Century of 0 & 1 / Transhumanism, 2019: a reading in seven lenses
Acrylic on canvas, 65 × 90 cm (25 ⅝ × 35 ⅜ in). Painting by Yiğit Özen.
At a Glance
Hands are raised into the air, palms turned to the front; the oldest sign of surrender and of execution scenes waits on the pink body at the left edge, while opposite, a yellow body in profile, mid-step, extends its arms forward and binds itself to the weapon in its hand. The mechanical unit between covers about half the crop and is the one bridge joining the two figures; the one measured, the one detailed form in the painting. Its magazines, its straps, its scope are worked out one by one while the two bodies are passed over in a few fast strokes. The anger is gathered not in the body but in the object, the aggression taken on by the tool in the hand. The muzzle falls between the belly and groin of the opposing body, and the raised arms leave that region defenceless too; the place hidden and the place threatened join at the same point.
A number is written above each head, zero on the left, one on the right; value put in place of name, the faces unworked, identity erased and a number seated in its place. In the blue field between, with a dry tool, in crooked chalk letters, it is written that gender and family will not remain in the twenty-first century, that only zeros and ones will be left. The sentence is bold; the real matter is who decides who will be counted zero and who one. The grey field is erased because it cannot be worked, whereas most of human life passes in exactly that grey field. That the weapon is drawn so detailed and the one aiming the tool so indistinct comes to the same place: in technology debates it is always what the tool does that is spoken of, at whom it is aimed glossed over.
The blue ground is laid on in circular twists, the brush stopping at a point and advancing by drawing a circle, and the cloth beneath reads everywhere. The same cold blue behaves otherwise toward the two figures; while it sinks into the pink ground opened with plenty of white, cadmium yellow springs out without losing its warmth. The edges of the yellow incline to green, because the acrylic could not lift the blue in a single coat and where the two colours overlap the green emerges of itself at the point where the covering ends. The placing of the two nude bodies at the two ends of the scene recalls the arrangement of Adam and Eve on the Ghent panel, but here neither looks to the centre, the object in the middle draws no one's interest. One reading counts the figure on the right a woman and sees the crosses on her chest as the annulment of the feeding organ; another says the same crosses also mark the aggressor, thinning the border between the one who harms and the one who is harmed. The distance between is one weapon long, too short to suffice for flight.
Form and Composition
The horizontal mechanical unit at the centre, as the painting's only measured form, sets up a bridge between the two figures and carries the composition's main force. While the pink body on the left stands frontal with its arms up, the yellow body on the right, in profile and in mid-step, stretches its arms forward, the two stances entirely opposite to each other.
At the centre a horizontally stretching mechanical unit binds the two figures to each other. Its length is about half the crop, its height a quarter. It has upright edges, straight bars and repeating compartments; it is the only measured form in the painting. Its left end stands in the void, its right end enters the hand of the figure on the right. Its position is not exactly at the centre, a little higher in the vertical. This horizontal is the painting's main force and sets up a bridge between the two edges.
On the left edge a pink body stands. Frontal, its two arms raised up and its hands cut off at the top edge. Its feet near the bottom edge, with a horizontal base patch beneath it. Its height is almost the whole canvas. A two-finger gap remains between it and the left edge. Its silhouette is close to symmetry; the angle between the arms is equal, the body upright. The lines inside it separate the muscle compartments, and all are short and horizontal.
On the right edge there is a yellow body, in profile and turned to the left. One leg stretched forward, the other behind; it stands in mid-step. Its arms stretch forward and connect to the mechanical unit. Its height is close to the one on the left but its width greater, because the forward leg fills the lower right region. It spills off the right edge and the crop cuts it from the right. The stance of the two figures is opposite to each other: on the left arms up, on the right arms forward; on the left the body upright, on the right the body slanted.
The remaining void is filled with text. In the upper central region a single line in large letters, in the lower central region a block of five lines. The upper line goes horizontal and straight, the lower block descends slanting to the left, and the line lengths shorten as they descend. The area between the two text blocks stays beneath the mechanical unit, and there the ground shows. In the upper left corner and the upper right corner a single character each stands, both stuck to the edge.
The ground is not a single colour but a single layer; on it there are circular brush marks, and these marks turn in the same direction across the whole surface. The contour is drawn everywhere with light value and leaves a halo outside the figures. The distinction collapses nowhere; the weakest point is at the bottom edge of the body on the right, where the yellow mass blends into the darkness of the ground. In the middle of the left edge there is a small signature standing vertically. The three units are not arrayed at equal intervals horizontally. Between the body on the left and the left end of the mechanical unit there is a wide opening, while between the body on the right and the right end of the unit there is none. For this reason the left half is loose and the right half crammed. The lower text block settles beneath that loose half and closes off the void. In the vertical, meanwhile, three tiers are read: text above, in the middle the mechanical unit and the shoulder lines, below the legs and the second text block.
Colour and Light
Because the cobalt blue fills the space between the two figures and stands cool and flat, it makes every colour set over it look warmer than it is. The same blue ground, while fading the white-lightened pink a register at every contact, does not touch the warmth of the cadmium yellow, so that the yellow leaps out while the pink sinks into the ground.
The blue fills all the space between the two figures. A tone between cobalt and sax blue; the brush has turned in circles, opening here and there and rising to sky blue, darkening at the upper left and the right edge and approaching night blue. The paint is laid thin, the weave of the cloth beneath is legible everywhere. This blue is cool and flat; it makes every colour set over it look warmer than it is. The figure on the left is candy pink. Plenty of white has been mixed into it, and in the chest and belly region a darker rose comes out. Because the paint is laid thin over the blue, at the edges the ground beneath has mixed in and the pink there has turned to lilac. On the arms and calves there are white hatchings, and they too are not fully white, but bluish.
The figure on the right is cadmium yellow. Set thick and opaque, the blue does not seep through from beneath it at all. Yellow and blue are exact opposites, and both have lost nothing of their force here; there is no intermediate tone between them, no softening. Because of this the right side is the noisiest region of the surface. At the foot of the legs green has mixed into the yellow, where the colour is suddenly dirtied and drops to olive. When the two figures are set side by side both are warm, but not to the same degree. The pink stands closer to the cool, because it is lightened with white and, at every point the blue touches it, it fades a register more. The yellow, on the other hand, has lost none of its warmth. The same blue ground takes the force from one and increases the other's.
The weapon form in the centre is entirely colourless. It consists of black, grey and white; the only achromatic area on the surface is there. The white over the barrel is thick and bright, while its body is ink black. These two extremes open a hole in the middle of the blue. On its right there is a small yellow patch, the same as the colour of the yellow figure, and it looks as though it splashed there by accident. The white letters are laid like chalk. Thin, dry, they do not fully cover the blue beneath them; and so their white has dropped to ice blue. The same white is in the hatchings over the pink too, weaker still there.
The distribution of value is unequal between the figures. The difference in lightness between the yellow and the blue is large, that of the pink small; although the two stand on the same ground, one leaps out and the other sinks into the ground. On the left edge there are a few dark morello lines that spill outside the pink, the darkest places of the body, at almost the same register as the dark of the blue. There is no such thing as a light source. Nor is there a shadow falling beneath the figures; on the lower edge there is a thin black band, but that is not a shadow, it is a flat boundary. At the lower right a green patch has stayed where the blue and the yellow have mixed, its edge scattered.
Iconography, Myth and Title
When the hands rise up, the gesture of surrender combines with the weapon opposite and sets up the arrangement of the firing squad, and the wide gap between suggests that the decision has already been made. The placing of two figures opposite each other calls up the narrative of the first couple, but when a death-bringing weapon takes the place of the forbidden fruit, the story of the founding turns directly into the ending.
A pink body with its hands raised into the air stands on the left edge. Its face indistinct, its body given frontally, its legs slightly apart. On the right a yellow body stands from the side and holds a large rifle in its hand; the barrel is turned exactly toward the figure opposite. On the two rings on the yellow figure's chest there are cross-marks. A number has been written on each of them: at the head of the left one a zero, at the head of the right one a one. In the blue area between them sentences written in chalk are lined up. The letters are drawn by hand and irregular.
When the hands rise up the scene tells itself. The gesture of surrender is the common sign of war paintings and execution scenes; the shortest way of showing that one is unarmed. Together with the armed figure opposite, this sets up the arrangement of the firing squad. But between the two sides there is neither wall nor rank of soldiers nor crowd. Only two bodies and the text standing between. In this arrangement the decision has already been made, and what remains is the carrying out. The gap between being left this wide suggests that the distance has been measured.
The placing of two figures opposite each other is the most basic setup of the narrative of the first couple. Man and woman, two bodies looking at each other, an object between them. In that narrative the object between is usually a fruit or a tree. Here a weapon has taken its place. When the thing that takes the place of the forbidden fruit is a death-bringing instrument, the story of the founding turns directly into a story of the ending. The writing's saying that the family will not remain also coincides with this reading. In the founding narrative the object between always offers a choice; here no choice is offered. Nor is it possible to put back the instrument that has taken the fruit's place.
The numbers being written on top of them is an act of naming. To give a name is, in the narrative tradition, a part of the act of creation; the first human orders the world by putting names to the animals. Here, instead of a name, the binary number system has been placed. Zero and one carry both the distinction between existence and non-existence and the language of the machine. Neither figure's face is worked; identity has been erased and value put in its place. Putting value in place of a name says that the one named is replaceable.
The crosses on the yellow figure's chest show that the cancellation mark repeating in this series appears here too. This time they stand not on the eye but on the chest. The nourishing organ has been struck through; the idea of continuity has been removed. The body of the weapon is drawn in detail, with magazines and a scope on it; it is the most carefully made object of the scene. At the lower edge the blue ground turns to black and the feet of both figures touch that darkness. Beneath the right figure's foot there is a yellow bar; like a step it stands on, it stands a little higher than the one opposite. This difference is the only distinction of height in the scene.
Psychoanalysis and the Unconscious
The muzzle is turned on the naked body opposite, and the figure surrendering with raised arms has opened its whole front defencelessly. The anger is gathered not in the body but in the large weapon worked in detail; the muzzle's corresponding to the region between the belly and the groin joins the place felt shame for and the place threatened at the same point.
The muzzle is turned on the body directly opposite, and the scene has been stopped at the moment just before the trigger is pulled. The naked body on the left has raised its hands into the air, its fingers open. The gesture of surrender is universal; even small children know it without being taught. In this state the whole front of the figure is left defenceless. It has left no place it could cover, drawing its arms up to open its body completely. Its palms are turned outward; the oldest sign showing that one has nothing to hide. Its face is gone over with a few lines, its expression illegible. Whether it is afraid, or submitting, we have to work out from its posture.
The weapon is very large. Drawn thicker than the arms that hold it, more detailed than the body that carries it. Its magazines, straps, scope worked one by one; whereas the two bodies are gone over with a few quick lines. The anger is gathered not in the body but in the object. No expression can be made out on the face of the holding figure; it does not look angry, nor is it resolute. The aggression has been taken on by the tool in its hand, while it itself has stayed almost outside. The handing over of an emotion to an object in this way may have to do with not being able to own that emotion. The scope on top looks upward, not in the same direction as the muzzle; even within the tool itself there is a mismatch.
I paid attention to the height being targeted. The muzzle corresponds to the region between the belly and the groin of the opposite body. The raised arms have left this region unprotected. The place felt shame for and the place threatened have joined at the same point. Whichever region of a body is most hidden, the threat turns towards it; the painting sets up this old pairing directly. The legs stand slightly apart, the knees locked. This is not a body preparing to flee.
On the chest of the figure holding the weapon there are two crosses. That is, the attacking party is marked too. On its body as well something has been cancelled or taken aim at. The difference between the two parties is that one has a tool in its hand; apart from this, both are diminished bodies. The boundary between the one who harms and the one harmed thins in this way. The lower part of its body mixes into the area behind and scatters; where its feet end cannot be made out.
On the blue wall behind, writing has been made in chalk, the letters coarse and large. Above each of the two heads stands a numeral; on the left zero, on the right one. A number has been given in place of a name. To give someone a number is to take them out of being a singular being and seat them in a place in a sequence. The numerals too are written in chalk, by the same hand; it looks as though the same person had named both figures. At the lower edge the feet of the figure on the left press on the ground, while the feet of the figure on the right slide towards the outside of the painting. The distance between the two is about the length of a weapon; this gap is enough neither for fleeing nor for speaking.
Society, Power and Technology
Over the surrendering figure stands the digit zero, over the one holding the weapon the digit one; turning a person into a binary value does away with the grey area, because what cannot be processed cannot be managed. Because improvements made on the body widen the gap before they spread, the difference between the rich man's child and the poor man's child may tomorrow be measured by something else.
On one side hands are raised in the air, on the other a gun barrel stands. Into the gap between them writing has been put too. Over the figure that surrenders there is the digit zero, over the figure holding the weapon the digit one. That is, both have been reduced to a single value. There is a sentence set out saying that in the twenty-first century gender and the family will not remain, that only zeros and ones will be left behind. The sentence is bold, but the real matter is not in the boldness; it is in who decided who would be counted zero and who one.
Turning a person into a binary value is no new business. You are counted fit for military service or you are not; you appear as insured or you do not figure in the records at all. What is new is that this distinction can now be made in seconds and without a human hand touching it. You enter the system, the system puts you in a box, the door either opens or does not open. The grey area in between has been done away with, because the grey area cannot be processed. And what cannot be processed cannot be managed. Yet most of human life passes precisely in that grey area. In which box will you put the man who works part-time, who sends money home now and then, who lives between two cities. The one who does not go into a box the system does not see, and because it does not see him it counts him as not existing.
The weapon itself is drawn in a curiously detailed way. Its magazine, its scope, its grip are clear. While everything around it has been left rough, this object has been placed with care. In technology debates it is always like this in any case; the instrument itself is described in detail, who aimed the instrument is glossed over. How many operations it performs, how fast it is, which new feature it has gained is talked about for hours. Whom it is used against, meanwhile, does not become a headline. Those who go to the launch of a new instrument listen to what it can do; the few who ask into whose hands it has passed sit at the back of the hall.
The idea of enhancing the human being comes out at the same door. You will live longer, you will think faster, they say. And who will be able to buy these. When a technology comes onto the market it goes first to the one with money, then it spreads; but improvements made on the body widen the gap before they spread. The difference between the rich man's child and the poor man's child is measured by schooling today, tomorrow it may be measured by something else. The distance between these two figures makes me think a little of that. The dissolving of old moulds such as family and gender some describe as a liberation, some as a catastrophe. Both skip the real question: when the old mould dissolves, what is set up in its place, and who writes that new order.
The surrendering figure's feet are spread wide, planted firmly on the ground. Its hands are up but its stance is not ready to flee. The finger of the one across from it is not on the trigger either, it holds the weapon horizontal in front of its body.
Art History and Comparison
On the Ghent panel Âdem and Havva look towards the scene in the middle because the source of the meaning is at the centre; here neither of the two naked figures looks at the centre, and the object in the middle draws no one's interest. In the still life the object is silent, it is the figure's property; the weapon here has its grip and its scope each drawn separately, becoming the most described part of the painting.
On the left a pink male body has raised its arms upward, on the right a yellow female figure is bent forward, and between the two stands a weapon drawn in detail. A numeral has been written above each of them, a zero on one, a one on the other. In the middle and lower part of the surface there are sentences in capital letters that look as though written in chalk. Cross-marks have been placed on the woman's breasts, while the man's face has been left as a crushed patch.
To place a naked man and a naked woman at the two ends of the scene is the classical solution of the altar-wing arrangement. On the wings of the Ghent panel Âdem stands on one side, Havva on the other, each within a narrow recess, and they look towards the main scene in the middle. Their gazes point to the centre, because the meaning of the narrative is in the middle. Here too the two figures have settled at the edges and there is something in the middle. The difference is that neither of them looks at the centre; the man is turned upward, the woman downward, and the object in the middle draws no one's interest. In the wing arrangement the figures' settling on separate panels separates them from one another; here all three are on the same surface, with no partition between them, and yet no relationship has been established.
The way the weapon in the middle is drawn stands apart from the whole surface. The bodies are made with a few broad strokes, their edges left indistinct; the weapon, however, is drawn piece by piece, its magazine, its grip, its scope each described separately. An object being depicted more than the figures is the inversion of the still-life tradition; there the object is silent, it is the figure's property. Here the object has become the part of the painting that carries the most information. Across the series objects are dispatched with a few strokes, chairs and cars reduced to signs; but every part of this weapon has been remembered separately.
Writing joining with painting in this way recalls the arrangement of the emblem books. In those books printed in the sixteenth century there would be a picture, a title above it and a few lines beneath; the reader could not decipher the picture alone, and without the writing the meaning would not be completed. In this canvas too the writing has settled below and above the painting, and numerals have even been placed above the figures' heads. In the emblem the writing explains the picture; here the writing stands as a separate layer, with no bond established between it and the figures. In Kruger's works, where writing and image are made to coincide, the letters come from the printing press, they are sharp; the letters here, however, are written by hand, crooked and misshapen.
Among the series' 2019 canvases this is the work in which the writing is most legible. While in other works the letters vanish under the paint, here the sentences can be read from beginning to end. The signature on the left edge is written vertically, standing parallel to the edge of the canvas. The green patch beneath the woman's feet is neither ground nor shadow, but a residue left there.
Material, Gesture and the Viewer's Experience
The blue ground is laid on by turning; while the fifteen to twenty centimetre twists, riding onto one another, show that the arm roamed a long while, the screen erases this turning and gives the area as a single piece. At the edge of the yellow figure on the right, when the covering power falls short and the blue strikes up, green comes out of its own accord, while on the pink that carries plenty of white there is no leak.
The blue ground is laid on by turning. Along the whole area there are small twists; the brush was placed at a point and moved on tracing a circle, then passed to the next point. The diameter of these twists is fifteen to twenty centimetres and they ride onto one another's edges, a dark blue underlayer left between them. The lighter blue on top nowhere fully covers the one beneath. Looking closely at the surface you can follow one by one at which point the brush stopped and where it turned; this region tells me that the arm roamed a long while over the canvas.
The edges of the yellow figure on the right turn towards green. Yellow acrylic cannot lift the blue beneath it in a single coat; in the middle the paint is thick and the yellow clean, and as it thins towards the edges the blue strikes up and the two colours ride over each other and give green. This green was not obtained by mixing, it came out of its own accord where the covering power fell short. On the belly and calf of the same figure a second round was made; there the yellow is more closed and the green has disappeared. On the pink figure on the left the situation is different, because there is plenty of white in the pink and the white covers the blue even in a single coat; nowhere on that body can I see a blue leak.
The white letters are written with a dry tool. Each letter is broken because of the weave of the canvas; the paint hung on the raised places of the cloth, never seeped into the gaps, and the insides of the letters became full of holes. Their thickness is not even either, doubling in the places that were pressed. The same dryness is in the fine white hatchings over the object at the centre too. Its black body, on the contrary, is full and matt; the paint there covered all the recesses of the cloth and left no roughness behind it. The blue around the object was also lifted a little, a thin halo formed at the edge of the black and that halo was left without being wiped away.
The black band on the lower edge was drawn last. With a broad brush, from left to right, in a single walk; the paint ran low towards the right and the band ended by thinning. The vertical signature on the left edge is of the same fineness too, standing almost transparent over the blue. In the lower right corner green and blue patches come out mixed from beneath the yellow; that is the only region where the paint entered into itself while wet, and that muddle was not cleaned up.
A canvas hung horizontal, sixty-five in height. Looked at from two metres the blue is a flat wall. Come down to a metre and that wall begins to turn, because the twists come into play and the area does not stay fixed. At thirty centimetres, meanwhile, the twists too fall apart, leaving behind hundreds of short pieces of evidence of which direction a brush went. On a screen this turning disappears completely; the screen gives the blue as a single-piece area and erases the entire roaming of the hand.
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