On His Work as an Independent Surrealist Painter

Leonardo

On His Work as an Independent Surrealist PainterAuthor(s): Michael HastedSource: Leonardo, Vol. 13, No. 3 (Summer, 1980), pp. 186-191Published by: The MIT PressStable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/1577815 .

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Leonardo, Vol. 13, pp. 186-191, Pergamon Press, 1980. Printed in Great Britain.

ON HIS WORK AS AN

INDEPENDENT SURREALIST PAINTER

Michael Hasted*

Abstract-The author sets out his beliefs and motivations, the understanding of which is crucial in order to gain an insight into his strange and disturbing world. In his statements about the use of the subconscious as a motivating force, he reveals points of agreement, but mostly disagreement, with many orthodox surrealists both past and present. He states that he is adverse to most of those who labour under the banner of art and is particularly critical of most contemporary, non-figurative painters. He discusses his paintings in broad terms and explains the significance of the various objects and situations that recur in them. He goes on to describe in detail the paintings that are reproduced to illustrate the article. In closing, he gives his views on the imprudence of comparing his works with those of Magritte.

I.

I am not normally very conscious of my motivating forces nor of any rationale for the way I work. I do not frequently stop to analyze my actions, for I find that spontaneity is a better ally than contri- vance and that extensive analysis, discussion and debate about painting is not only fruitless but also a little distracting. I think painting is and should be a solitary occupation and that one must seek one's own answers-or, more importantly, ask one's own questions. The answer is inevitably an anti-climax to the question. After a certain initial reluctance to write this article, I decided that a subjective review of my work might be an interesting and revealing exercise. The clarification of my beliefs and motives are of primary consideration, for without them my paintings would not exist.

Fundamentally, I believe in freedom from ra- tional, aesthetic and moral restrictions, in order that one is able to have a better insight into the processes of thought. Although I obviously have a certain amount in common with Surrealism, there are large areas of Breton's ideology and current surrealist dogma to which I find myself unsympathetic.

I am at variance with the proposed application of methods of automatism [1] and the denial of the intervention of conscious thought as a means of focusing the subconscious into a tangible form. I therefore have nothing in common with, say, either Miro or Matta. I find myself in opposition to the inflexible political position adopted by many of the original surrealists and, in more recent years, fervently developed by certain

*Surrealist painter, 65 St. Peter's St., London, N1, Eng- land. (Received 13 March 1979)

groups. Many of today's self-styled surrealists seem to me to be set on a road with bigotry as their guide. Their activities appear to be motiv- ated by political ideology pursued with such dogmatic fervour that they are surely precluding the very essence of Surrealism itself. They also seem addled by an inability to move forward without first consulting Breton, Marx, Rimbaud, Laut- reamont et al, for guidance and approval. Of course Breton did say many things that I find worthy of note, for instance, that it was impera- tive 'for experiments of the inner life to continue without an external check, even a Marxist one'. The fact that my views are unfashionable and incompatible with most contemporary surrealist thought causes me little or no distress, for I am happy to retain my independence on my journey of personal discovery.

However, my views are far from passive. I believe in untiringly questioning anything and everything, in denying preconceptions and revealing the marvellous wherever I find it. In my paintings I seek to redefine such notions as reality and fact, so they are not caged by fixed ideas. To accept something is to submit to it and consequently to be inhibited by it. The limitations of widely accepted views stifle my soul and the scope of my imagination. Acceptance is a tyranny one imposes on oneself. My aim is to express ideas that provide an alternative to dull routine and an incentive to look at the world anew.

The unfettered mind scorns such dogmatic con- cepts as reality and exposes them as fraudulent usurpers. I am concerned with a state of mind where anything is possible, and I wish to explore and discover things that before were only perhaps suspected or glimpsed in dreams. Although I do not attempt to present my dreams pictorially (in

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On His Work as an Independent Surrealist Painter

fact, I rarely remember the dreams I have while I sleep), I do, in some aspects of my work, try to harness and control the urges of dreams to present, in a painting, a situation that has the same disturbing, marvellous and mysterious attributes. Asleep, while one's mind functions in a subconscious world where anything is possible, one accepts events and visions that, if experienced during waking hours, would cause a state of hysteria.

I take the proposition of an idea as much more important than one's ability to prove it, especially when the very concept of proof itself is often built on the same shaky foundations as most arbitrary solutions. In an essay of mine [2], I sought to describe a world where inanimate objects existed independently of humans. I said: 'Is it not possible that these so-called man-made objects existed before man in their own right? . . . Is it not conceivable that man discovered the spoon, not invented it? . . . What great works of literature were produced by the private consortation between pen and paper long before man came along and inhibited them with his own creative limitations?

'Man's narrow view of what he calls ecology has no place for windows that cry or pavements that sing love songs to rusty umbrellas. Because his view of the world is conditioned and focused by his own inadequate knowledge it is totally unreal and restricted to the things that fall well within the strictly defined norm. The human race is inhibited more by its knowledge than by its ignorance. Man cannot see anything without a point of reference that he is already familiar with. He cannot see what he cannot conceive. How different the world would be seen through the eyes of a blade of grass-would man still be so important or would he exist in his rightful place alongside paper-clips and walnut shells?

'One day the objects will not be content with the insignificance man places on them. They will want to assert themselves and rule the world. The mountains will become presidents and the clouds will become kings and man will be banished to a life of exile upon a dusty shelf.'

In this essay I suggested the possibility that artifacts were capable of breaking away from human influence and authority. Life would be better if humans were also capable of operating independently of widely accepted behavioural patterns, customs and rituals. One is steadily suppressed by society's expectations. The Church organizations, political institutions, educational authorities, family structures, etc. strive to keep one in one's place under such banners as good, bad, right, wrong, honesty and morality. Most people seem quite content within this state of affairs, for it gives them security and a sense of belonging and of sharing a common aim-crude materialism. They have an avid distrust of pursuits of the spirit.

Herman Hesse in his 1917 essay entitled Lan-

guage expressed it better than I can: 'The average citizen likes to compare the dreamer to a mad- man. The average citizen is right in feeling that he would immediately go mad if, like the artist . . . he allowed himself to become acquainted with the abyss within him. We may call the abyss the soul, the unconscious or whatever; out of it comes every impulse of our lives. The average citizen has set a watchman between himself and his soul, a consciousness, a morality, a security police and he recognizes nothing that comes directly from that abyss of the soul before it has been given that watchman's stamp of approval. The artist's con- stant distrust, however, is not directed against the region of the soul but precisely against that bor- der watchman's authority; the artist secretly comes and goes between this side and that, between the conscious and the unconscious, as though at home in both houses!, [3].

Although in broad agreement with Hesse's sentiments, I do tend to shudder at the word artist. I dislike describing myself as an artist; it is a word laden with preconceptions and associations, none of which I would want to associate myself with. I have little in common with anything that congregates under the banner of art. The whole art establishment seems to me to be built on a premise of precedent and academism. Academ- ism cannot be a substitute for creativity. In my opinion, art historians suck the blood from the present and pour it over the ashes of the past. I agree with Bernard Newman's wisecrack that aesthetics for artists is like ornithology for birds- although, evidently, birds are incapable of de- veloping a discipline of ornithology-but then, they do not need to.

There are very few contemporary trends in visual art with which I have anything in common, and I am especially unsympathetic to most 20th- century non-figurative, especially Minimal, art. I often feel the situation has much in common with the children's story entitled 'The Emperor's New Clothes' in which an emperor is persuaded by an unscrupulous confidence trickster to buy a non- existent suit of clothes. The emperor does not like to question or doubt the salesman for fear of appearing an ignoramus. When the emperor par- ades his 'new clothes' before his subjects, they, also not wishing to appear unsophisticated, ap- plaud him vehemently. Only one small boy in the crowd, unaware of the expectations of society, asks in a very loud voice, 'Why is the emperor naked?'

Although I agree that the search for new truths should be maintained and intensified, I do feel, as I indicated above, that many contemporary artists are sowing seeds on barren ground.

II.

As my prime concern and motivation is the pictorial interpretation of the subconscious and the presentation of new aspects of reality, con-

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Michael Hasted

sideration of artistic qualities such as colour, form and composition are of minor importance. I have found that people on occasions when looking at my paintings have appeared to be distracted by a painting's aesthetic qualities so that they have overlooked my intended more fundamental impli- cations. As a result of these experiences, I have made an effort to reduce these qualities in my pictures. In their execution I now try to use a 'non-style'-to strike a balance between painting so well that the technique overshadows the content and, on the other hand, painting so badly that the painting is artistically offensive to look at and, consequently, equally distracting. By strik- ing this balance-producing an almost banal style-I hope that what is depicted in a painting will be unhindered by consideration of artistic qualities. This ambition is also promoted by presenting the subject depicted in as direct, simple a way as possible. Unless I am trying to portray a situation where the environment is an integral part, the subject is usually placed in the centre foreground of the painting, almost as if it were having its photograph taken [4].

Another aspect of presenting the picture in such a matter-of-fact way is my hope that the subversion is all the more surreptitious. It is almost as if the paintings are in disguise-mas- querading as an old friend who suddenly turns and kicks you in the rump. If I painted in a more flamboyant, outrageous style it would perhaps give some portent of what to expect.

I try to retain this simplicity, this 'non-style', in my use of colour. As a rule, I use only eight colours, including black and white, and I prefer the medium of oil paint on canvas. I feel no need to elaborate or to embellish textural subtleties and spectral nuances-for me, the sky is simply blue, grass is green and stone is gray. I do find geometric perspective a very useful device, but I often use it against itself and deviate from its principles when exploring aspects of scale and illusions of depth.

I may have given the impression that my 'non- style' has been very consciously contrived. This is not so. I have had no formal training as a painter and have not painted or foresee painting anything but the kind of pictures reproduced in this article (Figs. 1 to 4 and 6 to 8; Fig. 5, see colour plate). It could be said that some of my pictures are presented as almost theatrical tableaux-the curtain rises and the scene is revealed. This theatrical comparison could perhaps be employed to describe my use of what virtually amounts to a repertoire of objects and pictorial devices and a stage-dock full of backdrops and sets, most of which I use over and over again. This approach suits my purpose well, and I feel no need to excuse or justify it. There are certain images-a jig-saw piece for example-that open up a limit- less number of endless paths enabling me to explore them in many directions and on several levels. Other objects such as a diver's helmet

Fig. 1. 'The Captive Heart', oil on canvas, 66x76cm, 1977. Collection of Vicomte d'Halluin, Paris)

(Fig. 1), masks, books, rocks and trees have for me such intrinsic character, intrigue and menace that they command my attention and investigation while inevitably still retaining their secrets.

It would, however, be a mistake to think of the subjects and objects I use as symbols and of my pictures as allegories. As a rule, each picture is a statement about the object or of the situation contained within it in its own right. The fact that I rarely show the faces of people is not a matter of any deep symbolic significance either. It is just that in most instances I am concerned with por- traying 'a man' or 'a woman' and not with iden- tifying them as particular individuals. It is difficult to show a face and not give some indication of the kind of person behind it. When I find that a person in a painting does need to be identified, I keep the facts about that person to the minimum needed to make that identification-usually a vocational not a personal one. The same applies to clothes. Unless persons are to be vocationally identified (nun, detective, undertaker, etc.), I depict their garb as nondescriptly as possible. In some cases the occupants of a picture are passive and find themselves drawn into a strange situation just as the viewer will be. In several of my paintings, including 'A Matter of Conscience' (Fig. 2) [5], a possibly threatening man can be seen apparently following a naked lady. I have certainly not consciously introduced symbolism into these pictures, not a sexist motive. There is nothing to indicate who is the active party-is the man following or is he being led by her? These matters are left for interpretation to viewers whose subconscious emotions relating to the subject may possibly be aroused.

Sometimes I 'see' the finished picture spontaneously in my mind, and it then just has to be reproduced on the canvas. I very rarely change a picture once I have started painting it. At other times, the germ of an idea presents itself, and I develop it by various means until it reveals new

188




investigation into a jig-saw piece, were quite different. In 'The Certainty of Chance' (Fig. 3), for example, I presented certain ideas regarding the relationship of the piece to the whole. The component parts of an object (or indeed an idea) are, evidently, quite independent and have widely differing characteristics from those of the whole object. Normally, when component parts come together in anything from a motor-car engine to a loaf of bread, their individual existence is subju- gated by the whole. In 'The Certainty of Chance' I showed, simultaneously, the whole and its independent component parts. In 'A Right of Way' (Fig. 4), a piece of forest finds itself isolated in the

Fig. 2. 'A Matter of Conscience', oil on canvas, 96 x 76 cm, 1976. (Collection of Mr. and Mrs. H. Bryers, New York City)

plete in my mind. The 'jig-saw' pictures are a good example of this. Starting from the basic jig-saw puzzle idea, I was able to produce many paintings that, while retaining the same basic ;-

.. ._.......

asFig. 4. 'A Right of Way', oil on canvas, 51 x 40.5 cm, 1976.

middle of a desert. The idea of a piece of forest should be no less tangible than the idea of a piece of cake. There is another interesting question raised by this painting: 'Is the gap left in the forest now a desert?'

In 'A Paragon of Virtue' (Fig. 5, see colour plate) the relationship between the part and the whole is explored in a different way. Stone and sand may consist of the same substance, only the form of the substance is different, but, by presenting the sand in the form of the stone, the idea of of cake. the hour-glass, and indeed time itself, is ridiculed and left open to doubt.

I also explore ideas like the shape of the sky and the possible independence of shadows and reflections. In 'The Right of Silence' (Fig. 6), I suggested that perhaps typewriters are able to express ideas of nature (in this case the sky) as well as those of humans, while in 'A Change of Scene' (Fig. 7) [6] the sky appears to be a flat,

Fig. 3. 'The Certainty of Chance', oil on canvas, 76 x 56 cm. tangible object that can be moved at will like a 1977 piece of stage scenery.

189



Michael Hasted

existed on Earth before humans, that is, humans evolved to find a basic, fundamental knowledge already intrinsically'established. 'The First Step' (Fig. 8) explores this idea. A scroll has been

Fig. 6. 'The Right of Silence', oil on canvas, 61 x 51 cm, 1976. (Collection of Comte de Montaigu, London and Paris)

Fig. 8. 'The First Step', oil on canvas, 91x71cm, 1976. (Collection of Lord Kimberley, London)

Fig. 7.'A Change of Scene', oil on canvas, 91x65cm, 1977. (Collection of and ? Deutscher Sparkassenverlag, Stuttgart)

Pursuing a similar path to that explored in 'The Private Lives and Secret Ambitions of Various Objects', I am intrigued by the idea that some sort of knowledge or a non-human 'civilization'

washed up onto a tiled beach, the trees have not yet permanently settled in the soil, the sky is still in an embryonic state, and it is a very long time before humans will appear.

I give most of the paintings a title after they have been completed, and the title often appears as spontaneously as my mental visual image of it did. I rarely seek to use a title to explain or to further the understanding of a painting. In fact, on many occasions I choose the title deliberately to confuse and confound viewers. Occasionally, the titles are deliberately cryptic, as in 'Whistling Jack II' (Fig. 9). Originally, the picture was executed as a photo-montage. The person who modelled for the photographs was a friend, who many years before, had made a gramophone record under the pseudonym of Whistling Jack Smith. The final painting obscures his true identi- ty, and its title serves to further this aim.

m.

I think it would be a mistake, in closing, for me not to make any mention of the cross I have to bear-comparison with Magritte [7]. I think that any similarities either in style or, more especially, in content are superficial. Those who make the comparison reveal, in themselves, either a distinct lack of knowledge or awareness of Magritte's work or a singular lack of insight into mine. In

190




Fig. 9. 'Whistling Jack II', oil on canvas, 91x71 cm, 1976. (Collection of M. et Mme. Wack, Paris)

spite of the wide range of surrealist styles and approaches, when one presents figurative subjects and situations it is very difficult not to find oneself colliding with and sometimes even appearing to duplicate the work of a kindred spirit. My paintings certainly have as much in common with those of say Delvaux, de Chirico, Dali and the more representational figurative works of Ernst as with

Magritte, but, because of superficial differences, these similarities are not so obvious. There is, of course, the hypothesis that there is a collective human subconscious. I shall not get involved in argument about it in this article except to say that the subconscious is a very different and separate world from the one that is usually described as the real world. It is a place where 'normality' does not apply and one exists on a plane that is much more attuned to affairs of the spirit than to mundane materialistic pursuits.

REFERENCES

1. A. Breton, Manifestoes of Surrealism, translated by R. Seaver and H. R. Lane (Ann Arbor: Univ. of Michigan Press, 1972).

2. M. Hasted, 'The Private Lives and Secret Ambitions of Various Objects', exhibition catalogue (Paris: Galerie 3+2, 1976).

3. H. Hesse, Language (an essay written in 1917) (Berlin: Suhrkamp, 1957). Translation by D. Lindley (New York: Farrar, Straus & Giroux, 1974).

4. A. Bangert, Michael Hasted, Novum Gebrauchsgraphik (Munich), p. 41 (No. 4, 1979).

5. Kultur & Kritik, Minchner Merkur (19 Dec. 1975). 6. Michael Hasted, Minchner Merkur, P. 9 (11 Apr. 1979). 7. N. Neumann, Rosa Zeiten fir grine Mannchen, Ster

(Hamburg), p. 162 (30 Nov. 1978).

BIBLIOGRAPHY

1.

2.

3.

4.

5.

J. Davison, Putting Us All in the Picture, Islington Gazette (London), p. 16 (13 Dec. 1974). 'Hasted', exhibition catalogue (London: London Arts Gallery, 1975). O. Blakeston, Michael Hasted, Arts Review, p. 538 (19 Sept. 1978). 'Michael Hasted', exhibition catalogue (London: Fortes- cue Swann Gallery, 1978). A. Terry-Engel, New Surrealist Paintings by Michael Hasted, Arts Review, p. 73 (17 Feb. 1978).

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Top left: Aleksey Remizov. 'Solomonia', Indian ink and coloured pencil on paper, 15 x 16.5 cm, 1935. (Collection of N. V. Reznikoff, Cachan, Seine, France) (Fig. 9, see page 235)

Top right: Ralph Gander. 'Symbophilium, No. 13: The Labyrinth of the Mind', collage, Pavatex, oil pastels, color prints, 30 x 30 cm 1971. (Fig. 3, see page 211)

Bottom left: Helen Escobedo. 'Torres Vibrantes (Vibrant Towers)', model, 1/50 scale, 1978. (Photo: Paolo Gori, Mexico City) (Fig. 7, see page 179)

Bottom right: Michael Hasted. 'A Paragon of Virtue', oil on canvas, 94x71 cm, 1977. (Fig. 5, see page 189)















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On His Work as an Independent Surrealist Painter