Observingarts: legacy and inovation.

"The simple and frontal statement in the pictures show a red thread in Ransve art: the concentration on a figure, an object or shape leaning against a background. His debut as painter in 1971 caused a sensation with his estranged, isolated figures positioned frontally facing the viewer of the picture. The classic traditions of portraits and the legacy of Edvard Munch is mixed  with the experiences from meeting the nightmarish pictorial scenes of Francis Bacon. Pictures that are embedded in a larger European and existentially charged figurative painting tradition, but the irrational and absurd aspects of the motives also brings an element of paradox".

Bjørn Ransve, Demon

Edvard Munch, Puberty 1894

Source: Wikipedia CC Licence

Bildenes enkle og frontale oppstilling viser til en rød tråd i Ransves kunst: konsentrasjonen om en figur, et objekt eller en form stilt opp mot en bakgrunn. Hans maleridebut 1971 vakte stor oppsikt med sine fremmedgjorte, isolerte skikkelser plassert frontalt overfor betrakteren av bildet. I disse blandes den klassiske portrettradisjonen og arven fra Edvard Munch med erfaringer fra møtet med Francis Bacons marerittaktige billedscener. Det er bilder som er forankret i en større europeisk og eksistensielt ladet figurativ maleritradisjon, men det irrasjonelle og absurde ved motivene bringer også inn et element av paradoks.


Kilde: Ustvedt, Øystein. (2009, 13. februar). Bjørn Ransve. I Norsk biografisk leksikon. Hentet 8. februar 2015 fra https://nbl.snl.no/Bj%C3%B8rn_Ransve.

"Pale heart" by Bjørn Ransve

Bjørn Ransve

Pale heart

1975, oil on  canvas

60 x 50 cm

When all is subtracted, what is left but the object itself? Is there hope in a brutal, grey horizon? Or does it just bring structure to the painting? Structure versus pure organic form. The pale, transparent colors surrounding the object are giving off indications that it is somehow at rest, even when free floating. The background brings up associations to  works of Rothko. But the background has a function to the composition: to embed and contrast the heart. Hide and conceal.

But the heart – it is left lifeless. It is frozen in time and space. What a mare for an organ that should be warm, pumping, pouring red blood into the body. Giving restless, vibrant life. Now, at rest against colors of earth and maybe fog. Is there a sky, a higher dimension, potential of salvation and freedom? And, there is earth: death and the potential for new life. No matter how barren the land might seem. So there is hope. A heart gives hope. Standing out at the center of the painting and at the same time dissolving into the background. A dissolving, pale heart? A heart without the function of a heart. Faint, distant but with a strong presence. The painting of a heart, heart of the painting, the heart of a painter? Attempting to fix form and idea and expelling feelings and emotions. Are the composition an expression of a barren artistic landscape inhabited only by the visiting spirit of the painter? Is this the modern reflection on "The scream" by Munch?  Is it a self-portrait or a portrait of despair of how our attitude towards our surrounding has left it both pale and exhausted, passing the pain on to the observer? 

Intimacy and distance - man and nature.

Bjørn Ransve

Brown-red ape.  1995. 

Oil on board, 122 x 99 cm

How would you measure the distance between an ape to a human? What to measure, what metrics? How close are we to our primal ancestors? Is that a relevant question to the theme at present? Resemblance or distance could be depending on the situation. This cage is different. What if we as a naked individual are left, alone, under the eye of the observer, naked, stripped down to our basic existence? All integrity removed, our gaze introvert, yet seeking something outside. Yes, I have seen the gaze in the depicted primal before, it was on the face of a tormented human. What we expect to fill out the discomfort of pure existence is gone. Context is the color of feelings, not that of the rational. The core of our own identity, so stripped of everything that helps us constitutes it.  The jungle gone, left are structures vanishing in rough strokes of vibrant colors, impressions beyond that of the rational. A productive state of shard feeling – the fragile existence we cling to as primates in various states of evolution. This state of pure being establish a bridge over which we are invited to an intimate, yet rationally distanced encounter with – “our selves”.

And by stepping back the monochrome, dissolving unfinished expression leaves the primate naked and fragile to our looks. Intimate, even at a distance.  

For a more extensive discussions on the theme"The body: the meat and the spirit: becoming animal" based on pictures by Francisc Backon, please visit:

http://www.alexalienart.com/bacon%20bled%20bare.htm

Observearts: "Pink ape"

Bjørn Ransve:
Pink ape, 1995. 

Oil ond board. 125 x 94 cm. 

Light and darkness

So, what is this thing about art? Is it our opportunity to connect with others through a language spoken by great minds - guided by their hearts? Is it a clash of rationale and emotions, a productive solitude of the sender, echoing from the canvas? A silent language, left stripped and torn for our rational receptors. Intellect, emotions and - handcraft!   

                        Bjørn Ransve - detail from "Harlequin boy with monkey"

Observearts: harlequin boy with monkey

Bjørn Ransve:
Harlequin boy with monkey,1983.

Oil on canvas.

Observearts:Flow and fixation

Observing arts: the productive exchange and flow of ideas, patterns, challenging intuition, the making of  individual and collective constructs. Negotioations, agreement and diagrement. Individuality vs. collectivism. Associations and  - references of interpretation. Art through words, art through hearts. 

I want to share this rare interview with Frances Bacon. 

Source: A rare Francis Bacon interview from a 1971 BBC documentary.

                                       

Painting by Bjørn Ransve. 

Portraits, the nocturnal theatre

Bjørn Ransve

Green head, 1979

Oil on board, 125 x 100 cm

I found Jacki Wullsclagers article "At home with history" in last weeks arts section of FT interesting. She writes about the exhibition ‘Francis Bacon and the Masters’, Sainsbury Centre for the Visual Arts, Norwich.

The theme centers on portraits by Bacon and old masters, Picasso and "the distortion of the body to make it central to the art again".  

"I'm like a grinding machine, I've looked at everything, and everything I've seen has gone in and been ground up very fine" - Francis Bacon. 

 It evoked some personal reflections on a painting previously mentioned in this blog: "Green head" by Bjørn Ransve. The brutal simplicity makes it more real than life itself. The head, both held up and reduced to a representation of the body part and anatomy of "the head". No history, no social weight or value, just that of the flesh and perception of it – minimalistic, overwhelming and floating in space.   

Observearts:

Bjørn Ransve

Large circle, 1998. 

Oil on canvas, 240 x 240 cm.