MOSTAFA ABEL MO'ETY

With the end of the age of certainty, the contemporary individual lives in a perpetual state of doubt. Today, the modern human being is experiencing an age devoid of any absolutes; rather, constant change is the rule of life. In the process, uncertainty has infiltrated all aspects of life. What was previously believed to be reality has been proved beyond a doubt to be a matter of relativity. Quite simply, there is no such thing as absolute truth in the modern age.

Such is the principle of the age of science as science is always ruled by doubt; in other words, there are no givens in science. Creativity, in turn, necessarily exists in this state, consciously and intellectually at the same time. Gone is the time when art used to follow a certain school or style. Instead, the state of creativity has become a vision for the artist living in an age where conflicting ideas swirl this way and that, occasionally finding himself caught up in the ensuing whirlpool. It is during such instances that the artist takes on a completely different persona at variance with his previous self; as such, the person of today is definitely not the person of yesterday. Similarly, the principles of style and specific schools have dissolved in the field of art. The question that arises here is: how can the artist experiencing the turbulence of these constituents and rules of life achieve stability in style or adhere to any given principle after undergoing this metamorphosis? This is why art has become a dynamic and changing vision.

When this vision emerges from the absolute world in which it exists in the mind, consciousness, and feelings of the artist in order to be realized in the material world, it possesses complete freedom in conjuring both the means and the medium which achieve this material existence.

With the collapse of the imaginary barriers between areas of abstract creativity, between photography (by which I mean colour), sculpture, or the material form...drawing...ceramics...the fluid image... any occupied space, there is no such thing as a void in the universe... as with the human body and aesthetic concepts of nature, and so on.

The creative vision of today comes in the narrative of a comprehensive world which actualizes its presence in the material world. Nevertheless, in the language of the creativity of the age, we might find in a single work a fusion of colour, form, music, light, word, sound, and all sorts of nuances and pre-conceived elements after the artist's eye has draped them with a garment of beauty invisible to the conventional eye.

All of these features could be incorporated into one work, one could say in one single vision. Such is the state of contemporary artistic innovation out of which any assumptions must be viewed. Therefore, it comes as no surprise that an artist formerly expressing his vision in a work should now do so by means of an interplay of colour or the digitalized images of the latest technological advances which have imposed new aesthetic standards, and in turn, incorporated a deeper dimension into the heart of artistic innovation.

I personally believe that the artist who fails to respond to his own innovative stirrings in the actualization state (whatever it may be) is living in a time warp of specific schools and styles.

Accordingly, today we are looking at an exhibition by an artist unlike any other previous works. This should not divert us away from the aesthetics of the creative vision and the extent to which it is meaningful and relevant to contemporary life. Gone are the days of stereotypical innovation unless it can be reconciled to life. All of this depends on the authenticity of the artistic vision in presenting a compelling work in the field of artistic creativity.

Adhering to this concept was the Abstract School of artists in the early 1950s; scorning a specific style or school, there was only complete freedom of creativity with the artistic vision conjuring up the specific medium in which was actualized.