The artist known as No Land is aptly named. Their work exists in an upper atmosphere, an etheric realm, invisible and moving. Prana, Qi, Life Body or Ether body, are different names for the mysterious life force which animates all that exists over and above the mineral realm. Where this force comes from has been speculated upon since humans were making ochre handprints on cave walls by the light of a torch. Unseen currents make the flame dance, move the mutable clouds through the sky; they quicken and grow dark; they whisper in the blue. In the realms of art, we are presented with husks, exoskeletons of visions, records of a process whereby the artist attempts to transmute and materialize what is immaterial.
photo by Ariella Villefranche
We are left with the Pieta or Autumn Rhythm. A dream butterfly becomes a melody pressed into a page. A still photograph of a city in motion. A blushing nude. The history of art is a history of this attempt to freeze what we know never stays the same. You can’t step in the same river once. The work of No Land won’t fit in a portfolio. Not because there is too much of it, but because it is always moving. Poem scrolls and fragments are laid out on a table. The reading begins; No Land looks through the work like tea leaves or tarot cards. Certain pieces step forward and offer themselves. An hourglass stands beside a rock holding the papers down. The sand travels in both directions, suspended in the unfurling present, an oracle of words. Lines from other poets appear and are given new meaning. The fragment, cutup, collage is taken to its terminus, then sets out on foot forward to origin; being: born anew, integrated, continuously. The poem becomes a drawing, the drawing a song hummed while painting. Valery said that poems are never finished, only abandoned; however, it is this unfinished-ness, this abandon, which is the work. With deep respect for the diversity which surrounds her, we learn that in the quantum jetstream of No Land’s creations, all words, sound, and image are energy vibrating behind appearance. The veil is removed. Creation quivers, a drop of dew reflects the city in summer twilight, and falls away. --- Oliver Ray
drawings & metallics, No Land 2017-2024
