uncanny_11.jpg Printmaking by Matheus Gorovitz

Identity in difference
Give me a place to stand,
and I will move the Earth.
Archimedes

The computer edited photograph of Manhattan viewed from Brooklyn deals with the distance between things, between what is objective because it does not change with time – identity –, spatially separated from the eyes of an observer, a particular and subjective individual set in a historical time - difference.
Identity, the unchanging and impersonal objective component, marked here by the iconic and emblematic image of Manhattan skyline, belongs to the collective memory. It serves as a stand point for difference, represented in the picture by natural, ephemeral and changing factors: illumination, cloudiness and the reflection of things on the water, which denounce the subjective and particular manner the affected object is perceived by the subject.
The ephemeral nature of these peculiarities affects the object, whose altered presence is essential so that the environmental differences experienced by the subject can manifest. The separation implies the reciprocity subject/object that is the necessary presupposition of a whole composed by object and subject. The unit achieved by difference allows intelligibility and the possibility for judgment of taste.
The urban/rural theme, when treated aesthetically, guides the understanding towards the intrinsic aspects of the work, towards the analysis of how the parts are assembled in a harmonic or dissonant mode by plastic composition, which requires an autonomous viewer, such autonomy is embodied in the judgment of the work. The extrinsic aspects revealed by the ambiance and by the different ways the environments are experienced, are irrelevant here. The framing that defines the upper and lower limits of the image aims to highlight the autonomy of the composition; symmetry reiterates this meaning.
Identity in difference corresponds to the distinction between the consciousness of man as a collective being and the consciousness of this same man as a person, this fundamental contradiction appears as a common denominator in the history of art: for Da Vinci subjective and objective factors are reconciled by the aerial perspective which corresponds to the effects that the atmosphere has on the appearance of an object seen from a distance. In the works of Rembrandt and Vermeer, directed natural light acclimatize things and space. Monet relies on the Rouen Cathedral and the London Parliament to testify how ephemeral factors alter the identity of these monuments for the eyes of the individual. In Cézanne’s works, the logical organization of sensations in face of the static majesty of Mount Sainte Victoire is embodied in the variations of chromatic modulation. Giacometti confronts the blurring of the boundary that separates the volumes in space from the distance between them and the eye of the viewer, using scale and elongation of figures.
The landscape of Manhattan, edited by computer resources, falls in the wake of this route: the conviction that identity in difference is the essence of beauty, and reveals to the eyes of others the feelings we have when seeing an object (image-work- of art).