To Heal You, I Hardly Know What to Do
2023
EXHIBITION HISTORY
2024 group show Touch Nature, curated by Sabine Fellner and Alex Radu, /SAC Bucharest, RO
2023 group show The Twist. Five Provincial Stories from an Empire, curated by Călin Dan and Celia Ghyka, Kunsthalle Bega, Timișoara, RO
2023
EXHIBITION HISTORY
2024 group show Touch Nature, curated by Sabine Fellner and Alex Radu, /SAC Bucharest, RO
2023 group show The Twist. Five Provincial Stories from an Empire, curated by Călin Dan and Celia Ghyka, Kunsthalle Bega, Timișoara, RO
This installation of drawing and animation is inspired by a concrete situation I faced, of needing to discard a surplus of soil, accumulated as a result of practicing composting, within the limited space of a regular balcony in a block of flats. When I came to decide that I could not take it anywhere but to a forest, that was the moment when I was able to notice that the practical as well as moral implications, once considered, became overwhelming compared to the natural and direct relationship that we could have with a few lumps of fertile soil.
I decided to call my project "To Heal You, I Hardly Know What to Do". It is an expression I have been keeping written down for a long time, and now it seemed appropriate. It equates the physical action of emptying a bag that seems full of dark matter with the metaphor of eliminating negative emotions. I like the aspect that everything that is discontinuous and lacking sufficient structure, coming from the technique of animating with observational drawings, is explained, as if it were a confusion, by the obscure way in which I conduct myself, because I do not see a clear method to self-regulate.
The animation is obtained from successive sketches that I executed superimposed on the background representing the natural scene in which the action took place. To orient myself in reproducing the movement, I looked at stills from the film I recorded in the forest. After I finished photographing an instance, I deleted that sketch each time, completely or partially, depending on the rendering requirements of the next instance. The last frame in the animation is the drawing that I exhibit next to it. I see in this working method a way to search and find a specific image. The animation film documents the search process, which can always be accessed in parallel with the contemplation of the result. A reverse analysis, starting from the final drawing, reveals that it has a past, that it has a personal history, that something happened to it. And this implicates a future for the image as well, a complete personification that opens the work to a life of its own, beyond what I am able to do.
I decided to call my project "To Heal You, I Hardly Know What to Do". It is an expression I have been keeping written down for a long time, and now it seemed appropriate. It equates the physical action of emptying a bag that seems full of dark matter with the metaphor of eliminating negative emotions. I like the aspect that everything that is discontinuous and lacking sufficient structure, coming from the technique of animating with observational drawings, is explained, as if it were a confusion, by the obscure way in which I conduct myself, because I do not see a clear method to self-regulate.
The animation is obtained from successive sketches that I executed superimposed on the background representing the natural scene in which the action took place. To orient myself in reproducing the movement, I looked at stills from the film I recorded in the forest. After I finished photographing an instance, I deleted that sketch each time, completely or partially, depending on the rendering requirements of the next instance. The last frame in the animation is the drawing that I exhibit next to it. I see in this working method a way to search and find a specific image. The animation film documents the search process, which can always be accessed in parallel with the contemplation of the result. A reverse analysis, starting from the final drawing, reveals that it has a past, that it has a personal history, that something happened to it. And this implicates a future for the image as well, a complete personification that opens the work to a life of its own, beyond what I am able to do.
CRITICAL RECEPTION
"The remarkable project To Heal You, I Hardly Know What to Do by Ana Maria Micu, an artist who masters drawing techniques so well that she allows herself to push them beyond the limits of representation towards a space of affect and performativity, also represents a meticulous artistic phenomenology. The subject of this observational drawing, as the artist calls it – what I would also describe as a phenomenological description – is a life experience during the COVID crisis. After a period of gardening on a limited perimeter balcony, the artist realized she had too much compost. The dilemma of abandoning this organic material, which she had nurtured herself, turned out to be a revelatory issue, raising intricate ethical, metaphysical and practical questions. Is compost living matter or is it merely waste? What is its relationship to contemporary high-rise dwelling far from the earth? Are bacteria, fungi and other microorganisms part of nature with a status comparable to that of Anthropos? Can we consider this dark matter, perpetually the source of energy and life, as unclean?
Among the most pertinent answers to these questions we recall George Bataille’s base materialism, which calls for a reconnection with the soil and the abject as a fundamental layer of being, the contemporary theory of the formless (Rosalind Krauss) and Jane Bennet’s new materialism. Ana Maria Micu’s response was not to release the compost anywhere other than in the forest and to document the process through photographs, that upon returning to the studio, became charcoal and chalk drawings. The almost ritualistic process consisted of an animation of 47 frames taken at successive moments during the drawing process on the same sheet of paper. Specifically, while the background of leaves and branches remained fixed, the artist intervened on the paper with chalk and charcoal, sketching and erasing the character’s movements one by one. Thus, as soon as they were photographed, the successive drawings disappeared, ultimately giving rise to a final image, the last frame of the animation and also a drawing, exhibited face to face with it. We note that this ingenious process generates pertinent comments on the relationship between drawing and photography: Who documents whom? Which is the copy and which is the original?"
— Raluca Oancea, excerpt from "Nature as Affect and Touch", Revista ARTA, 27 June 2024
"The remarkable project To Heal You, I Hardly Know What to Do by Ana Maria Micu, an artist who masters drawing techniques so well that she allows herself to push them beyond the limits of representation towards a space of affect and performativity, also represents a meticulous artistic phenomenology. The subject of this observational drawing, as the artist calls it – what I would also describe as a phenomenological description – is a life experience during the COVID crisis. After a period of gardening on a limited perimeter balcony, the artist realized she had too much compost. The dilemma of abandoning this organic material, which she had nurtured herself, turned out to be a revelatory issue, raising intricate ethical, metaphysical and practical questions. Is compost living matter or is it merely waste? What is its relationship to contemporary high-rise dwelling far from the earth? Are bacteria, fungi and other microorganisms part of nature with a status comparable to that of Anthropos? Can we consider this dark matter, perpetually the source of energy and life, as unclean?
Among the most pertinent answers to these questions we recall George Bataille’s base materialism, which calls for a reconnection with the soil and the abject as a fundamental layer of being, the contemporary theory of the formless (Rosalind Krauss) and Jane Bennet’s new materialism. Ana Maria Micu’s response was not to release the compost anywhere other than in the forest and to document the process through photographs, that upon returning to the studio, became charcoal and chalk drawings. The almost ritualistic process consisted of an animation of 47 frames taken at successive moments during the drawing process on the same sheet of paper. Specifically, while the background of leaves and branches remained fixed, the artist intervened on the paper with chalk and charcoal, sketching and erasing the character’s movements one by one. Thus, as soon as they were photographed, the successive drawings disappeared, ultimately giving rise to a final image, the last frame of the animation and also a drawing, exhibited face to face with it. We note that this ingenious process generates pertinent comments on the relationship between drawing and photography: Who documents whom? Which is the copy and which is the original?"
— Raluca Oancea, excerpt from "Nature as Affect and Touch", Revista ARTA, 27 June 2024
To Heal You, I Hardly Know What to Do, 2023, oil-based charcoal on toned canvas, 100 x 175 cm.
To Heal You, I Hardly Know What to Do,
47 frames animation made with charcoal and chalk, observational hand-drawn and erased on the same background,
13s, 3840x2160px, no audio, 2023
Edition: 3 + AP
47 frames animation made with charcoal and chalk, observational hand-drawn and erased on the same background,
13s, 3840x2160px, no audio, 2023
Edition: 3 + AP