#300 Clogs

64x84 cm | Filler, oak frame

This image is made with my feet in the classic Kazuo Shiraga style. But where the Japanese master of abstract expressionism, one of the founders of the Gutai group, used ropes to elevate himself above the canvas, I have used the modern variant of clogs, made of plastic. This is the shoe of the common people, the shoe of the working class, from history in wood in the factories and on the fields, for example, today's healthcare workers widely use the plastic version. Still, it is also popular as leisurewear for the mainstream, or the so-called masses.

It is necessary for a group or an individual to rise slightly above the immediate material circumstances to become agents of change, to act instead of merely react. Maybe not hang in ropes from lofty ideals but to symbolize and understand ones position in a system of dependence. To perhaps wear the appropriate shoes. To identify not with one's privilege but instead with one's function in the logic of capitalism.

Where Shiraga's images are dramatic, sensual, with their different layers of colour in varying thicknesses, my work is flat and graphic, as it is actually a cross-section through the sculptural surface created by my footsteps in the wet filler. Restrained in tonality and size - I aim for a straightforward and accessible version of abstract expressionism.