BSI | tomrchambers

BLACK SQUARE INTERPRETATIONS

Black Square Trailers: The Malevich Effect: The pieces are generated from movie trailers. Their configuration within the confines of the "Black Square" move them in the direction of Suprematism with a kinetic component that incorporates the sound track.

Black Square Unmasked: To unmask "Black Square" is to remove this equalizer of all art movements, to reveal such (art movements) as insignificant in the mind of Malevich on behalf of Suprematism.

Bourgeois Black Square: The Stalinist regime that turned against forms of abstraction, considering them a type of "bourgeois" art that could not express social realities. Malevich's "Black Square" was considered as such.

Beyond Black Square: Moving Malevich's "Black Square" beyond - particularly in kinetic form - compounds the feeling of non-objectivity. The "Black Square" becomes the void in piecemeal fashion releasing those emotions that he refers to as being "kindled in the human being" to a higher degree.

Black Square Rotation Black Circle: The evolution from one geometric form to another - square to circle - via kinetics (movement) is in keeping with Malevich's description of the artworks as "new icons for the aesthetics of modern art" within the art movement, Suprematism.

Red Sweep Black Square: Malevich's "Black Square" and "Red Square", were exhibited in 1915. The sweeping of the color red acknowledges "Red Square" as a Suprematist figure, but there is always a return to the true icon, "Black Square" for Suprematism.

Black Square Merge: Nature: Photographs of nature are merged with the "Black Square" to create a zone of Suprematism via the pixel(s). This pixelized zone results in a loss of color (variations of gray including achromatic grayscale shades, which lie between black and white colors).

Black Square Cross Revolution: A video/installation piece that contrasts the Suprematist works of Kazimir Malevich with the Russian Revolution of 1917. Public domain video is merged with "Black Square" and a cross configuration to simulate Malevich's "Black Cross".

Black Square Desecration: Kazimir Malevich's "Black Square" (1915) receives glitch treatment - perceived as "desecration" - and perhaps embraced by this Suprematist if he were alive today. Suprematism is based upon "the supremacy of pure artistic feeling" (sensation).

Black Square Red Squares Statement: A transformation tool is utilized in GIMP (graphic Arts software) to create "Red Square" configurations/interpretations of Kazimir Malevich's statement - paragraph by paragraph - about Suprematism. The squares intersect, and dance/float about on his "Black Square".

Black Square Space: Images of the Universe (courtesy of HubbleSite [http://hubblesite.org]) are utilized in combination with Kazimir Malevich's "Black Square" to confirm his interest in Astronomy and connection of his Suprematist work with the Universe.

Black Square Bites: Kazimir Malevich's "Black Square" is seen in the form of "bites"/cutouts via the word, SUPREMATISM. The letters are configured vertically/centrally.

Exhibitions/Screenings/Articles:

1) Black Square Space, article, International Digital Art Gallery (D-ART) for the 22nd International Conference on Information Visualization & 15th Conference Computer Graphics, Imaging and Visualization, University of Salerno, Salerno, Italy, July 10-13, 2018.

2) Black Square Desecration, Experimental Animation and Video Art Program, LINOLEUM International Contemporary Animation and Media-Art Festival, Ukraine, September 28 - October 1, 2017.

3) Beyond Black Square (Black Square Interpretations), Digital Art Community (DAC), SIGGRAPH 2017, July 30 - August 3, 2017, Los Angeles, California.

4) Red Sweep Black Square (Black Square Interpretations), Suprematism Infinity: Reflections, Interpretations, Explorations (group show), Atrium Gallery, Harriman Institute, Columbia University, New York City, New York, U.S.A., December 1, 2015 - January 22, 2016 (pdf). Click on SIRIE to view photographs (by Cho Eun-mi) of the opening. Note: this work was accepted for the Russian American Cultural Center (RACC) Art Collection, New York City (letter).

Note: this exhibition is in conjunction with the "100 Years of Suprematism" conference, Shapiro Center, Columbia University, New York City, December 11 - 12, 2015. It is organized in celebration of the centenary of Kazimir Malevich’s invention of Suprematism and the first public display of his Suprematist paintings in December, 1915. The two-day conference is organized in association with the Harriman Institute, the Lazar Khidekel Society, and SHERA. It features presentations by an international and renowned group of scholars. Among them are leading researchers in the field from the United States, Russia, and the United Kingdom. The event includes a presentation of "Kazimir Malevich: Letters and Documents, Memoirs and Criticism" (London: Tate, 2015) (pdf).

5) Black Square Interpretations, Post Scriptum 100 + 8 (group show), One Month Gallery (OMG), Moscow, Russia, June 8 - July 8, 2015 (Tom R. Chambers comes together with seven Russian artists in Moscow to celebrate the 100th anniversary of Suprematism [1915-2015]. Click on interview to read Chambers' exchange with the curators of OMG.).

6) Black Square Interpretations and Other Suprematist Explorations (two-person show with Max Semakov), CaviArt Gallery, Russian Cultural Center, Houston, Texas, March 6 - April 7, 2015 (Much of the work above - along with the work of Max Semakov - Tom R. Chambers and Max Semakov/MiMs Art Group come together to pay tribute to Kazimir Malevich through a series of artworks that interpret his "Black Square", and explore Suprematism. Chambers is based in Houston, Texas, and Semakov is based in Moscow, Russia, which moves this collaboration to a higher plane of exchange between the citizenry of two countries – America and Russia. Chambers and Semakov through their interpretations and explorations move Suprematism in the direction of Neo-Suprematism. Their artworks accentuate and cultivate non-objectivity - the supremacy of pure feeling in creative art. Click on BSIOSE to view photographs (by Cho Eun-mi) of the opening.

Suprematism by Kazimir Malevich

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