Serial Artist

Ludvic delves into the inner sanctum to express his Egyptian-American point of view in assemblages and mixed media.

By: Susan Van Dongen

Untitled work from The "X" File, on view at the Hunterdon Museum.

Painter and sculptor Ludvic is enthusiastically American, yet the motifs of Egypt, his native land, come through in his artwork subconsciously. Take the image of the sarcophagus, for example.
   He pays passing homage to the ancient containers that held the bodies and eternal spirits of the pharaohs in many of his works, transforming them into contemporary images and forms.
   "I was working with the theme of the Egyptian sarcophagus, the enclosure," says Ludvic who, like his hero Picasso, prefers to go by only one name. "I was blending two materials together — steel from the industrial age and oils on canvas. I composed them together as a meditation on (quietude in a place), an enclosure inside of an enclosure."
   The mummies inside of the sarcophagi, he explains, were something like the Russian nesting dolls — one object was placed inside another repeatedly.

Ludvic with one of his sarcophagus pieces."

   "I eliminated all the hieroglyphics and Egyptian motifs and I focused on the essence of the sarcophagus, which is the packaging — which is also a contemporary idea, the way things are packaged and wrapped," Ludvic says, indicating one of his recent works — a contemporary sarcophagus comprised of three brightly colored steel boxes, nestled inside each other. "It’s the phenomenon of the packaging and enshrining (which also references) our fear of death. You always carry the seeds of death with you in everything you do and every step brings you closer to the inner sanctum, the enclosure of your death."
   Ludvic’s home studio in Monmouth Junction is a kind of inner sanctum as well. He works in what would normally be the family room of a spacious tract home on a cul-de-sac in a neighborhood, which, in turn, is located in a borough within a township within a county.
   Such is life in suburban New Jersey. An Egyptian expatriate creates art to express his musings on American culture while the teenage girl next door fixes her makeup for school, lining her eyes with kohl — a cosmetic that goes back to the land of the pharaohs.

"Mephistopheles of Detroit II"

   Art historians, curators and social scientists in our state noticed these juxtapositions and, in December 2003, launched Transcultural New Jersey: An Arts and Education Initiative. The statewide program is spearheaded by Rutgers University, the University’s Office for Intercultural Initiatives and the Jane Voorhees Zimmerli Museum, in partnership with New Jersey Network public television. The project is designed to foster cross-cultural understanding, provide insight into the state’s immigrant populations and to move local visual artists from under-represented populations into the mainstream art world.
   Transcultural New Jersey is believed to be the first art exhibition program in the country to carry a central statewide theme and will involve two-dozen educational institutions, arts organizations, libraries, galleries and museums — including the Hunterdon Museum in Clinton. This exhibit, titled The Apparent Intersection of Near and Far: International Perspectives in Contemporary Art from New Jersey presents the work of eight artists — including Ludvic — and will be on view through May 16.
   The show features paintings, photography, fiber art, sculpture and mixed media works by Zhiyan Cong, Richmond Garrick, William A. Ortega, Mayumi Sarai, Ela Shah, Armando Sosa and Young Cheol Yoon. The works vary widely in subject matter and style. The only unifying factor is that the artists share an address in New Jersey and were born outside of the United States.

"Judgment Day" (oil on canvas)

   Through references to personal experience, cultural heritage and modern history — as well as shared themes like home and distance, past and future, structure and chaos — the artists break down international boundaries. Some, like Ludvic, marry the imagery of their land with modern Western motifs.
   For example, in some of Ludvic’s work, the powerful symbol of the ankh acts as a focal point in otherwise abstract imagery. He explains that the ankh is instantly recognizable to Egyptians.

"Metascape of a New Mind"

   "Usually the pharaoh, who was a ‘god on earth,’ carried the ankh as the key to the afterlife," Ludvic says. "When Egyptians see the king holding this, they know he has eternal power. I tried to exploit the ankh in a series of my works, combining the ankh and the (mathematical symbol) ‘x’ together in one motif. The ‘x’ is a very contemporary symbol of western culture — it’s the unknown factor. So, I tried to take it and (connect it with) the symbol of the ankh."
   The result was a series of mixed-media works Ludvic titled The "X" File, which also was an homage to the TV series.
   More observations on Western culture produced the series Ludvic called Steel Jam Session, assemblages of tools, industrial components, car and machine parts gathered from junk and recycling yards in the area. In one work, "Mephistopheles of Detroit II," Ludvic attempts to express how industrial centers like Detroit sold Americans the promise of utopia in the form of technology. With the invention of the automated assembly line, every citizen could afford a car — therefore freedom and happiness.

"Mephistopheles of Detroit I"

   However, like Mephistopheles’ relationship with Faust, that utopia would come with a harsh price to pay.
   "I was thinking of how the growth of (the auto industry in) Detroit encouraged and advanced humanity but it also hampered it as far as the environment is concerned," Ludvic says, who adds that he was reading Johann Goethe’s Faust at the time.
   "Mephistopheles of Detroit II" — a Cubist puzzle of corroded beams, coils and steel plates punctuated with a fire engine-red shard of a car door — rises to more than six feet, in contrast to Ludvic’s other assemblages, most of which stretch out length-wise.
   "We usually grow horizontally but we never seem to grow vertically," he says, implying that our technology and money-driven culture doesn’t motivate Americans to reach upward or grow spiritually. "With ‘Mephistopheles’ I tried to express the more vertical growth. But I don’t make the message — I express what I feel, what is happening around me."
   Born and raised in Egypt, Ludvic was trained as an architect, earning a bachelor’s in architecture from Cairo University and a master’s degree from the Basel School of Art in Switzerland. As a youth, he frequented American libraries in Cairo, poring over books about American art and design.
   "I constantly read ‘Art in America,’ for example, all the American magazines," he says. "I knew about Jackson Pollock, Rauschenberg, De Kooning. I believe I was the first in Egypt to read (Princeton emeritus professor) Sam Hunter’s monographs on art. They were part of my early diet. I knew about all this as a young boy growing up."
   Unconcerned with creating a signature style, Ludvic produces art in series of works, which vastly differ in form and content. He frequently works on several series at once.
   "Although I consider myself a ‘serial artist’ where most of my works are created within a shared theme — even if it is rendered in a different technique, and with or without the notion of beginning or end — the underlying structure and syntax defines the relational order and continuity of the entire series," he writes in his artist’s statement.
   A major concern in all his work is the balance of classic, formal composition with emotional content. At times, however, Ludvic finds the integration of cultural references from his native country seeping in.
   "Egyptian culture has always found its way into my work," he says. "But if the symbols and motifs don’t ‘seep’ subconsciously, I don’t seek to emulate them."
   Ludvic and his wife, graphic artist Lauren Edgar, moved from Manhattan 10 years ago, mostly to take advantage of the space, privacy and nature that surrounds them in Monmouth Junction. Finding a refuge for tens of thousands of beautiful art books and catalogs has helped anchor them to their home.
   Sometimes the artist misses the energy of the city as well as the grants, commissions and "open checkbooks" of art patrons there. Yet the cosmopolitan Ludvic seems as much at home discussing his encounters with Picasso and Jean-Paul Sartre as he does planning his garden or enjoying the birds in the backyard. There is room for many things — high culture as well as nesting — in the suburbs of Central Jersey. It’s another aspect of America Ludvic praises.
   "America was generous enough to adopt me and give me a new lease on life, so I’m determined to leave something substantial to America," he says. "I want to say that I’m very thankful. Courtesy of the generosity of American culture and nature, I was here."
The Apparent Intersection of Near and Far: International Perspectives in Contemporary Art from New Jersey, with mixed media work by Ludvic, is on view at the Hunterdon Museum, 7 Lower Center St., Clinton, through May 16. Museum hours: Tues.-Sun. 11 a.m.-5 p.m. Suggested donation: $3. For information, call (908) 735-8415. On the Web: www.hunterdonartmuseum.org