TRIPTYCH
The Artist
Enjoyed repetition. A mutual friend introduced him to his muse. “Have you decided what you are going to do?” she would ask. A chronic insomniac, he would often pretend to sleep. “My city has no easy way from point A to point B,” he would say. He found certain obligations were inherent within different relationships. His mother expected his call on her birthday. He knew how to conduct himself. He knew how to construct himself. “How am I not myself?” he would ask. Enjoyed whiskey and repetition. “Repetition is an incredible device. It forces artist and audience to truly engage in the subject matter,” he would say.
The Art
Titled ILLUMINANCE. “Each piece, of which there are seven, consists of twelve lamps of equal voltage organized into the shape of a circle and separated by thirty degrees. Each individual lamp is fixed to light the same spot, which is thirty-two centimetres in diameter, and then turned on automatically for the duration of one hour exactly. At no stage is there any darkness between one lamp turning off and the next one turning on.”
The Critic
“The contract that takes place between the luminous effects of the lamps, the time it takes each lamp to flux, and the spot at the centre of the piece, opens up a dialogue between the artist and the onlooker. At stake is one’s understanding of what it means to be human in relation to the intensity of time. Unfortunately, all the exhibit does is ask questions. The artist never risks posing possible interpretation. He has constructed something that, when deconstructed, is found to be lacking a real, honest base. To enter into communion with an ‘Other’ one must first have something to share—beyond the mere act of the communion itself—or risk leaving the ‘Other’ with an impression that is hollow and yearning.”
Michael Naghten Shanks (b. 1987) is a writer / poet from Dublin, Ireland. His writing has featured or is forthcoming in various online and print publications in Ireland, the UK, and the US, including Burning Bush 2, The Honest Ulsterman, gorse, New Irish Writing, The South Circular, wordlegs, The Quietus, Ink Sweat & Tears, Five [Quarterly], and theNewerYork. He has featured in the anthologies 30 under 30 (Doire Press) and New Planet Cabaret (New Island). In 2013, he was listed for the Fish Short Story Prize and the Over The Edge New Writer of the Year. He is currently nominated for a Pushcart Prize. He has read at numerous events, including at the London Irish Centre as part of a Young Irish Writers Showcase. He is the editor of online literary journal The Bohemyth. For more info: mns.link