First e-diction.
Signified/ Signifier/ Significant. Towards a Comprehensive Written Art. William C. GutiĂŠrrez-Villamizar.
Artistic Affairs Bureau.
ABSTRACT The following is an essay to set the theoretical framework for an Art practice that considers “writing as (if) media; language as (if) plastic and subject matter.� Such approach is possible through the implementation of concepts as translation poetics, politic-of-aesthetics, and recreative writing to the traditional readings of concrete poetry, conceptual art, and creative writing throughout its common-history. The result is a series of experiments stored using Transmedia documentation methodologies, as a response to the problems derived from the displaced nature of the artwork when installed into the art circuit, enabling the emergence and definition of Comprehensive Written Art.
Art’s Language; !
Language in Art.
1
! ! Language -the written word- and Art -image-based representation- share their fundamental basis (a purpose) whose purport could be essentially described as an hermeneutic principle1: the capacity to store/transfer knowledge through the mastership of technologies -devises and abilities- developed to explain, translate, and interpret events/happenings which, as consequence, are to become matter of history. In a sense, both approaches aim to re-create a definition of world simultaneously, a fact as evident as their radical (ofthe-root) difference, from the codes of interpretation/ transmission to the media/strategies taking part in each process. Although far from behaving as opposite forces, their correspondence renders rather complementary, especially when it comes to compensate each other’s lacks.
2
Art’s Language; Language in Art.
Such reciprocity is indeed a matter of systematized recognition and transference; one significantly mediated2. Hence, in order to identify its origin and preconditions, the execution of a methodology ad hoc based on the ground of media archeology 3 is suggested since the necessary conditions to configure an effective system of knowledge transmission are inter-determined by the tech-no-logical developments available at a certain moment, and the cultural transformation derived from its extensive implementation through history. In fact, if we have learned anything from the motley media archeology definitions is that relay -from memory as neurophysiology phenomenon to computerized data storage- tends to delay 4, and there’s no new media penetration rate, neither update cycle frequency, nor programmed obsolescence that could compensate this fact. “Technology is entrenched in our history.5 ” ! The complexity complex yielded by these two reality operating systems throughout the diachronic Fluxus of references that constitutes the basis for their shared policy of subordination, and articulates (with all its ambivalence) the parameters under each party managed to configure their particular (albeit unspecific) attempt of purpose at the same time, can be exemplarily “illustrated” through a paper-sheet-deep review on how images and words have been co-operating during The Ages in the assemblage of both Art and Media histories:
! There was a time when information-war’s landscape was rather symbolic and yet fully operational. Back then, the group (be)holding the most significant bibliographic catalog was the ruling one; even if that implied the enforcement of systematic inquisitive violence aimed to extinguish others’ valuable possessions -especially if inspired by matters other than the reigning pataphysic beliefs. Such collections of handcrafted copies were not only precious, but also subject(s) of a restrictive inside-policy of loan(word), tracing over its indexed pages certain character of private-domain-cognizance-heritage, compelled by protectionist measures against others’, equally inquisitive, expropriation policies. Being that so, if a congregation needed to convert mobs into loyal followers, they had to use their knowledge assets as bait. But beforehand issuing a edition “for dummies” of such obscure wisdom, transcribed with sleight on the holly books of choice, it had to be translated into a language accessible to the wildly illiterate masses. Motivating the extensive repertoire of hanged imaginary, representative of the time, due its capacity not only occupy flat surfaces and minds, but flatten history as well. Nonetheless, the occupation process not only depended on reproducing as many images as possible, they had to move, be pathetic, in a sense, and since the word was (at) the beginning, the iconologists knew that the motif assortment had to be far from random. Then, a set of codified meanings matching the fellowships’ interpretation of the scripture’s was created, and with it arbitrary symbolisms
3
Art’s Language; Language in Art.
were composed over the figure of each creature or thing ever portrayed within the frame -of reference; grammar became composition, and ideology collective imaginary. As consequence, the economy of meaning instruction was made painting, and dwelled amongst those able to make sense out its pictures as long as it kept paying dividends to the hierarchy. This imperative remained unbroken, even after illustrators were granted permission to reproduce profane stories (the descent of divine in the royal-scape) and technical updates were introduced, there was no other medium that could match the powers of the written word and its divine law as the ultimate manifestation of truth. Such was the domain of the Signification Empire that we are still dealing with the remains of the commands dictated though (de)generations along the regime. ! It didn’t really matter how much time needed to pass-by, neither if dealing with figurative or abstract references: the word is the law, and the law is go(o)d. But there was another contribution to be amused with: the rise of its innovative (artspecific) terminology. In it, the scripted (later typed) monopoly was designated to fund the dictatorship of the ontological misinterpretation of reality as representation of the metaphysical, making it possible, for an ambiguous technolect as this, to transcend the limits of its media transference rate, and become both subjective (un)consciousness and Science -of the beauty. Although, the latter was the favorite of the knowledgeable mi-
nority, they soon learned to rephrase the discipline dedicated to the empiric study of being-in-the-world in a single concept: aesthetics 6. On the bright side, the symbolic occupation of existence required/demanded that (visual) literacy became “a thing” (subject matter) on its way to become a matter of public domain as collateral damage; the closest one could get to democracy, given the (lack of) conditions. “Being able to read was not the same as being allowed to write 7.” Benjamin The Scrivener 8
‘
4
Art’s Language; Language in Art.
1. Although, originally, the term hermeneutics refers to the process of interpretation mainly related to written expressions, further analysis lead to understand the process in terms of more general phenomena such the consciousness of being (Heidegger). Hence, its importance, when applied to Language and Art theory, and its complex relationship; the introduction of the written word (a relatively late event in the history of human communication) has completely changed the terms under the cultural landscape (History) was shaped though oral tradition, for example, and the many different ways artist have managed to interpreted reality, which have had a direct impact on the definition of the art practice, conceptually and practically speaking. See: Bjørn Ramberg and Kristin Ramberg, "Hermeneutics", The Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy (Summer 2013 Edition), Edward N. Zalta (ed.), accessed May 1st, 2013 2. The writer doesn’t write what he wants, but what he can -not paint. Despite being subject of détournement, Nietzsche’s famous quote on skill, has critical media/medium management implications: “our writing tools are also working in our though,” he wrote. Nietzsche quoted by Friedrich Kittler in Gramophone, Film, Typewriter (Stanford: Stanford University Press, 1999): 200. 3. In spite there is not such thing as a fixed definition of media archeology, we could say that its purpose and methodologies are to media (studies) what philology is to language (hence, written language analysis. Both disciplines avail themselves with the entire analytical repertoire at their disposal in order to approach their subjects comprehensibly. Thus, every category of knowledge
is welcome contribute to the task as long as it provides relevant information that leads to the accomplishment of what might well be the Gesamtkunstwerk (total artwork, as introduced by the german aesthetes in reference to Wagner’s Operas) of humanistic research. 4. The electronic revolution has been around for over half of a century, but we have started to experience the socio-cultural shift and its implications until relatively recent. See: Lev Manovich, The Language of New Media. (Michigan: The MIT Press, 2001), accessed April 18th, 2013, 5. Heidegger quoted by Friedrich Kittler in Gramophone, Film, Typewriter (Stanford: Stanford University Press, 1999): 200. 6. The misinterpretation of the philosophy of art or aesthetics as the discipline responsible for the common acceptance of concepts likewise taste, sublime, genius and a lot more others, comes from their contextual specificities conditioning those questionable definitions of art/ artist. But now there’s no reason for us to keep thinking on aesthetics as a formal study of Art or an specific visual style, but as a system of constant exchange of experiences in which the ground zero is conformed after processes of consensus and dissent take place; a political act by definition. See: Jaques Rancière, Sobre políticas estéticas -On Aesthetic politics- (Barcelona, Spain: Ed Universitat Autónoma de Barcelona, 2005). 7. Friedrich Kittler, Gramophone, Film, Typewriter (Stanford: Stanford University Press, 1999): 184.
8. It wasn’t until 1970’s that “experimentally inclined language poets proposed a way the reader could, in fact, become the writer. By atomizing words across a page, coupled with disrupting normative modes of syntax, they felt that the nonhierarchical linguistic landscape would encourage a reader to reconstruct such text as they saw it fit...demonstrating that the textual field is unstable, comprised of evershifting sign and signifiers, thereby unable to be claimed by either author or reader as authoritative. If the reader were able to reconstruct the open text, it would be as (un)stable and as (un)meaningful as the author’s. The end result would be a level playing field for all, debunking the twin myths of both the allpowerful author and passive reader.” Kenneth Goldsmith, Uncreative Writing: managing language in the digital age (NY: Columbia University Press, 2011): 153
5
Art’s Language; Language in Art.
1.1
Printing as (if) Art -of Typing: Writing as (if) Imprint. Once the occupation of the entire scope of visual artists’ productive role as transcription-translators is recognized, the abiding exchange of misconceptions, on interpretation and attribution of meaning, between these two “modes of representation”, leaves the impression that such correspondence is being based on an operative restraint that demands one of the parties to be at service of the other as a contingency measure; filling each other’s blanks for the sake of both high and popular culture in absolute synchronization. An attitude manifest in the pragmatic distinctions outlined between Art Writing and Written Art ! The first, is founded under full awareness (not yet, complete understanding) of the gap amongst theory and practice (thinking or doing), motivating the establishment of a certain theory of subjectivity in which written/printed text was, without question, the media par excellence (there wasn’t much com-
petition, anyways), through which authors, making their best effort to attribute truly significant meaning to artistic expressions, sought immortality doing the paper-work (filling and filing) required for the validation of their inexplicable contributions as part of the (equally unverifiable) official History of history and aesthetics. Hence, a conflict of interests is evident: if the whole purpose of developing a system dedicated to the transmission of knowledge such visual art is supported on the idea of triggering with ease as many interpretations as possible, then why restrain the interpretative range of the viewer/reader under a text-based authoritarianism? And more importantly, from where does such desperate need for legitimacy come, in the first place? ! Truth-be-told, all the evidences indicate that the reason why the exclusive code-language of visual arts/artists isn’t selfsufficient appears-to-be the aftermath of a misunderstanding of the original misunderstanding, hence, making it impossible to establish a zero degree stable enough to support the conditions needed to become a matter of public domain, or what is the same, it was imperative to set up a theoretical context (references) that could compensate the displaced nature of artifacts. As result, it became standard procedure to put a piece of text next to every art piece to ensure its meaning recognition, starting from the title. Thus, it was inevitable that the early symptoms of autism aesthetics showed became an issue of public health.!
6
Art’s Language; Language in Art.
! ! As expected, it was a matter of time before the situation got out of control (too many text, too little meaning), and the next thing art students, non-textual artist, and freelance art-writers knew, was that relying on a (pre)fixed theoretical repertoire was part of the new deal: the standardization policy of art writing promised a certain level of tolerance towards mediocrity (which was a huge relief, indeed) as long as the forms were kept, and by forms they refer to the use of formalistic (almost bureaucratic) language, and the inclusion of indexed (short-list) authors and key words to support each mayor argumentation; the quotation quota was officially institutionalized! As consequence, we learned to accept our minimum wage labor conditions, the grey-area of industrial productivity where the increase on the demand necessarily means the decrease of the product’s quality. And since our crisis is someone else’s opportunity, even those suffering from starvation pain found a way to do business by trading personal criteria for endorsed bibliography ready to be retyped ad nausseam. ! It has never been so clear, the main goal of today’s apprentice of copy-writer is no other than reaching the precise amount of published material required to maintain their status in the community: an exhibition has to have a catalog, flyers/invitation, a poster and a introductory text, a junior curator/researcher has to publish a critique review or essays
at least 3 times a year, a young artist must have a portfolio and be able to submit proficiently as many open calls as it’s humanly possible, and the list goes on... Luckily, the editorial staff at publishing houses and local presses couldn’t care less if all this was or not worth writing, read, or printed as long as the business (press) kept on running, regardless if the commitment implied such drastic measures as making profit out of selling the product directly to recycling factories: “whatever it takes” is the motto to ensure sustainability before the business goes completely digital, where content relevance deals in absolutes (from crucial as read on peer reviewed journals with consistent editorial guidelines, to merely accessory as seen in tabloids with more screen area dedicated to advertising than to its exhibitionist-trends reviews) and what’s worst, to achieve written mastership, either case demands, is as complicated as understanding how profit is even possible under those terms. ! No wonder, then, why professional art-writer’s reply to the undergoing word-cased scenario is the compulsive need to update and share the database of framing candidates fitting the template of bush-league-writing, as an attempt prove in public that writing sloppier than their own was possible. Actually, the Arts Writers Union has already chosen its brandnew scapegoat, and even gave it a funny name: International Art English9; after arguing that what initially appeared to be a
7
Art’s Language; Language in Art.
harmless jargon with a rare accent, turned up being a highly contagious langue de bois10, reaching epidemic scales after decades dedicated to reductive translations of French theory, chiefly, transforming core concepts into flat argumentative formulas meant to refill printed copies of internationally distributed art-journals. The extent of the impact attributed to this newspeak is as hard to ignore as it is to determine; as-matterof-facts, it has got to a point where is more accurate to assume that its influence, over the so-called academic fashion dominating English language art writing, is ubiquitous11. !“Writing
functioned as universal medium in times where there was no concept of medium.” (Kittler)
! Written Art, in the deft hand, presents itself as an alternative the scenario to explore language’s vast expressive potential once it’s resources started to be widish as media and -plasticmatter13, instead of being subject to the supremacy of dexterously executed policies of media management, replicating the “grammatologistics” ingeniously dictating/, since the times of epic storytelling, that true domain of language is a plaisir du texte reserved only to the word-masters.
!! The aftereffect of this early gestures was consigned in all sort of scribbles, traced with no other intention than the experience itself; not so, without noticing the advantage of putting their attempts on the record: The more resources a (self-managed) data base has, the faster its feedback loop could result on relevant updates. (though, excessive code processing could end up crashing the whole reference system before a zero degree is could be even ready to install. But In spite first timers’ distinctive clumsiness, this experimental approach has proven to be the cornerstone of the legitimate expansion of Written Art’s affluence, as if it was another medium with history or tradition in the arts, subject, just like any other, to the unknown effects of aesthetic alchemy, the same in-comprehensible procedure that once gave birth to both poetic images and visual poetry as if the logic outcome the opposition principle is applied to selfexplicatory language-based (re)creation. Notwithstanding the effort, “actual poetry” was still doing time in its golden cage of dyed paper, since it was too hard to imagine/understand/handle such impressive language manifestations beyond the set of media specifically designed to support and store its imposed instrumental essence. And since there is no history without a stable system of categorization, uncertainty is a luxurious commodity that couldn’t be afforded, at least not yet, as long as the link between language’s materialization and conceptualization keeps being subject to trans-codification processes in Beta phase.
"
Translators need to transcend transcendentalism.! 8
Art’s Language; Language in Art.
The subsequent implications are clear, but not less daunting; no matter how well-documented or evident it be, the undergoing process of referential correspondence between both textbased and image-based systems of inter/re-presentation, each code will remain confined in its own parallel reality when operative/operational in a common context, like those possible after a decisive contribution of the avant-garde movements; the official introduction of concerns inherent to language theory (interpretation, referentiality and signification) as subject-matter, and its following inclusion into the formal repertoire of visual art14, including its formerly exclusive media framework/mainframe. ! Once more, written language failed to overthrow the imposition of its third-kind status, as image-complementary (even if composed as an image itself) or supportive character (backup storage) in the meaning recognition logistics remained to be considered its definitive contribution to aesthetic and its theory. Not even after the subsequent neorevivals of the written manifestations15 that found the basis of Conceptual Art’s16 - and its filial branches- declaration of attempt -when writing-based art finally appeared to reach formal and conceptual maturity-, the introduction of language as a plastic matter, couldn’t negotiate in its favor the conditional/conditioned nature of the correspondence between signified, signifier, and referent, no matter how selfreferential, it always lacked complete media/mediumcontent-context cohesion. Hence, if text-based art insisted to achieve the institutional validation granted to hegemonic
theories, techniques, and mediums and media, first it had to undergo a transitional stage of extensive implementation of its alternative/ experimental methodologies by replicating (in its own terms, at least) the production and circulation strategies distinctive of those same traditional mediums of expression it critiqued, or worse, after text-specific (massive) media got aestheticized (not before proper validation through theoretical means) when these writing-friendlysurfaces hosting low-resolution impressions of the definition of Art as Idea as Idea, were tactically reframed, emulating the etiquette proper of the real classics, in order to fit among them -if ever considered collectables. Yet, the tactic was so effective that the sponsors felt the urge to admit its aesthetic value demanded certification and a price tag, which automatically turned this, rather exotic, creatures, into ordinary, but well conserved, stuffed animal, purchased to decorate, with its representative presence, the interior design of Art History’s Freak Show (world-touring) caravan.
! Decades passed, and happy-ending episodes as such were regular show. Soon, Written Art’s production, means, and methodologies were unable outsmart, or simply dodge, the policies of content recycling and generic translation of mass media. The fundaments of what was supposed to be a doctrine-free interpretation model, became symbolic currency due market share negotiations between agencies, and now face its definitive fate as fragments and/or deformed refer-
9
Art’s Language; Language in Art.
ences, vaguely recognizable under their dead-metaphor uniforms, awaiting to be reposted by armies of copy-writers on deadline, as another disposable curiosity, byproduct of advertising’s Frankenstein effect and its ravenous consumption of catchy phrases and stylistic leftovers, found-as-new in the crammed trashcans gathered at the end of every vernissage.
“What if you let the work speak for itself, absent any puffery? What if a copy/tag-line was written to simplify rather than deceive? You might end up with an piece like this” (Not-Balsessari)
A Fountain by Richard Mutt. Remixed media (replica). Marcelo Delcampo, 2014
10
Art’s Language; Language in Art.
9. Alix Rule & David Levine, International Art English, Triple Canopy 16 (NY, United States: June 2012), accessed June 21st 2013. 10. Translated as doubletalk, newspeak or even waffle, the expression langue de bois emerged in the tsarist Russia, coined by communist militants referring to the ambiguous terminology used by the political establishment to facilitate their dubious legislative duty by confusing the masses with non-arguments hard to understand and, hence, to refute; acquired its current meaning in the France post May of 68’ revolt. See: Gilles Guilleron, Langue de Bois, Decryptage irreverebcieux de politiquement correct et de dessous de la lague. Au Pied De La Lettre. (Paris: Éditions First, 2010).
11. Although Rosler questions both the objectivity and methodology of Rule & Levine’s research on the rise of artworld’s press release, she also acknowledges that a narrative of dominance as such is deeply embedded in the modern history of the English language in which the exercise of power dialectics is crucial during the process through which it became the world’s official language of economy, government and entertainment industries (art included). See: Martha Rosler, English and all that, eflux journal #45, accessed April 5th 2014. 13. At this point a disambiguation between the terms media and medium must take place before a comprehensive definition of Written Arts’ expressive means could emerge. Above all there’s the syntactic distinction where medium is a singularity: an individual (transference/ transmission) channel, and media a multiplicity: a cluster of mediums related to each other, as understood in media studies. Below (and here’s comes the confusion) there’s the reading of aesthetic theory, where medium is a category attributed to an artwork in accordance to its materials and methods of
production, and media is just a short for mass media. So, when we claim that written language be treated as both media and –subject- matter (medium), we are suggesting the possibility to work on the problems inherent to the philosophy of language in the field of arts, using its own qualities/properties as medium for understanding. But, in order to achieve it, its media spectrum has to transcend mass media coverage, since written language is facing a transformation phase after the electronic revolution advances. We must exploit this unique opportunity to jailbreak its operating system, and set the basis of a practice that expands beyond the limits of instrumentality of both production and distribution of meaning. 14. From the cubist exploration of the visual capabilities of words, through Dada’s exploration of already-made writings (automatic writing, collage, phonetic poetry, etc) and Surrealist’s inquiry in the meaning of art/ language as representational modes to the revolutionary policies of provocation movements such the International Lettrism and Situationism manifested. See: George L. Dillon, Image Text and Other Mixed Modes (United states: University of Washington, 1999) accessed April 18th 2013, 15. This is the case of Art Manifestos, where the idea of art theory becomes practical (literature) first arose, an approach so successful that unfortunately became formula too rapidly. See: Alex Danchev, 100 Artist’s Manifestos, From Futurists to the Stuckist (NY, United States: Penguin Books, 2011). 16. Here the textual ban on visual arts was completely subverted into a pure-idea, pure-text sort of art, as seen in the works of Baldesari, Kosuth, Nauman, Weiner and Art and Language, for example. See also: Alexander Alberro, Conceptual Art and the Politics of Publicity (Michi-
11
Art’s Language; Language in Art.
1.2
Poetry is what gets found lost (On translation). ! To find frustrating the idea of poetry as the most representative example of Written Art (as if was just art of writing), and translation as its conjoined strategy of transmission is a commonplace we have learned to identify by force of coercion. It is precisely there, where no for satisfactory correspondences between the source-code and its derivation occur or even expected, that’s where the cradle of frustration sets its foundations. Thus, performing an act translation (an act, because is pretended -and pretentious), especially when it comes to poetry, worse if through languages without traceable common roots, implies that each actor of the conflict has to be prepared (beforehand) for the negotiation of a loss 17, one both unavoidable and ruthless (another infamous fact. In most cases the transformations (monstrous mutations, if preferred) undergone end up rendering the original signified matter as an unrecognizable symbolic mass (letter-barf), and the stylistic sacrifice is done willingly as long as some preserva-
tion be barely possible. Despite the multiple deformations and mutilations suffered, throughout such violent editorial exercise, a loyal transformer still assays to keep the fundamental promise: to leave the source’s spirit far away from the confrontation field, and make sure it shows up intact in the following reinterpretation. But make no miss-take, here the only genuine trace of creative thinking is to justify ones voracious butchery for the sake of a better signification, or even more, to believe that the whole keyboard-raping sequence is worth reading. Such is, indeed, the curse translators are subject to; always operating under negative figures/standards, yet eager to celebrate every single outcome with signs of positive charge, no matter how slight might it be.
! But “is this the only possible scenario, I mean, for real? ” -Many have inquired, yet few heard a proper reply. What if performing deliberately deviant translations, in which the lossparty is banned from the negotiation board, was a viable legislation? Such rare case of literary forgiveness implies that the fundamental restraint (the loss-party representatives) be considered as a poetic/creative force based on a de/recodification process focused on utterance multiplicity rather than on the assumption that one part is the original and the other a, more or less faithful, reproduction. May-it-be(come) a third-way, if translation and poetics combine/merge in the con-
12
Art’s Language; Language in Art.
cept of translation poetics, for example? If so, could this model of free-interpretation suit the parameters of Comprehensive Written Art? The answers to these questions are far from being definitive, they depend on the applied definitions of the terms implied, and how we choose to put them in play through the whole transfiguration process.
along with other related terms19. This sequence of linguistic morphing leaves us with an encouraging first impression, after already revealing three fundamental principles of what is to become the essence of our ever-evolving definition of Comprehensive Written Art:
! If, for example, we agree that a definition of poetry as a metaphor-based practice - literally the act of re-emplacing (in this case, meanings)– makes perfect sense, we could then attribute certain poetic potential to the act of translation itself18, therefore enabling us to re-cognize plausible a concept like translation poetics as such.
! First, the distinction between doing and thinking is not as radical as it might seem at the beginning, in fact, the morphological similarities of both words suggest these aren’t opposite but complementary stadiums of Being, drawing the exact same diagram of hermeneutic reciprocity found between visual arts and written language.
! But before getting any further, this replacement exercise must be applied not only to poetry in its traditional sense (that would be just the beginning). To keep expanding the interpretative scope of the terms poetry and poetics, according to our particular version of Written Art, going back to the roots and see if we can rediscover its essence and restore long forgotten meanings that empower the conception of alternatives readings, is a must-do. Once undergone, the genealogical quest let us identify the etymology of the term poetry in the Greek language: starting from the source-word poiein -to do- and, which later turned into poiesis, meaning “creative thinking”, from which its traditional sense derived
! Second, the term creativity -generative doing and thinking- could be considered as the logic outcome of being aware of Being, which is no small thing if thought from the perspective of the origin of language –first gesture, then voice and finally image/text (thinking on pictography). ! And third, the fact that word poetry ended up denoting the creative potential of the act of writing, whose principal example is that well-known paraliterary gender characterized by sequences of words arranged in rhythmical patterns used in pre-history to ease remembrance (mnemonics), but also flexible enough to include the basis for more abstract inter-
13
Art’s Language; Language in Art.
pretations, like concrete and conceptual poetry or even uncreative writing, is a clear sign of how deeply embedded is the conception of language as the purest manifestation of thought in western philosophy, and yet, traces a direct link between both thinking/theory and doing/practice as a the benchmark for the relationship that written language and visual/plastic art hold, made evident in the epistemological approach supporting practice-based research model; the same under which this project has been inscribed.
“A concept is no A word, therefore cannot be translated... It is the operation of a displacement of the ordinary form of connection between states of things and meaning 20”
17. Umberto Eco, Decir Casi Lo Mismo –To Say Almost The Same-, trans., Lozano Millares, Helena (Colombia: Ed. Lumen, Random, House Mondadori, S.A, 2008). 18. The example given by Rilke, a poet well known not only for his prolific work, but also for his poetry translations, often considered richer than the original pieces. See: Guy Deutcher, The Unfolding of Language (Great Britain: Arrow books, 2005). 19. Ricardo Soca, La fascinante historia de las palabras (Colombia: Ed. Rey + Naranjo, 2010): 156-7 21. Jaques Rancière, Interview with Pablo Bustinduy, The Conversant (Summer 2013), accessed March 10th 2014,
14
Art’s Language; Language in Art.
1.3
Renegotiating (The Terms and conditions of)
A Loss. ! To override the fact that the critical mass of pop-culture reap-offs and remakes have proven, with spectacular eloquence, its lack of contextual coherence as the basic component behind the epidemic of headline platitudes eagerly reprinted in a daily basis (as long as a middling translation could be outlined) to correspond with immediacy the logic of market speculation; we must render the possibility of installing our alternative version of Written Art precisely where corporative communication has failed to convince the public. Precisely since the public domain is the ideal scenario to experiment, through language, with a consensus-based model of knowledge transmission in which the ideology of emancipation could actually be practiced, if the artist/writer manages to adapt the principles of the aesthetic-of-politics22 to his (written) work. Writing has finally met its photography23, it means that the conditions to configure a Middle-Ground Term24 had
finally arose; the written word now has the possibility to transcend the hegemony of any given media to which it has been attached, and achieve comprehensiveness once subject and plastic matter become a direct response to their context ! In theory, to re-signify liminal expressions such graffiti art/ writing is possible if we find a way to re-contextualize the terms of both medium and content as an active reply to the issue of publicity 25, for example, addressing their origin and production settlements: from politic critique to facade design and back to artistic practice. Imagine or picture, in other words, context-specific reinterpretations of Nauman's neon-text pieces, Kosuth’s self-referential installations, or even Weiner’s wall-art and statements as (if) public interventions capable to inquire about their own sense/means/ends as both artwork –references- and written -manifestations. Under the right circumstances, a comprehensive methodology like this, could be stable enough to enable the required operations of content, media, and matter re-contextualization in practice, where platforms, including those less charged aesthetically and politically as the ones taking place on the Internet -whose hermeneutic transcendence is disguised with everyday-life buribunkdom-, are subject to become another representative example of the raw materials constituting an alternative typology of Written Art, in which the transformation of any writing phenomenon into its own media and subject matter is possible as long as the self-referential code be implemented throughout every replacement/translation process.
15
Art’s Language; Language in Art.
! What would happen to our practical definition of aesthetic theory/experience, if the protocol-texts (we no longer read at every exhibition/catalog) were replaced by (curated) YouTube or Reedit comment feeds, or art history’s seminal statements were re-written as Art Student Owl26 memes27? We don’t know yet, but such are the possibilities of (openresource) translation poetics, aimed to be described and performed throughout this paper, an experimental framework where writing is no longer conceived as an instrumental discipline nor ornamental craft, but as cultural expressions selfaware of its operative conditions and potential to redefine, the purpose of visual arts and written language equally, as parts of the same meta-discourse in progress.
22. Paraphrasing Rancière, the aesthetic-of-politics consist on generating (re-creating) spaces of dissent that allow/ enable making politics (policies to be constantly re-written/ stated), in other words, the reconfiguration/redistribution of the real/sensible by virtue of categories not sublime nor properly relational, where different/alternative objects (media) and subjects –matters- (mediums) are introduced, and therefore voices and languages yet-unheard/unseen emerge. See: Jaques Rancière, Sobre políticas estéticas -On aesthetic politics (Barcelona, Spain: Ed Universitat Autónoma de Barcelona, 2005). 23. In the digital era writing practice has experienced an aperture similar to what happened to painting when photography first appeared. See: Kenneth Goldsmith “Provisional Language” Ricardo Boglione, editor, Crux Desperation 1: A Journal of Conceptual Writing (Montevideo, 2011) accessed March 1st. 24. From “political third –party-” (Rancière) as an encounter of equal-heterogeneous which results on a third intelligence or a Third Mind on Gysing and Burroughs’ words; a phenomenon that also invokes the heideggerian concept for “junction of beings”. Therefore, the Middle-ground (term) is ultimately a state/stage of transition of contextual (re)placement of meaning. See: William S. Burro, El Término Medio (Bogotá, Colombia: Ed. Cero 29, 2011). 25. “Publicity” refers to the different models of political representation of a community in the public sphere -from the Agora to the Parliament. See. Jurgen Habermas, Historia y Crítica de la Opinión Pública -History and critique of public opinion- (Mexico: Ed. Gustavo Gili, 1997). 26. Know your Meme: Student Owl”, accessed April 18th 2013.
27. The word meme comes from the Greek mimema, “something imitated”, and by force of repetition, media scholars had finally acknowledge it as the minimum unit of signification on digital age communications. See: Kenneth Goldsmith, “Why conceptual Writing? Why Now” Against Expression: An Anthology of Conceptual Writing
16
Mise en Abyme : 28
Written Art as (if) Contex-specific.
2
Throughout the text the as (if) formula has been appearing repeatedly, and probably we are used to its forms by now, but what hasn’t been already written is the reason behind the recurrence. Perhaps is due a rupture with “reality”; the abyss that occupies most part of writing’s landscape, perhaps is the last resort in order to foresee an scenario where a Comprehensive Written Art can actually take place; an exercise of creative thinking, may-be too close to an act of faith. Perhaps is both and not precisely either one. That’s the uncertainty intended when writing “as (if)”, the only thing certain is ambivalence; the place of language and specially of the written word as the support of thought, the ground zero where what might be concurs with what actually is.
17
Mise en Abyme: Written Art as Context-specific.
! This can be described as fiction poetics, the fundamental agreement that makes possible a displacement of the relationships between the significant, imaginative and narrative functions that shape a/certain “reality”... Fiction is not unreality, is the unfolding of mechanisms that disregard pre-established relationships/ connections between signs and images, between how some signify and others “make visible.29” ! ! In this sense, what-is-to-be renders as an ascertainable experiment, since the “representation in the abyss of presence is not an accident of presence; the desire of presence is, on the contrary, born from the abyss (the indefinite multiplication) of representation, from the representation of representation, etc. The supplement itself is quite exorbitant, in every sense of the word.30” Words in every sense, that’s what we came looking for since the beginning of this journey of serial typing. What makes worth thinking on language and write about it immediately after, and start all over again when new information comes along: the self-referential and cross-indexed cycle of both, fiction and Being at its finest. Lets state the obvious: we all are fictional characters, as well as our (written) language. It’s been said already many times, in many different ways, in fact. From Zarathustra though the Hassan-i-Sabbah in Alamut to his doppelgänger in Cities of the Red Night, and now is our turn to remember it:
“No referent is absolutely real; every writing-medium is permitted
31”
28. The literal translation would be “placed into abyss,” but its heraldic origin suggests that “droste effect” suits better meta-discursive designs. An exemplification of the “abyss effect” can be seen in compositions where an image is replicated ad infinitum within itself. In art theory is used it to describe de meta-gestures: a play within a play, or writing about texts on language. See: Stuart Whatling, Medieval “mise en abyme”, (London: Courtauld Institute of Art, 2009), accessed May 5th 2014. 29. See: Jaques Ranciére, Sobre políticas estéticas, (Barcelona, Spain: Ed Universitat Autónoma de Barcelona, 2005). 30. Jaques Derrida, Of Grammatology, (Baltimore: John Hopkins University Press, 1997): 205 31. The latest manifestation of this statement (Nothing is true, everything is permitted) has achieved massive recognition since its appearance in the Assassin’s Creed franchise, but despite the lightness of the new host (context), the redundancy exercise can only reinforce the sense and relevance of a looping iteration as this.
18
Mise en Abyme: Written Art as Context-specific.
2.1
The Signifier as Referent: The References as (if) Signified. ! In order to fulfill the requirements that a comprehensive Written Art suggests, the contextual restraints must cease to exist -at least as restraints. Once we have acknowledged that writing has no longer an specific media to be related with, a broader panorama, where each possible media(ted) implementation of the written word can be understood as plastic language and subject matter (a self-referential medium), unfolds. This could happen if the content consigned addresses the implications of the use of language within the chosen platforms according to its contextual specificities. Is a type of art that talks about/for itself -ontologically speaking? When referring to those particularities we also must take into account the fact that such kind of art doesn't have to be attached to the art scene any longer -its place is everywhere.
! Therefore the artist job is, in this case, to negotiate the way interpretations similar to those distinctive of the act of communication -via image-text- as a form of art can be installed "naturally" in the public sphere, just like any other form of communication that involves text and target public (the public deed) does. ! Of course, before any operation could take place, certain conditions must be meet in order to be able to differentiate our approach from those already written. This set of internal rules should address its own conditions -time-space specificities- as said before: just like the conceptual art movement is a reaction to the (art market’s) objectification of the oeuvre and the unspoken restriction to use language –written/ spoken word- as if its disembodied medium, therefore, temporarily out of context or even recreating its own (sub)version. ! Now, we have to react to the fact that, virtually, any medium might be(come) specific if an appropriate/appropriative translation is performed as (if) liquid methodology, making further interpretations endless. That’s why the artist/writer’s work should be as context-specific as the terms within its content and materialization make it possible, at the time readers/interpretants are provided with enough clues/hints to enable fallen/arisen interpretations (get to) be negotiated freely/fairly rather than reinforced due lack of references.
19
Mise en Abyme: Written Art as Context-specific.
! According to this logic, the traditional sign formula must be recalculated matching an alternative pairing of the fundamental elements, making possible a comprehensive transformation where Written Art is practiced as (if) the sign of a gesture through its document-in-action: The signified –the symbolic manifestation- should become its own referent –the object-of-the-real. The signifier –the concept alludedmerges into the cluster of references accumulated throughout the process of context replacement as (if) the reinterpretation of the “original” referent:
Signifier - Signified \ / Referent
Referent - References <----------> \ / Context
! Summarizing: if the referent does not exist (when is deliberately abstract), then the signifier can occupy its place automatically as a direct reference to the signified. Else, the form (media/matter subject) in which the signifier manifests itself must be exemplary. On the other hand, If there’s no signifier, then we have a gesture (action). So once these preconditions are clear, the new trilogy of the comprehensive (written art) sign can be formulated since the entire process is based on the “abyss effect”. In that case, the artwork func-
tions as signifier and, in turn, the signified gets set by the combination of each associated concept coming from both linguistic and aesthetic terminology, also including in its repertoire the backgrounds/precedents found along the (practice-based) research (the preparatory stage); it is “signified” (in past tense) because is matter of history. Finally, the context becomes the new object-of-the-real, its presentation in a specific space-time (social, economic, and cultural situation) in which the previous transformations can be recognizable by the “audience” after analyzing the spectrum of its material mediations (writing technique, inscription platform, and content), demonstrating how important is the (sign) exemplification phase for its “reverse engineered” configuration.
Writing ---- Concept Project ------ Research \ / <-document-action-> \ / Translation REplacement
20
Mise en Abyme: Written Art as Context-specific.
2.2
Transmedia
Documentation as: Gesamkunstwerk.
! Since there’s no substance inherent to language -the predominance of speech was put into question by (hand)writing, and (type)writing by electronic media, as well- concepts might become matter ones thought in action, meaning the zero degree for an art practice as such, is a signifier without signified. We cannot afford to loose the gesture, when facing the problem of translation through documentation means, artworks breed inside experimental media-labs rather than traditional art-scenarios. After all, we cannot ignore the fact that, if significant, the transference of these contents and methodologies into the standard repertoire artmedium(s) is a process rather inevitable. So, instead of resisting to its systematic absorption, the set of references must be autoreferential and assumed as part of the whole process. ! Like Sci-fi or meta-fiction authors wishing to describe a distant but plausible reality, artist might, as well, intent to recreate documents of their work as not-yet-realized interpretations,
whose appearance as happenings is definitely possible under this conditions -as a matter of media. Such documentation logic/ logistics can’t be proposed as 1/1 representation, but as links to download expansion patches where its essence transcends media -along with other conditioning factors. In Addition, approaching art documentation though a combined transmedia theory can also be read as a (self)critique to art-criticism as a form of Art Writing, and Written Art as a form of critical (aesthetic) theory practiced when the artist/writer cannot find the references to support its research methodology in institutional contexts, thus, using its own experience as reference: The first case compensates the decontextualization distinctive of translation processes, turning Written Art’s “re-” gestures into the symbolic matter of media representation. The second is an allergic reaction to art-writing protocols, addressing its practice-based research (trial and error), so the sense of the work is confronted directly with itself. This process usually leads to a type of meta-discourse, where the literature produced tends to resemble more re-creative than theoretical writing as such, a method to overcome the “abyss effect,” where every media/medium from which it gets served has a direct link to the context the work discuss, no matter how unorthodox. The same criteria applies to space-time restricted documentation, the notion of document must cease to exist as a form of representation if transmedia document-action is truly adopted/understood: translation poetics is just a metaphoric concept wishing to become an open-writing methodology, not a troubleshooting guide.
21
Mise en Abyme: Written Art as Context-specific.
2.3
MektoubManifesto:
Everything (has been) already written. The finest example of how determinism turns into resignation is found in the Arab philosophy; there, the basic principle of Being has no longer (a) sense, and not pleased with it, its purpose is reduced to a single word. It doesn’t really matter how you spell it: mektoub, maktoub, maktub, or maktoob, the fact is that “fate is written,” and there’s nothing to do about; “it’s written,” they insist. Such is the life sentence to which humankind has been condemned; not even last words, such is a privilege the gods have denied to us. Hence, in order to remain true/real humans, Beings, we must realize that under these terms the word of god is no longer good, which means that we must “challenge and change fate... cut-up the words. Make them a new world32” in order to become the kind of artist/person we respect and transform the resignation heritage into the gift re-
signification. Yes, Fate is a euphemism for history, but even if it’s true that “all histories ever possible” have been already written, it doesn’t mean they have been read as well, it’s literary impossible. This is our chance to choose in which tense, the sentences of our own version of the history of writing, will be rewritten. After all, “poetry and most poets comeback to what is already written33” Just like Brion Gysing did fifty years ago in his series of Mektoub-recordings34, whose experimental methodology provided us with the source-code used to write the actionscript for the Mektoub-Manifesto of Comprehensive Written Art, so it could run smoothly following its basic principles and parameters as identified and explained/exemplified in the following lines (to make sure the interactions between the different elements be absolutely clear before the same criteria be applied to the final experiments), as an attempt to provide recognition enough tools and trigger as many readings as possible without extensive technical support be required. Signified as Referent: “It’s Written” is written in a wall. Content – Writing Technique: to overcome the determinism implied in the term MEKTOUB we must perform a poetic translation and prove that neither fate nor history are absolute concepts, even if already “written.” Therefore a chalk-graffiti is the manifestation of an statement subject to disappear; like a lesson in a school blackboard.
22
Mise en Abyme: Written Art as Context-specific.
MEKTOUB (Itâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s Written), Schaerbeek, Brussels, 2013
Content â&#x20AC;&#x201C; Location: The word has been written over the pillars supporting a tunnel leading (following the reading) to the Rue du Brabant/Brabantstraat, one of the busiest commercial streets, characterized by the predominance of busyness owned and visited by Arabic-descents; a place where fate is either meet or re-written. Signified as Reference / Documentation - Content: the documentation is a video-recording as a clear reference to Gysingâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s Mektoubrecordings, and the interpretations of the word (written) and the experimental written art that derives from it. The five-word sentence subject to systematic permutation is the alternative translation of the word: everything has been already written. The caption and uttered words is
meant to reinforce the transition from speech to text as the starting point of history. The redundancy is also a middle ground for the recording and the written exercises performed separately around permutation writing techniques. After each combination is performed, both audio and video channels gain noise until neither image or sound is recognizable towards the end, yet the sequence is meant to be reproduced in loop, a process inevitable once the meaning gets to be found lost amongst translations. Also a QR linking the video-recording code was installed to (re)create this feedback loop effect.
23
Mise en Abyme: Written Art as Context-specific.
32. “Artist of the kind I respect want to be heroes, challenging fate in their lives an in their art. What is fate? Fate is written: ‘Mektoub’ in the Arab word, where art has always been abstract. ‘Mektoub’ means ‘It is written.’ So... If you want to challenge and change fate... Cut-up the words. Make them make a new world”. See: Allen Hibbard (ed.) Conversations with William Burroughs, (United States: University Press of Mississippi, 1999): 67. 33. Jaques Rancière, Interview with Pablo Bustinduy, The Conversant (Summer 2013), accessed March 10th 2014.
QR code posted as a link in-situ to the Mektoub-Manifesto.
34. In this recordings Gysing introduced an experimental method of automatic-poetry-writing based on the principle of mathematic permutation applied to sets of five word sentences from which compositions reaching up to 400 lines were possible without a single word sequence was repeated. See Mektoub recordings, Brion Gysing, accessed April 15th.
24
(Introducing THE )
Artistic Affairs Bureau.
3
25
Artistic Affairs Bureau.
! The idea of founding this para-institution in particular finds its motivation amongst the notable variety of "corrupted code" lagging the launch of our program for Comprehensive Written Art. An affair that has proven not to be a one-mancommission (no wonder why it wasn’t done this way before...) Being that so, we found this collaborative attempt of umbrella corporation as a necessary step towards the realization of our main script: to exploit our will-by-(hand)writing. ! But before executing any further actions, we must acknowledge first that the conditions required to resume our operations are quite relative. In fact, despite our initial interests could be described as writing desk art happenings, this could be as well a cultural transaction committee, or even an agency dedicated to aesthetic adultery, and the situation wouldn't be much different to what it is now. Our policies are as unspecific as the interpretation of each term in our name, therefore, we invite you to read them at please, and help us to retrace them since we are not comfortable with (pre)fixed scenarios. ! Most of the meanings attributed to the words Artistic (aesthetic, bohemian, cultural, expressive, tasteful), Affairs (adultery, business, concern, entanglement, doing, enterprise, episode, event, intrigue, matter, task, transaction), and Bureau (department, table, agency, committee, ministry, office, secretariat) have been already depicted. It is up to you to choose which
combination suits your (context-specific) needs better. You can be certain that, if significant enough, we will be there to walk you through your path of choice, whatever it takes to help you carry on the adversities of each interpretation.!
! Beware! What you are about so see/read are the early results of our self-commissioned research on the fundamental principles under which writing is able to function as media, and language as (subject) matter. Whereas this is an experimental field, we cannot claim that an art practice as such has achieved its definitive form yet, on the contrary, we can only show you some exemplary alternatives since before our theories become fully operative (as methodology), an extensive series of test runs must be executed, preferably if as-signed to an equally expanded array of contexts, which are still subject to practical recognition, though.
William S. Burro. Written Arts Representative Brussels, May 16th, 2014.
26
Artistic Affairs Bureau.
3.1
! What is a gesture, but a signified without signifier34, the action before every proper (written) language, hence, its origin and limit? In this/its sense, writing, or more precisely, how we write what we write, is in itself a gesture that cannot be overseen. Its implications are radical, they trace our reading of writing’s scenario as a sign of Being; from what is written to where writing takes place, including all the in-betweens (which are not few. Meaning that it’s understanding is fundamental in the scope of a comprehensive written art. ! Lets take, for instance, the little aesthetic story behind a sequence of gestural statements in translation: At the beginning were the words, and the words were conceptual art, and the art may be constructed/fabricated/built (but not nec-
essarily) by Laurence Weiner, whose sentenced –piece ofreference is simply: “The grace of a gesture,” specifically the one shown at the Palazzo Bembo during the 55th Venice biennale, which, must be said, is a sub-version of its own inspiration, originally intended-to-be presented at Lisbon in 2010. But that’s an-other/old story. “The Art world is full of literature (on both, the so-called ur-author and this already-made piece), more or less interesting, I do not wish to add any more.35” What really concerns us here is the attitude revealed in the (mentally uttered) sentence and its subsequent mediated iterations: the method became formula, the typeface a trademark (in this case, property of The Written Art Foundation -see the irony?) and its content meaning/sense unreachable/undistinguishable. Is such the grace of Weiner’s gesture? If so, it’s necessary to retrace the initial intention and figure out what went wrong along the vaporetti’s ensign journey through the mainstream channels.
27
Artistic Affairs Bureau.
The official documents recite as infinitum that in this piece Wiener “uses words as (if) objects36” and in its contemplation “we realize we are dealing with its -three-dimensionality-quality of providing space and encompassing substances,37” creating the illusion of a dialogue, that never took place, and whose line of argumentation is no less hallucinatory, no matter how much we want to believe in it: “The Grace of a Gesture becomes many things while always remaining the same.38”
SENSE
The consequence is an open door leading to our own definition of this “many things”, an invitation (if not direct provocation) to re-appropriate the gesture and put it at the service of the terms that better please us. Which was exactly what happened next, once we found our own Palazzo with turquoise walls in a forgotten pass-though under Rue de la Loi; by doing so, there, we were literally trespassing the law, even more, beyond the reach of its authority...
+
GESTURE
replacing BY VIRTUE OF INHERENT RECOGNITION 28
Artistic Affairs Bureau.
29
Artistic Affairs Bureau.
...If the studio assistants had a state-of-the-art cutting plotter, we had a rusty large-format school printer; if the typeface was already installed in the software, we had a software to trace the typeface; if the text was printed in fine adherent vinyl, we had an x-acto knife with enough blades to retrace the printing and spray paint to reprint the text; If Weinerâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s had grace, our gesture had sense; If the original sentence was translated to ten languages and exhibited in a Venice Biennale, ours is a permanent intervention amid of the European Union headquarters and has been translated into its three-way-speech system; and if his words plough though the Italian sea on a vapporetti, ours are still surfing the data stream of the Word Wide Web in a YouTube video.
language & replacement
+
public
reading into BY VIRTUE OF INHERENT volition
30
Artistic Affairs Bureau.
These are/were the terms (media and subject matter) under which our re-placed interpretation took place. The rest is matter of recognition, even in a context where the reader/ reading is conditioned by the absolute absence of specific references; once written (our job) is already done.
“Echo, literally, always has the last word 39” 34. Giorgio Agamben, Lecture on Gesture, or the structure of Art. European Graduate School, Switzerland, 2011. Accessed April 30th, 35. Dètourment of Huebles’ famous statement, quoted by Craig Dworkin in “The Fate of Echo”, Against Expression: An Anthology of Conceptual Writing (Evanston: Northwester University Press, 2010): xliii. Original reference: Douglas Huebler, “Untitled Statements,” Theories and documents of Contemporary Art, ed. Kristine Stiles and Howard Selz (Berkley: University of California Press, 1995): 840. 36. Katy Diamond Hammer, The Grace of A Gesture, Lawrence Weiner, Venice 2013, accessed May 1st 2014. 37. Thomas Kellein, Lawrence Weiner in Venice, Essay for Exhibition Catalog (Venice: Written Art Foundation, 2013) 38. Idem #36. 39. Craig Dworkin, “The Fate of Echo”, Against Expression: An Anthology of Conceptual Writing, (ed.) Craig Dworking & Kenneth Goldsmith (Evanston: Northwester University Press, 2010): xlvii.
31
Artistic Affairs Bureau.
3.2
Half Written Printed Media. ! For the following case-study, AAB representatives went to Bogotá (Colombia) to execute an intervention project. Inspired by the extensive use of (press) printed media in public space advertising (distinctive of this city, especially while on political campaigns season), flooding the streets with a massive amount of messages than soon enough render unrecognizable due its chaotic juxtaposition patterns, we decided to use Tactical Media methodologies to reactivate the spots where most of this non-communication stream circulates, in order to transform them into spaces suited for civic participation and critical exchange. That’s is why the “analytics team” suggested an intermedia (half written printed medium) be designed specifically to broad-cast public’s announcements and ensure the significance of the send-word by providing a platform to overcome the technical and legal inconveniences characteristic of the traditional public-writing methods such graffiti, -which by the
way, is also heavily practiced, displaying its (d)ubiety by tagging systematically the same hosting sites. Being this said, our “(trans)media research department” conceived and developed Monogram, a collective-writing exercise in which about seven hundred copies of a pseudo typographic design became a Typesetting Experimental Station, where any text could be composed character-by-character after editing/inking the template of our paper-based stereotype(face) with simple pen stokes, once posted over the walls designated for speech commerce. Squatting the propagandistic replication headquarters to insert in its serial ports of trifler storage real statements created by the target itself. Nonetheless, composing such hybrid interface was just the beginning, for it to be really operative, first, we needed to structure a (tactical) media plan in which user-resistance, and distribution delay are some of the factors to be taken into account in order to transform the weaknesses of our brand-new (uncategorized) medium into subscripting qualities/abilities.
32
Artistic Affairs Bureau. ! ! ! We started choosing the sectors with more traffic, hence, where the chances to assist its reiterative imprinting are significantly increased. Therefore we decided to follow the criteria of the local out-of-home-advertising policies, in which the approved placements tend to be allotted according to its degree of abandonment. These allocations are normally situated along the main avenues since it is almost impossible to maintain such vast and sometimes conflictive areas. Being that so, the routes chosen where The Carrera SÊptima and the Avenida NQS. The first is one of the most culturally, historically and institutionally representative of the city given that most governmental facilities and architectural landmarks are situated. Meanwhile, the latter extends for 40 Km crossing the city from northeast to southwest, being the route that a considerable portion of the population has to undertake on a daily basis, and of course, one of the busiest and (visually) contaminated, even after (and partly because of) several urban expansion plans have been carried on, resulting in its characteristics raw-wall surrounding landscape; the ideal scenario for urban mobiliary ornamentation initiatives. Lastly, the settlement stage was completed after identifying a set of tentative shelters where more specific comprehensive art writing experiments could take place in order to explore the possibilities of the recently developed transference system, therefore expanding its field of action and understanding. A couple of these examples where found at the advertising-ready façade of the Central Cemetery of Bogota (currently under a re-signification process through gentrification
33
Artistic Affairs Bureau.
strategies, including the inauguration of its front street as the more spacious and dubious canvas of Bogotaâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s emergent street art movement) and the massive gates of a building and a warehouse alongside the NQS, formerly occupied with one of the the administrative offices of the Metropolitan Police Department. ! The second tactical media measure was to devise a communication strategy impressive/powerful enough to invite the public to participate of the experiment since Colombians reluctancy to get involved in co-laboratory initiatives is well known, mostly due skepticism towards socio-politic transformations
(specially through art) or even fear to the authoritiesâ&#x20AC;&#x2122; retaliation. In this order of ideas, two sets of messages were consigned in the inscription platforms: one dealing with the characteristics of our intermedia in this particular context, and other settled around incomplete statements using the key words of the first, both created by our copywriters in residence as a demonstration to the readership/authorship of how does the editing methodology works/functions whit-in the transformation process of apparently disjoined words into coherent statements. This way, a third content tactic (actually the first), a series of blank posters with no intended message, began to make sense.
34
Artistic Affairs Bureau.
35
Artistic Affairs Bureau.
36
Artistic Affairs Bureau.
! The third, and final tactic, is content dispersion/distribution through the assemblage â&#x20AC;&#x201C;and subsequent uploading/linking- of a video-essay storing a compilation of half written statements on printed media and their multiple translations (resulting after permuting the interpretations of every word articulating each sentence) rearranged in a sequence of argumentation, whose montage is meant to resemble the time-line of the context in which the project took place, including both the implications of developing/ executing an experiment on public type-writing, and the transformation suffered by the contents consigned and its hosting platform as chronotope phenomena subject to medium-specific restrictions, in order to overwrite their respective definition as (if) happenings transcending its ephemeral (pre)essence.
37
37
Artistic Affairs Bureau.
3.3
The Medium to end all media.
40
()CODE 3.3.1 Overloading reality with binary codes: Reading is decoding; 41 writing is programming. The language of the upper echelons of leadership is always digital...it is nothing than the creation of nothing other than signifiers,42 proving that the essence of writing is inscription itself: to make a record of throught language. Same as the worded-law of god is meant to fragment the experience of existence to execute its domain over the socalled Man. Its binary code is the veritable precedent of encipherment, so it is no casual thing that computing engineers had decided to redact BASIC commands following up-to-the-letter the rhetorical method of the holly codex, enclosing the subject/machine in its conditional LOGIC/CONTROL programming language: ! ! ! !
IF
(read/write) THEN ! (true) ELSE (false) END IF.
The scriber has reached age of retirement, writing is no longer will-by-hand but the hand frenetically striking keys, managing to overlook how much of a precondition (of all possible preconditions) the keyboard has-been/will-be. There’s no such thing as will-by-type(writing) without the previous internalization of its distinctive/discrete layout. The mechanization of writing is, more or less, the apocalyptic realization of conceptual art’s dream of its absolute dematerialization: if “the typewriter made everyone look the same,43” then the code makes everything be the same. Uniformity (the sign of anonymity with no index nor responsible party) is what made possible that “the idea became a machine that makes art44” and the sign of a gesture a matter of mediamanagement. Before ( )code, the material limitations of writing were subject to its condition as printed matter, but now the inscriptions have been substituted with its (live) display. With the transmutation of the written word into codified numeric values its expressive potential received the ultimate update; the limitations of written language are no longer the limitations of any given media or its data stream rate. That’s possessing, converting into any possible medium.45” Launch your text-editor, and see what you can do with all the extensions when treated as .txt files!46
38
Artistic Affairs Bureau.
3.3.2 A word-processing feedback loop: Self-replicating media and displays off-power.47 The exponential growth of new media technologies has another drawback: what to do with the outdated (not-yetobsolete but technically-challenged) devises? “Give it a-way”, some would say. “Create a media archeology laboratory,” others have. But since it’s already here, waiting for us to do something in its place, the right call seems to be reassigning its mission: data is an ephemeral referent but metadata is the context, and “context is the new content 48” I. The institutional tagged lines are deconstructed 49 (cracking the code) according to their composition/ design and syntactic values: Billboard as found at the entrance of LUCA School of ART, Brussels.
Font-based fragmentation of the rather ambiguous intended message as an experiment on concrete poetry and its reception, reinforced by the visual compound: 50 the anatomy of a copy is revealed in its printed copies. According to this approach, the caption analyzed, shows the following subcategorized statements: - You want to be? It’s not gonna be easy - ARTIST, DESIGNER, FILMMAKER. YOU GOT THE GUTS. - AN A, A BUT ‘VE THE FOR IT.!
II. A derived statement is configured fixing the bugs (corrupted lines of programming) and written in a code compatible (readable) by its reassigned operative system: The HiperText-Markup-Language as “universal code” and tool to overcome the restraints of the new (designated) media, supported by its object-class-notation (grammatologic) to make the structure of the single typeface message, rolling through the Light-Emitting-Diode screen, recognizable for other code-writers/reading-programmers.
39
Artistic Affairs Bureau.
I < ! D O C T Y P E h t m l > < h e a d > <meta charset="UTF-8"> <meta http-equiv="X-UA-Compatible" content="IE=edge,chrome=1"> <meta name="viewport" content="width=device-width"> <title> ( )CODE </title> <style> p { text-align: center } .zl_dos { color: #000000; font-family: zl-dos, terminal, monospace; font-size: 65px; } .century_schoolbook { color: #000000; font-family: "Century Schoolbook", serif; font-size: 52px; } .maple_bold { color: #000000; font-family: "Maple Bold", sans-serif; font-size: 38px; text-transform: uppercase; } .helvetica_neue { font-family: "Helvetica Neue", serif; font-size: 50px; } .green { color: #8bc53f; text-transform: uppercase; } .blue { color: #2b388f; text-transform: uppercase; } </style> </head>
<body> <p>
< s p a n c l a s s = " z l _ d o s " > I f < / s p a n > <span class="century_schoolbook">you want to be </span> <span class="maple_bold">an </span> <span class="helvetica_neue green">artist,</span><br/> <span class="maple_bold">a </span> <span class="helvetica_neue green">(&nbsp;&nbsp;)signer</ s p a n > <span class="maple_bold">, a </span> <span class="helvetica_neue g r e e n " > ( & n b s p ; & n b s p ; & n b s p ; ) m a k e r < / s p a n > < b r / > <span class="zl_dos">{</span> <span class="century_schoolbook"> It's not gonna be easy; < / s p a n > <span class="zl_dos"> }</span><br/> <span class="zl_dos">else </span> <span class="helvetica_neue blue">you </span> <span class="maple_bold">'ve </span> <span class="helvetica_neue blue">got </span> <span class="maple_bold">the </span> <span class="helvetica_neue blue">code </span> <span class="maple_bold">for it.</span> </p> </body>
</html>
III. The sub-codified statement are displayed through a binary output (on split screen mode): a) Website-specific intervention: looping banner hosted in the Transmedia Internet page. b) Multi-platform storing: reel of all previous phases in a comprehensive (transmedia) document-action, or (recontextualized) self-referential statement. Media writing is rewriting media (itself).
40
Artistic Affairs Bureau. 40. The CPU is what made processing possible, hence “The medium to end all media”. See: Friedrich Kittler, Gramophone, Film, Typewriter (Stanford: Stanford University Press, 1999) 41. Kenneth Goldsmith, Uncreative Writing: managing language in the digital age (NY: Columbia University Press, 2011): 19 42. Lacan, quoted by Friedrich Kittler in Gramophone, Film, Typewriter (Stanford: Stanford University Press, 1999): 249 43. Friedrich Kittler, Gramophone, Film, Typewriter (Stanford: Stanford University Press, 1999): 199 44. Sol LeWitt, quoted by Craig Dworking, Against Expression: An Anthology of Conceptual Writing, (ed.) Craig Dworking & Kenneth Goldsmith (Evanston: Northwester University Press, 2010): xxxiv 45. Friedrich Kittler, Gramophone, Film, Typewriter (Stanford: Stanford University Press, 1999): 244 46. Kenneth Goldsmith, Uncreative Writing: managing language in the digital age (NY: Columbia University Press, 2011): 23 47. See: Ka Man Hun, Improving the social impact of a public displayi in Schaarbeek, Master Thesis KU Leuven, (Belgium: 2012-3) 48. Kenneth Goldsmith, Uncreative Writing: managing language in the digital age (NY: Columbia University Press, 2011): 3 49. Deconstruction is the theory of signification that questions the whole fundament of the composite trilogy of the sign, the annoying heritage of metaphysics that without question, or as Derrida himself said: “From the moment that there is meaning, there are nothing but signs. We think only in signs.” See: Jaques Derrida, Of Grammatology, (Baltimore: John Hopkins University Press, 1997) 50. Friedrich Kittler, Gramophone, Film, Typewriter (Stanford: Stanford University Press, 1999): 228
Bibliography.
Bibliography. -Giorgio Agamben, El lenguaje de la muerte -The language of death (Spain: Ed. Pre-Textos, 2008)
-Jaques, Derrida, On Grammatology, trans., Chakravorty Gayatri (United States: The Johns Hopkins University Press, 1997)
-Alexander Alberro, Conceptual Art and the Politics of Publicity (Michigan, United States: The MIT Press, 2003)
-Guy Deutcher, The Unfolding of Language (Great Britain: Arrow books, 2005)
-Roland Barthes, The pleasure of text (NY, United States: Hill and Wang (ed), 1998).
-Craig Dworkin and Kenneth Goldsmith, Against Expression: An Anthology of Conceptual Writing (United States: Northwestern University Press, 2010). ! -Umberto Eco, Decir Casi Lo Mismo , trans., Lozano Millares, Helena (Colombia: Lumen, Random House Mondadori, S.A, 2008).
-Roland Barthes, The Rustle of Language, trans., Howard, Richard, (United States: Farrar, Sttraus and Giroux Inc, 1986) -Roland Barthes and Lavers, trans., Annette, Smith, Colin, and Sontag, Susan (Forward). Writing Degree Zero. (New Yor, United States, Hill and Wang, 1977).
-Kenneth Golsmith, Uncreative Writing (New York, United States: Columbia University Press, 2011).
-William S. Burroughs and Brion Gysing, The Third Mind (New York, United States: The Viking Press, 1978)
-William Gutiérrez, El Término Medio –The MiddleGround Term- (Bogotá, Colombia: Cero 29, Ed., 2011).
-Alex Danchev, editor, 100 Artist’s Manifestos, From Futurists to the Stuckist (New York, United States: Penguin Books, 2011
-Jurgen Habermas, Historia y Crítica de la Opinión Pública (Mexico: Ed. Gustavo Gili, 1997).
42
Bibliography.
-Steven Heller & Mirko Ilic, Lettering Large: The Art and Design of Monumental Typography (United States: The Monacelli Press, 2013).
-Lev Manovich. The Language of New Media (Michigan, United States: The MIT Press,2001), accessed April 18th, 2013, www.manovich.net/LNM/Manovich.pdf.
-Ka Man Hun, Improving the scial impact of a public displayi in Schaarbeek, Master Thesis KU Leuven, (Belgium: 2012-3)
- Ludwig Wittgenstein, Philosophical Investigations -Anscombre, G.E.M, tans.- (Oxford, United Kingdom: Basil Blackwell Ltd, 1996), accessed April 18th, 2013, http://gormendizer.co.za/wp-content/ uploads/2010/06/Ludwig.Wittgenstein.-.Philosophical.Investigations.pdf
-Friederich A. Kittler, Gramophone, Film, Typewriter. (Stanford, California. United States: Stanford University Press, 1999. -Thomas Kellein, Lawrence Weiner in Venice, Essay for Exhibition Catalog (Venice: Written Art Foundation, 2013) -Jacques Rancière, Sobre políticas estéticas -On politic aesthetics (Barcelona, Spain: Ed Universitat Autónoma de Barcelona, 2005). ! !
Online Publication
!
Online Articles and journals.
-Katy Diamond Hammer, The Grace of A Gesture, Lawrence We i n e r, Ve n i c e 2 0 1 3 , a c c e s s e d M a y 1 s t 2 0 1 4 , http://eyes-towards-the-dove.com/2013/06/the-grace-of-a-ges ture-lawrence-weiner-venice-2013/ -Martha Rosler, “English and All That” E-flux Journal 41 (2013), accessed April 10th, 2013, http://www.e-flux.com/issues/45-may-2013/
-William S. Burroughs, The Electronic Revolution. (Ubu Classics, 2005), accessed March 15th, 2013, http://mindingthegaps.pbworks.com /f/BurroughsElectronicRevolution.pdf
-Ricardo Boglione, Crux Desperation 1: A Journal of Conceptual Writing (Montevideo, 2011) accesed March 1st, http://www.ubu.com/concept/Crux
-Jaques Derrida, Writting and Difference (Great Britain: TJ International Ltd, 2002), accessed May 1st 2013 http://www.wuala.com/nappan/Documents/ errida,%20Jacques%20-%20Writing%20And%20Difference.pdf?lang=en
-Ricardo Boglione, Crux Desperation 2: A Journal of Conceptual Wr i t i n g ( M o n t e v i d e o , 2 0 11 ) a c c e s e d M a r c h 1 s t , http://www.ubu.com/concept/Crux-2.pdf
43
Bibliography. -Ricardo Boglione, Crux Desperation 3: A Journal of Conceptual Writing (Montevideo, 2011) accessed March 1st, http://www.ubu.com/concept/Crux-3.pdf -William C. Gutierrez-Villamizar. Transmedia 404: ¿Una introducción a los nuevos nuevos-medios? Sablazo, accessed April 28th 2014, http://sablazo.com/transmedia-404/ -Zdenka Badovinac ,Eda Cufer, Cristina Freire, Boris Groys ,, Harrison, Charles, Vít Havránek, Piotr Piotrowski and Brank Stipanic, “Conceptual Art and Eastern Europe: Part I,” E-flux Journal 40 (2012), accessed March 1st, 2013, http://www.e-flux.com/issues/40-december-2012/
modified May 24th, 2013, http://loquedicemipc.blogspot.be -Bjørn Ramberg and Kristin Gjesdal, "Hermeneutics", The Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy (Summer 2013 Edition), Edward N. Zalta (ed.), accessed May 30th 2013, http://plato.stanford.edu/ archives/sum2013/entries/hermeneutics/ Jaques Rancière, Interview with Pablo Bustinduy, The Conversant (Summer 2013), accessed March 10th 2014.
-Zdenka Badovinac ,Eda Cufer, Cristina Freire, Boris Groys , Harrison, Charles, Vít Havránek, Piotr Piotrowski and Brank Stipanic, “Conceptual Art and Eastern Europe: Part I,” E-flux Journal 41 (2013), accessed March 1st, 2013, http://www.e-flux.com/issues/41-january-2013/
!
Web sites and Blogs.
-George L. Dillon, Image Text and Other Mixed Modes (United states: University of Washington, 1999) accessed April 18th, http://courses.washington.edu/hypertxt/cgi-bin/book/tablesall.html -Jaime Parra, “Lo que dice mi computador (Inteliencia Articificial) –What my computer says (Artificial Intelligence)” last
44