Painting in Microgravity: Jouissance

Jouissance [29] graced me at parabola 33 when I realized that I could not get out of the chamber despite needing fresh air. I was covered in paint and knew that my body would imprint itself on the jet’s interior if I escaped (Fig. 19). Suddenly, a sense of awe substituted this spectacle into the sublime as I lived a moment of life. There I was, overcome by paint fumes, battered by the jet, feeling humbled and wounded by this passage. I reflected on our potlatch and sensed the sacrifice of making this art in my “death of the hero/victim” [30]. I felt sick, exhausted, thirsty and grateful. My experimentation was over; yet, there remained what I found at the start of my flight: a wonderful sense of something mystical (Fig. 20).

“It should be clear, then, that if the art object has, as it were dematerialized—given way in the case of plastic art to the artist performing—another kind of object has nevertheless rematerialized in the absence of the former. In the face of absence a new kind of presence asserts itself. The presence takes two related forms in postmodern work, one of which we could call ritual, and the other narrative. In ritual work the new object appears as a text or document or site which exists as a script or generating environment for ritual action. But the presentness of the object in ritual work is limited—it projects a larger or greater presence which is realized in the performance of the ritual activity itself.”
—Henry M. Sayre [31]

In the future, I would like to be able to work in zero-g, aboard a space shuttle, uninterrupted by the ups and downs of parabolic flight. International space station studios will be amazing sites for unfolding new ways to satisfy creative desire.

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