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Nora See
Zontanarhia

2012

About the Item

“Good artists borrow. Great artists steal.” A quote oft attributed to various sources that was never actually uttered by any of them. Though Mark Twain elaborated on the sentiment: “Ninety-nine parts of all things that proceed from the intellect are plagiarisms.” In the Framed Series, I use my 1% contribution to combine issues of consumption with my autobiography. I paint copies of copies of paintings within paintings to reference the appropriation, commodification, and altered continuum of art. My paintings of paintings are based on photographs of originals to perpetuate the continual distillation of form, given the ease with which images are presently exchanged and modified. Further, by reducing historically significant paintings to framed objects hanging on walls, I augment art as a commodity and reconcile the conflict between the artificially assigned monetary value of artworks with the reality that they are simply swirls of paint. In this way, I am also acknowledging the literality of my own work. I have also altered each copied painting to personalize the context of the pieces and address specific autobiographical ideas. These ideas relate to a range of both recent and distant experiences, both funny and sad. Although my initial renderings are digital image composites, my medium of choice is oil paint, applied in transparent layers, using the image on the computer screen as a reference. In addition to its lush visual properties, I enjoy the flexibility of oil paint in making acute renderings as well as the evolution of the imagery from paint to digital and back to paint in further protracting both the distillation and evolution of form. statement on piece "This piece is based on H.R. Giger’s 1976 Necronom IV, Giger’s first rendering of the creature that would ultimately become the xenomorph in the Aliens film franchise, a chilling predator that commingles rape and murder with reproduction. I transformed the predator narrative to that of a grief stricken parent. To emphasize this new dimension, the female creature in Zontanarhia lacks the immense size and detailed crown of the Aliens queen and is reoriented from Giger's horizontal position into a vertical, passive and morose bow towards the figure in the tube to recast the creature from villainous to sympathetic, a notion reinforced by the piece’s title. Giger’s piece, Necronom refers to Necronomicon, a fictional tome in the writings of H.P. Lovecraft. According to Lovecraft, the word “Necronomicon” is Greek that translates to “an image of the law of the dead,” as “nekros” translates to “dead,” “nomos” translates to “law,” and “eikon” translates to “image.” Although Lovecraft took liberties with his translation, which is incorrect, Giger’s abbreviated “Necronom” in fact means “law of the dead.” Using this loose method of Greek translation as a template, I combined “zontanós,” which means “alive” and “anarchía,” which means anarchy to form “Zontanarhia” to mean “anarchy of life,” as a testament to the fact that life does not obey expectations, manifested here in the death of a child."
  • Creator:
    Nora See (American)
  • Creation Year:
    2012
  • Dimensions:
    Height: 24 in (60.96 cm)Width: 18 in (45.72 cm)
  • Medium:
  • Movement & Style:
  • Period:
  • Condition:
  • Gallery Location:
    New Orleans, LA
  • Reference Number:
    1stDibs: LU10521291893

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