The seduction of stasis and the illusion of control; an image or any other moment frozen in time is never really still or quiet and fully vaccinated against the burbling confusion and quintessence of chaos as complexity and change. Even beauty as that celebrated existential pivot of aesthetic value is never really frozen or delimited and static; images and the immaterial concepts of memory and imagination are endlessly embellished by the moving moment that holds them so transient and gentle in its duration.
Perhaps this is actually the essence of beauty – to forever represent that aspiration to certainty and knowledge that we know we will never fully control or understand but that in failing to possess, protect or isolate in any way we reflexively reproduce ourselves as those who might perpetually aspire towards it. It should be no surprise that beauty rests so enigmatically at the center of our uncertainty and existential doubt – all objects, artefacts, entities and concepts that are known possess just such mercurial ineffability as this.
We define ourselves in relation to the concepts we beg, borrow or steal and the cultural memories or personal experiences we inhabit. Whether this self-definition is a function of a concept, an image or some acquired linguistic affectation – it always represents an uncertain focal point of interest and meaning that we always approach, always approximate to and yet never, ever obtain.
Daedelus Kite 