The Belonging of Memories — Q+A with Painter Gideon Rubin
Scientifically intriguing yet poetic in its elusiveness, memory has been an unbounded theme among inspiring artists and thinkers in the past decades. In Matter and Memory (1896), an essay on the relation of body and spirit, philosopher Henri Bergson wrote on the relationship between mental images and souvenirs, sensations, and imagination, notably stating that there is no consciousness without memory.
Bergson's reflections in this remarkable topical book allow us to introduce London-based Israeli artist Gideon Rubin's paintings as a shortcut to the universality of consciousness. Appropriating fragments of other people's lives and giving them new perspectives and narratives in his work, Rubin creates what could be clues to comprehend the framework of human remembrance.
Cover image:
Gideon Rubin, Six Girls in Uniform, 180 x 2440 cm, oil on linen, 2020
Gideon Rubin, Untitled (Reflection), 25.5 x 20.5 cm, Oil on linen, 2016
Gideon Rubin, Black Pen, 59.5 x 55 cm, Oil on linen, 2019
We asked the artist some questions to learn more about his relation to art and the past's belonging.
Eve Laliberté: EL
Gideon Rubin: GR
Gideon Rubin, Interior, 51 x 56 cm, Oil on linen, 2013
EL: What brought you to painting? Was becoming an artist a dream, a plan, or a coincidence?
GR: It was pure chance and destiny. Or maybe the other way around. I first started painting during a backpacking trip in my early 20's in South America, on a salt desert between Chile and Bolivia, to be exact. I was born in a house surrounded by my grandfather's paintings, but only when I left Israel and began travelling did I start painting myself, and the need to paint appeared. Everyone around me was surprised. No one saw this coming, myself included.
Gideon Rubin, Smoking, 30.5 x 25.5 cm, Oil on linen, 2013
Gideon Rubin, Making Out, 30.5 x 36 cm, Oil on linen, 2019
EL: There is a strong feeling of enigma emanating from your body of work. You paint most of your pieces by drawing from old photographs belonging to other people. Why are you interested in souvenirs?
GR: I am always drawn to objects. The older the stuff is, the better. One of my most pleasurable activities is wandering off at flea markets and antique shops. My parents' house looks more like a 'British museum' jumble sale, as my mother is an obsessive collector who has difficulties throwing anything out. It's not only their intrinsic beauty that draws me in but also the way they hold times' passing. That's what I have a hard time resisting to. It's their stories that pull me in again and again. As if by working with these objects, touching them, painting them - some hidden angels or unearthed truths which weirdly enough seem relevant to me now, can reveal themselves.
Gideon Rubin, Untitled, 37 x 27.5 cm, Gouache on paper, 2017
Gideon Rubin, Untitled, 38 x 27.5 cm, Gouache on paper, 2016
Gideon Rubin, Untitled, 38 x 27.5 cm, Gouache on paper, 2016
EL: Interacting with fragments of strangers' lives, you take part in redefining the narratives. Are the memories you paint yours or someone else's?
GR: I used to think they're not mine, but now I'm less sure, so maybe both. Of course, the point of departure is someone else's memories and life. Then, I'm drawn to a specific image because it touches something within me, even if buried deep in my subconscious. Only then something quite interesting happens. The image becomes everyone's memory. I am very interested in how it crosses over, how by altering a few details, we, as viewers, can relate in a more direct way to someone else's story.
Gideon Rubin, White Shirt, 45.5 x 51 cm, Oil on linen, 2018
Gideon Rubin, Untitled, 45.5 x 40.5 cm, Oil on linen, 2018
Gideon Rubin, Untitled, 30 x 30 cm, Oil on linen, 2018
EL: Where do you typically find the photographs you draw inspiration from?
GR: Antique markets, flea markets, antique shops, used bookshops, and eBay, of course.
EL: Is there an aim to bring history forward in your paintings? Or perhaps to underline the universality of human experience? Why?
GR: A friend, who's an art critic, writer, and curator who has written about my work a few times in the past, once said that I try to stop time in my work. As if I look at history, freeze it, and drag it to the present. I like this. I think it's a fundamental quality in art, which makes it relevant to our lives — our here and now. I think this relates to how I experienced Velasquez and the Old Masters for the first time. There is this painting in the Met, in New York,' The Moore'. It's not only an admiration for how the image was made or its beauty, but also how much it touches and penetrates our present life that is so mind-blowing.
Gideon Rubin, Untitled, 25.5 x 20.5cm, Oil on linen, 2019
EL: It's as if the figures are waiting for us to tell them something, to give them an identity. Why are you interested in the "incomplete"?
GR: I have a vast catalogue at home - which my parents had to drag from NY - 'Unfinished' from an exhibition of unfinished works by all the Masters, which was held at the Met Breuer in New York I think, last year.
Oh, how I wish I could have seen this exhibition. Picasso once said,' To finish a piece of work is to kill it' - I'm a firm believer in that. It is so much easier to feed the viewer with every detail and nuance, so much more challenging to leave things a bit more open.
Gideon Rubin, Untitled, 11.5 X 9.5 cm, Gouache on cardboard, 2016
Gideon Rubin, Untitled, 11 X 9 cm,
Gouache on cardboard, 2020
Gideon Rubin, Untitled (Two in a Boat), 77 x 102 cm, Oil on linen, 2019
Gideon Rubin, Boy, 35.5 x 30 cm, Oil on linen, 2019
Gideon Rubin, Girl in the Water, 122 x 102 cm, Oil on canvas, 2011
Gideon Rubin, Pink, 46 x 41 cm, Oil on canvas, 2019
EL: Could you share any book, movie, documentary, or location that you particularly like or have inspired you recently?
GR: Next to my bed, I have 'The Flame' by Leonard Cohen. What's weird is that as you read his poems, often, you can hear his voice reading the lines in your head. I've also re-read a little book of poetry recently by Wisława Szymborska translated to Hebrew, which I always enjoy. And third and last is an artist's book by Francis Alys - which I recently had to buy, again, as I lost my original copy. One of my favourite art books of all time, 'The Prophet and the Fly': beautiful, poetic, and political, all wrapped up in one exceptional book.
All images courtesy of Gideon Rubin
