The Massacre of the Innocents by DEGO (Detlef Gotzens)
DEGO’s Massacre of the Innocents
Introduction by Léonard Beaulne
In the tradition of Western painting, the Massacre of the Innocents has been one of the preferred themes of artists to depict the brutality of war and savagery in humankind. Not surprisingly, painters were drawn to it at times of rising conflict and violence, and their dreadful impact on vulnerable populations. This was particularly the case among masters of the 16th and 17th centuries in Europe, like Rubens, whose art flourished when the new modern age was emerging. With this subject matter they could display the power of their artistic innovations while simultaneously condemning indirectly the barbarism and depravity of their time. They worked, for such a purpose, on developing a visual system of representation which focused on movement, action, dynamics, sharp contrasts and tension. Rubens is considered to have brought this system to its highest degree. When looking at his Massacre of the Innocents, one is struck by the dark energy pulsating throughout the scene, the realism in the portrayal of the human bodies, some of them quasi sculpture-like, reflecting his intention of provoking strong emotions of awe, fear, horror and sadness.
In presenting his Massacre of the Innocents, Detlef Gotzens (Dego) is taking upon himself a challenging task that he accomplishes with outstanding success. His work captures with as much vivacity the bewilderment, confusion, repulsion and the sheer frightfulness of victims senselessly slaughtered in our contemporary setting. The challenge faced by a painting intending to render in our context a classical theme with as much impact are various. Dego proposes skilful solutions which make his work a remarkable achievement.
First, there is the challenge of establishing the relationship with his illustrious predecessor while avoiding the pitfalls of repetition, pastiche or kitsch. While the theme remains the same and the intention similar, Dego has to forge a pictorial language that is attuned to the expectations of a different audience. Rubens could rely on the biblical narrative as an external foil to give unity and coherence to his work. The credibility of the narrative was undoubted among his contemporaries and supported the acceptability of his painting. Within that given framework he could deploy all the resources of his talent and the innovations of baroque art to achieve a maximum impact.
For Dego, the situation is different. While he maintains some of the structural elements of the Rubens composition, notably the central compact mass of twisting and buckling human bodies where the tragedy unfolds, he has to reconstruct within the painting itself the context which will give meaning to the scene. The off-balance masses of Rubens and their curvilinear interconnectedness are now compressed, truncated and set in a mostly vertically segmented plane. Some of the characters remain well defined with a painterly texture while many others hover above or around with a phantasmagorical presence. Indices pegged to these characters or strewn about the composition, like the child soldier in the foreground holding an ill-defined weapon, provide some clues to what is going on and the agencies at work. The traditional narrative unity of the scene is broken however. The viewing experience is constantly interrupted by the switching and overlapping of segmented planes accentuating the feeling of dissonance and discordance. While some figures are well delineated, giving strength to the image, others have little contour, fusing at times with the background. The illusion of space is very limited as aerial and linear perspectives are barely present.
Perhaps the most striking feature of the painting, at first glance, is the brilliancy, high luminosity and intensity of the colours. Pure colours shape forms, creating an impression of crispness and presence. It is as if figures were seen through high-definition digital media. Through the power of mimetic representation, the overall picture becomes an image of images, sharing with them the capacity to construct a self-referential world whose grammar is provided by their structural juxtaposition. This captures well the basic experience of a contemporary audience whose access to the world is shaped and mediated by the extended network of the media. The illusion thus created is that the world is always ‘in front of us’ and not ‘around us’.
In presenting a reinterpretation of such a seminal work as that of the Rubens painting, Dego is also compelled to meet a second challenge pertaining to the new conditions of visual credibility of painting in the present context. As a minimum, the advent of a modernist sensibility does away with the often criticized ‘theatricality’ or ‘stage-setting’ features of Rubens’ art. Once the ‘stage-setting’ effects of a painting are seen through, the painting loses its capacity to mesmerize and transfix the beholder. The risk of ‘theatricality’ is however always present in any painting, as the fundamental convention of paintings is to be seen by a beholder who always stands ‘in front of it’. Artists employ many strategies to neutralize ‘theatricality’ and thus enhance credibility. In his Massacre of the Innocents, Dego proposes a remarkable solution to increase believability and strengthen the impact of the work. He inserts a beholder within the structure of the painting itself, creating an alter ego to the viewer. This alter ego is fittingly made up of a collage of newsprint. He is as disembodied as can be and seems to exist only to function as a point of view for observing the cascading and ghastly images making up the scene. We are absorbed unwittingly by our identification with this alter ego, while remaining in reality outside of his purview. A space is thus opened allowing for the possibility of self-awareness.
The system of representation that underpins this brilliant work allows us, as the real beholders, to experience the full ambiguity of being mere spectators while at the same time, through the unfolding of the spectacle, to still be deeply moved by the sight of human suffering.
In the artist’s words:
DEGO, Detlef Gotzens’ multi-medium artwork is stark and peerless, the product of a long and varied career in the arts.
In his adolescence, he found himself excelling in one of art’s most traditional and revered niches: stained glass design. Born in Cologne, Germany, he became an apprentice to Jacob Melchoir at the age of fifteen. Soon after completing his apprenticeship and receiving his journeyman certificate, he went on to study glass technology and design at Rheinbach’s prestigious Glass College. His success as an artist continued after he immigrated to Canada, where he opened his own atelier, and was commissioned to work on restoration projects for some of eastern Canada’s most recognizable churches, including St. Joseph’s Oratorio and Notre Dame Cathedral, as well as the Peace Tower on Parliament Hill. DEGO told Ottawa Life Magazine that during his work on the Peace tower they were running into technical difficulties and there were several barriers making progress difficult. He recommended that some of the key people on the project visit the Cologne Cathedral and speak with some of the world renowned architectural and design excerpts who had worked to restore that famous landmark and many others. The trip provided Gotzen and others on the Peace Tower restoration team with new ideas and innovations to make the project a success.
Throughout his years as a stained-glass artist, DEGO rarely painted or drew outside of his plans and designs for stained glass windows. He slowly started to create original paintings and sculptures under the name “Dego,” though he focused on his high-profile stained-glass commissions. Gotzens decided to commit himself full-time to his original artwork in 2009. Since then, his art has been celebrated, even being displayed in the famous Saatchi Galley in London, England.
The art itself is visceral, visually arresting. It is comparable to Pablo Picasso’s early Dadaist work, or Salvador Dali’s surrealist dreamscapes, only abstracted even further. In some cases, “DEGO’s” sculptures incorporate his training in glass: “I Can Fly” features a spindly, wiry bottom, supporting a stained-glass wing, encapsulating a sense of boundless freedom in its form. “Enchanting Shard” is defined by a clash of rigid and free-flowing shapes, with dark blues attempting to bring structure to the earthy hues that float around inside the glass.
His paintings also contain this same controlled chaos They feature familiar figures – such as roses, thrown into visual turmoil, seeming to represent definite beauty in an otherwise subjective world. Two of his painted works on display at Ottawa’s Alpha Art Gallery are defined by swirling, dripping streaks of earthy shades, seemingly arbitrary lines of paint that, together, create an image that is cathartic to its core.
DEGO’ finished products act as reflections of his artistic approach, as he is driven by impulse. He has a symbiotic relationship with his art: he creates what his work demands, and in return, it reflects his personhood. Depending on the medium that he is working with, it reflects a different aspect of his self. Whereas working with glass is a highly technical process, painting and sculpting are far more freeing.
“I believe that in my paintings as well as sculptures there are elements of free expression and, then again, of controlled form and order, which is certainly a manifestation of my personality showing through or reflecting in my work,” he explains.
DEGO paints to discover truth, whether it exists in him or in society. Painting is, for him, a visual language, for him to communicate with the world around him, an invitation for response. Gotzens touches on something very raw in his work: his art may be challenging and complex, but so are the emotions and truths that he is communicating through his abstract portrayals of his self and his world.
In the filmmaker’s words:
I am an animation director and filmmaker.
I am also a puppeteer, which is very useful when making characters for my films.
Passionate and inspired by art, I am a creative who takes pleasure in meeting design and production challenges and I love to create and share my passions.
My work is also dotted with personal projects that stem from my social commitment (see the film The Box ) or which highlight art and artists or simply an idea that seems interesting to me.
I am very involved in my community and I share my passion with elementary and high school students in many school projects.
I organize once a year The smallest animation festival in the world .
