The Split of Life is a series of over 80 mural size oil paintings by Nabil Kanso. The paintings span a period from 1974 to 1994, and deal with contemporary and historical issues of war and violence.Nabil Kanso: The Split of Life Paintings: 1974-1994, NEV Editions, Atlanta, GA, 1996
Development and description
The subject of war in Kanso’s work began during 1972–1974 in New York when he did a series of paintings and drawingsThe Split of Life, p.13Brown, Gordon: Kanso’s Drawings, Arts Magazine, June, 1972 on the Vietnam War. After a brief pause,The Split of Life, p.12, Kanso’s studio was seized in 1974, and most of his art works were placed in storage, and, eventually, destroyed he started in 1975 the Lebanon war series evoked by the civil war that broke out in his native land.Fox, Catherine: Artist Inspired by War-Torn Homeland, Atlanta Journal/Constitution, pp. H1-3, July 8, 1984. The intersection of the two series reflecting similarity in composition, scale, style and theme provided the framework for a larger series whose underlying theme formed the basis of the Split of Life series in encompassing several other series dealing with war.Erminy, Peran: The Apocalyptic Paintings of Nabil Kanso, El Nacional, pp. 2-3, Caracas, 1987 Bäckström, Lars: Guernica of Our Time Ord & Bild, pp. 42-45, January, 1986 Stockholm, Sweden
The Split of Life series delineates two periods: 1974–1985 and 1986–1994. The works of the first period are characterized by the use of warm colors dominated by red, orange, yellow and black, and the depiction of compositions in which masses of figures occupy the entire surface plane.The Split of Life, p.9 Among the series in the period are the Vietnam, Lebanon, One-Minute on (Hiroshima and Nagasaki) and Time Suspended in Space on (South Africa) series. The works of the 1986–94 period depict compositions that divide the canvas in two or more sections depicting figures painted in dark blue and black within an enclosure of red and orange surrounded by a white space.Wehner, Rob: The Bloomsbury Review, p. 6, July/August, 1998, the author points out that the use of “White seems to pierce the canvas and gives the paintings the balance and strength they need to grasp the emotions Kanso tried to convey.” Everywhere in the painting there is the dynamics of transformation, rather than static forms of distribution and knowledge."Nabil Kanso, Articles, Essays, and Reviews on Kanso's Art." Nabilkanso, Nabil Kanso Artworks, Kanso's Art, Kanso's Paintings and Works on Paper. Web. 23 Apr. 2012. . Among the series in this period are the Cluster Matter, Glory and Cruelty, and Living Memory (Auschwitz) series. It is suggested that most of the Split of Life paintings are recessive in the upper center, and somewhat bilaterally symmetrical. This division is often in the form of a face placed against a V form. The violence seems to deploy itself towards that opening so that the center is dominated by a mother of war, a kali-figure.Sondheim, Alan: Nabil Kanso’s Split of Life paintings, Conference, Nexus Contemporary Art Center, Atlanta, October, 1985.
Analysis and interpretations
In examining the works in the Split of Life series, some studies point to compositional and thematic aspects in conjunction with a set of distinctive concepts, in particular, the human subject, the Gods, the luminous sky, and the concealing self-concealing earth.Medina, Angel:The Split of Life, El Nacional, p. 2, Caracas, April 26, 1987.
The human figures appear as the flesh of humanity, always compelled by the law of regeneration, offering itself willingly to the torments of domination and submission.Medina, The Split of Life, p.2. Human suffering and torment seem to have always existed. They bear the pain and continue to remain in this dreadful state dictated by a delinquent social reality. In the split of Life, they exist in a new and different reality created by the artist imagination on big canvases in which they make their case as condemned beings. Their presence disturbs and troubles us. We find ourselves immersed in their world whose reality becomes our own reality.Erminy, Peran: the Apocalyptic Paintings, El Nacional, p. 3, April 26, 1987, Caracas
The Gods appear immortal but not eternal; each Holy Family presides only over one epoch in the history of men with the Gods. The powers (beyond Good and Evil) into which “Necessity is analyzed have no history; they crush humanity within the eternal circle of helpless reflection and unconscious desire.”Medina, The Split of Life, p.2
The picture surface occludes the sky, the empty space of the horizon that makes possible light, darkness, and their relations, the horizon as a boundary between sky and earth. the composition covers that space and all its cognitive illusionsMedina, Kanso and the Split of Life, p. 2 The explosions of wars wreaking destruction and devastation inflamed and obfuscated the blue sky with dark forms erupting from earth burning fires. The violent scenes disturbs the chromatic gamut of chiaroscuro, light and shadow through which the victims emerge from the canvases with a common sigh of an open injury sustained by social reality.Fuenmayor, Carlos: Space Cry, Time Cry, Columna, pp. 8-9, May 21, 1987, Maracaibo The pictorial layout extends to the edges of the canvases as light or dark with no space. Light emanates from the figures and use the, so light, therefore, is ultimately a forceMedina, Kanso Split of Life, p. 2 Light, space, sky closely relate to forms of redemption through irony, acceptance of mortality, the story of people, light against darkness.
The earth absorbs the forces that conceal, and conceal themselves in, everything that comes to light.Medina, Kanso and the Split of Life, p.3 The earth cannot appear by itself; it needs of painting, of the choice of the painter, even as it consumes them. Kanso explores the terror that surrounds the act of choice of self-choice, of painting.Medina, Kanso and the Split of Life, pp. 2-3 The paintings bring out the earthly nightmares that have concealed the serenity of paradise and peace, and transmit a new calling for an awakening.Fuenmayor: Space Cries, p.8
In discussing artistic tendencies, it is remarked that Kanso breaks with the pictorial traditions of both the East and the West. He gives us instead the Middle, "the chasm of necessity that yawns at the heart of human contingency and universal contingency."Medina, Kanso Split of Life, p.2
The gap in the middle provided the ground for a total redefinition of painting in a style in which Kanso departed from the pictorial conventions of both the East and West.Medina, Kanso Split of Life, p.3 He presents a view of the world and its forms in terms of its multiplicity and interrelatedness. A world in which the political boundaries are not arbitrarily drawn by the superpowers.Kurlansky, Gail: Nabil Kanso’s Split of Life: Looking for the Poet: Power, Death, and Sexuality, Art Papers, pp. 23-26, November, 1986 In the words of Edward Said "The more one is able to leave one’s cultural home the more one is able to judge it, and the whole world as well, with the spiritual detachment and generosity necessary for true vision. The more easily too, does one assess oneself and alien cultures with the same combination of intimacy and distance."Said, Edward: Orientalism, p. 259, Vintage Books, New York, 1978
The question of cultural multiplicity as opposed to cultural dislocation comes into play. Orientalism is a form of cultural dislocation because it imposed a western culture on the “orient” in such a way that what is reflected back by the Orient is not the Oriental culture but instead a colonized culture.Said, Edward: Orientalism, p. 258 Cultural multiplicity on the other hand is maintaining one’s own cultural identity and presenting it with other cultures.Kurlansky, Nabil Kanso Split of Life, Art Papers, p.24. It is noted that “Nabil Kanso is the first Middle Eastern artist to surface outside, if not against the framework of colonialism.”Kurlansky, Kanso Split of Life, p.24 He presents a view of the world through the boundary situations of death, love, suffering, and guilt. The organization of these boundary situation, a critic points out, constitutes his poetics, which is "predicated on a profound human kingship with the West and an amazed expectant detachment from it. From this circle he derives his extraordinary power of expression."Kurlansky: Nabil Kanso Split of Life, p.26
Exhibitions
Between 1983 and 1993, a wide range of paintings from various phases of The Split of Life series were exhibited a various art centers in ArgentinaCentro Cultural de Buenos Aires, 1989 BrazilMuseo de Arte de Rio Grande do Sul, Porto Alegre, 1989, Museo de Arte de Santa, Florionopolis, 1991Mexico,Museo del Chopo, D.F.,1990, Panama,Instituto Nacional de Cultura, 1988 Korea,Galerie Bahk, Seoul, 1993Kuwait,Free Atelier, Kuwait, 1991-92 Sweden,Malmö Konsthall, 1986 SwitzerlandMusee de la Croix Rouge, Geneve, 1993 and Venezuela,Sala Arraga, Maracaibo, 1985, Ateneo de Caracas,1987, Sala Tulio Febres Cordero, Mérida, 1987 The exhibitions were the subject of articles, essays, poems, conferences, and peace projects.A selection of various published texts onlineArticles and essays on nabil kanso's artJimenez, Maritza: A Museum of Art for Peace proposes Nabil Kanso, El Nacional, August 25, 1987, Caracas In Venezuela, installations were featured as part of the Second Ibero-American Symposium held in Caracas in 1987,Universidad Central de Venezuela: Arte por la Paz Catalogue, 1987, Caracas the International Encounter for Peace in Mérida in 1988.Universidad de los Andes: Arte por la Paz Catalogue, 1988, Merida The paintings displayed in different exhibitions were viewed as reflecting a sense of "over-all-ness, of one painting running into another."Kurlansky, Gail: Nabil Kanso’s Split of Life: Looking for the Poet: Power, Death and Sexuality Art Papers, p. 25, 1986 It is remarked that the magnitude of the paintings place the viewer in the midst of a violent cage. Their synchrony and diachronic cross a still point in which the show is no longer a total of several pieces, but only one painting.Figueroa, Hugo: Nabil Kanso’s Paintings, Panorama, p.6, April 28, 1985, Maracaibo, refers to the exhibition featuring 27 paintings spanning a period from 1976 to 1984 Some critics point to a sense of entrapmentFuenmayor, Carlos: “Time Cries, Space Cries” La Columna, pp. 8-9, May 21, 1987, Maracaibo, text online in which standing in the central space surrounded by Kanso’s 12-foot-high paintings is as close as you get to being in the middle of a fire.Fox, Catherine: Fantastic Visions The Atlanta Journal-Constitution, p. H3, September 19, 1985 "The painted holocaust surrounding us," a reviewer wrote "entrapped us in cage of feeling".Seaberg, Steve: An Artist’s Response, Art Paper, p. 51, November 1985 "In encountering these paintings", a critic remarked, "it would be impossible to escape. The scenes draw the viewer in witnessing the violent events."Fuenmayor, Carlos: Nabil Kanso: Space Cries, Time Cries, La Columna, pp.8-9, 1987, Venezuela, “We find ourselves immersed in this violent totality, terrible and incisive, we are trapped."Guevara, Luis Camilio: Between Horror and dominating Rupture Exhibition Catalog, pp. 4-5, Ateneo, Caracas, 1987 The horrors appear to burst out of the canvases bringing the viewer face to face with scenes reflecting a continuum of war and violence occurring in our time and space.Erminy, Peran: The Apocalyptic Paintings of Nabil KansoEl Nacional, pp2-3, April 26, 1987, Caracas, online excerpt:
1984-85 series