Meta/Physicals: Surrealism, spirituality and figuration in contemporary art

Abstract

In the following thesis entitled Meta/Physicals: Surrealism, spirituality and figuration in contemporary art, I focus on an interpretation of spirituality ultimately separate to religion, that encompasses notions of a vital force underpinning existence, which acknowledges the innate connectedness of all “things,” and which is open to notions of the paranormal, aiming to discuss this interpretation of spirituality, in relation to contemporary art and in particular to figurative contemporary art. In the first chapter, I address a number of ways in which contemporary art and art discourses relate to the spiritual with emphasis on those of the sublime and Jane Bennett’s New Materialism. In chapter two, I discuss a spiritual interpretation of both Surrealism and Critical Surrealism identifying them as appropriate discourses through which to address contemporary figurative-spiritual artworks when discussed in conjunction with New Materialism and the sublime. In chapter three, I explore the work of a number of contemporary artists whose work can be discussed through this interpretive “triangle”, and in chapter four, I discuss my own work and practice through this framework, relating it to the artists discussed in the previous chapter, asserting that through my practice and research I have identified appropriate discourses through which to discuss spirituality and figurative contemporary art together. The creative work generated in relation to this research is a large scale watercolour and ink painted quadriptych, approximately 430 cm by 240 cm, to be exhibited in the Sydney College of the Arts Post-Graduate Exhibition in December 2014. The painting will be floated off the free-standing wall in section D3 of the SCA galleries. The painting depicts an underwater environment, part ocean part cosmos, in which animals, humans, plants, bones and shells, coalesce and disperse in a kind of murky underwater mélange. In this work, the ocean serves as a metaphorical underpinning with its manifold connotations of creation, destruction and rebirth, setting the stage for a contemporary myth, which at its core celebrates our inert connectedness, cycles of life and death, and the overwhelmingly abundant vitality that flows through us all.