The temporal conditions of the static image : repetition as an engine of difference

Abstract

This practice-based research project addresses what might be considered a reasonably straightforward question: what, if anything, can be achieved in painting from what is often perceived to be a most unpromising strategy for the visual artist - that of repetition? The emergence of repetitive strategies in my own painting practice generated three questions that form the basis of a PhD project that examines the relations between repetition, time, and painting: • How does repetition reposition the temporal conditions of the static painted image? • What are the operational means of repetition as an engine of difference?1 • How does repetition temporalise the space of its encounter?2 This thesis proposes that repetition is not only a force that unlocks a multiplicity of incidences in both space and time, but that it is an engine of difference. In order to address the research questions, and substantiate these claims for repetition, a series of forty paintings titled Repetition from Reproduction were produced in order to be apprehended within what I have described as an open labyrinth, an installation space wherein Repetition from Reproduction are encountered both sequentially and simultaneously. The open labyrinth operates as a material field in which the temporal conditions of painting are tested. Keywords: Repetition, Difference, Painting, Time, Space, Trompe L’Oeil, Labyrinths