Esoteric Vision
1991
Polychromed Found Wood/ Plywood
24"H x 24"W x 8"D

 


Esoteric Vision was cut from the same piece of wood as Spectre of a Distant War, but here a cross was used to represent the spiritual and visionary part of the human psyche.

When I travelled to NYC the month following its completion, and saw the Malevich exhibition at The Metropolitan Museum of Art, I discovered the Malevich "Black Cross," executed by him many times in the early 20th century. See one example from his "Last Futurist Exhibition."

About that time, Malevich was working with the concept of "zaum. . . a state where experience occurs beyond the naturally perceived world." In my own work, "esoteric" had been used in the sense of something seen within, secret, beyond ordinary understanding.

Esoteric Vision thus juxtaposes the imperfect, physical world of the flesh, with the perfect, pure, expanding universe of the spirit. The face is assymetrical, three-dimensional and undergoing decay even as it lives; while the cross upon which it lies draws you in, and through it, with increasing momentum; or you hit it at its axis, to be propelled up and down, left and right with almost agonizing speed.

So different from The Spectre of a Distant War, yet cut from the same log.

 
Esoteric Vision W. Logan Fry  Polychromed Found Wood Plywood 1991 Black Cross imperfect physical world of the flesh juxtaposes perfect pure expanding universe of the spirit

Exhibition History:
The Truth of False Faces, Sandusky Cultural Center, Sandusky, OH (1992); Two-Artist Show with Barbara Bachtell, 9th Street Studio, Cleveland, OH (1991).