The Anatomy of Human: Why we are who we are

Your weekly introduction to new artists on SuperRare.

SuperRare Exhibition Issue No.2: The Anatomy of Human

The following text is curated by Radiosolace

I. Identity – First, we begin with the question of who we are? How does one have an identity? Where does this identity come from? What shapes us?

Human is the intermingling of flesh and consciousness. My work explores the sensations of existing as an infinite being in a finite capsule.

Identity is the solidification of the ideas you use to represent yourself into a fixed state. It is the system used to differentiate ourselves from some and glue us to others. I am not sure who exactly to credit for this, but it my fav zen quote is “identify with nothing” and I think that translates to my work, cycling through styles, techniques, mediums to explore the nameless grey spaces in our individual and group psych. My spirit haunts the body of my work, but there is no identity, each piece is it’s own rorschach.

JESSE DRAXLER

II. Dream and Spirits – As a human, some of us believe in spirits and dreams. How do these play into our “beliefs” and who we are?

A human is a conceptual creation in this infinite conscious energy field which has manifested itself as one species among the various infinite forms. This self aware energy plays and dances through having interactions with itself, and one of the forms where it becomes self aware of itself and its source energy is called a human. It is only an apparent concept which derives another apparent conceptual story we call identity. The entire creation itself is art or creative spirit and it uses the human manifestation to expand and express its creative love and also its own understanding of itself through self reflection called art.

Dreams are a fluctuation / activity or state of conscious experience much like the waking state, but having its own properties or laws. it is a portal to another dimension which is unique and has its own diverse way of playing and communicating with the self. Spirit is pure unidentified energy. it is formless, beyond comprehension, free, unlimited and wild.. it is all there is and all is the play of the spirit. Spirit is love.

ARCHAN NAIR

II. Dream and Spirits – As a human, some of us believe in spirits and dreams. How do these play into our “beliefs” and who we are?

Humans represent duality, neither good or evil but both, and the nuances between, individual but connected, and the overall representation of life and death. The intention with the art is to shine a light on those characteristics of humanity, the life and death, the light and dark in us and everything in between. I mean the body literally glows, science has proven that the body emits a small quantity of light, around 1000 times less intense than the levels that our naked eyes are sensitive to. These are the aspects that I’m inspired by and try to represent in the artwork.

Emotion is a trigger, it’s your body giving you a notification saying “hey, this is what you feel” and it’s up to us to determine why and where these feelings arise from. With emotion, for me when creating art it comes from the gut, I think listening to your gut is the strongest source than your heart or your head. It’s a visceral feeling of emotion that’s either inspired by a personal event, a word or an image. The ideas come from various sources, sometimes pulling from the aether.

XSULLO

IV. Childhood – Everyone of us have a beginning. Childhood, innocence, and dream play big parts in our childhood.

The human is energy and as such flows with the passage of time. Vital energy is fueled by feelings and moods that accumulate over time with experiences. Identity is an abstraction, a word that has little value for me, the only thing that is important to me is the presence, here and now, and in the presence, in feeling the moment that flows, there is no identity. The inner child is my artistic research and only in the search of his own child the human being can find the answers to the meaning of life, can understand what the words love and hate, hope and passion mean.

Childhood is where I was imprisoned. Childhood is where everything is fulfilled. Childhood is a container where all the answers exist. Childhood is love and hate, joy and sadness, it is a metaphysical place where everything has already happened. I had a hard, difficult, complicated childhood. I suffered wounds that healed badly, leaving traces and deep furrows that still make me suffer. I was saved by Japanese cartoons that allowed me to dream and laugh. I owe everything to them. I created Jonny Boy which is the cartoon style depiction of the inner child. Thanks to Jonny Boy I can make the world a better place where it is still possible to dream and where extraordinary things can still happen like my encounter with SuperRare to whom I owe much gratitude. I am a physical and digital painter, manic, perfectionist, tireless worker. I have a wonderful lab that looks like a small NASA. I make use of exceptional collaborators. My aesthetic is seemingly joyful and “pretty” but behind each of my works are hidden stories of sadness and fear that only I can tell. To find inspiration and create I use meditation to go back to my childhood and when I’m there I see everything, images, objects, atmospheres, colors, I hear scents, sounds, voices. When I wake up from meditation I bring this information back into the painting or digital work. Every journey into the past becomes a work of art. JonnyBoy has only one expression, he has no eyes. This expression can offer 3 different moods depending on how you feel at the moment you look at him:
Amazement – neutral
Fear – negative
Wonder – positive

GIOVANNI MOTTA

V. Vitality and circle of life – Human is coded to reproduce. Where is the beginning of life? Where does life start? Where there is a beginning of life, there is an end to life as well.

I think from my point of view I can present a worldview and human identity. Through the profusion of colors, humanoid figures and the mixture of fauna and flora I represent how my or our existence behaves in a completely astral, energetic and solar way, but also immersing itself in the infinite dark of the universe. Traveling on various planes, our thoughts travel between the past, present and future at the same time.

The circle of vitality life represents for me the eternal transformation and flowering. The solar energy that insists on providing life where it can reach. I represent this through the way I work. My first idea is like a seed that grows until it takes my mind, sharpens my senses, activates my left hand, reaches the papers, the canvases and looks at you, where everything starts again in an endless cycle.

CARAMURÚ BAUMGARTNER

VI. Power – Power doesn’t need to come from money, military (weapons + army), or political stance, but power could come from the inside. Here, men doesn’t need to represent power, but women could represent power and uplifting one another.

Human is something unique and individual. What it means to be human and what we expect from humanity is a very individual thing to consider and aspire towards. What is unfortunately very human though is self doubt, insecurities and often over emphasis on our flaws. Just as being human and defining what that means is unique and individual to everyone, our strength and beauty is unique as well. I want my art to show that we are all strong, beautiful and most importantly capable in our own ways.

I want people to see what they are capable of through my work. Not necessarily because the model looks like them but because the model is achieving something significant, is the driving force behind an epic moment and the main focus of the piece. We all need to find our strength to be the main focus of our own epic moments.

SHAVONNE WONG

VII. Technology – How technology influence us and what will the technology make us become. Genetic modification may help us evolve into “New Human” or another species.

To my knowledge, humans are the most emotional animals. Each human being is unique, and the meaning of life to each individual is different. I want to trigger human emotions through my artwork. I try to create striking visual effects so as to explain the worldview that I have constructed. Through my work, the viewer can feel my message, think about it and then enjoy it. What’s more, I often use metaphors to present my work. I don’t want the viewer to get too much information about the work before viewing it, because this will limit his or her imagination. I think everyone has a unique way of interpreting the work according to his or her own life experiences.

I believe that technology will eventually be closely integrated with human beings in the future. In this regard, I would like to try to explore the relationship between humans and technology. I like to use flashy and bright colors to present a sense of loneliness and despair, in order to create a strong visual impact. My art style is somewhat similar to cyberpunk, but my work is created with contemporary settings. I believe such a configuration resonates more with the real world. After all, my inspiration for creation mostly comes from observing people and things in life. Painting styles are just the appearance; the essence of my style lies in the message I want to convey through my work.

CA CHOU

VIII. Culture – How our culture is formed through time and what is written in the history. Current culture and future of culture.

Humans are the most beautiful, creative, and intelligent animals on Earth. We are also the most cruel, evil, and wicked. We are animals, in every sense of the word, but we seem to forget and ignore this fact. Just like any other animal, we can be grouped into behavioral categories and our actions (and reactions) can be predicted. The characters I draw are called fiends, representing the evil, yet natural, side of humans. Focusing on the dark side of the human experience, my art explores exploitation, greed, and tragedy. Both the victims and the perpetrators in my art are fiends. The stories are mirrors of real life events.

Society is the very flawed, yet perfect, human collective. Our society is nowhere near ideal, but it is functioning perfectly the way it should and following the laws of our universe. I don’t know how the universe began, but when it did and the cards were dealt, the atoms and matter of our universe interacted with each other following the natural laws. This interaction of elements led to the explosion of stars and creations of planets which somehow led to the creation/evolution of biological animals. These animals, and more importantly, their atoms, also follow the laws of the universe. It is this natural behavior of our atoms that give our cells their functions, which then create our organs that have a wide range of functions. The combinations of our organs together form our bodies. Our body’s control center, the brain, is the source of the illusion of consciousness. Our advanced consciousness is a major evolutionary advantage that has allowed us to ascend to dominance. However, even though we are the most dominant species on Earth, we are still victims to the natural laws of the universe. The unfortunate tragedies that humans (fiends) perform are all natural. The society which we built is natural. The tragic facts of our societies are also natural. The intervention and conscious correction of the immoral aspects of our society is also natural. The continuous effort to create a happier and more pleasant society for everyone is natural. Every event is a domino effect following the initial domino that started our universe, whatever you may believe that to be. Through my art, I tell stories of these inevitable events that take place in our society. This continuous unfolding of destiny which we call life.

OTHERWORLD

X. Future – I want to leave and end the exhibition with hope. “Luxury Ship” symbolizes a humankind dream for a better future and exploration beyond where we are.

Artistically speaking, I think my view about human identity is intricately connected to immense environments and ecosystems. I have a fascination at depicting humans into the most extreme and gigantic habitats, shrinking the human scale to the point of futile. I find it somehow reassuring, at times, to dissolve our humanity into something way bigger than us.

I believe my art is extremely focused on the future in all its forms, good or bad, dramatic or optimistic, gloomy or dreamy. I usually love jumping into familiar science fiction themes with crazy spaceships evolving into alien worlds, but i do have my personal touch and recipe when it comes to visual choices: a very directional shape language, color interactions based on complementary tones, and even most important, compositions aimed at emphasizing the most pleasing visual flow for the best viewing experience.

SPARTH