what is sans sensation? - introduction post

the story behind the user name, inspiration, and what the phrase means to me from an artist's perspective

“sensation is the opposite of the facile and the ready-made, the cliche, but also the “sensational”, the spontaneous, etc”

sans sensation

The goal of this substack is to not only hold myself accountable for the work I am producing for my honors degree, but to examine ideas that I come across.

For my honors project, I’m working with photogrammetry apps to create 3D scans of locations and buildings to visually depict the discord I feel between my own self of place and the lingering desire to capture memories of locations.
In my practice, a lack of physical and tacticle presence is understood as quite literally lacking sensation on the physical level. However, I endevor to imbue my work with digital artifacts and waste that clutters and adds visual texture, simulating sensation.

Treating this platform as a stream-of-conciousness blog, I will refrain from upholding anything but basic grammar.

Throwing stuff at the wall and seeing what sticks.

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background

I started my bachelors degree in 2018, the course was titled “creative arts”. It was a great space for me to learn how to set my own schedules and create under guidance. Starting tertiary education as an older person (looking back, 22 is not old per-say, but you get my drift) allowed me to use my maturity and focus on goals.

In 2020, during my final studio unit for my degree, I created a video work titled “sans sensation”. Prior, I had worked with multiple mediums throughout the course of my studies, however leaning back into digital formats felt correct for what I want to achieve with art. Concurrently, reading (or perhaps, trying to make sense of) Gilles Deleuze’s text Francis Bacon: the Logic of Sensation.

In it, Deleuze writes on Cezanne and Bacon, in particular one chapter: Painting and Sensation. In it, Deleuze states that Cezanne gave name to painting “beyond figuration” as “sensation”, as it “it acts immediately on the nervous system”.

This had an immediate effect on me, and while I admittedly need to read deeper into the text I believe ruminating on this concept of sensation has had an impact on how I view my art and practice.

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Thank you for reading, and thank you for coming along for the ride.

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