“Every work of art is the child of its age and, in many cases, the mother of our emotions.” - I feel there to be an unspoken requirement of authenticity. A need for a step towards the real. Societal performatism can be highlighted with people striving to give an appearance of what they deem best. You only see the real through moments of passion and detriment; moments where one must revert to their base underneath the veil in order to survive.

As each ‘act’ is performed, it conveys to me there lies a performer behind it, and one that is either unsatisfied or fears to unsatisfy others with who they are. "The relationships in art are not necessarily ones of outward form, but are founded on inner sympathy of meaning."

One can understand the human as an animal at its root, hence it makes sense for the ‘real’ to be revealed in moments of strife. As all experience does to any animal, one becomes marked by this detriment. This is where the bewept state can be found. “Marked or disfigured by weeping”.

It’s a patch, sewn into the fabric of our existence. My thought is that through the creation of Bewept, we urge for pride behind its every stitch. It’s trauma dumping on the first date, it’s a culling of societal value resulting in freedom from whatever value you think you’ve lost. A rejection of this frequent ‘clean’ parameter we place around ourselves to be digestible to the next mammal.

To be bewept, is to readily be yourself, unashamed and unabridged. I seek “to express in [my] work only internal truths, renouncing in consequence all consideration of external form.”

Matthew Peter Reade Abela

 

Wassily Kandinsky, and Michael Sadleir. Concerning the Spiritual in Art. 1912. London, Tate, 2006.

“Bewept, Adj. Meanings, Etymology and More | Oxford English Dictionary.” Oed.com, 2023