Constructing reality with a pencil

On the fourth of June this year, Claudio Bravo passed away. He was a Chilean painter who made hyper realistic paintings. Before the news of his death, I knew nothing about him. On the web, one can get solid impression regarding his work. You can, e.g., start with a >> Wikipedia page about him and follow the links from there. Bravo was a painter of exceptional skill and patience, but I had immensely uncomfortable feeling while watching some of his paintings, especially his autoportrait from year 1984. Later I thought about what bothered me in his paintings and I reached a relatively complicated conclusion. This post is devoted to this and it is illustrated by my relatively recent autoportraits.

Should a drawing or a painting be a literal reproduction of "reality"? This is the question that bothered me in relation to the art of Claudio Bravo and I wondered what is exactly the reason and meaning of such art. It gradually lead me to the question of the meaning of art in general. And that is not an easy question :)

But, I managed to "answer" the questions that troubled me by relating painting to science, which, of course, is not at all new neither silly idea.

Theoretical science deals with models and theories based on these models and with numerical simulations. Roughly, numerical simulations are typically large computer codes and calculations which simulate the system "from first principles". Here is an example: numerical simulation of water. There are equations of flow which can be applied to each small volume of water, small "cubicle" of water. These equations depend on positions and speeds of other small "water cubes" and physical properties of water. Numerical simulation will follow the time development of each water cube and from that construct the wholeness of the water flowing in a tub or a stream. Second example: numerical simulation of a gas might follow each molecule of the gas interacting with other molecules and the walls of the box containing the gas. From this information, macroscopic quantities such as pressure and temperature of the gas can be constructed.

It is obvious that numerical simulations are extremely powerful tool of theoretical scientists because they start from very fine details, microscopic interactions, and from them they create an image of the whole system. But, they also have a pronounced drawback. Namely, what can you really learn from the perfect simulation of water? Perhaps that your microscopic premises are more-or-less correct, but will the observation of a whirling in your simulation bring you any closer to the understanding of turbulence? Besides, don't you have a better "simulation" in a stream near your institute?

The reproduction of reality is not enough for its understanding. What is needed for that is a reduction of reality (and the effect that is of interest to us) to several clear principles, elementary excitations, particles. What is needed is a construction, interpretation of reality using reasonable and simple elements of reality. These elements do not need to be rigid or point-like as is the case with classical description of elementary particles in physics. The elements can also be softer and more extended entities, but the reality must have some sense when expressed with their help. It is exactly what the models and theories in physics deal with.

And it is also exactly what painting deals with. How to "construct" reality? Using a brush stroke, dot, line or surface? What is that which we recognize as the visual essence of foliage (tree crown)? Of course, it is unimaginable that the painter paints each leaf of the foliage (this would be a "simulation"), he must recognize elements and principles which make the visual appearance of the foliage. He must recognize that which represents the foliage in his brain. Because our brain constantly "decodes" reality. A painter is a mediator between reality and mind, he is the one who recognizes what visual is for us.

To me, a painting and a drawing are, in relation to "reality" (when compared to a photograph) the same as are model and theory in relation to numerical simulation. Numerical simulation can reproduce reality to smallest details, yet, when we see that it all agrees, something is missing, we miss some "click", some idea that we understood, some understandable way of looking, some interpretation that we can comprehend.

It is the same in painting: a painter MODELS, interprets reality, he makes of it a set of understandable "rules", "elementary excitations" which are important to him and whose interaction describes reality. Out of reality he makes a theory, model, interpretation. This is very different from a simulation which in elementary theory includes enormous number of particles and parameters so to approach "reality" to smallest detail. But after all that we feel cheated, we feel as is something is missing, that we do not understand and that we are watching something vulgar, kitsch.

In the end, I will cite some people who probably think similar as I do, at least that is how I heard their words:

Last updated on 24th of October 2011.