An Interview With John Mitchell
By Odili Donald Odita

ODO - I've looked at the book that you sent me. It seems like you have a very complex project going on for your self here. The crux of the show seems to go back to this placard that you saw at Yale University in the courtyard of the Sterling Memorial Library. Could you talk a little bit about that placard? And explain your interest and fascination with that and how it's developed the work that you've been making since.

JM - While I was in graduate school at Yale, I worked in the basement of the Sterling Memorial Library binding old books. That was my student job. I would often eat my lunch in the courtyard of the library and one day noticed this square configuration of numbers in the facade of one of the buildings. I later discovered it's function. It's a magic square of one through sixteen. The sum of any line of numbers through the square whether it be a vertical, horizontal, diagonal line, or the sum of the four central numbers or the four corners is thirty four. At that time, I was working on a group of werewolf paintings on canvas and nightmare drawings on full sized flat bed sheets.

ODO - What year was this?

JM - 1998. Not long after I first discovered this magic square in the facade of the library, I was looking at a Giacometti book and came across the Albrecht Dürer print, 'Melancholia I' from 1514. I was surprised to discover that this same magic square is also just above the angel's head in the print. I was very familiar with that image, but had never given much thought to that square before. Erwin Panofsky referred to the magic square of one through sixteen as the mensula Jovis a 'Jovian device used to counteract the unfavorable influence of Saturn.' Marsilio Ficino said that the magic square of one through sixteen had the power to "turn evil into good" and "dispel all worries and fear." I later discovered that this magic square was used in facades of buildings in medieval Europe as well.

ODO - Okay, so the medieval iconography?

JM - In Roman mythology, Saturn devoured his sons because a prophecy foretold that one would eventually dethrone him. I'm sure your familiar with the Goya painting entitled, 'Saturn Devouring His Son'. This whole discovery was a real epiphany for me. At the time, my seven year old son Joey was having nightmares about me turning into a werewolf. Those werewolf paintings really scared Joey and so I felt that I should respond to that and began trying to develop a painting that would protect Joey from bad dreams. This magic square of one through sixteen was exactly what I needed because it was for protection from the father who would devour his son.

ODO - That's interesting to me, that you wanted to protect your son from nightmares. Do you have belief systems in your family that would make you do something like this? To make you make a symbol or find a symbol that would protect your son?

JM - I don't think it comes from anything I learned from my family. Since the paintings were causing Joey to have nightmares I thought that a sort of talismanic painting to hang over Joey's bed would be fun and maybe provide some sense of security, like a dream catcher. I was also thinking about alchemy and Joseph Buey's a lot at the time.

ODO - So then your interest in alchemy let's say, is that just a hobby interest?

JM - I think that the history of Alchemy became important to consider based on what I was doing.

ODO - Nothing that developed while working in the library looking at books?

JM - I think my interest in Alchemy originated with bands like Black Sabbath and Led Zeppelin, The Wizard of Oz and the work of Albrecht Dürer.

ODO - Were you looking at Dürer in high school or college? Was it something that you had around you since you were young or was it just popular culture? Coming to high culture as you got higher education?

JM - I think the first time I ever saw a Dürer image was when I saw 'The Knight, Death and The Devil' in a book when I was in high school. I loved it. It went right along with rock n' roll album cover art and played into my sensibility at the time as a 17 year old teenager in the midwest. As far as I'm concerned, the song 'No Quarter' by Led Zeppelin is the sound track to that image.

ODO - So the numerology, you know it's also not only a symbol that comes from medieval origins but as I read in the book you gave me, it also comes from Lo Shu? How do these things merge?

JM - In this current project of eight paintings, I'm using the magic square of one through nine as the internal structure. According to Chinese legend, a giant turtle surfaced from the River Lo in central China around 4,000 years ago. According to the story, that turtle had the pattern of this magic square of one through nine on it's shell. This story also played some role in my decision to use this irregular elliptical container format. I was also thinking about Joris Hoefnagel's 'Sea Fish' drawings from the late 1500's. The ellipse flips around for me a lot, it could be a cell, the shape of the human head or torso in cross section, a beach rock, or a reference to elliptical orbits of planets. In Western tradition the magic square of one through sixteen was for protection from Saturn and the magic square of one through nine is the sign of Saturn. I also like the implication in the Lo Shu story that the magic square of one through nine represents the discovery of perfection in nature.

ODO - So you are saying that these magic squares are the same thing used to different ends?

JM - They function the same way formally but have different symbolic associations. Now I know through my investigation of magic squares on the internet, that there is a whole world of magic squares out there. Just do a search using the key words 'magic square' and you'll see that there are many different configurations and kinds of magic squares.

ODO - So these quadrants can change and the range of numbers can change and these changes mean something else and there is a codification for all of these different configurations? Is that the way it is?

JM - At various periods in various places throughout the history of humanity, people have associated different types of emblematic meaning to magic squares. I think that since at least Benjamin Franklin's days of exploring magic squares, many people have been interested in them solely for the inherent harmony of a perfect sequence of numbers.

ODO - These things have crossed, I mean Lo Shu is Eastern and the one in the Yale Library is European and so these things have crossed boundaries but mean different things in different places at different times. And then now with the fascination of the internet, it seems to mean something completely different.

JM - At this point, I don't think many come with mythological or emblematic associations necessarily. It's more along the lines of recreation for mathematicians. Other artists like Al Jensen and various conceptual artists from the 60's and 70's used magic squares in their work too. I embrace that history. That durability over thousands of years and through so many diverse cultures is sublime.

ODO - Okay, how do you find numerology tying into the everyday world? Do you see people engaging with numerology as an outsider of that practice and how do you see people responding to it not knowing much about it? It seems to me that there is always this sort of fascination with the unknown and there is always a fascination with something that seems like a key to somewhere else. And so that mystery is intriguing to anybody who would come to it, to a certain extent. But with your work, your dealing with so many different layers of information, is there something also that acts as a mystery of the riddle if there is a riddle, or if there is a gateway to any other place?

JM - I think we live our lives based on numbers. I mean, I think almost everything comes to us in number terms. I'm not using numbers to make paintings that are problems to be solved or riddles to be answered. I wouldn't expect someone to walk up to one and decipher it although I do want the paintings to have an aspect of objectivity. The magic square in the protection paintings was used in a more obvious way and I think people tend to respond to them as these sort of enigmatic puzzles. In the SATURNSET, the magic square is more internalized. With this set, I think the primary element is the overall structure of the eight paintings.

ODO - It seems like your creating this elaborate maze of meanings. Can you talk a bit more about all of these different layers and textures of surfaces that you are putting into the paintings, the glow in the dark element verses the color verses the drawing and how these things inform the paintings?

JM - The scale of each painting (74x90") is based on the scale of the bed that I sleep on. The horizontal orientation is due to the high number in the Saturn Set being the number 9. I'm associating female properties to odd numbers and male properties to even numbers. Since the high number is odd the orientation is on the X axis. If the high number in the set was even then the orientation would be on the Y axis and the entire set of paintings would be vertical. The surface texture in each area of each painting is designed to differentiate that shape in the same way that differentiation of color does. An important feature of the four paintings with a pink linear shape or the four negative paintings is the way the linear shape is built up. I wanted to impose some extra resistance in the making of the more feminine version of the linear shape. I start with a drawing from one of the three dimensional models that I've made directly on to the canvas in each of these eight paintings. For each of the four negative paintings, I transfer the original version back down in reverse. So the pink linear shape is always based on a mirror version of the original. Once it's transferred in reverse I adjust it so that it's balanced. So if you see one of the positive paintings in the mirror it will seem awkward but the negative ones work either way.

ODO - Is the glow in the dark paint a device used in all of these paintings, or just some?

JM - Each of the eight paintings in this set have an irregular elliptical shape floating in a rectangle. The area between the ellipse and the rectangle in each painting contains a unique pattern that glows in the dark.

ODO - Did you use this glow in the dark paint in the paintings designed to protect your son?

JM - No. This is the first full set of paintings with the phosphorescent paint. The first time I used it was in 'Scotophobic Reflex' a 74x90" painting that was shown in the group show New Plasma at Folin/Riva in late 2000.

ODO - The reason why I asked about the glow in the dark paint in the paintings to protect your son, is the fact that you spoke about something that was interesting about the glow, that the painting absorbing light in the day continues to exist at night and acts as something that is a light in the dark. It's still present even in the dark. So the viewer is not alone.

JM - I enjoy that change that happens when the lights go out. It's important to me that these paintings be dynamic in their ability to maintain their integrity in different lighting situations. For example, I love to look at these paintings in the day time, just after I turn the studio lights off and there is still enough window light to see the interior of the ellipse and the color but it's dark enough to clearly see the glowing pattern around the ellipse.

ODO - In this painting ('Positive All Open'), I see the somewhat off kilter grid of circles in the tendrils. The circular forms are painted differently, really interestingly, is there any significance to the way they are painted? Maybe is there a certain number affiliated with the number of concentric circles? There are expanding contracting circles within these tendrils and then they have different colors. For instance one is darker and expands out to light or another is lighter and expands to dark. Can you talk a little bit about that?

JM - The linear shape within the ellipse is constantly mutating in my mind. Right now, I'm thinking about linear forms in medical illustration, plants, the Glass Flower Collection by Rudolph and Leopold Blaschka at the Harvard Natural History Museum, and the head of Medusa. The head of Medusa is a great metaphor for painting. It deals with ideas about beauty, repulsion and the power of the gaze, and of transformation caused by something seen or being seen. In each of the eight paintings a specific set of conditions govern the orchestration of these concentric circles that your referring to and the color of the entire painting. In each painting there is a linear shape that has nine ends. The linear shape is either in the family of pink or blue. There are four possibilities for the red or pink linear shape and four for the blue linear shape. The linear shape can be open, closed, only even open, or only odd open. The condition of the linear shape determines the color family of the color between the linear shape and the ellipse. The concentric rings are analogous to the concentric rings in the cross section of a tree. They reveal the age of the tree. The concentric rings in the painting reveal the number that corresponds with that section of the magic square that the painting is referring to. In this case, all eight paintings are referring to the magic square of one through nine that we were speaking about earlier. The magic square is reversed in the paintings that have a pink linear shape. So the numbers mirror the original configuration along the Y axis. In this magic square of one through nine, the even numbers are at the four corners and the five negative numbers form a + sign in the central part of the composition. Even numbered patterns of concentric circles are always darker on the inside and lighter outside and odd number patterns are always lighter on the inside and darker on the outside.

ODO - This aspect of mythology is really interesting as I learn more about the work and as it's growing with me. For instance, the idea of Medusa's head; because I know a lot of these stories myself and was always interested in the idea of repulsion/attraction and being frozen in the stare or in the gaze and so forth, so in a lot of ways your merging mythology with painting. Myths within Western mythology and these paintings are coming together. I am wondering, how do you see light and the idea of light because it seems like your really breaking down and cutting down painting to it's essential elements of texture, color, surface and I want to talk more about color, but I want to ask about light, light as it applies to form, forms within the painting and light as it applies to the color. Also, you have forms there that are flat and defining their shape or defining their form in the context of flatness. Can you talk a bit about that?

JM - The way I'm dealing with color is objective so that I can focus on the particular overall frequency of the painting.

ODO - So your dealing with color theory? Color compliments and color contrast?

JM - I'm working with red and blue. I picked red and blue because in medical illustration arteries are always red and veins are always blue. Arteries carry oxygenated blood from the heart throughout the body and veins bring unoxygenated blood to the heart. This process of exchange is a process of transformation. The inner number cords in these paintings are always opposite the outer linear shape in color. If the outside is male it's blue and on the inside male cords or even number cords are orange. If the outside linear shape is female it's pink and the inner female cords or odd numbers are green. And, since nerves are always yellow in medical illustration, the inner number cords always radiate to yellow. So there is this interest in the way color is gender coded in our culture too. What things come in pink? What things come in blue? How does this impact mine or anyone's self image? I enjoy exploring the boundaries of these colors. The name boundries. What is the range of color that will trigger a person to think, "That's blue"? I'm interested in the ambiguous color where for example, some people report that they see blue while other's might insist that the same color is green. As blood is aerated by respiration, memory is recharged by mementos and in my experience, it is very difficult to mix a color from memory. Color names don't help at all, but colors in my memory are reduced to color names. In this set of paintings I'm striving for an overall color experience that changes as the viewer looks from one painting to another and back. When I look at "+ All Closed" the area between the linear shape and the ellipse looks grey. But, if I look at "+ All Closed" and then at "- All Closed" and back at "+ All Closed", the area between the linear shape and the ellipse looks blue. When I'm away from the studio, I often try to remember what the color in these paintings looks like and I can't. I'm always relieved and surprised to see them again after time away from the studio. Then in terms of light, there is a play on absorbed light verses reflected light. Light bounces off of the interior shape and is absorbed by the exterior shape. The open linear shape within the ellipse is always facing the viewer the way a plant grows to the light. So I'm coordinating the empirical effect of color and light with a more emblematic use of color and light.

ODO - Something about the design of the space I find very interesting. I mean I'm not seeing this one ('- All Closed') right because it's not stretched, but I find it interesting that there's a difference because one isn't stretched. I think the particular depth of the stretcher is an interesting aspect of the paintings because sometimes it does not matter. In this case, they need this kind of existence other than just being flat.

JM - When I'm painting them, I stretch the canvas to the wall because I use my power sander a lot and I need that wall resistance. They never seem complete until they're stretched. It's always exciting to stretch them and see what they look like. The stretcher depth is very particular though because when this show is installed, these eight paintings will be embedded in the gallery walls.

ODO - That is interesting to me, in the sense that I want to know more about your reasoning for embedding the paintings in the wall.

JM - On one level, it's a way to refer back to that magic square of one through sixteen that's embedded in the facade of the Sterling Memorial Library. I'm also thinking about Mondrian's decision to arrange his nonrepresentational, flat painting in front of the frame. I believe that decision was a catalyst to a radical shift in thinking that had and continues to have tremendous impact on how people view painting. My reasons for embedding these eight paintings in the gallery walls come out of this tradition of thinking about how a painting relates to it's support and the surrounding environment.

ODO - Your aware of Western paintings actually being done to walls, the whole notion of the aristocracy building multiple houses and wanting to move their art around?

JM - Yes, the movability of the flat plane.

ODO - Exactly. So the idea of making moveable stretched paintings leads to why we have paintings on stretched canvas now.

JM - Right. I am interested in movability. I'm interested in a certain degree of flexibility. I'm thinking about the history of fresco and the fact that it was painted around the architecture, or jump to Whistler painting the gallery a specific color to create the most suitable viewing experience, or to Sol Lewitt designing a wall drawing to the specificity of the wall. My idea for the installation of these eight paintings is to alter the wall to the specificity of the painting. Given these conditions, the wall becomes a kind of frame and the moveable painting is more integrated into the structure of the room.

ODO - What do you think about that line around the painting when it's embedded in the wall?

JM - The space between the wall and the painting is a quarter inch wide and as deep as the stretcher is thick. I think of that space as a shadow line that echoes the green layer around the irregular ellipse.

ODO - Do you build the wall out in order to embed the paintings?

JM - Yes. We build the walls of the gallery out leaving negative space for the paintings.

ODO - I would like to address two more points regarding the sculpture and the drawings and how they relate to the paintings.

JM - I can't think of these three dimensional objects as sculpture. I've been thinking more in terms of making models. The words sculpture and model have a completely different set of connotations for me. The dreamy experience of actually standing there looking at that incredible model Imperial Star Destroyer in the Brooklyn Museum last summer during the making of Star Wars exhibit and recalling the scene in Star Wars the first time I ever saw it was mesmerizing. Or, looking at the model Dolphin Hotel in the lobby of the actual Dolphin Hotel at Walt Disney World in Orlando, Florida and trying to integrate the tiny exterior set of relationships with the actual interior space encapsulating the triangulating relationship between my body, the model and the building. In those moments I felt compelled to make something. I usually don't feel compelled to run back to the studio when I look at sculpture. It's just a different kind of experience.

ODO - Okay, now the drawings, I've seen them being built up. There is this linear space in the background, a dark monochrome. It's very attractive, you are kind of sucked into it. The two forms seem to be communicating or something. I see these conduits connecting them. Can you talk a little bit about that?

JM - The area around the linear shapes in the models and drawings is the result of a simple gesture repeated thousands of times. I use these areas as a place to think. While I'm working in this repetitive way, I'm looking and thinking about the paintings. In the drawings, I'm showing how the male and female linear shapes can extend their number cords to touch each other. It does seem like they're communicating or copulating, or something.

ODO - The thing about the connectors, again you talked about them in terms of numerology, is there also a biological reference? Intestines? You talked about Medusa, or coral under the water. They do have an internal thing. Veins, intestines...

JM - Although this whole project is based on a very specific set of conditions, I'm incorporating many different sources of imagery. This allows me to focus. Ultimately, I'm more interested in looking at the realized thing than recalling stories that got me through or contemplating the underlying common denominators of images that stimulate my imagination. I'm filtering possibilities.

ODO - So your almost counting on conclusions?

JM - Yes, but each new conclusion almost always suggests many new possibilities. As I continue to develop the work, the whole thing constantly fluctuates and transforms and I'm in a perpetual state of obsessive curiosity about where it's going.