The Problem of Autobiographical Art

The artist’s hand makes anything they create a projection of themselves, the individuality of an artwork is as much in the nature of the artist as it is in the slight of their wrist. This lends weight to the argument that all art work is - in a broader sense - self-portraiture, for the artist will put far more of themselves into any work than they are conscious of. There is a purity to this, and it is often in artwork that is not intentionally self-reflective that the true nature of the artist is revealed. Intentional self-reflection is by its intentionality self-aware, and therefore self-edited. The problem of overt self-editing is one I find both in my own studio practice and in the work of others.

During my foundation studies in Falmouth, I perhaps subconsciously avoided working autobiographically. During the first month I made two small autobiographical collages, reflecting on the anxieties that presented themselves in the face of the utterly new experience. Though cathartic, I find that replaying anxieties and experiences though a creative frame with the mind to create work is not always the way to solve the problem. At the time I found it more beneficial to occupy myself otherwise, and I found that through doing this that my problems often resolved themselves.

Stay Away From Constantinople, Mixed media collage - Sept 2014

I then spent the rest of the first and the second semester working on projects where a concept/manifesto was central. I enjoyed this enormously, and though I remained in a state of emotional fluctuation, I released this through the physicality of my work, the meticulous rigour acting as a form of emotional control. I now look back on the work I created during this times and do see, despite the fact that the subject matter is not autobiographical, a reflection of my emotional state at the time.

One of my issues with artwork that seeks to explore the mental state of the artist or those around them is the dishonesty of giving those things a solid form. Emotion is anything but tangible and solid, and the material that you chose to enshrine those things in will only ever present an illusion of that feeling, "Ceci n'est pas une pipe.”. Often what the artist creates is not a satisfactory representation of what they were trying to capture, and whereas with a solid object the artist can compare their representation and assess how lifelike their rendering is, emotion has no definitive form to compare the representation to.

The act of enshrining become problematic too, and like a religious relic, the experience the artist is reflecting upon becomes enshrouded in gold leaf. The act of recalling and articulating the experience repeatedly becomes dishonest also, and the subconscious edits. It is important to remember that our minds create memory from scratch when we recall it. It is easy at this point to both consciously and subconsciously make decisions on how we represent these things that are selective, and even make decisions that deliberately place ourselves as part of the ‘tortured artist’ tradition, the experiences of others before us, often those of people we admire, do affect the way we reflect.

Of course, much of this is completely subconscious and therefore all but inevitable. I had seen this as an unsurmountable obstacle, and had therefore avoided autobiographical work out of fear of my own dishonesty. It was only when considering this further, and thinking about the self-reflective artwork that I particularly admire, that I came to a realisation. The key to successful autobiographical work is doubt. An acknowledgement (not necessarily overt and often more grounded in tone) of the artists potentially dishonesty, and the inevitable dishonesty of the intangible taking tangible form, paradoxically makes the work feel more honest.

It was with this in mind that I created a small autobiographical installation for our end of semester exhibition. A site specific piece responding to the studio-come-exhibition space that I have been working in, I have brought together five small works. They are all pieces that seem to me, as the maker, irresolute, and therefore mirror the experience concerned. Many feelings never get to the point of being representable by a single word, let alone a solid object. Not all are representational in any way, one; a simple assemblage of wooden children’s building bricks was not created with any one experience in mind, it was created in a place of mindlessness. Sometimes all you need do is remove thought, and what is created through the simple act of making is completely honest and without pretence.

14/15, Installation - Dec 2015

This work is the single most satisfactory autobiographical piece I have created, and has made me more comfortable with allowing myself into my work. Both overly considered self-reflection and rigorously controlled concept can be barriers to the truth of the artist showing through the work, and this one time, I think I may have caught that balance.