PAINTING THE PARADOX OF EMPTINESS

BARBARA OSULLIVAN

In partial fulfilment of the requirements of the Master of Fine Arts Whitecliffe College of Arts and Design, 2007

ABSTRACT
This research is concerned with how the Buddhist concept of emptiness and the union of opposites impact both on contemporary art and art theory. This particular understanding of emptiness provides a platform for both philosophical and scientific discourse as it challenges our apprehension of reality and our response to the world by proposing that matter (including ourselves) is simultaneously existent and non-existent, hence, a paradox. Seeing the world as dual is part of a need for certainty and the ability to construct meaning within language. Emptiness is generally accepted to mean a void, nothingness or meaninglessness and may therefore be subsequently associated with negativity. Emptiness however, can also mean empty of intrinsic existence and can be associated with joy, spaciousness, and clarity. This is grounded in my belief in the Buddhist tradition and its translation of the Sanskrit Shunyata, which is a form of Mahayana Buddhist philosophy that focuses on the notion of emptiness. The aim of this research was to consider what place the experience of emptiness occupies in Western art. Who else is asking this question and what are their conclusions, if any? How have they interpreted this in their art practice? Many of these questions were resolved, but not as anticipated. I have discovered that it is indeed possible to express the paradox of emptiness as the paint, the painter and the painting become inseparable. Materials are needed to communicate the immaterial, the tangible to suggest the intangible, relative truths to convey absolute truths, the dual to point to the non-dual and in the act of creating a work of art, we are actually recreating ourselves. KEYWORDS Emptiness Buddhism Non-dualism Opposites Paradox Shunyata

CONTENTS ABSTRACT KEYWORDS CONTENTS LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS LIST OF TABLES INTRODUCTION CHAPTER ONE: EXPLORING EMPTINESS Emptiness Union of Opposites Science and Art Emptiness and Form CHAPTER TWO: EMPTINESS IN CONTEMPORARY ART Gretchen Albrecht and Joan Mitchell Hemispheres and Expressionism Spiritual Connections Symbolising the Divine Alejandra Repetto Escardo Lee Ufan CHAPTER THREE: BEING AND BECOMING The Ambiguous Endeavour Exploring the Paradox of Emptiness The Ten Ox Herding Pictures Made for Each Other CONCLUSION REFERENCES BIBLIOGRAPHY 2 2 3 4 5 6 12 12 15 18 20 24 24 26 34 36 37 39 41 41 42 45 54 58 62 66

LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS
Figure 1 Gretchen Albrecht Cope 1983 Acrylic on canvas, two panels, 1220mm. x 2442mm. Retrieved May 24, 2006 from www.fernergalleries.co.nz......................................... 28 Figure 2 Joan Mitchell Untitled 1992. Oil on canvas diptych 258cm. x 200cm. Retrieved July 13, 2007 from www.haberarts.com/mitchell.jpg .............................................. 30 Figure 3 Piero della Francesca Madonna del Parto. 1467 260cm. x 203cm. Retrieved July 10, 2007 from www.italica.rai.it/.../galleria/7.htm ............................................................. 31 Figure 4 Gretchen Albrecht The Fire & The Rose 1984 Acrylic on unpinned canvas 2 stretchers joined 1525mm. x 3050mm. Collection of The Sargeant Gallery Wanganui. Retrieved May 24, 2006 from www.city-gallery.org.nz........................................... 32 Figure 5 Joan Mitchell La Grande Vallee No 0 1983 Oil on canvas 259.08cm. x 200.02cm. Retrieved May 24, 2006 from www.arco.ifema.es ................................................... 33 Figure 6 Alejandra Repetto Escardo Untitled No. 174 2005 Acrylic over linen. 80cm. x 160cm. Retrieved August 8, 2006 from www.alejandrarepetto.com.ar .................... 38 Figure 7 Lee Ufan From Line 1977 507cm.x 400cm. Retrieved July 13, 2007 from www.cmndz.com ............................................................................................................................. 39 Figure 8 Barbara OSullivan No Separation 2006 Plastic & acrylic on canvas 71cm. x 71cm. Collection of the Artist. ................................................................................................... 46 Figure 9 Barbara OSullivan Hello Darkness Be My Friend 2006 Plastic & acrylic on canvas 71cm. x 71 cm. Collection of the artist. ........................................................................... 48 Figure 10 Barbara OSullivan The Inside is the Outside: The Outside is the Inside (Detail) 2006 Plastic & acrylic on canvas 71cm. x 71cm. Collection of the artist. ............................... 51 Figure 11 Barbara OSullivan No Sacred Cows Left 2007 Pencil and Gold Nail on Wall 71cm. x 71cm. Collection of the artist................................................................................. 52 Figure 12 Barbara OSullivan The Water Flows by Itself & the Flowers Are Naturally Red 2007 Plastic & acrylic on canvas 71cm. x 71cm. Collection of the artist. ....................... 53 Figure 13 Barbara OSullivan Choose the Colours of Your World 2007 Plastic & acrylic on board 71cm. x 71cm. Collection of the artist ........................................................... 54 Figure 14 Barbara OSullivan Made for Each Other 2007 4.5m x 4.5m Acrylic paint & shellac on plastic. Collection of the artist ................................................................................ 56 Figure 15 Barbara OSullivan Made for Each Other 2007 4.5m x 4.5m Acrylic paint & shellac on plastic. Collection of the artist ................................................................................ 56

LIST OF TABLES Table 1: The Heart Sutra (n.d.) George Boeree interpretation Retrieved August 1, 2007 from http://webspace.ship.edu/cgboer/heartsutra.htmlError! Bookmark not defined.

INTRODUCTION
In the heart of Emptiness there is a mysterious impulse, mysterious because there is actually nothing in the heart of Emptiness (for there is nothing in Emptiness, period). Yet, there it is, this mysterious impulse to . . . create. To sing, to shine, to radiate; to send forth, reach out, and celebrate; to sing and shout and walk about; to effervesce and bubble over, this mysterious exuberance at the heart of Emptiness (Wilber, 1998, p.186).

This research is concerned with the paradoxical challenges involved in expressing emptiness through painting. The definition of emptiness in the context of this study and my studio practice originates from personal experience, the realisation of emptiness as a spaciousness containing opposites yet not defined by any singularity, and is supported by my research into the connections between emptiness, spirituality, science, philosophy and art. There is a strong connection between my studio and meditation practices, for both require prolonged periods of concentration, mindfulness and awareness, which Buddhist teacher Thich Nhat Hanh calls necessary awareness (cited in Smith,1999, p. 144). Awareness is about paying attention, as Marcel Duchamp said, everything in the world is worthy of our attention . . . our attention is the creative act (cited in Baas, 2004, p. 20). Kenneth K. Inada1 describes meditation as the instrument by which dichotomies of all kinds are resolved in order to perceive things in fullness (2000, p. 87). The definition of emptiness which is elaborated on in Chapter One is considered as a non-dual position simultaneously containing the apparent opposites of both emptiness and fullness. I examine how the idea of the paradoxical union of opposites challenges our notions of the nature of reality and how this has impacted on both scientific and artistic discourse. The link between emptiness and spiritual art is also established.

Distinguished Service Professor in the Department of Philosophy at the University of Buffalo

The source of my position which I believe most clearly describes the connection between emptiness and form and is also based on personal lived experience, is The Heart Sutra which is defined by Jean Smith, editor of Radiant Mind: Essential Buddhist Teachings & Texts as perhaps because of both its profundity and its brevity . . . the most familiar of all the original teachings of the Buddha (1999, p. 178). In order to establish my position and clarify the source of my understanding, I believe that it is important at this point to include here George Boerees2 full interpretation of The Heart Sutra, (Table 1), as it provides by way of illustration, a connection that is important in the context of this discussion.

Ph.D. in Psychology at Shippensburg University

The Heart Sutra Avalokiteshvara, the Bodhisattva of Compassion, meditating deeply on Perfection of Wisdom, saw clearly that the five aspects of human existence are empty, and so released himself from suffering. Answering the monk Sariputra, he said this: Body is nothing more than emptiness, emptiness is nothing more than body. The body is exactly empty, and emptiness is exactly body. The other four aspects of human existence -feeling, thought, will, and consciousness -are likewise nothing more than emptiness, and emptiness nothing more than they. All things are empty: Nothing is born, nothing dies, nothing is pure, nothing is stained, nothing increases and nothing decreases. So, in emptiness, there is no body, no feeling, no thought, no will, no consciousness. There are no eyes, no ears, no nose, no tongue, no body, no mind. There is no seeing, no hearing, no smelling, no tasting, no touching, no imagining. There is nothing seen, nor heard, nor smelled, nor tasted, nor touched, nor imagined. There is no ignorance, and no end to ignorance. There is no old age and death, and no end to old age and death. There is no suffering, no cause of suffering, no end to suffering, no path to follow.

There is no attainment of wisdom, and no wisdom to attain. The Bodhisattvas rely on the Perfection of Wisdom, and so with no delusions, they feel no fear, and have Nirvana here and now. All the Buddhas, past, present, and future, rely on the Perfection of Wisdom, and live in full enlightenment. The Perfection of Wisdom is the greatest mantra. It is the clearest mantra, the highest mantra, the mantra that removes all suffering. This is truth that cannot be doubted. Say it so: Gat, gat, paragat, parasamgat. Bodhi! Svaha! Which means... Gone, gone, gone over, gone fully over. Awakened! So be it!

Table 1: The Heart Sutra (n.d.) George Boeree interpretation Retrieved August 1, 2007 from http://webspace.ship.edu/cgboer/heartsutra.html.

In order to give a balanced overview I draw on a variety of sources ranging from Western philosophy, science, art and spirituality which reflect my Western and Christian culture. At the same time, however, I must emphasise that the Buddhist language has provided me with a greater understanding of my experience of emptiness, which has influenced both my meditation and art practice. There are also some parallels to be drawn between Christian mythology and iconography and Buddhist experience which were worth investigating. abstract painter, Gretchen Albrecht. Questions arise around the aesthetics of conveying through the language of paint, what is basically a sensual experience. Also the question arises as to the validity of employing materials to express the immaterial. This paradox is examined by an analysis of the opinions of contemporary writers Mark Epstein, psychiatrist and Buddhist author, and Jacquelynn Baas and Mary Jane Jacob, the editors of Buddha Mind in Contemporary Art. I also consider the writing of artist Jesus R. Soto and the more populist writing of Leonard Shlain, author of Art & Physics, who both comment on the relationship between art and science. In an attempt to establish a connection between art and emptiness I provide views from Ken Wilber, American Buddhist teacher and philosopher, Toby Avard Foshay, Assistant Professor in the Department of English, University of Victoria, Canada and Jeffrey Hopkins, Professor of Religious Studies at the University of Virginia and the author of over twenty books on Tibetan Buddhism. Supporting my suggestion that emptiness is worthy of crosscultural discussion is Kenneth K. Inada, Distinguished Service Professor at the Department of Philosophy, State University of New York and author of The Aesthetics of Oriental Emptiness. In Chapter Two I look at the work of contemporary abstract painters Joan Mitchell, Gretchen Albrecht, Alejandra Repetto Escardo and Lee Ufan and how their work could be understood in the context of duality/non-duality. I describe These ideas are discussed further in Chapter Two in context with the work of contemporary

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how artists Escardo and Ufan are influenced by Buddhist philosophy and investigate the problems of simultaneously depicting figure and ground, arriving at their method of portraying both as the same entity. Non-duality raises particular challenges for the artist as it questions, among other things, the subject/object, form/ground relationship, but simultaneously provides a language for approaching a possible response. The work of Joan Mitchell and Gretchen Albrecht is also examined within the context of if and how they have translated emptiness into their contemporary art practices. Emptiness also impacts on my own art practice and raises challenges around my intentions and processes which is discussed in Chapter Three. In the following Chapter I detail the connections between my experience of emptiness and how it impacts profoundly on the way I view the world. I describe how the union of opposites is germane to my work, and discuss connections between art and science, in particular the branch of science which explores the relationship between time and space.

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CHAPTER ONE: EXPLORING EMPTINESS

Emptiness The common (Western) definition of emptiness, referenced from The Oxford Encyclopedic Dictionary, is described as containing nothing, unoccupied, meaningless or without substance (Hawkins & Allen, 1991, p. 469). In contrast to this, my personal understanding of emptiness comes from the Buddhist term shunyata, which states that emptiness is not a state of nothingness, but depicts potency, maturation, receptivity, freedom, open-ness, limitless and borderless nature in the total cosmological scheme (Inada, 2000, pp. 71, 72). Fritjof Capra explains this further in The Tao of Physics; by stating emptiness is thus far from being the nihilist statement for which it is often taken. It merely means all concepts about reality formed by the human mind are ultimately void (1987, p. 110). Therefore, I posit that emptiness could arguably contain all the common meanings of voidness, while simultaneously containing their opposites. As Zen monk and teacher D.T. Suzuki says Moment after moment, everyone comes out from nothingness (1972, p. 103). I have chosen to align myself with the Buddhist understanding of emptiness because I have found that Buddhist writings, particularly from the Mahayana and Zen traditions, are consistent with my experience. There is an inherent difficulty in providing a definition of my understanding of emptiness, as by its very nature, emptiness is almost beyond definition. It is elusive and slippery and can really only be fully understood through lived experience. As Suzuki says, Zen was not subject to logical analysis or to intellectual treatment. It must be directly and personally experienced by each of us (1973, p. 22). Welsh artist and art educator, Timothy Emlyn Jones3, described how, during the intense concentration and focus required in the process of creating his large scale concentric drawings, he experienced emptiness (personal communication, 28

Professor Timothy Emlyn Jones is Dean and Graduate Director of Burren College of Art in Ireland

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January, 2006). This revelation fascinated me as I had not heard emptiness used in this context outside of Buddhist discourse. Mark Epstein, Buddhist psychologist and author, provides a theoretical link to my understanding of emptiness connected to creativity when he says; Through its doctrine of emptiness, Buddhism affirms the primacy of the potential space in which the creative act occurs (cited in Baas & Jacob, 2004, p. 35). Because emptiness encourages a deep appreciation of the physical world, I am motivated to reinterpret that appreciation in my work. I have been compelled to rethink the way things actually are and simultaneously reconsider the processes by which I complete my studio work. It is this affirmation of creativity that I take into my studio and underpins the leap of faith that artmaking entails. There is an important connection between the understanding of emptiness and how form is generally perceived, which is, according to Buddhist philosophy, that form and emptiness are not two, but one and the same entity, and I again refer to Hanh who says Form is empty of a separate self, but it is full of everything in the cosmos (cited in Smith, 1999, p. 181). George Boeree, Ph.D. in Psychology at Shippensburg University, believes that; Emptiness is the usual translation for the Buddhist term Sunyata (or Shunyata). It refers to the fact that no thing including human existence has ultimate substantiality, which in turn means that no thing is permanent and no thing is totally independent of everything else. In other words, everything in this world is interconnected and in constant flux. A deep appreciation of this idea of emptiness thus saves us from the suffering caused by our egos, our attachments, and our resistance to change and loss (n.d.).

If, as Boeree is suggesting, all things are interconnected, then one could say that subject and object, existence and non-existence, for example, are not two separate entities, but unified. If opposites can exist simultaneously without contradiction or loss of identity, we are faced with a paradox which can be difficult to comprehend, as Suzuki says, all the psychological pedestals which have been given to one are now swept from underneath ones feet and one has 13

nowhere to stand (1969, p. 26). However, the paradox, a statement which appears acceptable but which has unacceptable or contradictory consequences (Bullock & Trombley, 2000, p. 626), remains. The root word from which emptiness is derived, is the Sanskrit word shunyata and was possibly first mentioned over two thousand years ago by Nagarjuna the Buddhist monk philosopher, and founder of the Middle Path School of Buddhism. The Heart Sutra, the foundation text of Mahayana Buddhism explains the key concept of emptiness, in the famous statement that Form is no other than emptiness; emptiness no other than form, Form is precisely emptiness; emptiness precisely form. Sensation, perception, reaction, and consciousness are also like this (Smith, 1999, pp. 177 & 178). This simple statement regarding the relationship between form and emptiness has enormous ramifications for both philosophical and scientific discourse as it challenges our apprehension of reality and our response to the world by proposing that matter (including ourselves) is simultaneously existent and nonexistent, which Jeffrey Hopkins describes as not a blending of these extremes but an utter refutation of both inherent existence and total non-existence ( 1996, p. 11). Seeing the world as dual is part of our need for certainty and our ability to construct meaning within language, but it is a major obstruction to seeing the world as it is in a constant state of flux. If, however, nothing exists in and of itself all phenomena are mutually interdependent and rely on their relationship with other things in order to exist. To fully understand and appreciate the impact of this statement would require further reading beyond the focus of this research and a detailed study of the texts and commentaries or prolonged meditation practice resulting in satori the immediate experience of the Buddha nature of all things (Capra, 1983, p. 134). My personal experience of emptiness occurred after many hours of concentrated drawing and was accompanied by a profound feeling of inward and outward

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existence, of no longer being able to relate objectively to the material world and of simultaneously having and not-having a body (form).This experience led me to question my fundamental beliefs about the nature of matter and the language we use to describe the physical world. I came to understand that instead of phenomena being fixed, permanent and describable in the accepted language, the world was virtually upside down and inside out, yet remained upside up and inside in; simply, a paradox. This links to my theory of the paradox of the union of opposites as a foundation idea and connects to my art practice as both catalyst and subject for creativity. It is my assertion that the experience of emptiness is profound, paradoxical and creative. Therefore, if my art is to honour this realisation and simultaneously address both sides of the form/emptiness question, the language of painting becomes my vehicle of communication because emptiness itself is beyond words. Like many other artists, my work reflects a desire to express spiritual, utopian or metaphysical ideals that cannot be expressed in traditional pictorial terms (Tuchman, 1987, p. 17) by exposing the paradoxical nature of the union of opposites. Union of Opposites My understanding of emptiness inspires me to create work which may demonstrate some of the qualities emptiness embodies; namely openness, spaciousness and the union of opposites. The union of opposites is a key concept and requires a discussion about non-duality, which occurs when opposites are united. The experience of emptiness can occur when one lets go of pre-conceived notions and finds that everything, including ourselves which we ordinarily perceive as inherently solid and permanent and lasting, . . . is actually empty of inherent self-existence (Rand, cited in Baas & Jacob, 2004, p. 266). If we search for the permanent self we will only find a collection of parts or aggregates and can say that the body is empty of a permanent self, termed no-self. Buddhist teacher Jack Kornfield puts this notion in a wider context when he says,

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When Christian texts speak of losing the self in God, when Taoists and Hindus speak of merging with the True Self beyond all identity, when Buddhists speak of emptiness and of no self, what do they mean? Emptiness does not mean that things dont exist, nor does no-self mean that we dont exist. Emptiness refers to the underlying nonseparation of life and the fertile ground of energy that gives rise to all forms of life (cited in Smith, 1999, p. 283). This may be a difficult notion to grasp intellectually, but the apprehension of emptiness can result in great freedom and creativity. When this is understood, opposite poles of existence and non-existence are united, sometimes referred to as the middle ground, which is not a refutation of either position but a combination of the two, into one, which is yet not just one but contains all things. Similarly, if the opposites of subject and object are united, they become not two but one, and in Wilbers words, It is precisely in the dualism of creating two worlds from one that the universe becomes severed, mutilated, and consequently false to itself, as G. Spencer Brown pointed out (1985, p. 40). D.T. Suzuki states it succinctly, For Zen students the most important thing is not to be dualistic (1972, p. 17). The theory of non-duality is a paradox and challenges our habitual view of the world but offers total freedom and complete release from the root cause of all suffering (Wilber, 1985, p. 22) and as Buddhist philosopher Nagarjuna said, nothing can be said to exist or not to exist, for so long as the mind conceives in terms of dualism it is still under sangsaric bondage (cited in Evans-Wentz, 1977, p. 2). The Buddhist position becomes clearer when the question of exactly why shunyata has been translated into emptiness is closely examined. According to Mu Soeng Sunim, It takes each of the existents, holds it up under an unflinching gaze and declares it to have no sustaining self-nature (as cited in Smith, 1999, p. 190). So all phenomena are declared to be empty. Buddhist teacher and author Tarchin Hearn responded to my research question by stating Painting emptiness! Ah!!! Isnt that what all of this is? (Personal Communication, January 2007). 16

The union of opposites provides the artist with a language for approaching emptiness and in an endeavour to explain this notion I examine how the coexistence of the opposites of emptiness and form may be suggested within a work of art. There are, however, pitfalls in this process as Mark Epstein explains, There is a fullness to Buddhist emptiness, a sense of spaciousness that both holds and suffuses the world. Not to appreciate this fullness is the great stumbling block of the deconstruction of the self, and one that many people, including some contemporary artists, fall prey to, (as cited in Baas & Jacob, 2004, pp. 34 & 35). In other words, emptiness must be understood in its fullness, and an appropriate balance maintained between them to achieve mental and creative equilibrium .It is my contention that everything, including ourselves and our thoughts, contains its opposite, but as Carl Jung said, Unfortunately, our Western mind, lacking all culture in this respect, has never yet devised a concept, nor even a name, for the union of opposites through the middle path, that most fundamental item of inward experience, which could respectably be set against the Chinese concept of Tao, (cited in Shlain, 1991, p. 241). I suggest that Jung was being rather harsh in his judgement of Western culture, but it is nevertheless true that the translation of shunyata into emptiness, (the nearest word in English to the union of opposites), does not help us to understand this most profound of experiences which is most fully described in Buddhist literature, but which I believe is to be found in a multiplicity of manifestations throughout many cultures, as Francis Huxley says of the ritual exchanges of life and death, In every such representation we are confronted with the identity of opposites (1974, p. 116). The union of opposites was possibly first mentioned in Western scholarship as early as the sixth century B.C. by the Greek philosopher Heraclitus and nearly two thousand years later Nicholas of Cusa spoke of similar ideas in his conjunction of opposites, (cited in Koch, Borman & Senger, 1972, p. 173). My understanding of the union of opposites is essentially a spiritual phenomenon. 17

Philosopher Mark C. Taylor says Subject and substance, self and other, humanity and divinity are internally related in such a wayThis dialectical mediation of opposites constitutes spirit true spirit (1987, pp. 29,30). As an artist whose work is motivated by the experience of emptiness and the union of opposites I have been presented with the same dilemma as Cezanne and the Cubists who, in the words of Soto, tried to redefine a new space-time concept, as they came up against the impossibility of separating form and matter (1994, p. 229). Postmodern artists such as Albrecht, Escher, Twombly, Duchamp, Ufan and Repetto Escardo, and much indigenous art is still attempting to close the gap between the dualisms that have habitually been used in reference to art. For example, subject/object, background/foreground, external/internal and the notions of perspective (which were) challenged by Cezanne who made history by replacing monocular perspective with polyvision (Soto, 1994, p. 227). Artists and hopefully viewers of art are gradually becoming aware that the subject/object position is no longer tenable and it is my hope that this will lead to a breakdown of other dualities, enabling a wider understanding of the intent of abstract artists. Surgeon and author Leonard Shlain notes our synthesis of these pairs (opposing aspects of reality) not only deepens our understanding of each and both, but also adds a new dimension to the mind generating energy for universal mind (1991, p. 437). Science and Art In his book Art & Physics, Parallel Visions in Space, Time and Light, Shlain tracks the parallel discoveries in science with the rise of modern art and puts forward the hypothesis that visionary artists have preceded scientific discoveries. His reviewer, Howard Rheingold says, Shlain presents his evidence that artists have created symbolic languages that have changed history and inspired scientists to create new symbolic frameworks such as physics: In the case of the visual arts, in addition to illuminating, imitating, and interpreting reality, a

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few artists create a language of symbols for things for which there are yet to be words (n.d.). Nowhere in his book does Shlain use the word emptiness but his many references to dualism convince me that the mystery many modern artists are attempting to illuminate is actually the mystery of emptiness, as he states, Einsteins special theory of relativity and Bohrs theory of complementarity both propose ways in which opposites can be annealed into a seamless alloy, (1991, p. 242). This brings to mind the work of M.C.Escher, Mondrian, Jackson Pollock, Mark Rothko and Robert Irwin. I suggest that the gentle squares and subtle colours of Agnes Martins paintings also fall into this category. Shlain continues, Though the great movement of abstract art began in 1910 with Kandinsky, it culminated in 1945 with Abstract Expressionism in New York. This tight-knit group of artists went further than previous abstract painters to create new images that spoke directly to the issues Einstein considered concerning our perceptions of space, time and light (1991, p. 242). To expand on this further Soto explains how he believes modern science has influenced twentieth century art The Einsteinian revolution was without a doubt the most significant event in the transformation of thought that has taken place in the twentieth century. Its impact on artists at the beginning of the century made possible a transformation of the space-time concept and, from that moment to the present day, the plastic arts have constantly conveyed anxiety and stimulated the most audacious creative proposals, (1994, p. 229). Western science and Buddhist philosophy are exploring parallel ideas regarding the nature of reality, a subject widely lectured and written about by Fritjof Capra. Niels Bohr, a leading scientist in quantum mechanics studied reciprocal opposites and noted that Combining any of these pairs creates a reciprocal duality that together form a seamless unity...opposites are not always contradictions; rather, they may be complementary aspects of a higher truth (cited in Shlain, 1991, p. 430). There are echoes here of Erwin Schroedinger, the founder of quantum mechanics who says Subject and object are only one. The barrier between them

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cannot be said to have been broken down . . . for this barrier does not exist (cited in Wilber, 1985, p. 38). Wilber responds to this by saying, In relinquishing the core dualism of subject vs. object, these physicists had in principle relinquished all dualisms (1985, p. 39). My reading of these commentators suggests to me that the challenge to artists to faithfully convey their understanding of reality in the light of new scientific discoveries (and in some cases leading them) has been at the forefront of modern art for most of the nineteenth century, and many of those artists have been motivated by their involvement with Buddhism.

Emptiness and Form For those artists who are concerned with the union of opposites and the connection between emptiness and form, the question arises as to how to translate their concerns into art in a way that conveys their intent to their viewer. There is the question of both how to combine the material to speak of the immaterial, and of employing the self to speak of the non-self. One does not have to belong to one of the spiritual traditions of the East, or even be a Buddhist to appreciate this, as Epstein explains, Rather than repeat the same form over and over again, todays artists, Eastern and Western, have the opportunity to reinterpret Buddhist insights in a contemporary context. They do not have to be officially Buddhist in order to do this, but they may be inspired by Buddhisms deep appreciation for the way creative expression links emptiness and form, (cited in Baas & Jacob, 2004, page 35). Hopkins expands on this notion further, The Buddhist practitioner zeros in on phenomenon to investigate them more closely and eventually perceives a reality or emptiness that is the same entity as the phenomenon it qualifies. Emptiness is seen as the very stuff of appearance and a necessary condition for it (1992, p. 144).

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I would go further and posit that emptiness is the very stuff of appearance, and a necessary condition for it. If an artist attempts to convey this emptiness, this new understanding of the world as a non-dual arena where all phenomenon are empty of intrinsic existence, then all the formal expectations of materiality are changed as Epstein states Because the primary conceptual tenet of Buddhism is the lack of a central essence or substance to the self artists (are) in the process of discovering how exciting art could become when freed from the restraints of materialism (cited in Baas & Jacob, 2004, p. 29). Epstein is suggesting that dematerialising art opens up possibilities for the artist, (just as the postmodern concepts of reframing and de-framing have led to installation art) but like the snake swallowing its own tail, this possibility can become a never-ending conundrum. Being freed from the restraints of materialism is one thing, but where does the artist go from there and how does he convey his or her message of non-materiality whilst employing the very materials that may be empty? Is it really a problem? Mumon, the thirteenth century Zen Buddhist monk states the dilemma very clearly in regard to written language and the use of dualism to express the nondualistic with this typical Zen statement whereby the truth may be pointed to by an apparent nonsense. It cannot be expressed with words and it cannot be expressed without words (cited in Hofstadter, 1979, p. 253). Toby Avard Foshay, Assistant Professor in the Department of English at the University of Victoria, Canada, addresses a similar problem, that of using language to point to something beyond language, in his essay Denegation, Nonduality, and Language in Derrida and Dogen, A significant question then arises as to how, if Buddhism manages to avoid the dualistic this-world/ other-world formulations of a theology, does it manage the more immanent, but still dualistic tendencies of ontology, and of its own discursive articulation. One way it has done so in various of its schools and teachings is by pointing to apparently nonlinguistically dependent religious practices that give access to ontensibly extralinguistic order of consciousness and experience (1994, p. 548).

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I believe the same question may be applicable to art. Is it appropriate for artists to employ materials to point to non-material phenomenon? My response is that the language of paint gives access to the immaterial realm and to employ materials for this purpose is quite legitimate, even essential, for what else is there? Nagarjuna replies to the question, Without relying on everyday common practices (i.e. relative truths), the absolute truth cannot be expressed. Without approaching the absolute truth, nirvana cannot be attained (Foshay, 1994, p. 549). I suggest that the infinite is contained within the finite and therefore no dichotomy exists. Baas emphasises this point, For the artists in this section Noguchi, Reinhardt, Klein and Johns the non-dualistic realm in which space and time are one is accessed through sensual engagement with the tangible (2005, p. 111). The interdependence of tangible and intangible is also called dependent co-arising, and as Jin Y. Park notes Derridean differance defies any attempt to see a being as an independent entity (2006, p. 4) Contemporary philosophical discourse examines the connections between emptiness and deconstruction and I quote Park again, who says Derridean deconstruction shares the spirit of the middle path, which Derrida calls differance or the middle voice (2006, p. 4). For me this suggests there may not be a fixed identity or subject upon which to base any speculations. The temptation here is to state that Buddhist emptiness and Derridas differance are identical but there is a word of warning from Ian Mabbett who has studied and written extensively on the history of India, South East Asia and Buddhism. He says of the comparison between deconstruction and the Eastern view of reality. We are, we must never forget, dealing with different systems that belong to different cultural worlds and ultimately work in different ways. There is, however, a real kinship which deserves to be admitted (cited in Park, 2006, p. 33). It is that kinship which suggests to me that the deconstruction of reality through contemporary Western philosophy may not necessarily point to emptiness as understood by Buddhist teachings, but may nevertheless take us beyond classical metaphysical thinking. . . and bring us to contemporary scientific perception and thinking oriented in the holistic, cosmo-ontological dynamics of

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things (Inada, 2000, p. 87) and suggests a cross-cultural link which is worth exploring. Cross cultural links were strengthened during this research when I made contact with Argentinean artist Alejandra Repetto Escardo and was privileged to engage in email conversation with her which resulted in a richness of understanding of how another artist had approached the task of expressing emptiness and form within a work of art. Likewise, this understanding was again reflected in viewing the work of Asian artist Lee Ufan at the Queensland Art Gallery, Brisbane. Ufan is a painter and installation artist, working with stones and steel that embody purity of line and space In the following chapter and prior to discussing the work of Escardo and Ufan, I concentrate on comparisons between two women painters, American Joan Mitchell and New Zealander Gretchen Albrecht. Both women are contemporary artists (Mitchell died in 1992) who initially drew their inspiration from nature but quickly developed strong personal styles derivative of the abstract expressionist movement. Large brush strokes which tell the story of the body in motion and a strong colour palette to evoke atmosphere is a feature they share, along with, I suggest, a wish to convey spiritual values.

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CHAPTER TWO: EMPTINESS IN CONTEMPORARY ART Gretchen Albrecht and Joan Mitchell Seventeen years after Joan Mitchell was born in Chicago in 1926, Gretchen Albrecht was born in Auckland, New Zealand and the work of these two women painters relates to some of the concerns in my studio research and practice, which involves expression of the spiritual. Within the context of my research, I define spiritual from the Oxford Encyclopedic English Dictionary as being concerned with sacred or religious things; holy, divine, inspired (Hawkins & Allen, 1991, p. 1399). For some artists, this may often include a need to express the highest ideals of human potential for transformation and the symbolising of the divine in humanity. A method of expressing or apprehending these values is through the confrontation between opposites; the paradox at the heart of mystical and theosophical study. The seventeenth-century German mystic Jakob Bohme explains, (This) divine self-awareness is predicated on the confrontation and interaction of contraries, whereby the undifferentiated One . . .can manifest itself through division into two, revealing each aspect of itself in terms of its opposite: (cited in Watts, 1987, p. 245). I was therefore interested in how artists such as Albrecht and Mitchell were able to express spiritual concerns through their work and whether their intentions are, in fact, conveyed to me, the viewer. I was also interested in how aware and deliberate they may have been in this regard and how explicit they are in discussing spiritual intentions. Albrechts Hemisphere paintings and Mitchells richly painted canvases are the subject of my investigation in terms of their form, colour and use of aesthetic feeling, as this is where I believe the interaction of opposites occurs. My current studio practice employs the same processes and similar use of materials in pursuit of the expression of opposites; concerns echoed throughout the paintings of Albrecht and Mitchell. I also examine whether or not, through the common language of paint, these artists have conveyed an interpretation of emptiness.

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The creative process requires focus and concentration, similar to meditation, which facilitates the apprehension of emptiness, as illustrated by Timothy Emlyn Jones in Chapter One. I believe that it is possible to experience and express the feelings associated with emptiness in the arena of creating art, and form and interaction of opposites are two key elements of this creative process. How do Albrecht and Mitchell use painterly form and tension to convey an interpretation of emptiness and who or what from the abstract expressionist movement influenced their work? I also consider how they each employed form; both the form of the canvas and form as marks on the canvas. I also believe that in their work paint is both the signified and the signifier by existing as a visual entity worthy of attention, and as carrying meaning beyond its immediate qualities. Well-known philosopher and psychologist of art, Rudolph Arnheim says expressionism heightens the irregular, the asymmetrical, the unusual, the complex and strives for the increase of tension (1974, p.7). How is tension employed by each artist in light of this statement? Both Albrecht and Mitchell were influenced by the Abstract Expressionist movement early in their painting careers and quickly adopted an abstract style. Mitchell was closely involved with this movement in New York and became known as one of the second wave of abstract expressionist painters. I look at this movement and how Albrecht and Mitchell were influenced by such painters as Willem de Kooning, Morris Louis, Henri Matisse, Franz Kline and Jackson Pollock. I support my position by reviewing a range of sources from members of the Abstract Expressionist movement, including writers and critics such as Jane Livingston, Barbara Hess, Clifford Ross, and Ron Brownson who have written reviews and books about Albrecht and Mitchell. I also draw on critics Bronwyn Fletcher, W. Jackson Rushing, Maurice Tuchman and John E. Bowlt, who have studied the spiritual component in art with the intention of illustrating the links between the creation of their work and the endeavours of artists who wish to express spiritual ideas. In order to express the concerns of many Abstract Expressionist painters, I critically examine the opinions of Maurice Tuchman, Senior Curator Emeritus at the Los Angeles County Museum of Art. Tuchman founded the Department of

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Modern and Contemporary Art at Los Angeles County Museum in 1964. He served as chairman of the department as it grew in size and importance over the next 33 years. He organized over 60 exhibitions including Art and Technology, 1971; The Spiritual in Art, 1986, and many solo retrospective shows and now resides in New York City as an independent curator and art consultant. He describes the art scene in America during the 1940s. The new American artists became a second wave of abstract pioneers, searching for expressive means appropriate to their generation and asserting the need for universal truths (cited in Weisberger, 1986, p.49). Tuchman is quite clear about the value of the spiritual component of Abstract Expressionist art, and it is my intention to demonstrate how Albrecht and Mitchell were concerned with wider issues than surface appearances; they too were concerned with communicating universal truths through their work. In the foreword to the recent book on Gretchen Albrecht, Auckland Art Gallery Director, Chris Saines comments on the spiritual in Albrechts work, noting that Beyond the universalities of literature and poetry, of family and faith, her (Gretchen Albrechts) works touch on the cosmologies that divine (sic) and order the terrestrial and celestial worlds (cited in Brownson, 2002, p. 7). To understand how Albrecht has earned such a description, the culture and context of her formative work is examined, and then her progress mapped through influences both local and international.

Hemispheres and Expressionism

By the 1950s Abstract Expressionism had been the subject for much applause, criticism and misunderstanding among artists and art-watchers in America for two decades and attracted the popular criticism what some people call the spatter-and-daub school of painting (Ross, 1990, p. 15). In her recent book on Abstract Expressionism, art historian and critic Barbara Hess describes how the most prominent artists in this movement were Jackson Pollock, Willem de Kooning, Franz Kline, Hans Hoffman and Mark Rothko and they were largely responsible for the fact that by the 1950s Abstract Expressionism stood as the hallmark of the Western worlds freedom of expression (2005, p. 20). Not so

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well known, yet pivotal to Albrechts development, was Morris Louis who studied art at the Maryland Institute of Fine & Applied Arts from 1929 to 1933. According to Painters Biographies, Labelled a post-Abstract Expressionist painter, Louis evolved a style that produced a complete integration of paint and canvas. Forsaking the three dimensions, Louis worked on emeshing (sic) spectrums of colour, differentiated by hue, filling his canvas with colour-space without perspective (n.d.). Ron Brownson, Chief curator, Auckland City Art Gallery, adds a further dimension to the connection to Albrecht and Louis when he states; Seeing Morris Louis huge acrylic paintings at the Auckland City Art Gallery in late 1971 was a deeply encouraging experience for Albrecht. It affirmed the direction that she had already initiated in her own painting style of the previous five years, but it was also a challenge to make her art more substantial in its subject and more dynamic in its aspiration (2002, p. 10). Albrecht was deeply affected by Louis work, not least by the fact that here was painting that was not of the square or rectangle shape in the traditional sense, but of a shape that spoke about the shape itself. Her paintings have a trace of the classical and yet they speak loudly of the modern in the sense that their forms can be read as not about anything other than themselves. Albrecht has successfully employed both traditions to suit her needs. Brownson notes that, A significant realisation occurred when Albrecht understood, especially after her encounter with Morris Louis art, that her paintings could enfold a visual cosmology, not only in their existential mediation on a meaning-filled space but in how her paintings could function as symbolic colour-filled objects placed before viewers (2002, p. 10).

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Figure 1 Gretchen Albrecht Cope 1983 Acrylic on canvas, two panels, 1220mm. x 2442mm. Retrieved May 24, 2006 from www.fernergalleries.co.nz

What later became her Hemisphere series is a striking combination of colour-field and gestural paint application (Fig.1). As an art student, Albrecht was exposed to the work of Abstract Expressionists Francis Hodgkins and Sonia Delauney and also to the 13th and 14th century Italian painters who would be so important to her later work. Brownson describes how the paintings of Morris Louis affected Albrecht. This self-conscious decision to create meaning from within the vehicle of painterly abstraction is a huge and challenging task in New Zealand, a country where non-figurative painting has been known by the public for less than fifty years (2002, p. 9). In comparison, the challenge for Joan Mitchell may also have been great but for different reasons. Living in New York she was much closer to, and compared with, other artists of the abstract expressionist movement, as clarified by her biographer Jane Livingston, who writes, The more I saw of her work, the more I wondered why she was not more frequently equated with the best artists who occupied the second tier of Abstract Expressionist fame, let alone the members of the pantheon (2002, p. 10). Livingston goes on to say, Evenings on Seventythird Street is one of the most classical of Mitchells early works; it is clearly a piece that takes cognisance not only of De Kooning and Kline, but of other contemporaries as well, such as Tworkov (2002, pp. 22, 23). In 1947 Mitchell

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moved to France and the change of environment had a profound effect on her work. Livingston further describes important influences on Mitchells work; France changed Mitchells work perceptibly. While she would never have characterised herself as being particularly influenced by the French version of American Abstract Expressionism a movement created by such artists as Pierre Soulages, Henri Michaux, and Georges Mathieu - it is perhaps arguable that these painters works did make their mark on the young woman artist. Most decisive, artistically and emotionally, was Mitchells exposure to the work and personality of the French-Canadian painter Jean-Paul Riopelle (2002, p. 24).

Mitchell and Riopelle lived together for the entire decade of the 1960s and although their relationship was described by Livingston as constantly stormy, with mutual provocation and often physical violence . . . but . . . they were helpful to each other. Despite all the fights, Ive seldom seen people who had as much respect for each other as artists (2002, p. 25). I include this anecdote because I believe it is important to note that the work Mitchell produced at this time expressed huge energy, even anger and violence, evident in the brushstrokes; evidence of tension released and violence subdued in washes of colour and light. Mitchells paintings are huge, one almost 20 feet in width and what impressed me was the tension between the movement of large energetic brushstrokes and the juxtaposed delicate, lyrical harmony of colour and dripping paint. Sometimes the tension is explored as all-over colour field and at other times as a central motif, hanging against the plain white ground. The feeling is one of intense joy and sadness, opposing yet not conflicting, spontaneous yet consciously calculated to hold the viewers attention (Fig. 2).

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Figure 2 Joan Mitchell Untitled 1992. Oil on Canvas diptych 258cm. x 200cm. Retrieved July 13, 2007 from www.haberarts.com/mitchell.jpg

I believe it is in Mitchells ability to portray opposites of light and dark, energy and repose, movement and stillness, chaos and order, and a general here and not here feeling that is where she has successfully translated paint into a unified whole and a spiritual vision. Albrecht also arrived at a personal cosmology through a European connection but in a very different way. She travelled to Italy in 1979 where she saw the work of the Renaissance painters, including that of Piero della Francesca, (Fig.3). This event is worth recording as Linda Gill, co-author with Francis Pound of After Nature, Gretchen Albrecht, a survey - 23 years, quotes Albrecht, The cemetery chapel in Monterchi with a fresco of the Madonna del Parto made a deep impression on me. The chapel was very tiny, just a bare barrel-vaulted room, whitewashed, with an altar, and above this was a marvellous painting of a woman and two angels. The fresco fitted into the curved shape of the roof and the Madonna stood right in the centre in a blue dress, pointing to the split opening in the centre of her dress. She divided the painting into two perfect halves and on either side of her, holding back the curtains . . . were two angels, each a duplicate in reverse of the other (1986, p. 14).

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Figure 3 Piero della Francesca Madonna del Parto 1467 260cm. x 203cm. Retrieved July 10, 2007 from www.italica.rai.it/.../galleria/7.htm

The connection to her Hemispheres is clearly described, and how they grew out of this and other similarly painted scenes. The curved ceiling of the barrel-vaulted room was translated into the shape of the canvas, and the gown of the Madonna was translated into the sweep of paint, with the split in the middle becoming the central line dividing the form. Piero della Francescas painting was being reborn and reinvented by Albrecht. The tension in these paintings is in the contrasting colour between the quadrants and in the meeting point in the centre. Where these opposing forces meet, a critical event occurs as Bronwyn Fletcher from the Auckland Art Gallery describes in the recent publication, Gretchen Albrecht Illuminations, In Albrechts paintings, we see a union of energies in the abutment of the contrasting halves of pink and blue and we see the mysterious centre, the conception point, in the join where the two quadrants meet. Through this union the artist figures a moment, the instant of conception, where the Word becomes flesh in Marys womb (cited in Brownson, 2002, p. 53).

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Mark Epstein author of Thoughts Without a Thinker and Going to Pieces without Falling Apart, makes an interesting connection here when he says, Emptiness is best compared to the hollow of a pregnant womb; shunyata is derived from the Sanskrit word shvi, which means swelling, like the swelling of a seed (cited in Baas and Jacob, 2004, p. 34). This connection between Christian myth, iconography and emptiness supports my suggestion that emptiness is not confined to Buddhism or Eastern religions, but is rather, an activity of the human heart and mind, which can herald the arrival of a new way of seeing the world as simultaneously temporal and divine. The tension of the form at the instant of conception creates the confrontation and interaction of opposites as I have previously referred to in my particular definition of emptiness. Both artists have employed the fluidity of paint to increase tension, but where Mitchell has employed levelling and sharpening as a method of balancing tension, Albrecht has used the shape of the canvas and the entire surface, and the implied space beyond to both heighten and balance tension. Duality and pairing is a strong element in the work of both artists and my view is that it is this very assertion of opposites that contain the possibility of emptiness (Fig. 4).

Figure 4 Gretchen Albrecht The Fire & The Rose 1984 Acrylic on unpinned canvas 2 stretchers joined 1525mm. x 3050mm. Collection of The Sargeant Gallery Wanganui. Retrieved May 24, 2006 from www.city-gallery.org.nz

Mitchells awareness of death (she had recently suffered the loss of her only sister) eventually forced her to find a means of overcoming her despair. I think involvement of any kind is to forget not being alive, she explained. Painting is

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one of those things (cited in Livingston, 2002, pp. 62, 63). Towards the end of her life, and over a period of thirteen months Mitchell painted a series of twentyone monumental canvases called La Grande Vallee. They represent a place which Mitchell never saw, but was visited by a Gisele Barreau, a close friend who described a hidden valley in terms that sparked Mitchells ideal of paradise; an idyllic vision of the joy and innocence of childhood. Livingston explains how painting this imagined landscape became a matter of survival for Mitchell. Indeed, Mitchell saw the act of painting itself as a means of transcending death. She said, painting is the opposite of death, it permits one to survive, it also permits one to live (2002, p. 63). When one looks at the huge works of La Grande Vallee series, there is no doubt that the painter is concerned with living; they are almost leaping off the surface with joy and vitality (Fig. 5).

Figure 5 Joan Mitchell La Grande Vallee No 0 1983 Oil on Canvas 259.08cm. x 200.02cm. Retrieved May 24, 2006 from www.arco.ifema.es

Mitchell was using both the act of painting and the results to express and overcome her fear of separation. The paint signified supreme courage and a will

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to live whilst simultaneously pointing to the sadness of loss and a yearning for the ideal. Does this mean Mitchell was talking about emptiness? It is a difficult task to find the absolute linkage between my understanding of emptiness and Mitchells intent, but I believe the possibility is there. I suggest she was demonstrating the transformative act of painting herself as she wished to be. This is the inspired act of creativity. Act as if and you become.

Spiritual Connections

In his book on the spiritual in contemporary art, James Elkins says, There are many more abstract painters who cant (sic) be described as spiritualists, among them . . . Jackson Pollock . . .Joan Mitchell . . .To understand work like theirs it is necessary to bring in the many secular discourses on abstraction and to think differently about the history of painting, the importance of medium, and the limitations of selfreflectivity (2004, p. 80). Pollocks interest in spiritual matters is well-documented by art historian W. Jackson Rushing in his chapter titled Ritual & Myth: Native American Culture & Abstract Expressionism, (cited in Weisberger, 1987, pp. 273, 281 293). Elkins is defining spiritualist in quite narrow terms, which should not be confused with spiritual and I do not believe their inclusion here precludes either Pollock or Mitchell from having spiritual concerns as I have defined them. Elkins comment on the limits of self-reflectivity is also interesting. He is suggesting that some painters, and maybe Mitchell was one, are unaware that their work has a spiritual connection, or if they are aware, they do not wish to be explicit about it. My reading of her work is spiritual. It brings me to a place where emptiness can be evoked, a place where opposites are reconciled, and a place where the painted surface is empty of recognisable form yet at the same time full of potential. I have found no evidence to suggest that Mitchell was familiar with the concept of emptiness, yet she alludes to the concept in a way that parallels and mirrors my belief that the synthesis of abstract form and colour evokes the apprehension of emptiness.

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This is true also of Albrechts work, but she has been more explicit about her spiritual aspirations than Mitchell and her inspiration from the religious paintings of Piero della Francesca support this theory. Auckland art historian, Francis Pound, illustrates this when he says, There is everywhere asserted the possibility of the lift, the surge, the uncontrollable carrying away of the mind to regions outside the material facts of colour and form, to the diffuse and sumptuous realms of connotation. If the mind is carried away by colour, by paint, it is carried away, in the end from paint. Paint is asserted not as a signified (as in the pure modernist title) but as a signifier (1986, pp. 27 & 28).

I agree with his observation of the lift, the surge but need to clarify my position that the mind could be carried away outside the material and carried away from paint. All experience is experienced by the body, and I must be consistent here in emphasising the non-dual nature of existence by declaring that equally it could be stated that the body which experiences may not have an in or an out side. In his book What Painting Is, author and art educator James Elkins takes this notion a step further by suggesting that the artists studio is actually an extension of the artists body, a womb even, when he links artistic practice with alchemy. Alchemys lesson here is that everything actually takes place within the body. The insanity of the studio is that it is not architecture . . . but it is nothing other than the inside of the body (2000, p. 167). Insanity aside, the mind is not carried away to another place, but carried away to here, to now. Attempting to express emptiness or similar notions of spirituality may not be as difficult as I imagined for as Elkins suggests throughout his book, the painters studio and the activities which take place there are themselves symbols of our divinity.

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Symbolising the Divine

I have described how Albrecht and Mitchell were not only influenced by, but Mitchell was recognised as a working member of the second wave of Abstract Expressionists, a label she rejected and parodied. Both were inevitably exposed to the work of Pollock, de Kooning, Hoffman and Kline but quickly moved on to develop their own abstract language. Albrecht and Mitchell were motivated by serious concerns; that of how to express their need to make sense of the world and the problem of death. I believe they resolved these concerns by facing them down and incorporating them into their painterly work. Both women responded to their environment with sensuous abstraction to take control of their worlds, both real and imagined, and transmuted their energy into illuminations of wholeness.

As Taylor says In a world where religion seems increasingly irrelevant and philosophy moribund, art alone can refigure humankinds deepest spiritual preoccupations and aspirations (1992, p. 52). I suggest Taylor is referring to both maker and viewer, as in the case of how the paintings of the pregnant Madonna affected Gretchen Albrecht. Albrechts resultant feelings were translated through abstraction into her work, which may be read and appreciated firstly on an aesthetic basis, then understood and appreciated on another level as highly personal and spiritual. In her Hemisphere Series, she successfully combined a modern canvas shape which brings the attention of the viewer to the sublime sweeps of vivid colour signifying nothing other than itself in its abstraction of unrecognisable form. The brilliance of her work is that she simultaneously expresses the confrontation of opposites at the heart of spiritual art, delivered through the classical metaphor of the Virgin Mary as carrier of the message of spiritual and earthly potential being created out of meaningful space, which is consistent with my understanding of emptiness.

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Mitchell was less overtly concerned with expressing ideas of creation and symbology, but her Grand Vallee series offer up the concept of an ideal place, neither wholly here (for she had never seen the valley) nor wholly there, but rather both here (as in the painting) and there (as in the ideal), and also a place of potential and meaningful space. Albrechts hemispheres are a powerful metaphor for the union of opposites and Mitchells huge works express her will to live. They may not be harmonious, but are always beautiful. While I have discovered Albrecht to be more overt than Mitchell in her intentions of expressing the spiritual realm, my reading of both artists work is that the interaction of opposites portrayed in the expressive elements of paint strongly suggests a spiritual quality of life and the spiritual in their art. I suggest that they have demonstrated their concerns for the highest ideals of the human potential for transformation and the symbolising of the divine in humanity.

Alejandra Repetto Escardo It is my claim that while emptiness may be impossible to express directly, the question of how to approach and articulate this concern is central to the work of many contemporary artists who share a non-dual world view. Alejandra Repetto Escardo has followed the path of her minimalist predecessors Mark Rothko, Barnet Newman and Yves Klein and reduced her canvases to monochromes of pulsating colour. Escardo was born in Argentina in 1960 and graduated from the National University Institute of Art with her Masters Degree in Visual Arts with her research thesis Emptiness and Metamorphosis. She has studied Hindu and Tao Te Ching philosophy, enunciating emptiness firstly through negation, allowing the formal qualities of the work, described in her own words as, Emptiness as refered (sic) in the Tao Te Ching, as an emptiness that is primordial to all things, and at the same time belongs to all things because it takes an active part in the question of figure-background, and needed for the shape, (Personal communication July 18, 2006).

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Escardos unique use of English as her second language produces an apt description when she says and needed for the shape (ibid). My reading of this is an important point; that is, form is needed to talk about formlessness, as much as formlessness is needed to talk about form, that Hopkins described as the same entity as the phenomenon it qualifies (1992, p. 144). Critic Julio Sanchez describes the work of Escardo and likens the emptiness portrayed on her canvases to the Big Bang of Quantum Physics, going on to say that (she) is faced with a major challenge: to represent emptiness through her paintings and they are a chance to experience the no-shape, the emptiness the oriental sages tell us about, the timeless and spaceless emptiness (2003). Escardos study of the Tao encourages the interpretation of emptiness as noshape, allowing the employment of background/foreground simultaneously, as in this work from her Emptiness Series 2000 2006 exhibition (Fig. 6).

Figure 6 Alejandra Repetto Escardo Untitled No. 174 2005 Acrylic over linen. 80cm. x 160cm. Retrieved August 8, 2006 from www.alejandrarepetto.com.ar

Escardo explains further, Artists use the white space in their works as symbolic space which refers to this fundamental Emptiness. Negative space becomes positive space, (Personal Communication September 29, 2006). As a result of corresponding with Escardo and studying her work I have come to understand how an interpretation of emptiness can embody both aspects of difference, combining them into a seamless whole without losing the characteristics of either. Her non-dual approach to painting gives rise to the combining of the formless within the form.

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Lee Ufan

Born in South Korea in 1936, and considered one of East Asias most significant artists, Lee Ufans works are recognised for their expression of infinity and emptiness. Echoing Escardos words in describing the necessity of ground in order to explore form, Ufan says Until the early 1980s I always composed repetitious figures, as a pictorial enactment of the idea of infinity. infinity (As cited in Tate Modern, 1998 ). This is a key statement which links the work of both artists; that is, their assertion that the ground of a picture itself expresses emptiness and the problem of expressing emptiness becomes the solution, allowing both aspects of opposites to maintain their own difference while unifying into the whole. Ufan attempts to create mutual relations, spatial movement, duality and a double reading of the dematerialization of material (Cited in Lisson Gallery, 2004), reinforcing my earlier point that we can employ the material to represent the immaterial and herein lies the paradox of the contradictory statement that may nonetheless be true. Ufans work From Line, (Fig. 7) demonstrates the union of staticity and fluidity working together in a single piece, suggesting form and ground coexisting simultaneously yet neither one taking precedence over the other. Then, somehow I realised that the ground of a picture reveals itself and itself expresses

Figure 7 Lee Ufan From Line 1977 507cm. x 400cm. Retrieved July 13, 2007 from www.cmndz.com

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I conclude with a quote from John E. Bowlt - a specialist in the history of Russian art who has published widely on Symbolism, the avant-garde and Socialist Realism. He states Ultimately, the exact correlation between the spirit and its embodiment is impossible to determine, and we must remain content with allusions, insinuations, and veiled connections; after all, these are the essential ingredients of the spiritual in art (cited in Weisberger, 1987, p. 179). Bowlt is describing the elusive mystery which lies at the heart of all spiritual endeavours and experiences and which cannot be contained, described or grasped. However, it is the task of painters concerned with the spiritual to attempt the alchemy of converting the material of paint into the metaphysical realm of the spirit, and vice versa. This conversion is the inspired act, a rite even, that facilitates the paint retaining its value simultaneously as the subject and the object, the signifier and the signified, suggesting the merging of the many into the one that Jakob Bohme was describing. It is this merging that I bring into my studio practice and demonstrate through the act of creating art. I act out the conversion of paint materials into the realm of both the spirit and the temporal. ...ora means prayer. . . labour and ora spell laboratory. . . As in the artistss studio, so in the alchemistss laboratory: both of them mingle labor and ora (Elkins, 2000, p. 37). The following chapter describes my search for a process which recreates the paradox of emptiness in my studio and re-affirms my continuous relationship to it.

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CHAPTER THREE: BEING AND BECOMING

The Ambiguous Endeavour

The key statement from the The Heart Sutra, Emptiness is not other than form; form is not other than emptiness (Lopez, 1996, p. vii) suggests that neither is absolute in and of itself but is dependent on the other for its existence. In this context I explore the relationship between conceptual opposites through paint and plastic, at the same time, in keeping with Buddhist philosophy which acknowledges the paradox of a middle path between both eternalism and nihilism (Kakol, n.d., p. 3). Kenneth Inada uses the term Oriental Emptiness (2000, p. 71) to differentiate between the usual meaning of emptiness as containing nothing, and the oriental understanding which brings together the opposites of fullness (or form) and emptiness. This supports my earlier point that the English language does not have a satisfactory translation for the Sanskrit shunyata, but in Inadas words, The East has been employing the term emptiness, for a long time now with certain plausibility and success (2000, p. 71). Donald Kuspit, American art critic, poet and professor of art history and philosophy at the State University of New York at Stony Brook has relevant comments on the success or otherwise of the dilemma of relating dualities, and Mark C. Taylor, Professor of Religion at Williams College takes us a step further by suggesting how we may respond to the frustration of seeking the unattainable, both as humans and artists. Accustomed as we are to perceiving the world in terms of what we can see and what we cannot, the paradox of emptiness challenges our dualistic world view, requiring a drastic turn around in our ordinary perception, a paradigm shift (Inada, 2000, p. 87). It is the view of nondualism which the Buddhist teacher and scholar Shunryu Suzuki describes by stating everything is just a tentative form and colour (cited in Smith, 1999, p.

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193) that I take into my studio and attempt to translate into the language of paint through my art practice. Overarching these analyses is the question of the possibility/impossibility of expressing emptiness and whether it is a doomed endeavour, given the fact that emptiness is a spiritual phenomenon beyond description, beyond definition and beyond concepts and is, most importantly, a felt experience. My assertion is that however successfully an artist may feel they have achieved the goal of connecting opposites, my claim is that it is a never-ending unsolvable dilemma which is both achievable and unachievable. As Mark C. Taylor says in his book Disfiguring: Art, Architecture, Religion: The work of art (impossibly) represents nothing. Paradoxically, this failure is its success (1992, p. 276). Absurd as this may sound, it is relevant to my painting process which values the ambiguous and mysterious. While acknowledging and valuing the transient, open, borderless, tentative quality both of materials and intention, I approach my painting with the ongoing question What will happen if?

Exploring the Paradox of Emptiness

My experience of emptiness produces immeasurable, sustained feelings of joy which is impossible to impart in words and therefore it was my intention to attempt to convey some of this joy through painting. In the words of Wilber, I need to to send forth, reach out, and celebrate (1998, p. 186). This need underpins my entire approach to painting. It is for this reason that the work is colourful, active, expressive and evocative of some of that exuberance. The paradox of this is that through the realisation of emptiness, colour is inextricably linked to transparency, movement linked with stillness and the sense of self as an individual is linked with the connectedness of all life. It is my belief that art which illustrates form is emptiness without acknowledging its opposite emptiness is form is failing it-self. In The Spectrum of Consciousness Wilber describes this as; 42

just as front and back are simply two different ways of viewing one body, so subject and object . . . are but two ways of approaching one reality and set(ting) of the opposites against one another while trying to figure out which is really real this is to condemn oneself to the perpetual and chronic frustration of trying to solve a nonsensical problem (1985, p. 40).

I believe that Wilber illustrates this point perfectly and in pointing out that there actually is no problem, has, in a sense, given permission for me to continue with my endeavour to express emptiness through the language of paint. The interpretation of emptiness and form into figure and ground provides a tangible means to translate opposites into material form and lead to a new understanding of how the creative act can promote the apprehension of emptiness, that most fulfilling, profound and healing of experiences, the experience of no separation. Whilst articulating the symbiotic relationship between the relative and the absolute, I can work in full awareness of the existence of both. It is not a case of either/or, or both/and, but a stepping aside of existence and inexistence; (Mabbett, 2006, p. 29). The paradox of this position is the potential creative space in which to act, but because it is impossible to separate space and form, impossible to pin down the simultaneous coexistence of opposites I have to resort to spatial symbols.

My decision to use plastic was to provide a metaphor for the visible/invisible nature of phenomenon, and I believe it to be useful as representative of emptiness, that is, characterless. As Inada says, The vision of things as they are does not cancel out the realm of the empirical or phenomenal.Since there is no separation in the dynamics involving both realms, they coalesce and are coterminous at all times (2000, p. 81). This is not to say either is negated by the other; but rather that opposites can inhabit that seemingly impossible realm of paradox, a contradictory position that may nonetheless be true - in a word, emptiness. The plastic is a metaphor for emptiness, the ground is a metaphor for the natural or external realm; in/separable. The success or otherwise of this 43

endeavour is as slippery and opaque as a piece of plastic and cannot be measured in tangible terms. Donald Kuspit addresses this issue when he describes the work of Jackson Pollock and Barnett Newman.

For all their efforts to integrate the opposites, and apparent success at doing so, these artists are stuck with the old dilemma of the ambiguous relationship between figure and ground. The struggle to reconcile them is unending, for their relationship can never be adequately defined, since it is inherently indefinite (2006, pp. 1& 2).

Kuspits language is interesting for he does not state possible or impossible: he says ambiguous, unending and indefinite. It is not only Pollock and Newman who are faced with this struggle and I have established that many artists, particularly within the abstract expressionist movement have worked with the same intention, their efforts demonstrating the value inherent within the process. I suggest that the value of the process lies in the creative moment when an artist takes hold of the possibilities of who they might be, what they might create, and in so demonstrating, they become. The task never reaches completion and requires continual negotiation and re-negotiation as Taylor eloquently describes Though the elimination of repression is a utopian dream, and, thus, the Kingdom will never arrive, despairing or cynical resignation is not the only response available to us (1992, p. 318).

Taylor is suggesting that however disfigured, deserted and possibly failing in its intentions, serious art is our positive never-ending response to the repressive structures of ideologies that are both inescapable and forever deficient (1992, p. 318). In the process of making art we are continuously creating, remaking and saving ourselves. Concentration, awareness, and a belief that the act of searching for the answer actually provides the answer through the process itself, is the key to my studio practice. As a work of art is created and witnessed, the seeer, the seen and the seeing coalesce into the union of subject and object. That is, externalising the internal, internalising the external.

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The Ten Oxherding Pictures During the process of exploring new possibilities by combining plastic and paint on a fixed support, I decided to use the classic fifteenth century Chinese Zen Ten Ox Herding Pictures as a presentation format for the work. Much of my painting was in black and white and many experiments with various patterns and textures on plastic had resulted in a body of work which needed an appropriate format for presentation. As the Ox Herding series is based on a spiritual journey of the lost self searching for meaning which culminates in the unification of Self and other, it paralleled my exploration into the uniting of opposites through the experience of emptiness. In his essay The Aesthetics of Oriental Emptiness Inada states, The 10 Ox Herding Pictures in various presentations is a perfect example of depicting the inner dynamics of the conditioned and unconditioned realms (2000, p. 87). In the original series of paintings the Ox gradually changes from black to white, symbolising internal movement from isolation and separation to wholeness and creativity, echoing Dantes epic poem of the hero travelling through purgatory and hell in order to eventually arrive at paradise. The search is for the essential self not through thoughts and concepts, but as it really is (Kubota, n.d. p.1). The essential self can include the realisation that even ones thoughts are empty of intrinsic existence and that the search for meaning outside of ones own experience, e.g. the Ox, is pointless.

By trapping the paint between the plastic and the support material, either canvas or board, and manipulating the paint using pressure of my hands I produced marks which contained the qualities of both order and disorder. I then either left the paint to solidify, or took the process a step further by removing the plastic while partially dry, providing two surfaces to continue working with. Both these surfaces could then be reworked with a variety of paint materials. Part of this process involved preparing the ground with a layer of textured paint, so that when the next layer was applied and pressed down over the plastic, the pattern of

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prepared texture emerged. The dynamic of revealing what had hitherto been hidden appealed to me, like the process of the spiritual self being revealed during meditation or contemplation, in an act that is both intentional and open to whatever may occur. My central studio process involves testing my questions through experiments and strategies which involve sensual engagement with my materials. I explore the idea of non-duality by using acrylic paint and shellac mono-printed between canvas or board and plastic, conveying the idea of no/separation between the opposites of subject and object, (Fig.8). The product of my enquiry is the proverbial finger pointing to the moon, as it is not the moon nor never will be. I can only point, suggest and provide metaphors and signs, but they remain just that; signs of some other.

Figure 8 Barbara OSullivan No Separation 2006 Plastic & Acrylic on Canvas 71cm. x 71cm. Collection of the Artist.

My intention was to create a mark of such quality that the viewer is invited to contemplate the smallest areas of paint, thereby suggesting something much larger. This suggests the coexistence of the microscopic and the macroscopic; opposites which are dependent /independent. Further explorations led me to cut

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out round shapes of plastic and reattach them to a new canvas or board surface, providing another variety of marks and colours as the shellac mingles with the texture of the wet white paint.

I deliberately chose to present the series in this format to strengthen their presence as a continuum, and to suggest the dynamic of movement within a fixed environment, like De Leuzes nomad, who is not necessarily someone who moves: there are travels in which one does not move, travels in intensitythose who start nomadizing in order to stay in the same place and free themselves from codes (cited in Haerdter, 2007). Like the nomad who discovers him or herself by travelling many miles without leaving home, this series of paintings proposes that the opposites of stillness and movement may co-exist without the loss of identity of either. Beginnings may be the same as endings and as Heraclitus said, everything is in flux. One of my goals is to explore methods of suggesting what Inada would describe as an open borderless perception of things, although the ordinary mind could only perceive a border-defined perception of things (2000, p. 73 ).

The Ten Ox Herding Pictures is a series of paintings, each on a fixed square ground, with the internal patterned plastic area gradually changing from a small square to a large circle. In keeping with the original series, the background colour of the first four paintings is black. In the fifth the background colour changes from black to white in a vertical spinal division, emphasised in red. The aesthetics of this arrangement demonstrate confrontation and interaction of opposites wherein figure and ground may be intertwined and the red column evokes sacrifice as the giving up of preconceptions of the ego. The dominant colour in the last five paintings is white, in keeping with the Ox becoming white as his identity is more elusive.

The narrative begins with the disfigured hero/ine as a small central motif lost in a vast black landscape where life appears futile and separation is all encompassing, (Fig.9). This is the famous crisis where all things are possible and, as Mark C.

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Taylor explains, To emerge from this darkness into the full light of reason, it is necessary to establish the mean between the extremes. The mean both joins and extinguishes opposites like identity/difference and same/other (1987, p. xxiii).

Figure 9 Barbara OSullivan Hello Darkness Be My Friend 2006 Plastic & Acrylic on Canvas 71cm. x 71 cm. Collection of the Artist.

The spiritual journey begins with the hero/ine seeking the means to integrate his/her identity with the world in a meaningful way. The Christian equivalent of this position would be the City of Destruction inhabited by John Bunyan before he sets out on his journey of Pilgrims Progress, or the moment before Mary, Mother of Jesus conceives of the Holy Spirit, symbolising potential and the coming of the Messiah fills all emptiness and hence overcomes the absence haunting unhappy consciousness (Taylor, 1987, p. 12). The power of this moment of awakening is akin to Gretchen Albrechts response to the paintings of the pregnant Madonna by Pierro della Francesca. This links with my theory that the experience of emptiness has powerful reverberations and cross-cultural

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sympathies which have kinship to our humanity rather than being entirely dependent on particular cultural practices.

As the journey towards wholeness continues, the hero/ine becomes aware of the sense perceptions, as Donald Kuspit says: The spirit knows itself most through sense experiences (2003, p. 1.), and like Dante in the underworld must confront all of himself, flaws included, in order to accept all of himself. But he is unable to say where the self actually is, and in searching for the true self one begins to realise that our preconceptions of the self are the result of delusion; that when we try to grasp our true self, it eludes us. We can break the body down into its constituent parts and say we are a collection of these, but we are not just a collection of parts, we are far more, yet: A person is thereby shown not to exist inherently (Hopkins, 1996, p. 38). This connects with my idea of the value of viewing the world as both dual and non-dual simultaneously, that is as a unified whole, continually becoming, becoming, becoming.

During the narrative the seeker finds the Ox and attempts to grasp it, but doubts arise and efforts may be undermined, this ox has been in our heart a long timeIt has been mired in the world of dualism (Kubota, n.d., p. 6). Patterns are emerging and some attempts at integration are having positive results, although still unresolved, because we are so attached to our dualistic world that we are not prepared to relinquish our hold without a struggle, as Zen Master D.T. Suzuki explains owing to the overwhelming pressure of the objective world, the cow is found hard to keep under control, (1973, p. 372). (Fig.10).

The realisation of emptiness can hit us like a bolt of lightning, an epiphany, or in Zen terms It is the sudden flashing of a new truth hitherto altogether undreamed of (Suzuki, 1973, p. 261). This sudden shift in viewing the world evokes what the famous poet and mystic William Blake was describing in his poem Auguries of Innocence,

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To see a World in a grain of Sand And a Heaven in a Wild Flower, Hold Infinity in the palm of your hand And Eternity in an hour. (as cited in Butter,1982, p. 132). To see the world in this way, as non-dual, beyond time, and containing natural beauty requires the reconciliation near/distant, of opposites: suggesting that possible/impossible, open/closed, human/divine,

immanent/transcendent are constructs of the mind, rather than fixed truths. Described by Frambach as a releasing of all differentiated contents of awareness. . . one deemed to be the deepest source of authentic creativity (cited in Stevenson, 2003, p. 119). In short, the paradox of the co-existence of opposites without contradiction is eloquently described. However, as Taylor has warned, this utopia is not permanent and there is still much work to be done, and as the red vertical line suggests, this ground gained has been at great cost and sacrifice. Seizing the ox is grasping clearly the fact that the essence of your self is completely empty (Kubota, n.d., p. 7). If we are St. George, we have slain the dragon, snake or serpent which is the carrier of symbolic or spiritual messages in many cultures.

As the series progresses and the central image changes from square to circular, there is a feeling of resolution and although things may appear the same, everything has changed. The red vertical line of renunciation has been replaced with a blue horizontal, suggesting a time of spiritual growth within rest and now that emptiness has been experienced instead of being only a theory, we can know that the substance of unenlightened/enlightened, ordinary/holy, good/bad, gain/loss is empty and that accordingly the wall between unenlightened/enlightened, ordinary/holy, good/bad, gain/loss has disappeared (Kubota, n.d. p. 9).

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Figure 10 Barbara OSullivan The Inside is the Outside: The Outside is the Inside (Detail) 2006 Plastic & Acrylic on Canvas 71cm x 71cm. Collection of the Artist.

One point in the narrative is forgetting the Ox because when we do away with the self which is doing the looking, you actually understand that you have already reached home (Kubotu, n.d., p. 10). We still inhabit a world of dualism, but we know now from experience that the world of non-dualism is hidden within it. As Wilber stated in the introduction, the experience of emptiness can free us from the suffering of not knowing our interconnection with all things. When we clarify our world view as inclusive, we can see ourselves as both individuals and part of a greater whole. The Ten Ox Herding Pictures are a creation story which I suggest is synonymous with a worldview that will open to us the transcendent that informs it, and at the same time informs ourselves within it (Campbell, 1988, p. 52). Further on in the narrative all certainties have disappeared and doubt prevails; the person and the Ox are both forgotten, (Fig.11). I chose to hang this work as a non-painting by placing a gold nail in the wall and drawing a pencil line directly on the wall around the edges of a canvas.

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Figure 11 Barbara OSullivan No Sacred Cows Left 2007 Pencil and

Gold Nail on Wall 71cm. x 71cm. Collection of the Artist.

The mystery of simultaneous existence/non existence is un/veiled and shown in the painting which is not there. I allude to the paradox of the double negation through the use of the pencil line and nail, suggesting hanging, creating the possibility that nothing could be something. This work is also a reference to those painters, Ad Rheinhardt and Yves Klein for example, who have expressed the idea of deconstruction and negation by non-painting, reducing their canvases to a single colour. This connects with the stillness of deep meditation when one can experience the body as being present, but not present, as the boundaries separating us from our surroundings dissolves, while the mind remains fully aware of all sensory input. However, the position of negation (nihilism) is not the final one and so the ninth painting is where the hero/ine returns to the world of phenomena and acknowledges the beauty of the natural world.

The understanding of emptiness may be likened to a washing away of illusions, a form of baptism maybe, so therefore in The Water Flows by itself & The Flowers are Naturally Red (Fig. 12) I used water to wash away a heavy layer of paint, exposing fine textures and pattern beneath. As Kubota says: If you succeed in washing it away by constant and persistent sitting, you come to a state of realisation of the 52

fact that Person is empty, so is the dharma, (n.d. p. 12). Dharma means teachings or ideas, so in other words this painting refers to my earlier assertion that the experience of emptiness takes us beyond concepts.

Figure 12 Barbara OSullivan The Water Flows by Itself & the Flowers Are Naturally Red 2007 Plastic & Acrylic on Canvas 71cm. x 71cm. Collection of the Artist.

The final painting in the series (Fig. 13) suggests the multiplicity within the one, and the connectedness of all phenomena, the co-terminality described by Inada, (2000, p.84). This is the opportunity for the Buddhist bodhisattvas, the enlightened ones, to bring their talents and humility to others, for artists to give their creative gifts to the world. Kubota describes this as Entering the marketplace with arms hanging loose (n.d. p. 14) the ox herder is relaxed and at ease and returning to his community, ready to offer whatever talents and skills he has and any remnants of the dualistic concepts opposing self to other are completely gone (ibid). .

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Figure 13 Barbara OSullivan Choose the Colours of Your World 2007 Plastic & Acrylic on Board 71cm. x 71cm. Collection of the Artist.

Although The Ten Ox Herding Pictures were presented as a series and arranged chronologically, I emphasise that they were not fixed in a literal sense. Beginnings and endings are not permanent but flow within and without like water. As Inada says: The sequence of events exhibits, graphically and phenomenally, the constant transformation of the dynamics from the conditioned to the unconditioned and back to the conditioned (2000, p. 88). He is referring to the original series of course, and I acknowledge that my abstracted version is just my interpretation.

Made for Each Other

A further development into non-dualism and the relationship between emptiness and form evolved into an installation of six large sheets of plastic hung loosely like a curtain for 4.5 metres of the gallery wall. On the opposite wall were twentyfive plastic circles indexing their original position on the plastic sheets when they were painted. The presentation of these works reflected the process of their composition in that the circles were cut from a sheet of plastic, attached to the 54

larger sheets by their own tactile suction, and printed with an abstract pattern using black acrylic paint and shellac. The circles were then removed, leaving blank areas in their place (Figs. 14 and 15). This process relates to my theory of emptiness by taking a clear, transparent material devoid of marks or decoration and then applying form to it, referencing the open, transparent nature of emptiness. The removal of the circles and placing them opposite their original position reads as their being simultaneously present and not present, visible yet not containing their own inherent existence, that is, their very existence is dependent on their opposite. The placement of this installation on opposite walls meant that the viewer is positioned between the two, allowing and encouraging a study of the works in order to clarify their process, connection and communication, deliberately raising questions of duality and non-duality through the existence of the free-floating circles and the simultaneous existence of the blank circles on the opposite wall. The middle path is not one of demonstrating a middle ground between opposite poles as is often incorrectly assumed, but is a position where both extremes coexist simultaneously without the loss of identity of either. The blank formlessness of emptiness co-exists with (and is dependent upon) the existence of form. But as truth and reality cannot be pinned down, this installation is suggesting, pointing to, and opening up possibilities of a truth which always steps aside from itself. One cannot speak of it, but one can point to the conceptual space it occupies (Mabbett as cited in Park, 2006, p.24).

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Figure 14 Barbara OSullivan Made for Each Other 2007 4.5m x 4.5m Acrylic Paint & Shellac on Plastic Collection of the Artist

Figure 15 Barbara OSullivan Made for Each Other 2007 4.5m x 4.5m Acrylic Paint & Shellac on Plastic. Collection of the Artist

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The attempt to paint the paradox of emptiness required a complete letting go of any preconceived or desired outcomes as my painting is largely experimental. The studio is the place where there are few rules and so my practice is based on the question what will happen if? Trying to pin down the opposites of figure and ground is fraught with the frustration of trying to solve a nonsensical problem, however, I have discovered that the language of paint is such a subtle and magical thing that it is able to speak for me. The energy I bring to the painting studio is transmuted into the work itself and becomes the life of the paint. Each time I lay down a colour, spread and mingle different tones, explore the effects of texture and make decisions about presentation, I am becoming the paint itself and it becomes my voice. There develops an awareness that the paint, the painting and the painted merge into one and the sense of separateness dissolves. The clear PVC sheet becomes a membrane, a thinly spread division between the temporal and spiritual, which then dissolves because it too, is empty. Just as the Ox Herder discovered that after he had made his journey to find the Ox and had struggled to subdue it, he could rest in the knowing that everything is holy. Dualistic concepts are removed, self and other are reconciled, figure and ground become one, form is no other than emptiness and emptiness is no other than form.

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CONCLUSION
My studio work relies strongly on process and materials to convey the joy of the union of opposites and the paradox of painting emptiness. Through the realisation of emptiness, one becomes aware of opposites existing simultaneously; light is interdependent with darkness, colour inextricably linked to transparency, movement linked with stillness and the sense of self as an individual is linked with the connectedness of all life. I am reliant on the use of materials to demonstrate the immaterial, and the choices I have made reflect my intentions surrounding transparency, openness, spirituality, paradox and revealing the hidden. While The Ten Ox Herding Pictures originated in China and belong to a culture very different from my Western Christian tradition, they have meaning and resonance with my experience, suggesting that while it is important to understand the culture within which we live, there can be primary connections and equivalent experiences that cross cultural boundaries and unite us as part of the family of humankind. To accept the similarities within differences is, I believe, a crucial requirement for world peace, especially at a time when racial and religious difference, when misunderstood and misdirected, cause so much suffering. Recent discourse surrounding the possible connections between deconstruction, Derridas differance and Buddhist emptiness is ongoing and challenging Western philosophy to re-examine its premise that investigation proceeds from an established subject. Human change does not progress in even stages and while signposts can be useful they are not fixed; they can ground me while I learn to fly, they teach me who I am and by studying and painting them I am learning who I might become and who I have always been. I suggest a kinship here between the act of painting and those fundamental rituals which play out connections between self and other, singular and plural, human and divine and contain hidden energies of sacrifice and resurrection. My original question of if and how the realisation of emptiness can be conveyed in paint has been resolved, not through definitive answers and conclusions, but 58

rather by renewed appreciation of the value of continuing to ask the question and put the question into practice through my exploration of paint. Many artists throughout the twentieth century have endeavoured to express the inexpressible, the paradox of the union of opposites and those ideas which have sprung from, or led to, new discoveries in quantum physics and it is my contention that the desire to express emptiness is not confined to Buddhists, but is of concern to artists from a wide range of cultures.

With regard to my own experiences of emptiness, I am not laying claim to any special enlightenment or realisation for myself, although I can identify with many phases of this journey, and my drawing and painting are inseparable from my meditation practice. The artists who have been motivated by the same inner necessity are countless, and some of them have reached the peak of their endeavours in the process of making works of art which contain the often obscure message of non-duality. This is a quest that has no beginning and no end, it is the middle way of seeking and searching and finding myself in the process. Paradoxically, I may not even have a self to find because I am always already here. In examining the expression of emptiness through the union of opposites and the methodology of applying my findings to my painting, the paradox inherent in such an endeavour suggests that I am attempting the possible/impossible and I happily concede this point however, I prefer to hold the question of how to than provide conclusive answers which are fixed, immutable and unchanging. The very character of this exploration suggests movement, ambiguity and spaciousness and it is my contention that any conclusion of this discussion must embody these aspects. I am satisfied, however, that many of my original questions have been put to rest and I conclude that what originally appeared as a problem is now no longer a problem for the simple reason that, as my experience of emptiness clarified, and as my research has shown, emptiness really is form, and form really is emptiness.

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Each is contained inseparably within the other, without loss of identity, and without contradiction. Employing materials to articulate the immaterial is a legitimate/impossible endeavour for as I have argued, there is a history of this dilemma among artists and philosophers and my conclusion is that materiality is always insufficient, unfinished, and inadequate, yet that is not all the paradox contained with emptiness allows for the simultaneous existence of sufficient, finished and yes, adequate. Form and materiality are the language of the artist, just as the written word, being the language of the writer is employed to point to that which is beyond language. The artist therefore must employ materials to communicate the immaterial, tangible forms to suggest the intangible, relative truths to convey absolute truths, the dual to access the non-dual, materiality of the finite world to point to the infinite world, and in doing so perhaps see that they are one and the same. I suggest that experiencing emptiness is a prelude to enlightenment, which integrates our individuality with universality. It unites us with the other, meeting our deepest need for unity, reconciling us with what we most desire which is always and already nearer to us than the ends of our fingers. When I talk about no separation and union, I am suggesting that if the separation between subject and object, self and other is no longer tenable, the potential for understanding between different cultures and religions increases. Interfaith dialogue and the interest being shown by Western philosophers in Buddhist philosophy, and increasing globalisation, are I believe, an indication of the growing necessity for seeing the other as an aspect of ourselves. The peaceful coexistence of the human race may depend on this. I suggest that we are at the point in history when we can proceed outwards from the post-postmodern era by celebrating the human potential within non-dualism, beyond the personal and egotistical to a more inclusive and universal position, which is, as Wilber says, to do with expanding and clarifying our awareness . .

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When one exhausts the personal, there is left the transpersonal. There is, right now, simply nowhere else to go (1999, p. 267).

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