What Do We Remember When We Remember?

 I've watched a LOT of interviews with artists of all kinds. And one needs look no further than at any artist's statement or snapshot biography of an artists and inevitably they will claim their work has something to do with memory. But in looking at their work (or experiencing it), I can't help but ask myself what the hell they are referring to?  It feels as contrived as it sounds.

After all, I have personal memories as does the artist.  If the art doesn't ring any bells of recognition on my art as a viewer, I can only assume that the memory is significant to the artist.  Okay.  In either case, a larger cohort of people may share that vaguely similar recollection.

And to further deconstruct that train of thought, the memory device an artist uses may refer reflexively to art itself, something related to a shared culture, a special interest, or something specific to identity.  This is where it gets tricky.

Here, I want to tease out something that occurred to me in listening to an artist who claimed that by using the color scheme and imagery of well-known commercial products that his art was in fact an intellectual  byproduct of memory. At face value, this in inarguable.  There it is - red Coca Cola can with an unforgettable product profile.

The key for me is the concept of the unforgettable. Are unforgettable things actually memory artifacts - something along the lines of a first kiss or a lost loved one?  I'm going to argue that these are two quite different kinds of stored information that have the misfortune of being categorized under the general label of memory.

Information like identity, cultural heritage, and other formative building blocks of being in the world are (rightly or wrongly) informational imprints. This is automatic, reflexive information - less memory and more actionable , operational code.

Over time this canon of operational material is exploited and supplemented by both pragmatic and commercial imprinting.  For example an animal can be imprinted to think its something other than its own species - a dog thinking its a cat. Training that dog to sit is another set of imprints that govern its behavior.

For humans conditioned to recognize and impulsively consume market products, the visual device is color and labeling and jingles or subliminal suggestion. All of this is certainly retained in our being and, yes, its kinda/sorta memory related but its not at all the same as remembering a first kiss.

What I am asserting is that when artists claim their work is based on aesthetic memory vernaculars they may be misinforming themselves and their audience by mistaking memory artifacts with impulse gratification triggers that can involve color, smell, taste, sensation, visual glitches, and so on. there's plenty of room and evidence to suggest that this is done in pure ignorance.

More importantly, Modern Day artists can and do consider this unconscious and sometimes subconscious triggering material an effective and compelling aspect of their art practice.