Intersubjective Response [ISR] by Peter Breen to works at the Post Datum “Oculus” Exhibition at Jugglers Art Space May 6, 2011
the spasms and vomiting that protect me (series). 2011
It was the shock of the title at the beginning. Profound. Then a moon. Sitting with the image now there is an irregular shape and more than moon or maybe the moon by another view. And then on the right side a peninsular with reddish tones with grey and pink and hairs on the surface. And the narrow thin space between them is a kind of bridge. But the black means that leaping into the space to find the bridge between if one wants to is very foreboding. And then the reddish grey toned shape has me connecting with a Sesame Street kind of puppet. So there is humour here and foreboding. Launching into the dark to find a way has always been the way for me. So why do I want to connect these? Why do I think I am moving upwards to “the moon”?
Protection is part of the launch into the dark – I need protection from who knows what - but the artist has responded poetically in these images to the need for protection and it is in “spasm and vomiting” that he finds his protection. For me there is no protection in “spasm and vomiting” and how does this text spring from these images or do the images spring or creep from this text?
Sometimes violent illness is a moment of being lost and in being lost there is a feeling of protection. Almost like passing out under general anaesthetic. The beauty of these images are representative of a connection to the artist and the text. For me I am grounded in the right hand image, warmed by it and wondering as a child at the great moon above. I don’t feel sick and I have no spasms.
