Jouissance

Micky Donnelly  Proposition #42  2008/2010  Oil on Fabric on Canvas

Recently, while writing a statement about my work, I hesitated for some time before using the phrase “the jouissance of seeing” to describe some of the motivation behind my paintings and photographs. “Jouissance” is a word teetering on the brink of pretension, a word rarely used and probably only then by people who might claim to have read Jacques Lacan. There is a certain risk by association in using it, but the alternative possibilities for what I wanted to say didn’t quite measure up….

“The joy of seeing” is too weak, and too laced with intimations of popular psychology; similarly “the joy of looking” is too cosy and too domestic; “the joy of vision” or “the richness of vision” aren’t specific enough and seem to suggest some kind of mystical leanings; “the erotics of seeing” is a bit misleading, though it might have a certain agreeable overlap of correspondence; and so on….

“The jouissance of seeing” suggests more than just joy – it suggests play, joyousness, and delight through an active engagement, rather than something passively received. It implies the pleasures of actively looking at things in the world, things that become unique through the looking, not just awe-inspiring images of nature, for example, but modest everyday things seen consistently from new angles or in a new light.

The phrase might even suggest a kind of in-the-moment awareness of constantly 'seeing the world anew', the kind of awareness that can only be cultivated over a long period of time. And it would seem natural that years of looking at paintings, and making paintings, would help cultivate such an awareness.