Vispo / Ambiguity, art and pure vispo

 

untitled, RTomens, 2026

This piece is untitled because I couldn't actually engage my brain in order to create one - too hot - and the heat-induced lethargy strikes again, from the brain to the bottom of my body, to the end, the toes I think they're called. A long hot summer here in the UK. I played with carbon paper to get the blue letters in 'untitled'. It's a messy exercise since the thin paper easily crumples and catches when moving the carriage. 

I don't know if I really like the result but...then again, being ambiguous about a creation is OK. Certainty is such a bore, darling! Sometimes I definitely do not like what I've done. In ambiguity there is...a mystery, in a way. The ambiguous zone is not clearly defined. It's the suburbs of creation, having no definite border. It's uncertainty which sparks not only doubts but questions regarding the very meaning of 'good' and 'bad', 'successful' and 'unsuccessful'. My 'good' may be one viewer's bad. My doubts may not exist in a viewer's mind. They clearly recognise it as either 'good' or'bad'. 

There's always 'mediocre', of course. Perhaps mediocre is the worst of outcomes. It's related to bland and average and no-one wants to be associated with them. They're the dull kid at school who was neither hip nor totally square. They just were, with their harmless haircut and sensible shoes. One boy I remember at secondary school was supremely average. He never got told off. Never swore. Never dressed terribly, or very well. He was neat. He was bland.

No artist sets out to create the bland but they may aim for ambiguity. I confess I'm partial to ambiguity myself. That's very different from doing my best but feeling ambiguous about the result. I know full well that many texts I use in my vispo are ambiguous. Good. I like letting you, the viewer, interpret their meaning. I also like meaningless text which is still funny or potentially profound. One that could go either way is good as far as I'm concerned. 

A piece such as the one above may be considered 'pure' vispo. No words. In that mode, to include an actual word would be a sell-out! Not that I'm normally 'puritanical' in my vispo, as you'll have noticed. I still have a great love for words, albeit in minimalist form, as opposed to actual poems (god forbid!) or fiction. Much vispo, especially in history, uses only words, but that is not my favourite style. I like the combination of legible text and abstract letter shapes, clusters, lines. Regarding that, I am definitely unambiguous. 

TTFN