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PART II
Fourteen etchings on the autographed version of
J.S. Bach's The Art of Fugue
Artist's Statement:
To comprehend Bach's inner quest for silence in his final creation was to visually grasp the music in his course towards death. The mood and intensity of Bach's faded days and black nights of six months he spent in a darkened room to improve his sight was the starting experience for my immersion in these scores. There were different approaches to graphically express this body of work. As I had not found the best approach through playing this composition, I needed to find something tangible and constant that could integrate this theme fourteen times. I became totally absorbed by the thematic progression in each fugue and made many attempts to analyze it. After two years, I had theorized the thematic progression as a post- and-lintel configuration. The vertical and horizontal lines of the first and fifth note in the music formed the pillars that supported the musical progression. The repetitive patterning of notes in each fugue also implied to me a deeper philosophical view. The theme existed in time and space as a cycle which like a moving wheel linked birth, the starting point of an evolving harmony, with death, the transformation of new life. Experiencing the sequence of notes to an extended existence, transforming the limitless extension of sound into silence I had attained the eternal within myself. Being in touch with this stilled center , like experiencing the unmoving axis of a moving wheel, I began to get a glimmer of the direction the etching would take. This entry theme of each fugue was held together by seven notes, concluding that the mystical number seven was the core of this revolving form. The focus now became to develop the concept of a seven - pointed rosette circle. I used the combination of seven equal lines extending inward from the circumference of a circle, crossing over each other and diminishing in size towards the center point of the circle, reflecting the beauty of proportion of the Golden Mean. I did a series of prints on this seven-pointed circle that evolved into an inner-spiraled vortex.
EH
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