I have not been painting
seriously for quite some time. Lately, when I paint, I would think of the
meaning, the notion and the possibilities of painting today. When I talk and
look at paintings, my interest lies in the ”what next” and “what else” aspect of
it. Immediate Conception gave
me some kind of break, loosening up, a little bit more space and freedom to
just playfully look beside and around the area I am working in my studio at the
moment, grabbing at some existing stuff, exploring potential in a few separate
objects or elements and trying to reconstruct them into something within a very
short period of time… one of them became a “sculptural painting” (?).

The immediate effect is where the
sculpture stops and becomes a painting, or where a painting stops and becomes a
sculpture. It could be a starting point to a whole new territory.

Terra incognita is
a Latin word for “unknown land”. Used in cartography, it is a term for regions
that have not been mapped or documented. The expression is believed to be first
seen in Ptolemy’s Geographia c. AD 150. The term was
reintroduced in the 15th
century upon the rediscovery of Ptolemy’s work during the Age of Discovery.

I first came across this term
whilst working on the Enrique de Malaca Memorial Project in
2016. The unknown but promising aspect of these newly combined elements for Immediate Conception, especially
in the abstract nature of the small painting and the accidental form of an old
palette on the stool in front of the painting echoes the geographical and
cartographic form of an ‘unknown land’ — unchartered territories which
potentially open up a new and bigger entry point to many more possibilities in
my future painting projects. Hopefully!

Ahmad
Fuad Osman, Artist, 2022