Joseph Balletta

I really can feel the atmosphere in this painting- thanks

Nice abstract expressionism piece

A blind diver in itself makes one suspect because why would someone wish to be a diver if they are blind? This leads one to divine that the blind diver may be a metaphor for the archetype of Ulysses- the sailor that risks journies into the "unknown". Maritime law can also be a symbol of the masculine restless energy of Faust in his futile exploits. These exploits can only represent the female energy the original landscape( nature) as the struggle between the ego and the id ( Captain Ahab and the white whale). The diver as a sailor in the employ of " Empire" touches upon the cosmic energy of the earth represented herein as a female but is blind to it otherwise. Being blind to this energy He can only stumble upon it due to karma and not by in Jungian terminology an integration between animas and anima! He is unconscious or blind to it due to his equally perverse desire to exploit it !

Critique:

I must say I like this style of work because it always reminds me of the prejudice I hold for an aesthetic of art as a craft that alludes to the poetical. What I mean by this is when a piece of art can remind me of the beauty and the struggle we all experience in Living Life. For this reason I have chosen to comment on this piece and Miss Werfel's apparent style and I thank her as well!

Wave as a two dimensional assemblage has a Zen like quality if one considers that it constricts the eye to a metaphysics in the idea of the impermanence of the self. This idea which is usually imputed to " Eastern Religion" also has roots in the Platonic notions of ideal forms noted by a universal or cosmic relation to the concept of change. The transference of a cosmic concept of change into a two dimensional format is performed herein by the alliteration of line ,color and shape into a sense of movement where no distinct objectification of figure and ground can impose a narrative that will minimize Dance as a more ancient way in which to express the movement of our bodies. This work alludes to a body but one lost in a movement of ecstasy in which the tension between self and ego disappears. There is a definite interplay between form as shape, color and presence as a mere physical experience of what our physical eye is used to seeing in other words form as immediate present and static or "known" and then its poised and interspersion with a more subtle presence of form prior to its three dimensional attributes.

In side every atom is an electrical field . In a dance the physicality of language to objectify space for a moment in time and space becomes nullified by movement being released into the electrical field of perhaps a fourth dimension always available to one who senses it. Is this representation evocative of the dance of Life its agony and ecstasy inside and outside our beings as a consciousness in contradiction?

More pointedly is this assemblage a beautiful representation of Jacobs ladder, or our existence as also what manifests for our species as a profound disconnect between heaven and earth?

I like your representations . I have some art up on this platform too but I also like to write so if you wish I would invite you to check out my article : " Fathers and Sons" at josephballetta.substack.com

In the future I will attempt to critique your art and I hope it will be something you like.

Thank you for responding. I truly like the style and feel for it as many of my designs also exhibit

This is a style I particularly like and execute in my own works. I think I am attracted to it because it presents color depth and movement as not any particular narrative based on the logic and syntax of language but more purely as a painterly style. And due to this factor of this style I become not grounded by the mesmerizing experience of objectifications that rely on technique but am more mesmerized by and aspect of nature that evoke a more mystical organic essence!

I like this piece because its clarity and cubistic sense stops any transpersonal metaphors by demanding a focal point that gives priority to the small over the large something that is so often not presented in many works. One must find content and its meaning in the immediacy of this works design its structure. It is starkly more pictorial then narrative and because of that one has to find any associative meaning in the design itself and again not so much in any metaphorical references tangential to the picture!