Michael Kire
Hong Kong
Michael Kiré was born and grew up in colonial Hong Kong. In 1988, he completed his education in Canada where his Mentor professor, Pat Martin Bates, fortified his exploring nature. He was immediately juried into the North Park Gallery upon graduation, but a twist of circumstances diverted him into an art education career for 20 years in Hong Kong. Impacted by an exhaustion and realizing a personal mission, he returned to Canada in 2010 for good, focusing on his Art exploration in private in Edmonton.
Artist Interview
The Following is an Article on Automatism by Artist and Guest Writer Michael Kire, through an exploration of his own personal creative practice.
Automatism: A Journey into The Subconscious
Automatic Writing, akin to Automatic Drawing, is a journey into the subconscious, unearthing meaning that eludes surface perception. In my approach, Asemic writing acts as a gateway to a literary realm unbound by traditional language, while the intricate lines and shapes evoke evocative speech. Here, language and visual art converge in a symbiotic dance, where the elegance of Chinese calligraphy infuses my work with an Asiatic sensibility, diverging from the Latin-based norms that often dominate.
When we first encounter calligraphy, our instinct is to decode its characters. This impulse underscores our inherent desire to extract meaning. My work subverts this expectation by stripping away the linguistic content, redirecting our focus to the aesthetic and fluid qualities of the characters themselves. This shift allows the visual elements—the lines, the flow—to command attention, celebrating their inherent beauty independent of semantic content.
My approach to creating art follows a split-staged process that divides the creative journey into two distinct phases: the intuitive and the cognitive. These stages are crucial in the way the relationship between the figures unfolds on the canvas or paper. The first stage, intuitive, is an immediate, spontaneous action. In a matter of seconds, the initial lines are dropped — subconsciously but intentionally avoiding any mechanical, repetitive gestures. The marks are made with a mindfulness that transcends logical thought, engaging a deeper, more primal part of the creative process.