Oliver R. Meschnig

broken keys series

eons collide

Media changed recently. The media one consumes, the perception of it and of oneself as the conveying medium - the shift in itself is significant. It’s not that there is just a new form how media is delivered, its hierarchical structure was completely turned upside down. A revolution in its literal meaning. The top-down architecture of the traditional media does not apply to the media we perceive in the 21st century any more. But does the social in social media really make it a collective endeavour where each one participates equally? As with many revolutions it started by a critical basis which was thriving for utopian goals like equality. Soon the established ones became the new masters. Isn’t it always like this? In the very beginning of each change its negation, its opposite is always already there. Looming and waiting. As Adorno and Horkheimer coined it: with every Myth-overthrowing Logos a new Myth is born. The King is dead, long live the King. That is the topos of eons collide. It illustrates that game-changing event by the usage of old hard disks and torn out book pages. Ages of handwritten scriptures handed onto the next generation meet ephemeral digitised information ready to be cast away on the next occasion. A momentum that tears away the old petrified habitus only to replace it with a new custom as rigid and static as the old one which is being being nebulous in its substance on the other hand is depicted through the fluid strokes which are contrasted with the high contrasting colors and the different medias meeting in the artwork. A well seated and therefore fossilised empire of media representatives meets their young and dynamic usurpers. The superficiality of Hollywood is surpassed by the honesty of masses. The like button as a democratic revolution – if it weren’t for the all-seeing algorithm.

Post-dionysian expressionism

This is the general theme that thrives all of the artists works. While Nietzsche saw two fundamental momenta in the ancient Greek's art and culture - the Apollonian and the Dionysian - these concepts have lost their purpose and ability to describe the surrounding cultural context in its entirety. In a post-colonial age we have outgrown the shackles of a singular root and causation for our sociocultural habitus. But still the ecstatic frenzy that is described by the Dionysian is found in western countries as well as indigenous tribes as well. The German word Rausch describes this much more accurately then the English words of ecstasy, frenzy or intoxication. To bring this border-transcending basis of society into contrast with its equally far-reaching antagonistic principle the Apollinic in the form of western influenced science and reasoning onto the canvas in order to illustrate its common day battle is the goal here. As with most of his paintings the artist tries to keep the dichotomy of the juxtaposing colours alive whilst playing with the contrast to the stale background. The confrontation and simultaneously unity of colours, contrast and background prove their belonging to one and the same realm.