Artist statement - May 2017

Artist statement Afraz Entessari From childhood, I had great fascination for mystery. In that period space science and wildlife was source of awe. Becoming an astronaut was my childhood fantasy. Now I can phrase it as, the void like dimension that astronaut enters stuck to my mind. As I grew older music, film, cultural productions and art grabbed my attention. Creativity and experiencing creative solutions and productions would fulfill my thirst for mystery. I become familiar with fine arts after I get acquainted with music, literature and cinema. Most of my inspirations comes from sciences, philosophy, poetry, performing arts and etc. My thought process and my inspirations involve topics such as philosophy of science, consciousness, human evolution, language and experiences of altered states of consciousness. Digging through them and looking for origins of phenomena mentioned above, are my main motivation to research, study and create. In the process of brainstorming and making I let intuition play with knowledge. To break conventions of thought and knowledge. To open new modes for experiencing. I do t a t to state a thi g, othi g is a solute. I like to ithd a uestio s a d lea e these questions unanswered. In other words, to question unanswerable. Process of making and thinking an artwork is a path which leads me to the potential questions. The artworks happen to me because there is something which cannot be answered. It is great motivation to dig into unknown and unknowable. In other words, what goes beyond limits of human comprehension triggers me to search. It triggers my curiosity. Thus, as my obsession to o sta tl uestio ealit and its concept, to show that always there could be something else, an extra layer and to considering that everything within boundary of knowledge could be wrong, I propose a question to confront assumed reality. By exploiting concepts as reality , infinity , nothing and words as such. In my thought and making process I break semantics of thought. Mentioned words are sensitive concepts. They are approached in different way in variety of sciences or studies. hat is i fi ite? hat is othi g? Ca the e ist? I do t thi k the a e ua tities (o e e qualities) they are not subject of physics, mathematics or philosophy. But of human experience, feelings. They are representations of unspeakable, of what cannot be explained. They are rare experiences of human. Experiences which distort assumed reality. Concepts which stand at the edge of knowledge, they become absurdity which tickle and insult reason. they dissolve boundaries. I am nothing... I am infinite... Absence of sensory stimuli. When you close your senses to the world around you. The feeling, the sensation arises. Then they vaporize and if you can hold on, you experience the void. Void releases everything, all emotions like toxins leave you. Nothing or Emptiness, pleasance or weightless suffocation. There is presence in absence of everything. Why does human articulate what cannot clearly be defined? why does our language has words for them? we have words for them as clearly considered phenomenon like other tangible phenomenas. Tangible as color red. As like as 'life' or 'love'. how much do we really understand these? where do they stand as human experience? They can merely be result of our perception, interpretation or even confusion. Or just form of e p essio . I te esti g is e still do t ha e a lue, hat is t uth ehi d the . Infinity and nothing, they seem like opposite sides of extreme paradox. They seem different sides of duality. But this duality arises from miss-perception. They contain and involve each other. They have been subject of discussion and have triggered imagination since beginning of philosophy. Their very existence/fundament is still questioned. My works are visionary exploration through series of concepts and experiences though some are seemingly of mundane and routine nature but actually they stand at the edge of sciences and philosophy. By digging into them, they have potential to destruct conventions of thought and understanding of reality. By this exploration, I suggest and open ways to examine the comprehension of alternative modes of perceiving information, being and prehension of consciousness. Expand definitions and boundaries of language and therefore our understanding. In order to reach this goal, I break conventional semantics and syntax of thought, perception and language. Go beyond cultural and lingual model of reality. In the process of this exploration I combine analytical and poetic language and forms to achieve the main goal. How art make all these topics more tangible and connects such topics to our feelings is within poetry and their poetic vision. Poetical sides of the works lean where they deal and dig into mental struggles and intense feelings and emotions. This is where cosmic philosophical subjects and small pure life come together, confusion, loss, curse, bless, absence and presence. The fact is that understanding of the world and how it works does not contribute to our daily life. The question of why we are here? And where does universe come from? Which have been with us from very beginning of civilization, language and rationality, does not contribute to individuals lives. But it has been inseparable part of our psyche to constantly explore and ask such fundamental questions. These questions have been everyday concern of philosophers, scientists, artists, and enthusiasts which have its effect on mass consciousness. In order to reach and bring on such questions we need growth in basic elements of our thought process, language. We have to push evolution of our language in particular way to comprehend more complex and unambiguous concepts. However, we have achieved any answers or not there has been very important evolutionary benefits for human to ask such questions. They have been base for philosophy and improvements in science. We have brought results and sciences which have enhanced our lives, even though we never really reached ultimate answer. The beneficiary aspect of asking these questions is to achieve information that we ould t possi l thi k of. Dissolutio of ou da is so eho p e o ditio of u de sta di g ealit . A d this is a pa ado … – Terence McKenna Art expands definitions, art too has great potential to dissolve boundaries to broaden our imagination.