THE THEORY OF THE GREEN PAINTING

Group exhibition Curated by Theodore Svenningsen and Alaïa Parhizi

Dates of Show: June 21st - July 19th 2024

Wonzimer is pleased to present THE THEORY OF THE GREEN PAINTING

THE THEORY OF THE GREEN PAINTING

The concept of the green painting came into being slowly over many centuries as certain peculiarities were noticed to be prevalent in the histories of a small number of paintings. The defining characteristic of the green painting is that after having been finished, the painting remains continually in the artist's possession even though the artist had never made a decision to keep the painting and had actually made many attempts to have others obtain it. Why this occurs is part of the theory of the green painting. The painting itself seems to have dictated its own history. Prima facie this appears to be an invalid assumption. How could a painting dictate its own history. However there are certain qualities in some paintings that result in those paintings dictating their own histories, not directly, but in an indirect manner. A concomitant relationship exists between the relevant qualities in the painting and the person viewing the painting which in turn results in attitudes regarding wanting or not wanting involvement with the painting. This has nothing to do with viewers liking or not liking the painting, or judging the painting as good or not good even though no painting seen as a green painting has ever been seen as not good. Qualities which bring about liking or not liking, and which are criteria for judging good or not good are not the same qualities that result in a painting being a green painting. What these qualities are remains the question and they are the subject of the theory of the green painting.

It should be noted here as to why such a painting is called a green painting. When the presence of these peculiarities in certain paintings were first noticed, those paintings happened to be green, or an amalgamation of various hues approximating green, or of a dominantly green appearance. It should further be noted that there are many paintings that are green, or have a dominantly green appearance that do not exist as what is called a green painting. A painting is said to be a green painting by its history, not by its appearance although green exists as some aspect of a painting that is a green painting.

Theories of art go back as far as Plato and Aristotle and possibly further. Slowly over centuries the idea of the green painting developed . discussions by philosophers were said to have taken place with resulting theories but any definite evidence has been lost although there are rumors that fragments of those theories exist. Augustine, Claudius Galen, and some neo-platonists including Plotinus were mentioned as having been involved. Thomas Aquinus at the University of Paris in the 1200's became involved in the concept of such a painting. Was it simply a concept or could such a painting exist. His ideas were discussed in a thesis, now lost. Those who read it said he argued that such a paintings could actually exist. During the next several centuries a number of philosophers put forth various theories regarding the green painting. During the middle ages when scholasticism dominated discussions and inquiries in the universities, many doctores scholastici were involved in an informal manner with theories of the green painting. Scholasticism was primarily concerned with the existence of God. Their thoughts were that art, since it was a creation and all creation was from God, then art was seen as coming from God through an artist. If God was involved, then why did some paintings remain with the artist while most paintings went out into God's world. This question persisted through the middle ages. As this period waned, the idea of God being involved in the creation and the history of a painting began to loose its hold. As the era of modern philosophy arrived, the idea of the green painting continued to be discussed with the idea of qualities replacing the earlier ideas of scholasticism.

During the 20th century the idea of art having to be of a certain type of thing or having to have certain qualities began to change to one in which anything, or almost anything, could be art. The view that there was an exhaustive list of qualities relevant to art was untenable. This led to the argument that there could be no objective judgment as to good or bad in art since there was no list of qualities to be used as criteria ; the question of whether or not this is a valid view is not of concern here. The theory of the green painting is concerned with the question of just what qualities are in a painting that result in its being a green painting.

Theodore Svenningsen

Nick Taggart

Eve Wood

Alaïa Parhizi

Ming C Lowe

Nadège Monchera Baer

Cyril Kuhn

Tulsa Kinney

Michael Falzone

Narsiso Martinez

Alicia Piller

Emily Elisa Halpern

Serena Potter

Ada Pullini Brown

Cameron Masters

Lucinda Luvaas

Mark Acetelli

Jill Sykes