram of the molecular structure of the “fabric of water,” 39 composed of an oxygen atom and two hydrogen atoms
39 P. Ball, H20: A Biography of Water, Weidenfeld & Nicholson, London, 1999, p 5 28 The use of elemental components to generate a larger pattern infers the incremental fabrication of a textile; the spinning of fibre into thread, and the warp and weft yarns in woven fabric. In the pen drawings, the lines function as stitches, „embroidering‟ a surface on the paper. The water droplet drawings (Figures 10, 13, 18), can be construed as elemental parts (cell, molecule, fibre), binding into larger structures, simultaneously resembling a textile, fabric, material, topography, a topology, the land, the surface of water, an equation, H20, the unified field.
29 CHAPTER 7
ORGANIC CODE / TEXT
“The land is the first information superhighway.”40
The pen drawings differ from the watercolour droplet drawings in that lines generate dots. In Family tree; banksia; interference pattern (Figure 20), points of light occur as unmarked paper at the intersection of other resultant lines, formed in the negative space of saturated layers of pen inscriptions. The „negative space‟ of pen lines, signifying the field from which visible „material‟ structure is generated, has the
„synaesthetic‟ appearance of „white noise.‟41
The layering of sounds and energies equates with “white light as a superposition of waves at many frequencies.”42 This „static‟ or layering of multiple „frequencies‟ serves as a literal description of the transcendental experience of being in the land. It is my perception of this „immersion‟, that a form of energy / information / data is imparted, perhaps analogous to the streaming or downloading of digital information. This
„information‟, conceptualised as an „organic digital‟ code, is depicted in my work using the codified „binary‟ characters of the dot and the line,43 acting as a representation of
„opposite‟ states forming the whole.
40 Yunupingu, op cit. 41 White noise (or Gaussian noise) is a random noise having a constant energy per unit band width that is independent of the central frequency of the band. D. M. Considine (Ed), Van Nostrand’s Scientific Encyclopedia, Van Nostrand Reinhold, New York, 1995, p 2187 42 Ibid, p 1878 43 Binary code in digital technology uses the digits 0 and 1 as “a coding system for characters, using 6 binary digits (1 and 0) to represent each character.” Ibid, p 377 30
Figure 20: Sussie Heymans Family tree; banksia; interference pattern, 2008
The translation (recording / re-coding) of data in my work is essentially an anagrammatic process, an intuitive „re-sequencing‟ of an „energy form‟ as material form
(and vice versa), using a framework of units or elemental constituents. These arrangements function in a similar way to anagrams or mathematical equations, in that the same essential components may be rearranged in various relationships to each other, re-encrypting meaning. Energy / plant structures are re-sequenced, in codified form; they are woven together generating new patterns using the dot and line as binary code characters, generating a type of „organic text‟.
Anthropologist Howard Morphy describes the use in Yolngu art of “geometric signs...the smallest meaningful units in the system” as “analogous to morphemes in language.”44 This evokes the characterisation of a painting as a (codified) text that may then act as a document for the relaying of „information‟ to the observer. Morphy
44 H. Morphy, Ancestral Connections: art and an aboriginal system of knowledge, The University of Chicago Press, Chicago and London, 1991, p 167 31 describes the functions and concerns of Yolngu art, an aspect of which is the portrayal of certain information, where “…art is part of the Yolngu system of knowledge both in itself and as a system of encoding meaning.”45 Describing the term „Buwayak‟
(„Invisibility‟), he says,
In addition to representing the visible world, Yolngu artists are equally concerned with conveying the reality of the unseen, the underlying forces in the landscape. In Yolngu art conceptualisation and perception are interrelated. The world is the visible manifestation of an ancestral design and art expresses the relationship between surface and inner form.46
Morphy also asserts that
There is a synergy between the process of encoding meaning and the expression of meaning in the formal properties of the painting...the notational aspects of Yolngu art interact with its expressive dimensions.47
This concept resonates with the processes and intended meaning in my work.
Perceived via the lens of the land, my use of dots and lines are intended to simultaneously notate, and act in the same way as, the field. Each piece of paper in a grid, or each painting also holds the same meaning as the dot. This fractal-like quality provides a conceptual model for the idea of inter-dimensionality, transcendence of the physical plane, the field.
45 Ibid, p 75 46 H. Morphy, „Buwayak: surface and inner form‟, Essay in catalogue, Buwayak;(Invisibility), Annandale Galleries, 2003, p 16-17 47 Ibid, p 16-17 32 CHAPTER 8
SPATIAL FABRIC, TEXTILE
The Family tree; acacia; constellation paintings (Figure 21) are made using the same conceptual and formal premise as the pen drawings, in that the image is generated using negative space. However, instead of saturated „films‟ or planes of pen lines, branch forms are drawn into the emulsion of smooth transparent oil glaze layers by removing pigment with the fingertip. These layers generate „new‟ energy resulting from interacting branch forms and lines, fabricating an emergent topological form.
Figure 21: Sussie Heymans Family tree; acacia; constellation, 2008
The paintings are made with transparent pigments, conceptually grouped in the colour relationships of blue and brown, and black and white. Both colour relationships signify the notion of duality; representing the idea of physical matter as an image of a pattern in the unified field. The „duo-tonal‟ relationship of black pigment and the white ground of 33 the canvas could be interpreted in terms of Manichaean philosophy, which perceives life as dualistic, a conflict between “the separation of good and evil, light and darkness,”48 the balancing of spirit and matter in the paradigm of human life on earth.
The blue / brown equation is also seen as dualistic, read in the same terms as the complementary opposite colour relationship of orange and blue. Blue denotes the
„spiritual‟ as allegorised in the colour of the sky, and indicates hydrogen, a constituent of water, the most abundant element in the universe.49 Brown signifies „earthly‟ matter: soil, trees, carbon, and its association with fire – a major factor influencing global atmospheric conditions and the basis of the matter of the human body.50 I focus on these two elements as represented by these colours, as a fulcrum for my own physiology, the conditions supporting life, and the transmutation of energy and the myriad forms of matter.
In Family tree; acacia; constellation (Figure 22), dots occur as places where lines overlap, leaving a „pixel‟ in the larger „bitmap‟. In subsequent layers, new connections are made between these intersections, „knitting‟ or „stitching‟ points of „constructive interference‟ together in a process informed by the concept of re-sequencing, recording
/ re-coding, materialisation / de-materialisation. This creates a labyrinthine pattern, suggesting the emergence of a topological, material form from the field.
48 Manichaeism is a religious philosophy based on the vision, writings and paintings of Mani (Persia, c. AD 217–277). “The basic doctrines of Manichaeism were that the soul has fallen into the material world; that unless something happens it will remain trapped in the round of reincarnation; that God, the Father of Greatness, sends a saviour who will rouse those asleep in darkness; and that the way to salvation is by knowledge – direct experience of the Light.” N. Smart, The World’s Religions: old traditions and modern transformations, Cambridge University Press, Cambridge, 1992, pp 222 -224 49 Hydrogen is “a flammable colourless gas that is the lightest and most abundant element in the universe. It occurs mainly in water and in most organic compounds.” Dictionary, op cit, p 762 “Hydrogen is considered by some scientists as the primordial substance from which all other elements in the universe were developed. Considine, op cit., p 1637 50 “All plant and animal life is composed of complex organic components containing carbon combined with hydrogen, oxygen, nitrogen and other elements.” S. P. Parker, (Ed), McGraw-Hill’s Concise Encyclopedia of Science and Technology, McGraw-Hill, New York, 1982, p 295 34
Figure 22: Sussie Heymans Family tree; acacia; constellation, 2008
As in the pen drawings, the superposition of the branch form upon previous layers generates the appearance of a terrain, reminiscent of topographical mesh structures and surfaces in 3D digital modelling of actual terrain, represented as a mesh of coordinates (Figure 23). This method of rendering imparts the appearance of a woven fabric.
Figure has been removed due to Copyright restrictions
Figure 23: A digital terrain map of East Los Angeles
35 The mesh-like appearance of these paintings results in a reading as constellation-like due to the building up of layers of pigment. The idea that physical matter is an expression of an „energetic‟ universal structure, expressed and manifested in material form, evokes physicist Brian Greene‟s use of the term „spatial fabric‟ in his descriptions of string theory, based on the mathematical equations of general relativity and quantum physics. 51
In Woven Heaven, Tangled Earth, Cecelia F. Klein (Professor of Art History, UCLA) draws together examples of cosmological mythologies in Mayan and Aztec culture.
Referring to the Chilam Balam, 52 a Yucatec Maya text, she notes
its reliance on metaphors that present Maya time and space in terms of a pliant substance that, given the allusions to knots, swaddling clothes, and folds, is here surely some sort of fibre or fabric.53
Another link between universal, cosmological structure and woven form – a viewpoint of our place in the universe from the earthly perspective – is found in Indigenous weaving and craft technologies of North and South America. Designs woven (into objects)
by women of the Great Lakes peoples often feature images of the thunderbird on one face of the bag and the horned serpent (underwater panther) on the other. As such, the bags represent a kind of cosmological diagram. Between these symbols of the sky-world and the underworld lie the sacred contents of the bag, intended for ritual use here on earth. The cosmological principle of balancing antithetical elements is also hinted at subtly in the asymmetrical use of colour in decorative designs on
51 Greene, op cit., p 263 52 M.W. Makemson, The Book of the Jaguar Priest: a translation of the book of Chilam Balam of Timizin, with commentary, Henry Schumann, New York, 1951, p 41, cited in C. F. Klein, "Woven Heaven, Tangled Earth: A Weaver‟s Paradigm of the Mesoamerican Cosmos", in Ethnoastronomy and Archaeoastronomy in the American Tropics, Ed. by Anthony P. Aveni and G. Urton, Annals of the Academy of Science, Vol. 385, New York, 1982, p 1 53 C. F. Klein, "Woven Heaven, Tangled Earth: A Weaver‟s Paradigm of the Mesoamerican Cosmos", in Ethnoastronomy and Archaeoastronomy in the American Tropics, Ed. by Anthony P. Aveni and Gary Urton, Annals of the Academy of Science, Vol. 385, New York, 1982, p 1 36 formal clothing…Even the most basic decorative principles are informed by an underlying cosmological structure. 54
Seen through the „lens of the land‟, the plant form / constellation pattern operates in my work as an intuitive conception of the unified field; a „universal structure of invisible energy‟, which I intuitively perceive as mesh-like with a „woven‟, interconnected quality.
These images act as a personal version of a codified, compressed cosmological diagram, where energy or „resonance‟ patterns in the field resound in the physical world, leaving patterned traces of “constructive” or “destructive” energy, as in an interference pattern.
In this paradigm, matter could be conceptualised as being „shaped‟ according to these patterns. The „encoded information‟ of the underlying universal energy field could be interpreted as a „digital‟ program, instructing an „encoded formation‟ of matter, the way that each seed contains the program and information to grow into the prescribed plant form.
54 D.W. Penney, Native Arts of North America, Pierre Terrail Editions, Paris, 1998, pp 62, 67 37 CHAPTER 9
ORGANIC DIGITAL
„Organic digital‟ is the representation of the energy field as the universal, underlying
Operating System.55 My representations of patterns in the field are translations of invisible, energetic „organic digital‟ information; perceived „measurements‟ of „energy‟ collected in the land / field; recorded and re-coded as „maps‟ and „graphs‟ as a data / information pattern. „Digitally‟ codified through use of the dot as a character, these graphs and patterns represent an „organic text / code‟, written into plant forms, the earth, the universe, ourselves. Plant growth patterns are seen as codified,
„programmed‟ representations of the field, re-interpreted as a „digital‟ pattern in the use of the dot as a „digit‟ or „morpheme‟ 56.
In Organic digital; field (Figure 24), the seed becomes a „digit‟ or a „character‟ in an organic text, also representing an „elemental unit of energy‟. The repetition of this form creates a „woven‟ field mimicking a „piece‟ of holographic film in which the „whole‟ is visible. The seed functions „hologrammatically‟, in that it contains the potential for exponential growth, a point through which the infinite is visible.
55 The operating system is the infrastructure software component of a computer system. “System software operates at a level below application software; it performs functions that apply to any application running on the computer…it performs operational tasks such as how to display a graphic or how to retrieve information from its memory.” The operating system acts as an interface between an application and the hardware. Encyclopedia of Technology and Applied Sciences, Marshall Cavendish, New York, 2000, Vol. 3, p 307 56 Morpheme - (Linguistics) a speech element having a meaning or grammatical function that cannot be subdivided into further such elements (from Greek morphe, form). Dictionary, op cit, p 1016 38
Figure 24: Sussie Heymans Family tree; eucalyptus; organic digital, 2009
39 CHAPTER 10
ENERGETIC TERRAIN
Figure 25: Marramarra undergrowth
Through experiential research in the field, it is apparent that the „energy‟ or vibrational frequency of a particular place influences one‟s own. In the dense, transverse valleys and creeks in the sandstone escarpment country of the Marramarra National Park area in northwest Sydney, the visual effect of the myriad tree, branch, leaf and flower patterns of the enclosing, net-like terrain (Figure 25), taken in through the „pinhole‟ aperture of the eye, directly affects my „brain wave pattern‟.57 The spectrum of varied colour and tones of light and shade and sound – birds, wind in the trees, running water, plant and earth „energy‟ – generate in my perception a white noise effect of „saturated‟,
57 This sensation is also apparent to me when observing any organic grid or mesh pattern, for example, the reflection of sunlight off rippling water. I compare this to Nigel Spivey‟s explanation of dot or grid patterns found in cave paintings in Africa, as depicting the trance / transcendental state in shamanistic practice. He links this to a dot or mesh pattern discernable in front of the eyes in the neuropsychological process of a trance state, and as perhaps inducing this state. N. Spivey, How Art Made The World, BBC / KCET Hollywood, 2005, Programme 2 40 „multi-dimensional‟ vibration, permeating the physical body at a cellular level. This feeling of life-ness, directly affects the organic energetic being. Through this
„immersion‟ in the land, a meshing of the „invisible‟ individual energy field with the
„vibrational frequency‟ of the multi-dimensional field occurs. Feeling with the being, as opposed to thinking, the natural opens a window onto the transcendental, the supernatural.
Figure 26: Marramarra terrain
The effect of this particular place was „clarified‟ to me in the rocky plains at Fowlers
Gap in western New South Wales. The diverse terrain of these places, influenced by geological causes and other environmental energies affecting the surface of the land, could be read as a vibrational expression of the factors influencing it58. The „white noise‟ of the steep, densely-foliaged valleys of Marramarra (Figure 26), feels like
„heightened‟ activity while the more horizontal terrain and occasional blips of elevated
58 For example, the wave patterns of wind and water on sand, and the movement of sand dunes by wind over time, like waves. 41 rocky outcrops of the Fowlers Gap area have a „lower frequency‟; it feels „slower‟, ancient. Here, energy seems intensified in the sparser vegetation, markedly discernable via an awareness of a particular tree eking out a living in the arid stone field (Figure 27). An understanding of the tree crystallised – its roots in the ground and branches extending into ‟space‟ – as functioning as an „antenna‟, receiving / transmitting palpable life energy, connecting the earth and the universe. Here it afforded a „clearer channel‟, a more „concentrated‟ reception / perception of the field than the white noise of Marramarra.
As such, plant growth patterns function in my paintings and drawings as a „template‟ for a pattern / interaction in the energy field, informing a philosophical model of relationship, the „earth / human / being equation‟; family tree. As such, they operate conceptually as a cosmological diagram of interaction with / in the field via the land;
„immersion‟. By feeling rather than thinking, with the being rather than the mind, there is no separation of the individual, the energy of the earth, the field. The land, literally, grows into your soul.
Figure 27: Tree at Fowlers Gap
42 CHAPTER 11
THE BOTTOM LINE – GROUND ZERO
We‟ve got a million choices, We‟ve got a single fate 59
Using the premise of the field, human aspects of being, such as mental, physical, cultural, social, religious and economic structures, are possibly informed by, and subject to „interference‟; influencing and influenced by some „invisible‟, „codified‟ energetic pattern. In this scenario, the globally dominant, constructed entity of the economic growth pattern is then seen as subject to these same „laws of nature‟, part of the paradigm of the quantum field, which also generates plant growth patterns or
„programs‟. The „economic growth pattern‟ unlocks carbon otherwise stored in various forms into the atmosphere. In this way, it can be seen as functioning in the opposite way to the „plant growth pattern‟; the cycles of growth and decay, the seed / flower equation, in which plants store carbon and produce oxygen, exuding it into the atmosphere.60
Rearranging and re-sequencing energy and matter – fabricating new relationships between the self and the raw materials of the earth, and the energy available through it
– into ever more complex and „sophisticated‟ forms, the psyche attempts to fill the space left by disconnection from the earth – the organic aspect of being. Justified by the separational „right‟ of dominion over nature, enacted through the concept of possession, the feeding of economic growth by consumerism implies and requires incessant production. Its relentless pattern of growth, contrary to plant cycles and patterns is symptomatic of the human organism‟s currently unbalanced, disease-like interaction with the organism of the earth. In a paradigm of „carbon as currency‟, and
59 Celibate Rifles, „Buttland‟, Beyond Respect, 2004 60 Flannery, op cit., p 31 43 the “carbon budget”,61 the tree as a template for relationship to the earth illustrates the con-currency of the earth, the human body, the air we breathe, our elemental, essential connectedness, informing the „human / earth equation‟. The only real currency, the bottom line, to use the economic term, is the earth.
Physics and metaphysics essentially describe the observer‟s relationship to the world – the material / energetic manifestations of the field: life, being. The separational paradigm of mathematical, scientific thought names, breaks apart, measures and quantifies each detail to „discover‟ and unlock the „hidden‟. The imaging modes used in these processes are a translation; the recording and recoding of data, generating patterns in the form of sequences, equations, charts, maps, graphs. This reductive approach perhaps renders the synergistic (“the whole is greater than the sum of its parts”) „unreadable‟ in terms of analysis and interpretation of these „patterns‟, as it would perhaps be in a synergistic paradigm, as represented by plant growth patterns, where interactive energies are somehow apparent, embedded into the pattern, forming a visible, readable picture.
Figure 28: M. W. Hughes Voice flowers – tree form
61 The “carbon budget” alludes to the balance of carbon and other elements and their effects in the atmosphere, in association with the continued emission of carbon into the atmosphere, and the „new‟ concept of carbon credits, used as a trading item, and as an element of which the human body is formed. Flannery, op cit, pp 27 – 35, pp 222 - 231 44 M. W. Hughes‟ voice flowers (Figures 16, 28) „chart‟ or „map‟ vibrational „interference‟, imaging an energetic growth pattern; a picture of, and in, the field. In a parallel way, the photographs of ice crystals (Figure 29) by researcher Masaru Emoto, form a „picture‟ of the effect of „energy‟, in various forms, upon the state of water; a chart or graph of the energy or hado.62 These organic patterns, like flowers, could be read as graphs of life, patterns in the field, in nature, whatever physical form it may take. The field images a
„total‟ picture; the macrocosmic and the microcosmic, patterns of life-ness, organic text
/ code, written into every seed and flower, every atom.
Figure has been removed Figure has been removed due to Copyright restrictions due to Copyright restrictions
Figure 29: Masaru Emoto Ice crystals photographed forming in water from Fujiwara dam in Japan. The image on the left shows a malformed structure. The image on the right, made after a prayer to the water by a Buddhist priest, shows a symmetrical, clearly defined growth pattern.63
62 Emoto photographs ice crystals forming in water, subjected to various forces and energies, in the form of intentional thought, text, characters, music, and environmental factors. He asserts that water takes in information; “external factors affecting the mind and body,” and changes its quality according to this information. Crystals from a polluted source, or “negative” words such as “stress” or “no good” produce deformed crystals with no apparent pattern, while water from a natural, unpolluted source, or “positive” words such as “love” or “well done” form regular, symmetrical patterns. He asserts that water is sensitive to a subtle form of energy; “hado; the energy or vibration inherent in all things; all the subtle energy that exists in the universe. It is this form of energy that affects the quality of water and the shape in which the crystals form. Hado is integrally woven into the implications of water‟s response to information.” M. Emoto, The True Power of Water, Atria Books, New York, 2003, pp viii - ix, 11, 21-22 63 Ibid., p 101 45 Codes are patterns. Energy / patterns are codes. Organic patterns – a single tree, a seed, the branch / leaf matrix, flowers, clouds, stars, wind and light on water, cellular and molecular structures, the DNA double helix – manifestations of the field – can be read as systems, codes, patterns of life / being-ness. These patterns directly affect the human being, perhaps „meshing‟ with a „cellular memory‟ in the DNA, the energy patterns in synapses, like areas of constructive interference. As energetic, organic, thinking, human, being, I feel „programmed‟ in some way, by the same „organic code‟, as written in the „organic text‟ of trees, rocks, stars, the field. These patterns „infuse‟ the being with data / information / energy; the land is the first information super-highway.
Seeing the self through the lens of the land, the organic and the invisible energetic patterns of being become „visible‟, infusing the consciousness and subsequently acting on the thinking part of the „human / earth equation‟. The plant planet paradigm equates the „self‟ with the earth and the field, acknowledging the most fundamental defining factor of humanity – the dot on which we all stand – the earth.
Connection to the earth, „visible‟ via the „lens of the land‟, makes evident the universal; energy; the field. The building of, and worship at, the altar of consumerism – a manifestation of separation from the earth, promoted by the premise of „dominion‟ – attempts to fill the space within the self, left by unacknowledged connection to the earth. The replacement of this bond is apparent as the desire to own and „re-assimilate‟ objects and products – ultimately the material of the earth and the body – as part of the self. This supports the economic growth pattern, the global power structure built by the human organism, currently exercising a stranglehold on the earth and itself, like a parasitic plant64 overgrowing its host and compromising the entity on which its own life exists.
64 Parasite: “An organism living in close association with another organism, deriving its nourishment from the host and harming the host organism in the process.” 46 Perhaps a stance approaching that of epiphyte65; an acknowledgement of being supported by the earth rather than seeing it as a resource for humanity‟s wholesale use would enable a more balanced relationship within the self, hence with the earth. A paradigm in which the human organism perceived of itself as a symbiont,66 living within the larger symbiosis67 of the earth organism, could illuminate the earth / human relationship as that of mother and child.68 The child depends on the mother, and though the mother is not dependent on the child, there is an interdependent relationship where the maternal being provides an environment promoting survival, hence the continuation of the whole; the tree and the seed; macrocosm and microcosm, mother and child. In place of the currently parasitic relationship, the human organism could acknowledge itself as part of the symbiosis of the plant planet we live on.
Whatever we are doing to the earth, and to each other, we are doing to ourselves.
Ground zero is the ground we stand on. The bottom line for humanity is the Earth.
Parasitic plant: “Some plants, known as phanerogamic parasites, such as mistletoe, attach themselves to other plants, growing on them and depriving the host plant of nutrients, light and moisture – in essence inhibiting normal growth of the host plant through processes of deprivation and strangulation.” Considine op cit., p 2346 65 “Epiphytes are plants which grow, attached to other plants, both on the main trunk and on the branches. Epiphytes gain nothing but support, and a more favourable position of growth due to better light conditions and other environmental factors; they do not obtain any nutrient from the supporting plant, as parasites would...Frequently, as in the orchids, the roots of the plant are so modified as to absorb water directly from the atmosphere. Epiphytes also include ferns, aroids, algae, lichens and mosses. Considine op cit., p 1169 66 Symbiont: an organism living in a state of symbiosis [C19: from Greek sumbion to live together, from bioun to live].Dictionary op cit. p 1561 67 Symbiosis: 1. a close association of two animal or plant species that are dependent on each other. 2. a similar relationship between interdependent persons or groups. Dictionary op cit. p 1561 68 “…the system of relationships which Yolngu people practice is known as Yothu Yindi…(which) translates as child and mother. It's the belief system our culture is driven by, the ultimate source from which we draw our power as a society.” M. Yunupingu, Reconciling With Aboriginality and Culture, accessed 18 January 2009, at http://www.yothuyindi.com/theband.html 47 LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS
1. Heymans, S., Family tree; banksia; interference pattern, 2008, pen on paper, 152 x 224 cm
2. Heymans, S., Family tree; banksia; interference pattern (detail), 2008, pen on paper, 152 x 224 cm
3. Moire patterns Image source: Cloud, G. L., 1995, Optical Methods of Engineering Analysis, Cambridge University Press, Cambridge, p 170
4. The T‟ai-chi T‟u, the yin/ yang symbol Image source: Capra, F., 1991, The Tao of Physics; an exploration of the parallels between modern physics and eastern mysticism, Harper Collins, London, p 119
5. Interference pattern Image source: Cloud, G. L., 1995, Optical Methods of Engineering Analysis, Cambridge University Press, Cambridge, p 224
6. Heymans, S., Family tree; banksia; interference pattern, 2008, pen on paper, 152 x 224 cm
7. Van Gogh, V., Starry Night 1889, Oil on canvas, 72 x 92 cm, Museum of Modern Art/ Bridgeman Art Library Image source: Bernard, B. (Ed), 2004, Vincent by himself, Time Warner Books, London, p 193
8. Stephenson, D., Star Drawing 2006/1 (S + WNW+ ENE, 21/8/2006, Central Australia) 2006, type C photograph, 125 x 158 cm Image source: Stringer, J., 2007, Cross Currents – Focus on contemporary Australian art, Museum of Contemporary Art, Sydney, p 110
9. Heymans, S., Untitled, 2002, scanned 35 mm negative
48 10. Heymans, S., Family tree; callistemon; DNA, 2008, watercolour on paper, 152 x 224 cm
11. DNA sequence Image source: http://www.nwfsc.noaa.gov/publications/issuepapers/cfmfiles/cb6105_1_img.jpg
12. Model of DNA double helix Image source: www.theory-of-evolution.net/chap8/DNA-structure-1.php
13. Heymans, S., Family tree; callistemon; DNA (detail), 2008, watercolour on paper, 152 x 224 cm
14. Runge, P.O., Levkoje und Lilien, white paper-cut silhouette on grey paper, private collection, Hamburg Image source: Richter, C., 1981, Philipp Otto Runge; Ich weiss eine schone Blume, Schirmer/ Mosel, Munich, plate 18
15. Diagram of chakra positions and functions in the human body / energy field Image source: Brauen, M., 1997, The Mandala; sacred circle in Tibetan Buddhism, Shambhala, Boston, p 54
16. Hughes, M.W., Voice flowers Image source: Hughes, M. W., 1891, „Visible Sound I. Voice Figures‟, The Century; a popular quarterly, Volume 42, Issue 1, pp 37, 38, The Century Company, New York, accessed June 25, 2008, at: http://cdl.library.cornell.edu/cgi-bin/moa/moa-cgi?notisid=ABP2287-0042-7
17. Kngwarreye, E.K., Yam Story XIII, 96H012, 1996, synthetic polymer on canvas, 120 x 90 cm, the Holt collection, Delmore Gallery, N.T. Image source: Emily Kngwarreye Paintings, 1998, Craftsman House, Sydney, p 187
18. Heymans, S., Family tree; casuarina; aerial ocean, 2008, watercolour on paper, 76 x 112 cm
49 19. Diagram of the molecular structure of water
Image source: Ball, P., 1999, H20: A Biography of Water, Weidenfeld & Nicholson, London, p 155
20. Heymans, S., Family tree; banksia; interference pattern (detail), 2008, pen on paper, 76 x 112 cm
21. Heymans, S., Family tree; acacia; constellation, 2008, oil on canvas, 183 x 183 cm
22. Heymans, S., Family tree; acacia; constellation (detail), 2008, oil on canvas, 183 x 183 cm
23. Segment of Los Angeles East digital terrain map Image source: www.ifp.uiuc.edu/IDFL/results/resultsahuja.html
24. Heymans, S., Family tree; eucalyptus; organic digital, 2009, installation, seeds, dimensions variable
25. Heymans, S., digital photograph
26. Heymans, S., digital photograph
27. Heymans, S., digital photograph
28. Hughes, M. W., Voice flowers Image source: Hughes, M. W., 1891, „Visible Sound I. Voice Figures‟, The Century; a popular quarterly, Volume 42, Issue 1, pp 37, 38, The Century Company, New York, accessed June 25, 2008, at: http://cdl.library.cornell.edu/cgi-bin/moa/moa-cgi?notisid=ABP2287-0042-7
29. Emoto, M., Ice crystals Image source: Emoto, M., 2003, The True Power of Water, Atria Books, New York, p 80
50 BIBLIOGRAPHY
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