“The fundamental layer of our co-existence is the object of interest investigated by mixed media artist Protey Temen. A layer that is constructed by our ability to gain and accumulate knowledge that, in turn, structures our experience of the world around us. In the sediment of the symbols we have created to manifest this structure, he detects scattered fragments of the mechanisms and interdependencies that characterize the collaborative act we call civilization. From his perspective, knowledge constitutes the foundation for civilization, therefore the key question is: How is knowledge created and how are systems of knowledge creation structured?

Protey Temen’s artistic practice is a method of simultaneous creation and observation — a method that gives way to unconscious links and spontaneous impulses as it allows the artist to actively draw the attention away from the actual act of creation and to take on the role of an observer, looking for recurring shapes and themes. Creator and observer are one, bound in simultaneity. In claiming this contradictory position, it becomes possible to witness the subjective process of sense-making in the light of the world of symbols.

Furthermore, he utilizes a scientific aesthetic featuring graphs, grids, and annotations in an attempt to legitimize the subjective experience as a meaningful source to illuminate collective processes of knowledge creation. An ode to subjectivity by means of objectivity. Art and science in unity.

An abstract canon of forms is the typographic material used to condense the observations in map-like drawings. By evoking the visual structure of formats that embody the knowledge frontier and produce credibility such as atlases and maps, he questions the prerogative of interpretation that is embedded in such.

The “Inner School of Open Studies” is a body of work that encompasses the creations of several years and a variety of different formats such as drawings, videos, books, and installations. The selection shown is a glimpse of Protey Temen’s abstract visual poetry.”

by Kurt Bille for 42 Magazine, on the occasion of collaboration on “Space” issue