For the sake beauty, against the world
“The Mystery of the world is the visible, not the invisible.” - Oscar Wilde
Hannu Palosuo's (1966) latest paintings challenge through their praise of beauty, which in its ruthlessness borders on the horrible. This horror of beauty is, of course, what the late 1800's fin de siécle aesthetes, Oscar Wilde (1854-1900) particularly, called “art for art's sake”. Their boldest manifesto was elevating art to a similar level as religion and ethics, and instead pointing out, in Wilde's terms, that there are no morally good or bad books, only well or poorly written books. Aesthetic attractiveness, in other words, has no ethical obligations. Beauty simply is in the greatest of them all. Maybe even the only criteria that ultimately makes a difference.
Luchino Visconti's (1906-1976) Death in Venice begins with a scene that shows exactly what the viewer will be faced with for the next 125 minutes. Its inarguable beauty is like a subtitle to the film, and for the ultimate impact of beauty. In the form of Tadzio, the composer Gustav von Aschenbach meets the ideal of Beauty at its most perfect. The venerable gentleman professor simply cannot take his eyes off the Polish boy, that seemingly perfect being. Tadzio is remarkable in the sense that he returns the gaze. Tadzio's gaze seems to communicate with an ambivalence similar to the Mona Lisa or some other mystery-filled work of art. It is impossible to interpret the youth's smile or the secrets of his expression, because he resides in the higher spheres of beauty, although ostensibly in the same space and time as von Aschenbach.
Previously, Palosuo has favoured mainly pastel-like colours in his works, but now his palette is, at least momentarily, brightened. The pastel-like tones are an interesting effect, bearing some emotional relation to the hues of Visconti's Death in Venice, which is consciously pastel-like. The pastels create a protected mood. An air of fascinating sensitivity, or the heavy scent of lilies, seems to hang in the air. The lily has dual connotations, as it is on one hand the exemplification of overwhelming beauty, but also flower commonly associated with funerals. A kind of charming Death, if you will. Venice becomes a beautiful metaphor of the transience of beauty, as death and the city's slow, but inevitable, sinking underpin the protagonist's plunge toward destruction , dumbfounded by beauty.
In Palosuo's artistic philosophy, beauty is the greatest of all forces, one that can never be adored enough, one that needs to be examine indefinitely. In this respect, he is an artist similar to Visconti. Lonate Pozzolo Count Luchino Visconti di Modrone's films never disguised the fact that beauty is the greatest of all forces. In his films the eulogisation of beauty continues indefinitely and can never be avoided in any way. Beauty, in its Viscontian sense, is not in any way merciful or comforting. It is in fact completely merciless, as one can never achieve immunity, or defend oneself, against it. In Palosuo's works beauty is a tad more merciful, partly because their scale is not as colossal as Visconti's. Palosuo gives the public the opportunity to breathe every now and then. In this respect, his works are familiar with intermediate areas, recognize their significance and importance of the process of internal assimilation.
In Palosuo's works beauty is extortive, because their spirit is more than often linked to a kind of counsel. They seem to say: "Look again, notice and re-think." They are not law books, textbooks of didactics or even aphorisms printed on tea bags. They speak of the significance of life, art and other basics on an elementary level. They are a good example of the practicality of beauty. Beauty stops you and makes it easier for you to discover, acting as a kind of gentle usher. We know this from everyday life, because we have all witnessed situations where a beautiful person gets their way by simply flashing a smile. In Art, we deal with Beauty so often that it raises expectations and requirements on and on, onto a higher level. However, in this respect, life resembles art, as in life, we can admit beauty in a beautiful thing or person, even though we would not necessarily be ready to burn the world for him. Death in Venice offers an excellent comment on love's ability to humiliate. Gustav von Aschenbach resorts to an artificial renewal of his youth at his barber suggestion. At the time of his death, his make-up and hair dye runs, almost as a mockery of all his failed efforts. In the background Mahler is playing, the film proceeds majestically, and life proves to be very trivial alongside Art. This is probably one of the strongest Viscontian creeds.
The language of flowers and chandeliers
Palosuo's latest (2010-2011) paintings present an imagery in which people, chandeliers and flowers mix into a dense forest of symbols where different meanings and references slide together with a kind of dreamlike logic. Dreamlike in the sense that events and things are clear, but their relationships require interpretation. In dreams, the past and the future, the perceived and desired, and other contrasting moods are linked to each other seamlessly and directly. In dreams, the complexity of the world is revealed. Sleep is a relative of Art in this respect, because both share a complexity and a multiplicity of meanings. This is a rule rather than an exception, a thing which is actively sought to achieve by all means necessary.
In Palosuo latest paintings crystal chandeliers and flowers are linked. The iconographic dimension of flowers is perhaps more easily seen, but what about that of the crystal chandeliers? In addition to an all too obvious metaphorical connotation of luxury and splendour, the viewer should also be advised to remember how in 17th century Flemish artists' paintings, the lamp's ball had its own distinct role. For example, in Jan Vermeer's (1632-1675) works, the ball of the ceiling lamp was one of the points where studies of perspective could be placed, and where the meaning of reflections could be examined. On the other hand, Painting also has connections to other traditions of thinking, disciplines where the meaning of beauty were discussed. The idea of the general brightness and goodness of Beauty, however, represent an important strand in Christianity, showing traces of Neo-Platonic thought. Beauty is bright, and therefore readily noticeable.
Palosuo continues to work in a way where serialisation has a major role. In his series (consisting of multiple pieces), he creates stories and allusions to different cultural meanings. The imagery of the works also forms an interesting layered and referential world of meanings, where, for example, childhood is a recurring theme. Linking the past to the present is a classic example of how time can be compressed within works of art. I see something that transports me directly into the past, which becomes almost tangible, even if I remain right where I am. This is one of the most clear examples of Art's miraculous ability to transform a location.
But what does all this mean on a concrete level ? Let's look at the artist's paintings and examine their storytelling. “Denying one's destiny” is a triptych in which the left-hand panel shows a woman and child, the middle one a solitary woman, and right-hand side panel two men looking at something invisible. The characters are all dressed in a way that leads to vague ideas of the past, and some sort of historical subject. The colour of the canvas is left visible, which creates the impression of the general ambivalence of the characters, because they do not really have any special temporal or spatial context. In this respect, Palosuo paints in a classic way, but replaces the nudity of the protagonists with the nudity of the background. We are faced with a nakedly human situation. The clothing of the characters is linked in my mind to post-war Finland, and seems to either refer to peasants or the working class. What is the importance of the background in human life, and can one ever be released from its grasp, or zero out its meaning?
In the 1960s, the American essayist Susan Sontag (1933-2004) wrote the following in her essay Against Interpretation: "Real art has the capacity to make us nervous. By reducing the work of art to its content and then interpreting that, one tames the work of art." (1) In her text, Sontag declares war on the interpretation and the interpreters, and defends the significance of the artist's style. She concludes her essay with the requirement that instead of a hermeneutics of art, an eroticism of art is needed (2). With this, she refers to the importance of individual experience and personal significance in contrast to an authoritative "correct interpretation". In Sontag's case, this is self-criticism, because at that point she was already recognized as a critic and theorist. Following her example, it is easy to understand what an important a role style plays in Palosuo's works. The tension between realism and non-realism is both a stylistic and substantive element, upon which is the narrative of his paintings is built.
The series “Love only is incorruptible” follows the logic of style. It consists of twelve paintings, including 11 showing flowers, and the last portraying two people in a rowing boat. The series is very monochromatic, which places more emphasis on the outlinen and shape of the flowers, highlights them more intensively than what would be possible if the element of colour would be more dominant. To us, a colourless or monochromatic flower arrangement is an exception, as colour is a pre-expectation associated with flower paintings. Another almost monochromatic series of works is “None of them is the truth”. This series links different grey and brown flowers with a silhouette of a little boy portrayed from the side. A boy in knee length trousers and a variety of tulips and lilies create references to different time levels. Black and white, or more precisely a colour scheme reminiscent of that, is a kind of meta-level. Black and white photos document and illustrate, or black and white picture of a plant is somewhat reminiscent of a sketch.
The series “Today is the frightening tomorrow of yesterday” shows chandeliers and other ceiling lamps, as well as people. The types of lamp vary, and human figures show a violinist, an adult with a child and two adults passing on a toddler. The latter figure, in particular, bears a strong stamp of nostalgia: I interpret the picture as an icon showing the continuity of the family trough its portrayal of the lineage between grandmother, father and child. Many of Palosuo figures appear as mere silhouettes, which I feel refers to both the Platonic idea of the world and Leonardo's painting style. In particular, the play between light and shadow is one of the key themes in the lamp paintings. It is as if we're moving between light and dark. The artist can also be seen as referring to Leonardo's chiaroscuro, where light and shadow creates a relief-like impression.
In the artist's most recent works we encounter a variety of combinations, one of which is of particular interest: namely, lilies and tulips. The lily was a popular plant among the Symbolists. Their appearance speaks to us of the importance of aesthetics and style. The now almost common tulip has a wild past, for when it arrived in Europe in the 17th century, people were even prepared to kill in order to possess the flower. Whereas this tulip-mania was a phenomenon of its era, the appeal of the story to modern humans comes from how mad people were driven by a flower. The tulip showed how important beauty can be. In a nutshell, beauty conquered reason, and hence life.
A classic example of a fictitious character who chooses art instead of life, of course, is J.-K. Huysmans' (Recalcitrant, 1884), Jean des Esseintes. For him, aesthetics and style is everything. This is evident from how much time - and money - he uses on the beautification of his existence. The process of collecting objects such as wonderful perfumes, rare books, works by Gustave Moreau (1826-1898), Odilon Redonin (1840-1916) and Francesco Goya (1746-1828) , or even the poor living turtle, whose shell is gold-plated and encrusted with a variety of precious stones. Des Esseintes has chosen a style that is as aesthetic as possible, as well as not mundane in the least. Style is everything, and its most important companion is Taste.
Tracing dreams
Faced with Palosuo's work, I have often experienced similar emotions as when looking at Symbolist art. Although Palosuo operates within the realm of contemporary art, it is easy to see in his works why Symbolism may in many ways be seen as a grandparent of the themes and means of expression of Modernism and contemporary art. The relationship between two-and three-dimensional, the personal dimension and an interest in the great narratives are all things both the Symbolists and Palosuo draw on. Odilon Redon (1840-1916) wrote about Camille Corotin's art in his critique of the 1868 Paris Salon: ”Everybody knows that M. Corot, whose paintings appear unfinished, is on the contrary extremely subtle and accomplished…If, for the expression of his dreams, he intentionally leaves vague jumbles almost obliterated in semi-obscurity, he immediately places next to them a detail superbly firm and well observed. This proves clearly that the artist knows much; his dream is supported by a seen reality.” (3) Redon emphasized the link between reality and fantasy in his writings about art, but also in his artistic work, in which various imaginative and realistic elements create a kaleidoscope-like reflection.
Art historian Jodi Hauptman notes in his article on Redon, how many 19th researchers, as well as artists, were interested in the investigation of dreams. The interests of artists and researchers were often synonymous. For example, Alfred Maury examined, in the popular book Le Sommeil et les Rêves, the visual meanings of dreams, and the same thing fascinated many Symbolist artists, for example, Odilon Redon. (4) Through dreams, as Freud pointed out later, it was possible to get new perspectives on people's internal worlds, and based on this imaginative material, explore how the human mind was moving at any given time.
But how do dreams relate to, for example, Palosuo's series “Who believes in his dreams, fears his shadow?” It is a series of paintings, each showing a ceiling or chandelier. In addition to the traditional iconography of lights and lamps, I find references to the ornamental, and its valuation, in these paintings. Palosuo's attitude towards the ornamental is deliberately ambivalent, as he is prone to both showing its might, or erasing it almost completely. In the same way, I feel that the scepticism of the name he has given this work is ambivalent, at the least. Repeatedly painting with a dreamlike logic the artist shows the power of dreams, but remains ironically sceptical of their might to explain the world. Art, like dreams, is false, but resembles reality in a wondrous way. In Art, for example, it is possible to simultaneously explore your own thoughts through the products of another person's mind, so that your own self is engaged in dialogue with both itself and that of the other. Yet the situation is even more versatile, because it can be interpreted as two intersecting monologues. (5)
Roland Barthes (1915-1980) writes: ”The image – as the example for the obsessive – is the thing itself. The lover is thus an artist; and his world is in fact a world reserved, since in it each image is its own end (nothing beyond the image).” (6) The lover becomes an artist, because to him pictures, which have the ability to both cast a spell or torture, are unspeakably true. An artist should similarly believe in his creations so much that he imbues them with enough vitality and independence for them to be able to go out and conquer the world. In Hannu Palosuo's works we see, time and time again, how he relies on the power of fundamental symbols (chair, person, flowers, lighting and so on). The artist creates his own symbolism and narrative, and we, moving through it, gradually begin to reach the specific features of the meanings of his symbolism. Personal symbolism was of special importance to the Symbolists of the 1890s, because the personal became one of the criteria of artistic quality. In this respect, contemporary art practices are remarkably close to the ideas of the 1890s, since then, like today, the artist used personal material as inspiration for his art. In Hannu Palosuo's case we should consider this in relation to his paintings of chairs, where different seat models form a kind of metaphysics of chairs, where basically the same object turns out to be different every time. It is difficult to come up with better example of a personal fine-tuning of symbols. The chair is a common object, but a palosuoan chair is particular.
But what is the common message of a variety of different flowers? Does the juxtaposition of tulips, lilies and other flowers create something otherwise unattainable? The symbolism of flowers is perhaps even more open that that of chairs, taking into consideration the different cultural interpretations of the same plants throughout the ages. And in addition, we must remember that simultaneously, culturally similar realities also affect the process of interpretation, not to mention private interpretations or meanings. The interplay of plants is so diverse that we teeter constantly on the threshold of ambivalence with our interpretations. A tulip can signify both death and profligacy, while on the other hand it stands for middle class safety. A lily can be both a symbol for the Virgin Mary or St. Ludwig, or it can refer to the Medici family. The Iris signifies good news, or the first sensations of love. These are only a few well-established meanings. In Hannu Palosuo's flower paintings, the case seems to strongly suggest that the artist is extremely wise in leaving the symbolism of flowers open, and in toning down the personal symbolism related to the works. In this respect, he complies with the guideline of the Symbolists, because for them the most personal meanings were the most secret. The most personal didn't translate to any other language or understandable form, but remained thus forever a mystery.
Epilogue
Beauty, and a kind of fascination with the decorative, is a major feature in Palosuo's latest paintings, which he rightly perceives as some kind of taboos. Could beauty be a kind of unheimlich (7), something that horrifies us? What if art wasn't allowed to be simply beautiful or ornate, but it should deal rather in content, or, as one cliché states, "the work should have multiple meanings of different levels"? Is the idea of "depth" or "gravitas" linked to the cultural obsession of finding "meaning" instead of style in all artistic creation? Is beauty superficial? Or is beauty of one of those things that specifically separates art from mundane life, a thing that opens up new horizons? Is beauty dangerous, even threatening? (8)
One route to the "dangerous” nature of beauty runs through the aestheticism of the1800s, which in its day was conceived as a very radical way of experiencing the world. The only measure of beauty seemed to contain a complete aesthetic autonomy, which in turn merged with the erotic, often in homoerotic or gay meanings. Walter Pater (1839-1894), Oscar Wilde, Robert de Montesquiou-Fézensac (1855-1921) (9) and many others are examples of how aesthetic and erotic issues entangled to form a dense discourse in themselves. Considering the case of Visconti's latest works, the Marxist film critics of the 1970s had a hard time defining whether it was at all possible that someone from that kind of background, making extremely aesthetic films, and even gay, could effectively make progressive films? For many the answer was confused, leaning by default towards the negative. The central difficulty with the entanglement of the aesthetic and erotic was how its connection problematised the concepts of nature and the natural. If the issue was, after all, only style and understanding style, it became impossible to give or offer a definitive truth about beauty. If this was the case, this applied to morals, too. If books were not moral or immoral, but simply well or poorly written, then this transformed art into an area where man was released from his environment and its morals.
In his iconic way, the oft-quoted Oscar Wilde once remarked: ”To be really mediæval one should have no body. To be really modern one should have no soul. To be really Greek one should have no clothes.” (10) In this paradox we move simultaneously in the realms of simplification and multiple meanings. The Middle Ages were spiritual, while modernity is non-spiritual or materialistic, and the classical age is exemplified through aesthetically pleasing nudity and an ideal state of being. Wilde's way of dealing with things is, I believe, in many ways a relative to Palosuo's of artistic expression, because he trusts in, as does the Irish writer, the clarity of complexity or the ambiguity of simplicity. An example: we recognize a tulip or a crystal chandelier, and we begin to address the question of what this means. Next, we come up with different explanations or reasons why the object appears in the work. Very soon we perceive contradictory or complicating interpretations of our initial thought, and as a result recognise we've thought a lot, but wake to the fact that the ultimate truth is unattainable. What remains is rather a diversity or a masquerade of truths, in which the first idea can in principle be relied on, but not completely.
Another one of Oscar Wilde's most fascinating paradoxes states that: "We are all in the gutter, but some of us are looking at the stars."11 Like paradoxes, Wilde leaves the final significance open. In relation to Palosuo's paintings, it is perhaps worth to remind ourselves of the power of beauty. Beauty can snatch, destroy, challenge, enchant and perform all kinds of strange tricks. Beauty can just as well be complacent as attentive, loving or cruel, merciful or ruthless, yet in all beauty there is a common feature which challenges us. By definition, beauty is, to quote George Bataille's expression, unproductive waste i.e. heterogeneity, as it exists mainly for it's own sake, and due to the fact that we humans need something more in our lives than just neutralized rationalism, moderation, and boredom. Beauty is indeed in the eye of the beholder, because it clings to our skin and does not let us off the hook easily. Its cousin, or sibling, is love, but I'm not talking about that at this point, even if it is good to keep love in mind always.
Hannu Palosuo's latest works are in line with his previous output in the way they depend on the simultaneous and separate charm and horror of beauty. Compared to his earlier work, the artist has moved to even more loose meanings using multi-directional symbols, such as chandeliers and flowers. These paintings are linked more closely to the tradition of Western art history and contain little or no reference to new Nordic or Finnish cultures. They do not deny the artist's origin, but function as good paradoxes do, by being almost like empty canvases onto which the viewer can project their own meaning. Transparency is, however, only the second half of the paradox. The works are filled with references, but they are also deserted halls of mirrors, which tempt us to partake in secret rituals and meetings. Perhaps in these mirrored halls of meaning of Palosuo's we can all become like those who look towards the stars even when they lie in the gutter. Or perhaps we have arrived at a level called for by Sontag, where the interpretations do not deal with meanings, but rather with the sensual and erotic, that is, first hand experiences.
Juha-Heikki Tihinen 2008
Literature:
Barthes, Roland 2002: A Lover’s Discourse. Fragments. Translated by Richard Howard. Vintage Books, London.
Freud, Sigmund 2005: Murhe ja melankolia (Mourning and Melancholy). Teoksessa Murhe ja melankolia sekä muita kirjoituksia. Translated by Markus Lång. Vastapaino, Tampere.
Hauptman, Jodi 2005: Beyond the Visible. In Beyond the Visible. Art of Odilon Redon. The Museum of Modern Art, New York.
K-J. Huysmans 2005: (À Rebours) Vastahankaan. Translated into English as Against Nature, 1884. Translated by Antti Nylén, Desura, Helsinki.
Sontag, Susan 1966: Against Interpretation. In Against Interpretation and other essays. A Delta Book, New York. Tihinen, Juha-Heikki 2008: The uneasy borders of desire – Magnus Enckell’s representations of masculinities and femininities and the question of how to create the self. In SQS 1/2008.(http://www.helsinki.fi/jarj/sqs/sqs1_08/sqs_contents1_08.html)
Wilde, Oscar 2008: Valehtelun rappio. Teoksessa Naamioiden totuus ja muita esseitä. Suomentanut Timo Hännikäinen. Savukeidas, Turku.
Sontag 1966, 8
Sontag 1966, 14
Redon 1868, cited in Hauptman 2005, 33
Hauptman 2005, 34-35
Keeping in mind Mihail Bakhtin's ideas about polyphonic art, where different voices intersect, we are lead to even more complicated constellations. For art as means of developing the self, see Tihinen 2008.
Barthes 2002,133
Freud 2005
It is worth remembering that beauty and art are both bound to history and relative to culture. It is not perhaps meaningful to try to rate different aesthetical systems, but this doesn't take away from the importance of the relation between beauty and art.
The person Huysmans modeled des Essensteis on.
1A Few Maxims for the Instruction of the Overeducated, 1894
Act III, Lady Windermere's Fan, 1892 402 (Works of Oscar Wilde, Collins 1957)
