"AutoPeinPo" by Melting Native
A visual affair between conscious and unconscious constraints while painting blindfolded

Oulipo, or the “workshop of potential literature,” seeks to create works establishing and using constrained writing techniques. I based my video, in which I paint a series of canvases with a blindfold for 4 minutes each, on the Oulipo manifestation, which states an artist seeking new structures and patterns which can be used by artists or writers in any way they enjoy. Gertrude Stein’s innovative writing emphasizes the sounds and rhythms rather than the sense of the words. By departing from conventional meaning, grammar, and syntax, she attempted to capture “moments of consciousness” independent of time and memory. Stein’s creative process becomes very influential in the video, motivating the uncontrolled constraints. A blindfold creates a barrier which is unnoticeably broken by the freedom which comes through the moment of my body. My mind is free of its visual judge, runs through a canvas, freely, no longer taken by the conscious critic that rises upon any artistic creation. By this I am liberating myself from my own inner critic, consciousness, and letting be the energy and gravity my being seeks to create. The experience which takes place when art and literature are being created is hardly ever shown to the audience. An audience always contemplates upon drafts and final objects, but what about all that beauty and actual life we go through, the actual madness which arises from various hours of works, words, nonsense, and inspiration? To some it might be Dada, but the 21st century excels to conceive that time holds no specific measure, so caught up with deadlines insisting upon the importance of the outcome over the process. Process is substance and existence; outcomes are excuses and/or explanations. There is no future for this piece…. I will continue to paint blindfolded… could that be it?

Tony's perspective on "AutoPeinPo"

When artists starts their work, where does their inspiration come from? In most cases the artist’s audience never gets the pleasure of viewing the creative process. Where do theses “moments of creative consciousness” come from? What were the techniques used to create the work? What emotional state was the artist in at the time of conception? All that is left in the end is the viewer’s interpretation and emotional response to the piece. It affects only those that see it. This video experiment is based on ideas created by Gertrude Stein. Stein’s creative process dealt with sounds and rhythms of writing, the sounds and rhythms of pen on paper, the sounds and rhythms of the typewriter clicking away with each word being typed, and the sounds and rhythms of the modern day keyboard. What of the sounds and rhythms of the brush on canvas? What comes when and artist removes an everyday sense to create? By eliminating the visional judge, Melting Native strips herself of a sense body response and takes a journey into the unknown. She explores creation in its rawest and most vulnerable form. She blindfolds her mind and experiences creation through a non-judgmental platform on which to create. It’s important to note that Melting Native’s e-lit work was inspired by literature. It is a literature-inspired work. Throughout the semester, Melting Native questioned the ideas of literature versus the creation of art. How do they intertwine? How did our coursework mix into her chosen medium? This piece forces the viewer to be companionate to her experiment. Knowing she stripped herself of one of the most important senses of a visual artist, sight, we must sit back and watch what comes from each stroke of her brush. It’s clear that Melting Native took what was important and relevant to her in this class and excelled in creating a piece of e-lit. It’s not only relevant to what we learned in class, but she also found a new way to create her work in the future. I love this video. I want this work on my walls.

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