Meditation Painting

Timothy K. has long been interested in the formation of identity and how it is fueled by intent. Rejecting the notion that one must render the world and its inhabitants naturalistically in order to express truth, he seeks to dismantle the racial hierarchy and the metaphorical construction of self through the lens of abstraction. By doing so, he is able to break through the barrier of objectivity and access the personal and subjective source, like those who belonged to the abstract movements of the 40s and 50s. Where he diverges, though, is in his endeavor to take this apart the subjective source in order to establish himself as a member of the greater collective Id. This commonality between seemingly disparate individuals, Timothy feels, is the true nature of humanity and something that we must regularly remind ourselves of when faced with the divisiveness that has come to define our sociopolitical and cultural climate. Above all else, his oeuvre of abstract painting is dedicated to what inextricably binds us to one another and the physiological matrix in which we are all embedded as opposed to what ostensibly separates us.

In order to reach a place where consciousness and self do not operate, Timothy uses breath and meditative focus to lower the frequency of brain waves. Here, in delta wave territory, the greater force that propels us and the sensory patterns that exist in the inner sanctum of the fastidiously manufactured self are channeled. Similar to the Process Art Movement of the the mid 1960s, he believes that these pieces are alive and should not only mirror the course of nature, but encapsulate it, thus breaking down the artificial barriers of our atomized world. This barrier is removed with the removal of a conscious self, Timothy then sees no established hierarchical divide between his atomic nature and that of the surrounding setting.  Following this strain of logic, he chooses to employ a wet on wet technique to the black canvas tacked to the wall in order to ensure optimal, uninterrupted flow. The wet canvas is mounted unprotected to the wall during and between sessions. It efficiently traps  the surrounding natural elements of life, as though a lint roller sprawled against a flat surface ensnaring all that is perishable and ephemeral. These elements, he feels, must be considered as  integral to his work as his own hand.

In the midst of tantric meditation, Timothy will let his brush dance on the black canvas mounted to the wall. The bristles, a filter of all that lies beyond the human perceptual threshold and the stroke, a sweeping and sometimes fevered gesture of the great energy that lies dormant and waiting within us all. As such, the bristles are meant to trace even the most minute flutterings of energy while the stroke is intended to channel his impetus.

Though these paintings are records of the course of nature, both within the body and without, they are also remnants of an amplified neurological feedback loop. In other words, in Timothy’s existential quest and honing of his method, he found that the sensation of the neurological trigger  that was initially inducing brush movement was then returning rapidly back through the brush, down his arm, and into his body starting the loop all over. As a result, a dialogue with the subconscious was cultivated and a language of internal phenomena, developed.

To attempt to access the forces that do not belong to the visual order of things is neither impossible nor esoteric. In fact, these forces that Timothy attempts to access through tantric meditation belong to the continuum of daily existence, just below the surface we tread. They are what make us human. But when we allow our senses to be deadened and muddled by the dailiness, our identities to be tethered to physiognomy are warped by the superficial, we lose sight of commonality and we degrade the tissue that we are all effectively cut from. The tissue that connects us.

In his process, which includes both the painting methodology and the meditative practice, Timothy understands that there can never be a complete removal of the creator. What makes us unique is as significant as what makes us similar, and almost equally, as unavoidable. In fact, there was never a separation to begin with.