ego and alter ego

© Ginestet, 2005

• Series of sketches dedicated to the since 2001 ongoing developing of thetheme «Picadoras» as in the monumental trilogy:

– emancipation (Elan) -

– dialogue (Seiltänzer project : tightrope-dancers) -

– creation (not yet defined).

• Second step: DIALOGUE, tightrope-dancers

• After the emancipation, dialogue can be settled and this requires a definitionof identities which separate to become ego and alter ego, female and male.

• The male is still represented by a symbol, the bull. There exist otherrepresentations, but they will not be shown for the time being.

Elan 1988-1998 Seiltänzer, 1993-1996

The beginning• The first ideas and sketches started with the blue belt, a painting commissioned by

Standardkessel director Dieter Dünnhaupt 2001. First sketches exist from as early as October2001 and are born out of the observation of the 2 dancers biologically defined on each femaletorso.

• The sketches were produced in Wuppertal (Germnay), Paris (France), in New York and BocaRaton, Florida (USA) in different sessions, always whilst traveling.

• The 9-11 effect was claiming for a healing and as a consequence female figures were mixed upwith architecture to form several ideas to replace the void left by the sky-scrapers in Manhattan.The idea was to heal the wounds and to replace destruction by life. In present day this void is notreplaced in a positive way. I don’t agree with any of the developments started to close the woundsinflicted by terrorism. I don’t agree with any of the ideas of Liebeskind or of any of the politicianspresently working to fill this void.

• Since then I went on and do go on transforming in a utopian way, what needs to be cured andtransformed, my work becoming vital and not lethal within the arts and within science.

• The following sketch was one of those produced in New York in 2002, visiting Manhattan andliving on Long Island at the home of Penny and Sy Budoff who have supported me and my worksince 1998.

The “blue belt” drawing (1050x110cm) and its sequelsSketches and final work drawn on paper with pure pigments and inks. Metamorphosis towards the “Picadoras”

2 Picadoras dancing

Born out of a female torso

More sequels: sketches of the “Picadoras”at the Polytechnic University Valencia, in the Staatliche Weingüter Hessen, and in the Königshöfe in Münster

More sequels, sketches for the Picasso Square (Königshöfe) Münster

More sequels: this project for the Picasso square won

a first prize that was awarded by the city of Münster ,

but it was not built because the bishop did not allow it.

More sequels, a project that was actually commissioned and was painted in Cologne,

Germany: the Opera Mallthis painting of 16x4 m was painted as fresco on plaster board in 10 days

Coincidence or fate?

HISTORICAL COINCIDENCE

• During an exhibition in Barcelona in April

2006, a group of scientists of the

university of Barcelona came into the

exhibition and looked at my work.

• Some of the scientists addressed

themselves and explained that they saw

some similarities between my work and a

historical precedent, the Minoan art. They

asked if I knew about it.

• I did not know anything about the Minoan

art. They asked me to read a book: The

chalice and the blade, Rhiane Eisler.

• After reading the book, I went onto the

internet and looked for Minoan artwork.

• I found these pictures and was stunned

by the similarities between my creations

and those of the Minoan art.

Some associations between the Minoan and the Ginestet creationthe Minoans also used gold to keep their most precious symbols as relevant symbols for their culture safe and

preserved, and they have lasted to present day. Andres Ginestet restarted the same procedure, without having any

knowledge of what the Minoan culture had created.

Following the drawing:• The first sculpture of the second

collection of “Picadoras”, the lesssymbolical and the more explicitlyfigurative ones was commissionedby Uli Widmaier, a former professorof mine in political sciences at theUniversity of Bochum,Germany.

• Uli was one of the strongest andmost important supporters for all ofmy art and science development.He supported me through severalhuge crisis that my ideas created atthe Bochum university in Germanyand went on in a very stubbornfashion provoking the universityestablishment with his support, untilmy ideas were taken on in Canadaand on a practical level in theEuropean council.

• Until and through his death in 2008Uli was one of the strongest mindshelping the accomplishment of mywork against violence andrestoration of gender balance,working in discretion and insolidarity, facing opponents andstigma.

Bull looking into a lady’s eyes

The lady and the bull do not match and she turns away.

Two more designs that are still to be shaped as baroque sculpturesall these designs are also to be converted into clothing ready to wear in the Minoan style.

The bull and the lady, man and woman

“at a friends wedding I saw a horizon raining”

Conclusions and hypothesis:

• If an artist feels that gender is a relevant matter and if an artist is sensitive, heautomatically will work to restore gender balance if he feels that the balance isthreatened. He will create a certain type of beauty to carry the message.

• The way an artist will express the subliminal feelings regarding gender balance andjustice is encoded in aesthetics.

• Aesthetics are a code of their own, often described in words but never explained.

• These aesthetics will be the same, regardless of the origin, the gender and the epocain which the artist lives.

• Andres Ginestet is not a reborn Minoan, but…

• …the feeling of gender balance of the first human cultures expresses itself through thehands of Andres Ginestet in the same way it did do through the hands of Minoanartists.

• The rules set within aesthetics and art are to watch that the general cultural balancebetween genders is kept, in order to guarantee the survival of the species.

• The subliminal influence of the art and aesthetics is stronger than any economical,political or educational and manipulative attempt of constructing reality.

• “At a friends wedding I saw a horizon raining”

• History cannot be reversed or manipulated, the laws of fragmentation are strongerthan any single human will. Gender balance has to be restored to the extent it was inMinoan times.