Text written by Dr Yonat Nitzan-Green for PowerPoint
presentation at
CAS
Symposium, Winchester School of Art, The University of Southampton
8th
March 2018
Slides
1st Slide – BLOCK_CHAIN
>THE POWER OF TWO: a model for material discourse
Project initiated and
curated by Susan Francis 2018
Participating
artists: Peter Driver & James McColl * Ashokkumar D Mistry & Karen
Wood * Denise Kehoe & Sarah Misselbrook * David Dixon & Gian Cruz *
Aldobranti & Jonathan Kelham * Fran Kelly & Rosina Godwin * Benjamin
Hartley & James Aldridge
2nd Slide - In
order to speak about dissent there is a need to develop a vocabulary of
dissent.
Dissent is not a word that
we use in everyday language.
A
list of things to do today:
8
- 9am breakfast + cleaning the
kitchen
9am
– 2pm dissent
2pm
– 4pm siesta
4pm
– 5pm Tesco shopping
5pm
– 7pm reading/painting/yoga
7pm
– 8pm dinner
8pm
– 10pm family time
10:30pm bed-time
3rd Slide – “We start from negation, from
dissonance. …”
John Holloway, Change the World without taking Power (2005)
Jorgensen and Agustin (Bak Jorgensen, M., & Agustin, O. G., 2015) refer to John Holloway, Change the
World without taking Power (2005), where he claims that saying ‘No’ is the
first step toward dissent. Dissonance definitions: ‘1. Discordant combination
of sounds. 2. Lack of agreement or consistency.’ (Collins English Dictionary (1985) Patrick Hanks ed.) Further definitions (http://www.dictionary.com/browse/dissonance.) include: ‘inharmonious’, ‘state
of unrest’, ‘unresolved’, ‘disagreements’ and ‘incongruity’. These terms describe different
situations that can be associated with dissent. In psychology Cognitive
dissonance (Leon Festinger developed the theory of cognitive dissonance in 1957.
suggests ‘discomfort’, ‘mental
stress’, ‘simultaneously holds two or more contradictory beliefs,
ideas, or values’ and ‘inconsistency’. These may add to a vocabulary of
dissent which is fundamental for it gives us conceptual ‘tools’ with which a
thinking space can be constructed. Such a vocabulary also emerges and develops
from listening to the voice of experience, both, of one’s own and of others.
Alongside words, it is enriched by material thinking.
4th Slide - For
example…
The concept ‘dissonance’
describes an initial state that helps us recognize a possibility and an
intention for dissent. Dissonance is a musical concept which addresses the
sense of hearing and, indeed, connects to the other senses. Finding or
recognizing a possibility for dissent initially comes from the senses. I feel
that something is ‘not right’. This feeling provokes questions, thoughts,
intentions and actions of dissent.
For example, I walk in the
streets of Winchester and see homeless people. I get a strong feeling that
something is not right. This leads to questions such as ‘how can this
still happen in Britain in the 21st century?’ ‘Who is
responsible for this phenomena?’ ‘What can I do?’ This feeling is translated to
emotions of sadness, compassion, anger and rage, among others.
5th Slide - Chantal
Mouffe: bring passions back to politics
According to Chantal
Mouffe there is a need to harness passions (as distinct from feelings and
emotions) and bring them back to politics, to use them as a force for actions
of dissent against the status quo. Mouffe claims: ‘The passions
cannot be eliminated from politics; they are everywhere. They are part of
individuals' make-up.’ (Enrique Diaz Alvarez, ‘Interview with Chantal Mouffe: “Pluralism is linked to the acceptance of conflicts” in https://dawnssong.blogspot.co.uk/2012/05/pluralism-is-linked-to-acceptance-of.html) Mouffe makes a
distinction between passions, which are collective, and feelings and emotions
which are individual. She says:
‘I take the term
“passions” to mean all the emotional forces that are at stake in the creation
of collective identities. I disagree with calling these things emotions or
feelings. They are not individual passions, they are collective passions.’ (Ibid)
6th Slide - Artists
create a link between individuality and the collective
Artists create a link
between individuality and the collective. I want to articulate this link with
the help of Karen Barad’s theory ‘agential realism’. To ‘read’ BLOCK_CHAIN
>THE POWER OF TWO (curated and initiated by Susan Francis; performed by 14
artists) as a model for material discourse.
7th Slide - Material
discourse
Karen Barad asks: how come
words gained the dominant single ‘vehicle’ for agency and meaning making? And
how is it that matter is perceived as inert, passive or lack energy? (Karen Barad, ‘Posthumanist Performativity: Toward an Understanding of How Matter Comes to Matter’ 2003). Barad writes: ‘… it seems that at every
turn lately every “thing” – even materiality – is turned into a matter of
language or some other form of cultural representation’. (Ibid). If matter is perceived only as an
end-product, determined by social thinking, it is robbed from its own capacity,
for materiality is continuous. In Barad’s words:
‘To restrict power’s productivity to the
limited domain of the “social,” … or to figure matter as merely an end product
rather than an active factor in further materializations, is to cheat matter
out of the fullness of its capacity’. (Ibid)
8th Slide - Karen Barad’s theory ‘agential realism’
‘Agential realism’ theory is founded on
connectivity: everything is connected
Diffraction
‘allows you to study both the nature of the apparatus and also the object’
Entanglements
are thinking through and understanding various problems from within
Agency
does not belong to a human or a non-human. It is an enactment of possibilities
for reconfiguring apparatuses or entanglements
Flexible, changeable boundaries - the process of reconfiguration
involves the consideration of what is included in the apparatus and what is
excluded
Intra-action
- how things intra-act in themselves, among each-other, and in the world
Causality
is not linear. Barad calls for thinking causality in all its complexity; as it
crosses disciplines and academic ‘fields of knowledge’
Objectivity
as an emergence from intra-actions, as acting with response-ability and
accountability
Barad’s theory informs and
renews some important concepts, combining feminist and Quantum mechanics
theories. Barad developed diffraction as a main concept in her ‘agential
realism’ theory, as a practice and a methodology.
She refers to a scientific experiment that sets out to discover if light is a wave or a particle. This experiment revealed that the results depend on the set of tools, or apparatus, which is used. (It has been proven that light is both wave and particle. However, waves and particles behave differently. Waves can overlap; two waves can occupy the same place, whereas particles can’t). Understanding diffraction by using quantum mechanics ‘allows you to study both the nature of the apparatus and also the object’ (Ibid). This, she claims, is ‘not just a matter of interference, but of entanglement, an ethico-onto-epistemological matter.’ (Ibid).
Understanding
diffraction by using quantum mechanics ‘allows you to study both the nature of
the apparatus and also the object’ (Ibid). This, she claims, is ‘not just a
matter of interference, but of entanglement, an ethico-onto-epistemological
matter.’ (Ibid)
As artist-researchers,
diffractive methodology can be understood as a state of mind that expects the
researcher to examine her/his object of research as it is in the world in which
she/he is included.
‘Agential realism’ theory is founded on connectivity: everything is connected, or in Barad’s term, entangled. These entanglements can be reconfigured through revealing their intra-actions. Entanglements are thinking through and understanding various problems from within. Reconfigure entanglements requires rethinking the terms agency, causality, interaction, objectivity and diffraction. Agency – the carrier and mediator of links and meaning - does not belong to a human or a non-human. It is not something that someone has. Rather, agency is an enactment that opens up possibilities for reconfiguring apparatuses or entanglements; apparatuses of bodily production and material discourses including their boundaries. The process of reconfiguration involves the consideration of what is included in the apparatus and what is excluded. The way in which agency is enacted differs from case to case. As Barad said: ‘[…] the how is precisely in the specificity of the particular practices […].’ (Barad, K. “Matter feels, converses, suffers, desires, yearns and remembers”, Interview with Karen Barad in “Meeting Utrecht Halfway” June 6, 2009 the 7th European Feminist Research Conference, hosted by the Graduate Gender Programme of Utrecht University). [Emphasis in the original text. YNG]. Barad proposes a relationship of intra-action, rather than interaction in the reconfiguration of entanglements. Looking at the relationships, how things intra-act in themselves, among each-other, and in the world, demand the reconsideration of causality. Causality is not linear. As Barad said:
“Cause and effect are supposed to follow one upon the other like billiard balls” (Ibid); this perception fell short of providing answers and led, in some cases, to evade thinking about causes. On the contrary, she calls for thinking causality in all its complexity; as it crosses disciplines and academic ‘fields of knowledge’. Objectivity as it is practiced both in the sciences and humanist studies traditionally implied distancing and othering. It comes from a wold-view that divides the wold in binary terms, ‘nature’ on the one side, ‘culture’ on the other. Barad reconceptualises objectivity as an emergence from intra-actions, as acting with response-ability and accountability.
9th Slide - Block_Chain as a dissenting format for material discourse
Block_Chain’s format opens
a space for a material discourse where materiality can be seen as it is: a
continuous, on-going effectivity. It brings the inner connections, or in
Barad’s term intra-actions, into public visibility; allowing a discourse in
which matter and meaning are entangled and reconfigured; A discourse that does
not rely on words as the sole agent for meaning. At its core is an objectivity
that comes from participation and collaboration rather than distance and
othering; based on response-ability and accountability. Artists are not agents;
rather, their artworks are enactments of possibilities for reconfiguring
entanglements.
10th Slide - This
symposium is another ‘block’ in the apparatus of Block_Chain
This symposium is not a singular event but another ‘block’ in the apparatus of Block_Chain. It will be a mistake to ‘read’ this project as virtual. In fact, it gives us the opportunity to move away from yet another binary thinking: virtual-actual. Here, in this space, Block_Chain artists’ works are manifested as physical, tactile blocks. They gain another form of visibility, a mutilation from their earlier version; a mutation.
I want to quote from the dialogue between Gian Cruz and David Dixon. Gian brings a quote from Joan Fontcuberta, who writes:
‘Every gaze implies a blind spot on the retina; every visual system involves an area of blindness that is the necessary counterpart to the area of elucidation.’
(Joan Fontcuberta’s Pandora’s Camera. Photogr@phy After Photography. Quoted by Gian Cruz in BLOCK_CHAIN>THE POWER OF TWO, Block IV - 13.2.2018).
Gian writes: ‘the stronger and deeper we delve into these actualities, the greater the blind spots we induce.’ (13.2.2018) And Dave replies: ‘Blind spots are interesting. They speak of limits.’ (17.2.2018). Blind spots are necessary prompts for creative reconfiguration of entanglements.
Looking at the artists’ dialogues of words and images on the internet, I can’t help noticing the screen as an object that, both, connects and fragments. The closer I get to it the greater the blind spots. (Perhaps this explains my recent paintings of screens). However, it is not the case that one must choose between a virtual or actual work, but rather, to be able to bring them together; to ‘read’ this phenomenon as an enriching entanglement.
11th Slide - ‘… we are the biological process that ensures the cell grows, mutates and evolves in unpredictable ways.’ David Dixon (2013)
• Artists are not agents; rather, they use agency through making artworks where possibilities are examined, tested and enacted
• Dissent is a state of consciousness embedded in artists’ actions and works; it is the essence of the link between individuality and public
• Artworks are constructed from senses and feelings which transform in the process of making the work into public passions
• BLOCK_CHAIN>THE POWER OF TWO is informed by and informs CAS’ vision
Slide 12 – Bibliography
Holloway, J. Change the World without taking Power (2005) in Bak Jorgensen, M., & Agustin, O. G. (2015). The Politics of Dissent. In M. B. Jorgensen, & O. G. Agustin (Eds.), Politics of Dissent. (pp. 11-25). Frankfurt am Main: Peter Lang. (Political and Social Change, Vol. 1)
Hanks, P. (Ed.), Collins English Dictionary (1985) London & Glasgow: Collins
http://www.dictionary.com/browse/dissonance
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cognitive_dissonance
Enrique Diaz Alvarez, ‘Interview with Chantal Mouffe: “Pluralism is linked to the acceptance of conflicts” in https://dawnssong.blogspot.co.uk/2012/05/pluralism-is-linked-to-acceptance-of.html.
Barad, K. ‘Posthumanist Performativity: Toward an Understanding of How Matter Comes to Matter’ (2003)
Barad, K. “Matter feels, converses, suffers, desires, yearns and remembers”, Interview with Karen Barad in “Meeting Utrecht Halfway” June 6, 2009 the 7th European Feminist Research Conference, hosted by the Graduate Gender Programme of Utrecht University
Fontcuberta, J. Pandora’s Camera. Photogr@phy After Photography (2014, published by MACK)
https://block-chain.chapelartsstudios.co.uk/
End
