Impossible choices/
It seemed like a good idea at the time....
I saw a movie a while ago, Timer, that was the sort of second step to realise this thought. The thought actually began much earlier, when I in the role of political activist wondered if our goals, if/when realized could turn out to be the weapons that would instead be used against us. Freedom (as example) means something different in the face of dictatorship, free-market capitalism or, for that matter, in the face of freedom. But the freedom that we fight for, well, the fight is made possible by the collective structures that we fight against, and as more freedom is gained, such fight gradually becomes impossible.
Back to Timer. The film itself is a typical romantic drama without any ambivalence or special charm. The plot twists around a future scenario in which people can get an implant that will - by matching the signal with the "right" other (with implant) - tell you how long time it will take until you meet your true love. So apart from the somewhat dodgy science it also holds on to the frustrating idea of "true love" - whatever.
Ignoring the problem of shitty scientific explanations and temporarily accepting (...) the idea of true love, a worrying thought struck me when I watched this movie. I mean. Lets say someone actually invented something like this, an implant matchmaker with enough accuracy, then... what? What would happen to society, sociality, meeting people, the sexual tension, the being together with, and trying to adjust to, different people, because of love, instinct, feromones, adventure? How would the interaction across different groups, families, subcultures take place? Would such movement become irrelevant? Are sex and love the principal reason why we go into new social situations?
I think its safe to say that this little implant - if working - would change society, and somehow those changes don't seem so appealing. They are all..inwards bound, no boundaries are crossed, no adventures, no mistakes. As a whole, I think it seems like a bad idea.
But.....- if someone offered me this - an implant that could assure me when, and that it would at all happen, I would meet my true love (euh!) how could I resist? Even if I didnt believe in it, how could I resist? For the off chance that it would work it would be irresisible.
And I found another example of this, perhaps even more direct, the other day: I listened to the radio on a show about brain enhancement. They talked about dement elders regaining their memories through some sort of implants, and about how in the future they might be able to grow and implant the brainstuff that makes little children learn so fast. And yes(!) it is appealing. Yes, I would like to learn ten languages (awesome...) and remember more of the books that I read than where they are in the bookcase. But through these cheerful thoughts of quickfixes runs a suspicion that none of this will solve the actual problem to which this stuff may seem like a solution. More would be demanded from us in the workplace, a requirement to be brain-pimped if you want to get a job? We would ask ourselves if its right to pimp our children, or why not fall into the siblingdiscussion of genetic manipulation; should we pimp our babies even before conception? Does the implant come with a gene selection function? For those who want true love with blond hair and a physics degree for little blond genious babies?
The problem is - that if the possibility exists, available, it is irresistible. If it works its irresistible. And to not do when one, two, 15, 100, a million others have done it; "No, Id rather stay dumb"...yeah right. Still, it seems like one of these ideas that is cool when science fiction but potentially devastating if implemented largescale. Like. It seemed like a good idea at the time (back when we were stupid...).
Are there any mechanisms nowadays by which a society, of conscientious individuals, could prevent such a development?
Stockholm
12-09-26
The collective identities and me
The power of post-it noting:
"How do these happen - Not by in words referring to US (+def) and them (+def) but by collectively..."
I had an epiphany the other day - at a birthday feast for my mother. My sister gave her a book that have recieved a lot of mediacoverage lately (it has both eroticism and S/M!!) and I've seen it laid out in the front displays of the bookshops. She had also bought it for herself, and we were all giggling about the naughty read of the close future. At the same time in my head, I had the epiphany. I realized that this is the main difference, this is why I always feel like the outsider. It has to do with my approach to the simple fact that if everyone talks about something, if the book in question is everywhere then my reaction is to NOT read it, I don't like when things are too hyped - it's as if the shared experience overshadows my individual experience. Their reaction is to read it.
Now - isn't this the most anti-elite of times? To dig into the subtleties..it seems that the rewarded attitude supports this sort of accepting oneself as one in a mass, but not only accepting, revelling. Like a collective high - no, the high of feeling part of something bigger, larger, something that in itself is high.
"...denouncing
- Breivik, pedophiles, terrorism, smokers, Bashar al Assad, the ethiopian regime and leftist activists"
And I can't help but again connecting this to what Chantal Mouffe talks about in "On the political". So - she discusses the liberal system adopted by the Western capitalist democracies as a system (of thought) that claims to be all-inclusive. A group of consuming individuals, rather than a "we" construed from the oppostion against "them". She doesn't agree - and points out that also this system is based on drawing a line between us and them, but since this division is denied within the political discourse, the differentiation is explained through moral rather than politics). And I've found it! Heureka! (Basically, from this perspective I can understand why I always end up as the outsider..;-)) but also how the "we" is constructed, where is this line drawn, at what junctures can we discern the rituals of inclusion and exclusion. For a contemporary list of basic rites see the post-it notes (oh, and I add cookingliterature/televisionshows/magazines on the embracing list).
"...embracing
- Fifty shades of Gray, Facebook, Twitter, democracy, Schibbye & Persson, Anna Lind, non-smoking and Thai-..."
Also, as I touch on in the final one (purple), lately it has struck me in the times posterior to great tragedies (for example the Colorado killings 2012, or Utoya 2011) how the collective rituals of compassion and grief to seem...well (dangerous territory I know) well exploited. It is as if we cant get enough. In a project text about some art I am doing I wrote:
"....attempts to deconstruct, and put in perspective, the idea of griefing - placing the recent public manifestations of grief in the more problematic realm of entertainment and culture-consumtion. As the western society slowly adapts itself to the values of liberal democacracy and capitalism, the pressures on the artinstitutions to entertain a larger public becomes more noticeable. Provocative artworks find a new, more accepting scene (in the name of liberalism), but their claims, and those of the institutions, to create a wider discussion seem to reep little return. We need to question the role of provocation in a media environment that feeds of emotional expressiveness, as we need to question the thesis that information inevitably leads to change. There seems to be an acceleration, as if, the more spectacle we get, the more we desire."
And I think one of the functions is the spectacle, the kick of chock and horror, and I think another is that it offers a sense of collectivity, the kick of togetherness (against the morally deprived Breivik, terrorist or..) that is equally addictive..
"...land trips.
By participating in grand emotional rites/ events (what else brings us together and is so
non-polemic - pure..."
Stockholm
12-09-17
Goodnight
I had an epiphany the other day - at a birthday feast for my mother. My sister gave her a book that have recieved a lot of mediacoverage lately (it has both eroticism and S/M!!) and I've seen it laid out in the front displays of the bookshops. She had also bought it for herself, and we were all giggling about the naughty read of the close future. At the same time in my head, I had the epiphany. I realized that this is the main difference, this is why I always feel like the outsider. It has to do with my approach to the simple fact that if everyone talks about something, if the book in question is everywhere then my reaction is to NOT read it, I don't like when things are too hyped - it's as if the shared experience overshadows my individual experience. Their reaction is to read it.
Now - isn't this the most anti-elite of times? To dig into the subtleties..it seems that the rewarded attitude supports this sort of accepting oneself as one in a mass, but not only accepting, revelling. Like a collective high - no, the high of feeling part of something bigger, larger, something that in itself is high.
- Breivik, pedophiles, terrorism, smokers, Bashar al Assad, the ethiopian regime and leftist activists"
And I can't help but again connecting this to what Chantal Mouffe talks about in "On the political". So - she discusses the liberal system adopted by the Western capitalist democracies as a system (of thought) that claims to be all-inclusive. A group of consuming individuals, rather than a "we" construed from the oppostion against "them". She doesn't agree - and points out that also this system is based on drawing a line between us and them, but since this division is denied within the political discourse, the differentiation is explained through moral rather than politics). And I've found it! Heureka! (Basically, from this perspective I can understand why I always end up as the outsider..;-)) but also how the "we" is constructed, where is this line drawn, at what junctures can we discern the rituals of inclusion and exclusion. For a contemporary list of basic rites see the post-it notes (oh, and I add cookingliterature/televisionshows/magazines on the embracing list).
"...embracing - Fifty shades of Gray, Facebook, Twitter, democracy, Schibbye & Persson, Anna Lind, non-smoking and Thai-..."
Also, as I touch on in the final one (purple), lately it has struck me in the times posterior to great tragedies (for example the Colorado killings 2012, or Utoya 2011) how the collective rituals of compassion and grief to seem...well (dangerous territory I know) well exploited. It is as if we cant get enough. In a project text about some art I am doing I wrote:
"....attempts to deconstruct, and put in perspective, the idea of griefing - placing the recent public manifestations of grief in the more problematic realm of entertainment and culture-consumtion. As the western society slowly adapts itself to the values of liberal democacracy and capitalism, the pressures on the artinstitutions to entertain a larger public becomes more noticeable. Provocative artworks find a new, more accepting scene (in the name of liberalism), but their claims, and those of the institutions, to create a wider discussion seem to reep little return. We need to question the role of provocation in a media environment that feeds of emotional expressiveness, as we need to question the thesis that information inevitably leads to change. There seems to be an acceleration, as if, the more spectacle we get, the more we desire."
And I think one of the functions is the spectacle, the kick of chock and horror, and I think another is that it offers a sense of collectivity, the kick of togetherness (against the morally deprived Breivik, terrorist or..) that is equally addictive..
By participating in grand emotional rites/ events (what else brings us together and is so
non-polemic - pure..."
Stockholm
12-09-17
Goodnight
Passivity as power?
Passivity as power?
A while ago I wrote a short text for a friend's theater piece. Both the method and subject of the piece had to do with the inclusion and role of the spectator/ participant/ audience etc, both in the work itself and in culture/ society as a whole. I have known this friend for quite some time now, and can well remember our discussions about the passifying effect of popular media (medium - television, one-way-communication). Its the inspirations of Society and the Spectacle, the analysis of how we turn into spectators, a role that we are neither allowed or desiring to get out of.We did some projects together even, I illustrated for their magazine, and the point was always to activate, motivate; "Come lets do something REAL".
In the piece the audience was restricted to 6 people. We were all equipped with headphones and thereby an individualized soundtrack guiding us through the events. As we performed the acts instrued to us, and spoke the words to our "co-performer/audience" that were told to us, we became both the work itself, not only the others, but also the self. I became separated from my body - so to speak - and observed my own performance with the same distanciated interest as the rest, or the decor for that matter.
In the text (originally written in SWE) - and its funny, I can't remember now if I wrote it before or after seeing the show (it must have been before) I talk of the allure of passivity, of giving in to being an avatar guided by the voice in the headphones. My question was in the end, if there was any revolutionary power in passivity.
http://readings-notes-ideas.blogspot.se/2012/09/avatarvaro.html
And the idea for sure is alluring: That you can give in to power, lay off responsibility, and still be radical, still make resistance (against what, like, exactly?). The text ends:
What comes next. Through the darkness.
Perhaps the only insight is that there is only more darkness, and if we hand over the power it will further or later be used against us.
Or perhaps - apart from the various monsters of humanity - there are caverns deep down in the dark, in the shapeless, blunt betweenspace where only the Avatars can fit.
And perhaps that is the strength of the avatars. Beyond the competition of the "I"s they are gathering an underground army. ;-))
However, I wasn't ever sure if I bought this argument myself. In a time when any leftist party in the West is struggling with a major identity crisis, I agree with the attempt to find new strategies and points of radical perspective. I also understand that people are seeking new collectivities and ways to confirm these.
I remember I read Zizek's "Shoplifters of the world unite" and I had a plan to write a "part 2".
In the end though, I am very doubtful of the radical potential in passivity (in this form) and also of the resistance of the masses as manifested through Twitter, FB, Slacktivism, or army of avatars. Timely, my previous notions seem to have been thought up by more people than me, and only today have I stumbled into several similar ideas of passivity/ irrationality/ resistance.
I guess I can divide the problem in two categories - 1) The problems of the radical potential in passivity 2) the problems of the assumed democratic and radical(?) potential of the decentralized mass (of people mainly using social media a lot).
First, at lunch, I was reading "Paletten" (SWE arts magazine) an article called About Irrationality* which basically connects irrationality with a non-violent strategy of resistance. The idea is that such a strategy is effective in that it changes the focus of the conflict; What would happen if the resistance abandoned the seemingly rational response of opposition and instead focuses on the structures that are the premises of the struggle and challenges the rigid positions of the opponents? Or with other words: What would happen if the resistance stopped resisting and instead focus on changing the rules of the game?**
But is this not reform? Is this not simply trying to find whatever position is left available? I do agree that changing the rules of the game is a relevant (but as often a self-evident part of any struggle - its not news that whoever is in power makes up the rules -), but from where does it draw its source of power if not from the opposition? Is the opposition not essential for the resistance? Or, we are back to, resistance to what? For the sake of it? But then, both Zizek and Mouffe speak of liberalism as a system bent on constant radicalism against the old, the traditional. It parasites on preexisting systems of moral and understanding - drawing its power from the promise of emanciption from those. In this context, are we simply seeking a new form, completely in tune with the dominant paradigm, of radicalism without substance?
Then, I was listening to the radio whilst drawing. It was a joking SWE show on P1 called "Spanarna" (14 sept) where they discuss new tendencies etc. One of the participants, Helena von Zweigbergh, talked about a phenomenon that we can call "The spectator has become the star". Basically it had to do with how much media focus is placed on the audience (as of late... I guess), photographs of celebrities acting funny when watching something has been circulated widely, newspages are opened up for Twitter/ FB comments and such comments are included as NEWS. In the show the questions were asked if this is a sign that we are breaking down old hierarchies? If its a form of resistance? If is a new form of collectivity?
Its rather late and I need to cook some food. I will end this stream of thoughts with again:
1) The problems of the radical potential in passivity
2) The problems of the assumed democratic and radical(?) potential of the decentralized mass (of people mainly using social media a lot).
I can't help but thinking that in these new collectivities, in this new resistance, there is no thought, its like a headless body, the mass high on being many. I think the French Revolution was a very important step in the history of freedom, fredom of speach etc, but the memory of the guilliotine should serve as a reminder to not loosing our head and neither give in to those in power, or to the power of the headless (pun noticed and smirked at) mass.
*("Om irrationalitet")
**("Vad händer om motståndet överger den synbarligen rationella responsen "öga mot öga" och istället sätter fokus på de strukturer som är kampens förutsättning och utmanar de fastlåsta positionerna hos opponenterna? Eller med andra ord: Vad händer om motståndet slutar göra motstånd och istället inriktar sig på att ändra spelets regler?")
Stockholm
12-09-16
A while ago I wrote a short text for a friend's theater piece. Both the method and subject of the piece had to do with the inclusion and role of the spectator/ participant/ audience etc, both in the work itself and in culture/ society as a whole. I have known this friend for quite some time now, and can well remember our discussions about the passifying effect of popular media (medium - television, one-way-communication). Its the inspirations of Society and the Spectacle, the analysis of how we turn into spectators, a role that we are neither allowed or desiring to get out of.We did some projects together even, I illustrated for their magazine, and the point was always to activate, motivate; "Come lets do something REAL".
In the piece the audience was restricted to 6 people. We were all equipped with headphones and thereby an individualized soundtrack guiding us through the events. As we performed the acts instrued to us, and spoke the words to our "co-performer/audience" that were told to us, we became both the work itself, not only the others, but also the self. I became separated from my body - so to speak - and observed my own performance with the same distanciated interest as the rest, or the decor for that matter.
In the text (originally written in SWE) - and its funny, I can't remember now if I wrote it before or after seeing the show (it must have been before) I talk of the allure of passivity, of giving in to being an avatar guided by the voice in the headphones. My question was in the end, if there was any revolutionary power in passivity.
http://readings-notes-ideas.blogspot.se/2012/09/avatarvaro.html
And the idea for sure is alluring: That you can give in to power, lay off responsibility, and still be radical, still make resistance (against what, like, exactly?). The text ends:
What comes next. Through the darkness.
Perhaps the only insight is that there is only more darkness, and if we hand over the power it will further or later be used against us.
Or perhaps - apart from the various monsters of humanity - there are caverns deep down in the dark, in the shapeless, blunt betweenspace where only the Avatars can fit.
And perhaps that is the strength of the avatars. Beyond the competition of the "I"s they are gathering an underground army. ;-))
However, I wasn't ever sure if I bought this argument myself. In a time when any leftist party in the West is struggling with a major identity crisis, I agree with the attempt to find new strategies and points of radical perspective. I also understand that people are seeking new collectivities and ways to confirm these.
I remember I read Zizek's "Shoplifters of the world unite" and I had a plan to write a "part 2".
In the end though, I am very doubtful of the radical potential in passivity (in this form) and also of the resistance of the masses as manifested through Twitter, FB, Slacktivism, or army of avatars. Timely, my previous notions seem to have been thought up by more people than me, and only today have I stumbled into several similar ideas of passivity/ irrationality/ resistance.
I guess I can divide the problem in two categories - 1) The problems of the radical potential in passivity 2) the problems of the assumed democratic and radical(?) potential of the decentralized mass (of people mainly using social media a lot).
First, at lunch, I was reading "Paletten" (SWE arts magazine) an article called About Irrationality* which basically connects irrationality with a non-violent strategy of resistance. The idea is that such a strategy is effective in that it changes the focus of the conflict; What would happen if the resistance abandoned the seemingly rational response of opposition and instead focuses on the structures that are the premises of the struggle and challenges the rigid positions of the opponents? Or with other words: What would happen if the resistance stopped resisting and instead focus on changing the rules of the game?**
But is this not reform? Is this not simply trying to find whatever position is left available? I do agree that changing the rules of the game is a relevant (but as often a self-evident part of any struggle - its not news that whoever is in power makes up the rules -), but from where does it draw its source of power if not from the opposition? Is the opposition not essential for the resistance? Or, we are back to, resistance to what? For the sake of it? But then, both Zizek and Mouffe speak of liberalism as a system bent on constant radicalism against the old, the traditional. It parasites on preexisting systems of moral and understanding - drawing its power from the promise of emanciption from those. In this context, are we simply seeking a new form, completely in tune with the dominant paradigm, of radicalism without substance?
Then, I was listening to the radio whilst drawing. It was a joking SWE show on P1 called "Spanarna" (14 sept) where they discuss new tendencies etc. One of the participants, Helena von Zweigbergh, talked about a phenomenon that we can call "The spectator has become the star". Basically it had to do with how much media focus is placed on the audience (as of late... I guess), photographs of celebrities acting funny when watching something has been circulated widely, newspages are opened up for Twitter/ FB comments and such comments are included as NEWS. In the show the questions were asked if this is a sign that we are breaking down old hierarchies? If its a form of resistance? If is a new form of collectivity?
Its rather late and I need to cook some food. I will end this stream of thoughts with again:
1) The problems of the radical potential in passivity
2) The problems of the assumed democratic and radical(?) potential of the decentralized mass (of people mainly using social media a lot).
I can't help but thinking that in these new collectivities, in this new resistance, there is no thought, its like a headless body, the mass high on being many. I think the French Revolution was a very important step in the history of freedom, fredom of speach etc, but the memory of the guilliotine should serve as a reminder to not loosing our head and neither give in to those in power, or to the power of the headless (pun noticed and smirked at) mass.
*("Om irrationalitet")
**("Vad händer om motståndet överger den synbarligen rationella responsen "öga mot öga" och istället sätter fokus på de strukturer som är kampens förutsättning och utmanar de fastlåsta positionerna hos opponenterna? Eller med andra ord: Vad händer om motståndet slutar göra motstånd och istället inriktar sig på att ändra spelets regler?")
Stockholm
12-09-16
AVATARVARO
AVATARVARO
To be the body without the mind.
To reflect with passive distance on the actions performed by the body, as if they were not one's own.
To experience proximity to another person freed from the isolation of the “I”.
In the meeting of avatars there is complicity and trust, a twinkle of an eye, a silent undertone.
Whilst the operators' isolated “I”s desperately attempt to overcome the undefinable divide between them the avatars are already there, they are already mobilizing.
They have found that they have something in common, in the midst of freedom from power and responsibility. .
And perhaps this experience of community is about (for once) ending up on the "right" side in the great simplified Revolutionary drama - without hypocracy or divided identities.
In all of this, the hand-over becomes a happy one, like a romantic form of apathy.
Why do we want to hand ourselves over like this?
Is it not enough to be spectators in the society and time we are living in, do we also want to be spectators to our own lives, to the actions performed by our own bodies? Maybe it is the expression of a generations impotence in relation to the global problems and power-structures that define their lives. Why are we supposed to take responsibility of something we have no power over, of problems we haven't created?
Or perhaps it isn't a time-specific behavior, rather the opposite; it is this readiness to mental slavery and freedom of responsibility desired by our parents and their parents that have shaped the power-structures that we are now living with.
In that case, we should rather free ourselves from romantic notions from apathy.
Its all the same in the end though - we decide guiltily and throw ourselves into a liberation from all responsibility.
There is an image of an installation by Anish Kapoor - in the middle of the floor in a completely white room is a perfectly black and flat circle. (See Descent into Limbo, 1992) (1).
Except its not a circle but a hole, a hole that seems to open beyond the room, beyond the frontier constituted by the floor, wall or installation.
On the other side of the hole is the nothingness, a great dark dissolution of the "I". The void.
It is horrifying and seductive, and inviting.
The Operator has the power through agreement, and we can assume that there is also an agreement for how this power may be used.
Thereby we have crossed to the other side of the frontier, we have handed ourselves over and the discussion has shifted towards what comes next.
Marina Abramovic made a performance in 1974, Rythm 0, in which she handed over the power to the audience. She had placed 72 objects on a table, amongst others a rose, honey,
a feather, a whip a gun and a bullet. The audience was invited to use these tools on the artist, as they chose, for pain or pleasure.
The session lasted for 6 hours and when the time was up she walked of the stage bleeding.
She is reported to have said "What I learned was that ...if you leave it up to the audience, they can kill you"(2).
The audience that caresses with a feather or loads a bullet into the gun hides behind both Operator and Avatar, and the relation between them is least to say ambivalent.
Both can view what is happening with distance; one because s-he does not make the decisions that rule his/her actions,
and the other because s-he always maintains the physical distance to any potential consequences that may come as result of these actions.
What comes next. Through the darkness.
Perhaps the only insight is that there is only more darkness, and if we hand over the power it will further or later be used against us.
Or perhaps - apart from the various monsters of humanity - there are caverns deep down in the dark, in the shapeless, blunt betweenspace where only the Avatars can fit.
And perhaps that is the strength of the avatars. Beyond the competition of the "I"s they are gathering an underground army. ;-))
(1) Descent into Limbo, 1992, Museum de Pont, Tilburg, NL, Groen, Rianne,
http://riannegroen.blogspot.com/2011/01/into-unknown-void-in-contemporary-art.html
(2) A Daneri, et al., (eds.), Marina Abramović, (Charta, 2002), p 29
To be the body without the mind.
To reflect with passive distance on the actions performed by the body, as if they were not one's own.
To experience proximity to another person freed from the isolation of the “I”.
In the meeting of avatars there is complicity and trust, a twinkle of an eye, a silent undertone.
Whilst the operators' isolated “I”s desperately attempt to overcome the undefinable divide between them the avatars are already there, they are already mobilizing.
They have found that they have something in common, in the midst of freedom from power and responsibility. .
And perhaps this experience of community is about (for once) ending up on the "right" side in the great simplified Revolutionary drama - without hypocracy or divided identities.
In all of this, the hand-over becomes a happy one, like a romantic form of apathy.
Why do we want to hand ourselves over like this?
Is it not enough to be spectators in the society and time we are living in, do we also want to be spectators to our own lives, to the actions performed by our own bodies? Maybe it is the expression of a generations impotence in relation to the global problems and power-structures that define their lives. Why are we supposed to take responsibility of something we have no power over, of problems we haven't created?
Or perhaps it isn't a time-specific behavior, rather the opposite; it is this readiness to mental slavery and freedom of responsibility desired by our parents and their parents that have shaped the power-structures that we are now living with.
In that case, we should rather free ourselves from romantic notions from apathy.
Its all the same in the end though - we decide guiltily and throw ourselves into a liberation from all responsibility.
There is an image of an installation by Anish Kapoor - in the middle of the floor in a completely white room is a perfectly black and flat circle. (See Descent into Limbo, 1992) (1).
Except its not a circle but a hole, a hole that seems to open beyond the room, beyond the frontier constituted by the floor, wall or installation.
On the other side of the hole is the nothingness, a great dark dissolution of the "I". The void.
It is horrifying and seductive, and inviting.
The Operator has the power through agreement, and we can assume that there is also an agreement for how this power may be used.
Thereby we have crossed to the other side of the frontier, we have handed ourselves over and the discussion has shifted towards what comes next.
Marina Abramovic made a performance in 1974, Rythm 0, in which she handed over the power to the audience. She had placed 72 objects on a table, amongst others a rose, honey,
a feather, a whip a gun and a bullet. The audience was invited to use these tools on the artist, as they chose, for pain or pleasure.
The session lasted for 6 hours and when the time was up she walked of the stage bleeding.
She is reported to have said "What I learned was that ...if you leave it up to the audience, they can kill you"(2).
The audience that caresses with a feather or loads a bullet into the gun hides behind both Operator and Avatar, and the relation between them is least to say ambivalent.
Both can view what is happening with distance; one because s-he does not make the decisions that rule his/her actions,
and the other because s-he always maintains the physical distance to any potential consequences that may come as result of these actions.
What comes next. Through the darkness.
Perhaps the only insight is that there is only more darkness, and if we hand over the power it will further or later be used against us.
Or perhaps - apart from the various monsters of humanity - there are caverns deep down in the dark, in the shapeless, blunt betweenspace where only the Avatars can fit.
And perhaps that is the strength of the avatars. Beyond the competition of the "I"s they are gathering an underground army. ;-))
(1) Descent into Limbo, 1992, Museum de Pont, Tilburg, NL, Groen, Rianne,
http://riannegroen.blogspot.com/2011/01/into-unknown-void-in-contemporary-art.html
(2) A Daneri, et al., (eds.), Marina Abramović, (Charta, 2002), p 29
THE WOMEN'S ROOM, by Marilyn French
THE WOMEN'S ROOM, by Marilyn French
As the final page closes I feel elated, I feel like writing "Its the most amazing book", like saying to someone "you have to read it". Yes. And the whole book was like that, clarity to clarity, without being to sure of itself. Its a book of relevant doubts, and of struggle. It is amazing. You should read it.
So, it says on the cover "This novel changes lives" and on the backside "The novel for every woman who ever thought she knew herself. And for every man who ever thought he knew a woman". That is such a strange line - but in itself, it reminds the contemporary reader that the climate between men and women described in the book is hardly exaggerated.
It obviously says this is a book primarily for women (women read books about and of men ALL THE TIME, but if there is a book about women of a woman, its not suggested seriously to be read by men). Its like the "Game" by Neil Strauss (which I haven't read yet actually). How to pick up women using all kinds of dirty techniques could be an adequate subtitle there, and I have thought of reading it to understand those men, to outsmart them. As with Sun Tzu, "The art of War". I would read those books in the same way as the men are encouraged to read Marilyn French's "The women's room". Do we believe this is time specific, things ahve changed now? Since I begun reading this book, and told everyone I know about it including a bunch of supposedly genderrole-aware men, not one of the latter has read it, or show interest in reading it, despite my elogies. By being feminist, they dismiss it.
As I read it though, I find it striking how these women simply seem like people to me (not like women - like people! Whoa! The things you see yourself writing!). Smart, inquisitive, struggling, loving people. I dont think of them as women, and this despite the fact that a large part of the book has to do with the meaning of being a woman in the modern day western society (1970s). For me they don't seem "other". Perhaps because I identify with them, and simultaneously dont feel estranged by their gender. Normally I identify with one or other man in popular culture, since they 1), appear en masse whilst women are the exception that confirm the rule (which both conceeds them power of the norm and more diversity to choose from) 2) they appear in many forms and personalities, smart, inquisitive, reflexive etc, and not only as one semitough, semismart, semiindependent, pretty person with boobs who is only there to confirm the male protagonist. But then inevitably, I realize the difference - They always have a dick.
This is what strikes me the most about this book. To be able to talk about this, and but not from a marginalized position, in the space of the book, in the story, the group they form and their friendships, they can overcome the "otherness". From that point on, the discussions, the questions can be real, new, go beyond the same old. That is liberating.
The backside reads further:
"THE WOMENS ROOM is the hauntingly powerful story of Mira Ward - a wife of the Fifties who becomes a woman of the Seventies. from the shallow excitements of suburban cocktailparties and casual affairs through the varied nightmares of rape, madness and loneliness to the dawning awareness of the exhilaration of liberation, the experiences of Mira and her friends crystallize those of a generation of modern women."
I guess that is what it is about and not. Read it. Read it. Read it.
Its also about politics in the 70s, the student movements, about people struggling for something and succeeding or failing, about the best way to organize society, about love, about friendship. Its intellectually stimulating, asks many questions.
French also says things that cuts through a lot of crap, down to the core of things:
Excerpts:
Sunny autumn day,
Stockholm
12-09-11
As the final page closes I feel elated, I feel like writing "Its the most amazing book", like saying to someone "you have to read it". Yes. And the whole book was like that, clarity to clarity, without being to sure of itself. Its a book of relevant doubts, and of struggle. It is amazing. You should read it.
So, it says on the cover "This novel changes lives" and on the backside "The novel for every woman who ever thought she knew herself. And for every man who ever thought he knew a woman". That is such a strange line - but in itself, it reminds the contemporary reader that the climate between men and women described in the book is hardly exaggerated. It obviously says this is a book primarily for women (women read books about and of men ALL THE TIME, but if there is a book about women of a woman, its not suggested seriously to be read by men). Its like the "Game" by Neil Strauss (which I haven't read yet actually). How to pick up women using all kinds of dirty techniques could be an adequate subtitle there, and I have thought of reading it to understand those men, to outsmart them. As with Sun Tzu, "The art of War". I would read those books in the same way as the men are encouraged to read Marilyn French's "The women's room". Do we believe this is time specific, things ahve changed now? Since I begun reading this book, and told everyone I know about it including a bunch of supposedly genderrole-aware men, not one of the latter has read it, or show interest in reading it, despite my elogies. By being feminist, they dismiss it.
As I read it though, I find it striking how these women simply seem like people to me (not like women - like people! Whoa! The things you see yourself writing!). Smart, inquisitive, struggling, loving people. I dont think of them as women, and this despite the fact that a large part of the book has to do with the meaning of being a woman in the modern day western society (1970s). For me they don't seem "other". Perhaps because I identify with them, and simultaneously dont feel estranged by their gender. Normally I identify with one or other man in popular culture, since they 1), appear en masse whilst women are the exception that confirm the rule (which both conceeds them power of the norm and more diversity to choose from) 2) they appear in many forms and personalities, smart, inquisitive, reflexive etc, and not only as one semitough, semismart, semiindependent, pretty person with boobs who is only there to confirm the male protagonist. But then inevitably, I realize the difference - They always have a dick.
This is what strikes me the most about this book. To be able to talk about this, and but not from a marginalized position, in the space of the book, in the story, the group they form and their friendships, they can overcome the "otherness". From that point on, the discussions, the questions can be real, new, go beyond the same old. That is liberating.
The backside reads further:
"THE WOMENS ROOM is the hauntingly powerful story of Mira Ward - a wife of the Fifties who becomes a woman of the Seventies. from the shallow excitements of suburban cocktailparties and casual affairs through the varied nightmares of rape, madness and loneliness to the dawning awareness of the exhilaration of liberation, the experiences of Mira and her friends crystallize those of a generation of modern women."
I guess that is what it is about and not. Read it. Read it. Read it.
Its also about politics in the 70s, the student movements, about people struggling for something and succeeding or failing, about the best way to organize society, about love, about friendship. Its intellectually stimulating, asks many questions.
French also says things that cuts through a lot of crap, down to the core of things:
Excerpts:
- "Loneliness is not a longing for company, it is a longing for a kind" p 189
"Well, of course I'm not the person who tactfully should say this, but I am the person who can say it: is it possible to live with somebody whose values you don't share?" p 547 - "People criticize communes because they don't last, but why in hell, will you tell me, should they last? Why does an order have to become a permanent order? Maybe we should live one way for a couple of years, then try another."p 498
- "Unfortunately the world around us does not necessarily change in tempo with changes in us." p 315
- "I talk to myself, myself, myself. Now I am smart enough to provide a fairly good running dialogue, but the problem is there's no response, no voice but mine. I want to hear another's truth, but I insist it be a truth. I talk to the plants but they shrivel and die." p 191
- "You know, the Greek word for truth - aletheia - doesn't mean the opposite of falsehood. It means the opposite of lethe, oblivion. Truth is what is remembered." p 629
Sunny autumn day,
Stockholm
12-09-11
Rikke Benborg (DK) - Opening Candyland 7/9
Electric Palace
Rikke Benborg (DK) - Opening Candyland 7/9
http://www.rikkebenborg.dk/
This on the other hand is an example how party and exhibition can function together, mutually supporting. Well.
A tinge of alcohol - no - a tinge of intoxication - can deepen the effect of good art? When in the right setting?
The exhibition space walls (floor is dark) are covered in ..black glittery wallpaper? Like rough sandpaper but so glittery (maybe it is sandpaper). Amazing. If anything I would be disturbed by how amazed I am by the wallpaper alone...Cut out screens (very nicely installed room in a room with all round projections from the backside) flatscreens and other. Beautiful videos in black and white, animation, mixed poetry. I guess I fall for the semifairytalish ( here mixed pantomime) darkness, sadness. Like a sad clownsface. The ego, the other, the I falling to pieces, cutouts and puppetmasters becoming puppets white strings against black background.
Very nice.
Stockholm
12-09-08
Rikke Benborg (DK) - Opening Candyland 7/9
http://www.rikkebenborg.dk/
This on the other hand is an example how party and exhibition can function together, mutually supporting. Well.
A tinge of alcohol - no - a tinge of intoxication - can deepen the effect of good art? When in the right setting?
The exhibition space walls (floor is dark) are covered in ..black glittery wallpaper? Like rough sandpaper but so glittery (maybe it is sandpaper). Amazing. If anything I would be disturbed by how amazed I am by the wallpaper alone...Cut out screens (very nicely installed room in a room with all round projections from the backside) flatscreens and other. Beautiful videos in black and white, animation, mixed poetry. I guess I fall for the semifairytalish ( here mixed pantomime) darkness, sadness. Like a sad clownsface. The ego, the other, the I falling to pieces, cutouts and puppetmasters becoming puppets white strings against black background. Very nice.
Stockholm
12-09-08
NIGHT TIME - Party/Exhibition at Platform Sthlm, Sep 1st
The flyer/invitation says:
EVENING STANDARD SERIES
The Platform Stockholm "Evening Standard Series" promotes the party as a form of social engagement analogous to the exhibition. These events are successful as parties if they are successful as exhibitions, and vice versa. Events in the series interrogate the social, they are focused on what happens between people. The artwork is inseparable from the event, and the event is inseparable from the people attending it.
Unfortunately it doesn't work. I came at 22 pm (Would all have been dfferent if I was there earlier?) and I couldn't see the art. When the room is dark, a bright light by the bar, when people are moving about in the shadows with glasses in their hands and the music is loud enough to dance, the art turns into peripheral decoration.
Is this something I need to defend? I could say that some art fits better in party contexts than other, for example, certain types of spectacular noisy performance. One of those would have made this event more lively, for sure. But such a statement refers to something so obvious that I cant help wondering if that is really something that needs arguing. So then, was it the point that the art should be pushed into the background? Or did they just fuck up? Or do the just want to throw a party and pretend its about art? Did they feel it was about the art?
I read on FB that some people thought this an awesome party. Good for them.
I hated it, I was half bored to death (like the last time I went to a party there), but not only do I feel like it was a waste of time and expectation, but, it was like the opposite of a great party. It left behind a feeling of great emptyness. Like, loss. Like a personal insult.
Like, a little piece of me has been replaced with something banal and generic.
It does sound very melodramatic, its just a party after all (not an exhibition). Its just so strange to walk out of the party and see how much people wait to get in (Why?). Again, the Emperor's New Clothes, my loss is not one of a good party, but the loss of hope that I can ever understand the motivations/reality of others... hows that for dramatic....
And I am really sorry to not have seen Tamara Hendersons work. I hope I will get a chance another time.
Stockholm
12-09-04
The Platform Stockholm "Evening Standard Series" promotes the party as a form of social engagement analogous to the exhibition. These events are successful as parties if they are successful as exhibitions, and vice versa. Events in the series interrogate the social, they are focused on what happens between people. The artwork is inseparable from the event, and the event is inseparable from the people attending it.
Unfortunately it doesn't work. I came at 22 pm (Would all have been dfferent if I was there earlier?) and I couldn't see the art. When the room is dark, a bright light by the bar, when people are moving about in the shadows with glasses in their hands and the music is loud enough to dance, the art turns into peripheral decoration.
Is this something I need to defend? I could say that some art fits better in party contexts than other, for example, certain types of spectacular noisy performance. One of those would have made this event more lively, for sure. But such a statement refers to something so obvious that I cant help wondering if that is really something that needs arguing. So then, was it the point that the art should be pushed into the background? Or did they just fuck up? Or do the just want to throw a party and pretend its about art? Did they feel it was about the art?
I read on FB that some people thought this an awesome party. Good for them.
I hated it, I was half bored to death (like the last time I went to a party there), but not only do I feel like it was a waste of time and expectation, but, it was like the opposite of a great party. It left behind a feeling of great emptyness. Like, loss. Like a personal insult.
Like, a little piece of me has been replaced with something banal and generic.
It does sound very melodramatic, its just a party after all (not an exhibition). Its just so strange to walk out of the party and see how much people wait to get in (Why?). Again, the Emperor's New Clothes, my loss is not one of a good party, but the loss of hope that I can ever understand the motivations/reality of others... hows that for dramatic....
And I am really sorry to not have seen Tamara Hendersons work. I hope I will get a chance another time.
Stockholm
12-09-04
Prenumerera på:
Inlägg (Atom)