Alchemic Punk

Alchemic Punk began as a meditation on the functioning of the enneagram. It follows a single premise, “to create art that is objective”.  Between The Work of Gurdjieff and my own, many similarities will be found. I have created ways to visually express Aim, Identification, Observation, and other concepts that are pertinent to Gurdjieff studies. Many of the pieces reference the enneagram, the ray of creation, the law of three, and the law of seven.

Alchemic art, in its classical sense, is an art of taking meaningful elements and placing them in relationship to one another in certain ways to express hidden or occult meaning.

Kenney

While any phenomenon can be applied to the shapes I employ, I approach the art as if it represents the phenomena of thought. Everything in the art represents various types of thoughts interacting with one another or changing due to influences from the world and other thoughts around them.

The Primitive Shapes

The primitive shapes represent individual identifications or basic thoughts. Each shape is an abstract description of a thought phenomena.

Thinking thoughts

Spherical and round shapes – represent thinking thoughts which are the thoughts that we can hear in our head, our memories, rationalizations, reasoning.

Moving thoughts

Triangular and pyramidal shapes- represent moving thoughts which are thoughts that are involved in managing our way through the world. Often things that are learned and done automatically.

Emotional thoughts

Cubic and Hexagonal shapes- represent emotional thoughts. These are thoughts that centered around our emotions and feelings, our inner world.

Extruded Shapes

The extruded shapes represent mental structures that form through conditioning, practice, or repetition. These are thought compounds which are groups of thoughts that are associated with one another.

Compound Shapes

The compound shapes are loose groups of identifications that are familiar with one another through association. This is the most basic form of a thought complex or “chain of identifications.”

These even more complex shapes represent identifications that have become Chief features over time. They most often represent states of considering and various forms of attachment.

Identifications that have become so ingrained and so powerful they are noticeable parts of the personality.

Rings and Curves

The rings and curves represent Aim. The rings and curves are glimpses of an infinite assemblage that will never end. It is only for artistic balance that I make them closed circles or terminate the ends.

Petals

The petals and fins represent the points at which impressions and shocks enter into an octave. These points will always be placed along an Aim. For something to happen it has to happen in time.

The Nested Shapes

The nested shapes represent point of view or perspective. We are always seeing things from a different perspective depending on what we are identifying with at the time when something happens.

Our perspective is just a point along our narrative.

Orbiting Spheres

Orbiting spheres represent polarity, positive and negative, yin and yang, dark and light, inner and outer, etc. The larger sphere represents the currently dominant polarity. The smaller sphere that orbits the larger one represents the other polarity in potential waiting for its chance to shift.

Positive and negative dark and light they’re always in an eternal dance with one another.

Cables and Ribbons

Narratives are how we see ourselves and our life so far. The narrative is our point of view over time, or autobiographical self.

Spiraling Spheres

Chief features are identifications that become so pronounced they are our main personality traits. These are identifications are so pronounced we know we have these traits. Often, we feel like they are our best qualities, even though they cannot be.

The Colors

The colors represent the types of identifications. The golden colors represent ingrained thoughts. Thoughts that have become so mechanical that they are habitual. These are the thoughts that make up our personality and make us who we are. When we see the brassy gold color we are looking at a metaphor for our self.

Silver and gray

The silver gray colors represent thoughts and identifications that are of our essence. These are the thoughts and identifications that we are born with, thoughts that we all have and share.

I am sparing with the silver and gray, the represent something that is present in very limited quantities.

Gold and  yellow

Gold represents thoughts and identifications that are of our personality. This is something that’s forever changing depending on who and what it’s interacting with at the moment.

I’m very generous with the golds and yellows, it seems as if we are all personality and ego.

Red green blue and blue-green

The red greens and blues describe elemental signature of the thoughts or identification.

These colors are always alternating or slowly turning to gold as they become part of the personality or forgotten for the next identification.

The various bits and pieces represent states of transition and change. This transformation is meant to depict the change of ourselves as we interact with the world around us.