The last words of John Adams, vice president under President George Washington andthe second president of the United States (on American Independence Day, July 4, 1826,when he was 90) were words of comfort: "Thomas Jefferson still survives!" Namely—donot despair, there is still someone left of the Founding Fathers. He died with the thoughtand promise to his followers at this last, dark hour of his life, that the grand enlightenedenterprise of the declaration of rights and infrastructure of the constitution is not orphaned.Unfortunately and ironically, he was wrong, and Jefferson died that same day, a few hoursearlier. I love this anecdote because it teaches us something profound about last words,and also about painting, and this lesson is especially relevant to Michal Na'aman's (b. 1951,Kvutzat Kinneret, Israel; lives and works in Tel Aviv) paintings of last words.
Na'aman's painting has always been textual. David Ginton called it "scripainting"or "letterpainting" (Heb. tsiktav, a portmanteau term combining the Hebrew words for"painting"—tsiyur and "letter"—mikhtav), and in the catalogue of her exhibition "Legion" shewas called "the purloined painter."1 But what kind of text is this? Well, certainly a riddle. Aletter in a bottle—no doubt. A note smuggled to a prisoner in a cake. But also, last words.After all, what is a painting, if not a headstone or a grave? Is this not the plain and simple truthabout Na'aman's paintings, that they are buried under masking tape? And that the caption isessentially an epitaph? Therefore, it was a natural process for the paintings to converge intofinal words: Last words, with their strange characteristic, that when they appeal to the audienceit is already a lost battle, the last attempts to formulate something that will remain behind us;and Adams's lesson—that we have no control over these words and their meaning, since themeaning lies not in the speaker's intention, but in reality, in the setting, in the circumstancesand the addressees. In medieval painting, the words would come out of the angel's mouthin "banderole," and take their meaning in reverse from the virgin. For example, if you said "Ilove you!", the setting, the addressee, the circumstances, and the response determined themeaning of the statement. After all, a possible response could be: "Sir, I'm just the securityguard at the mall, I don't know you!" All this is amplified sevenfold in the case of last words, inwhich the speaker relinquishes all control over the setting and the circumstances.
Paintings are a bridge with its head at the end of the earth and its ending suspended inthe air; single player tennis; words cast into the world without a return address. Under eachpainting we get the painter's stuttering and thoughts, and often flashes of inspiration andinsights, that the artist had to sacrifice and bury under the next layer of paint. A grave; aheadstone; an epitaph.Na'aman intensifies an inkling of the most profound nature of painting, putting it underthe spotlight. But she only makes the situation worse: not just a "letterpainting"; not just a"letterpainting" without an addressee, but one without a speaker too (as he had just passedaway). The last words are Na'aman's, therefore they constitute a metaphor for the act ofpainting itself. Mourning taken to its final conclusion.
"Don't cry for me, for I go where music is born," said Bach on his deathbed. The corruptand cunning Caesar Borgia whispered to his relatives before his death in 1507 that it wasquite astonishing, "I have prepared for everything but death, and now I die unprepared."Chopin made his last listeners swear: "make them cut me open, so that I won't be buriedalive." And Charlotte Corday, at the scaffold, called the scene "the toilet of death," conductingone to immortality. These are missiles that destroyed the launch pad that fired them. WhenNa'aman paints Vladimir Nabokov's last statement, that "a certain butterfly is already onthe wing," she duplicates the painting, echoing the butterfly's simple symmetrical shape(as does the Hebrew word for butterfly, parpar!). The painting itself becomes a butterfly,which is a last word shot into the air without an ability to return to the pupa and withouta beautiful flower on which to land; a butterfly doomed to be eternally on the way to, andnever reach its destination.
.jpg)