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GAM Gallery - An/aesthetic Exhibition Critique

Nov. 18, 2011

GAM Gallery - An/aesthetic Exhibition

              The Aesthetic Exhibition begins the discussion on the subject of "aesthetic/anaesthetic" by looking at the original meaning of aesthetic, which refers to pure sensory experience rather than the philosophical meaning of the term, which idealizes Truth and Beauty.

            On the other hand, the An/aesthetic Exhibition begins by portraying the idea of numbness as a result of the overwhelming effect of aesthetics, specifically the aesthetic pleasure of viewing our own destruction. However, the discourse actually circles back, and the exhibition becomes aesthetically beautiful (in the philosophical sense) as a result of its anaesthetic qualities. This is evident in a few points regarding the show as a whole:

First, the poster reads:

  WE  APOLOGIZE.

THE WORK FOR THIS SHOW

DIDN'T  GET  DONE  DUE TO THE

PARALYZING EFFECT

OF WITNESSING THE SPECTACLE

OF OUR OWN

DESTRUCTION.

S O R R Y

FOR ANY INCONVENIENCE

YOU MAY EXPERIENCE AS A RESULT.

            However, upon entering the gallery, it becomes evident at second glance that this did not actually happen. "Art" did get done, albeit with an "anti-art" theme. Evidently, the artists were not paralyzed as a result of witnessing the spectacle of their own destruction. Instead, the opposite happened, and they created an aesthetically pleasing show. The content of the show itself was somewhat nihilistic and on the surface, aesthetically "numbing." Thus, instead of being paralyzed by the spectacle of their own destruction, the artists actually actively produced work that made the spectacle of our own destruction aesthetically pleasing.

            Further supporting this point is the fact that it is specifically the anaesthetic qualities of the show that make it aesthetically pleasing. In contrast with the Aesthetic exhibition, the An/aesthetic exhibition is actually more aesthetically pleasing due to its coherence and its subdued appeal to the senses. However, both exhibitions explore a different side of the word aesthetic. The first exhibition was successful in the sense that it grabbed the attention of the senses, and provided a powerful sensory experience. It was aesthetically pleasing in the instinctual, corporeal sense. The second exhibition was aesthetically pleasing in the philosophical sense of perfection. Whereas the first exhibition was more overwhelming and confrontational, the second exhibition made the viewer feel more at ease and secure. This is precisely because of the show's uniformity and anaesthesia on the senses. We are relieved that stress is not placed on our senses.

            Lastly, the discourse itself is evidence of this paradoxical relationship between sensory experience, anaesthesia, and aesthetic beauty.  This is because, as we talked about before, it is the philosophical discussion of aesthetics which has changed its meaning from the sensory, and twisted and deformed it into a new meaning. This distortion of the meaning of aesthetics is an anaesthetic effect of persistent discussion and argument on the subject. The trauma of discourse has numbed our senses, reduced them, and directed them to specific "new aesthetic qualities" of perfection and idealized beauty.

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Here is my piece from the An/Aesthetic Exhibition at the GAM Gallery (Anaesthetic part).

Materials: Gum, Yarn, Lightbulbs

Link: Aesthetic Artwork Notes <--notes based on the conceptualization process, as well as after-the-fact rationale.

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The Strings Attached: Adorno & Wallace

Nov. 4, 2011

Theodor W. Adorno: Culture and Administration

Keith Wallace: A Particular History, Artist Run Centres in Vancouver

            These days, a university education has become the norm. Go to university. Get a degree. Gain respect in society. And use the knowledge gained through "higher education" to fulfill your role in society. But what is the role of the Artist in society? There is a new need to gain an "Art Education" in order to become "experts" in the field. However this idea of the "Art expert" is a strange one. One can be knowledgeable about various aspects of art, or engaging in the community, but being an "expert" connotes integrity in all aspects of the subject. How does one be an "expert" in a contradictory field--a field that depends on the collective but promotes independence and autonomy, a field that segregates itself from the rest of the world but tries to complicate the public with the private, a field that exults in but also despises its own elitism and self-righteousness?

            I return to the question of the role of the Artist, because like Aesthetics, "Art" and "The Artist" have been complicated and pulled apart by so many layers of discussion that I wonder if the Artist really exists anymore, or ever at all?

            Let's look at the issue of the Artist Run Centre. It seems as if every possible method has been tried to achieve the ideal that the ARC originally imagined. However, all attempts have been inevitably thwarted, and so far, it has been impossible to escape from the bureaucracy that comes with funding. The Artist cries and thrashes out with disappointment and frustration, and attempts more silly and ineffective means of achieving that which he cannot see.

            However, does the Artist have the right to attain this magical, ideal space that is outside of the system and rules to which everyone else is subject to? To be and artist and to make Art has now become wrapped around the need to create an alternative in society. However, the artist complains about being bound to the restrictions and structures that everyone else is bound to.

            Of late, artists have been given more "voice" in the curatorial process. Artist talks act as a promotional aspect--genuine gatherings of concerned individuals, yet they have perhaps also become part of the "fad" of Art. Promoting Art is popularizing Art; Art tries to be trendy but rejects its claim to trendiness? Is the artist "voice" a superficial one? Is its underlying purpose to give the artist a sense of control, to satisfy the public into thinking there is less space between spectator and artist, and to relieve the administration of some of its "evilness?" It has the potential to function as a "making-everyone-happy" approach. Most importantly, we feel that there is less embellishment of the "artist soul." Even though artists have more say in the curatorial process--the context changes greatly when we talk about whether we are curating ARCs, commercial galleries, or major galleries (i.e. VAG).

            Furthermore, the "artist voice" promotes the ideal that the artist is the soldier of freedom. This triumph of freedom is remarkably reminiscent of the American ideal, and the American "unalienable rights" of "Life, Liberty and the Pursuit of Happiness."

            Another point along this tangent: The Western Front tagline on their website reads: "promoting the role of the artist in determining the cultural ecology." However, how much do artists "determine the cultural ecology," or how much do they have the right to? Is this the Artist's born purpose and gift to society? Or do artists take on this role of "disguised cultural police" who, on the surface, oppose the real "cultural police?" Is the role of the Artist a self-imposing one which forces itself on society and demands society to adhere to ideals in a similar way that the US acts as World Police?

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Moving Through Space: Marcus & Debord

Oct. 28, 2011

Greil Marcus: Legends of Freedom

Guy Debord: Society of the Spectacle

            I try to facebook minimally, and I believe I can give myself credit for saying that I rarely do use facebook, and only really do because school somewhat requires me to, but I kept connecting everything in the presentation on Marcus and Debord to facebook. Maybe because facebook is used in every possible example in theory class so it’s just automatic now.

            Let’s begin with Debord’s theory of Dérive. The idea is that every urban space has a psychogeography, and by engaging in derive, or drift, one can escape the mundanity of everyday routine by following the route of least resistance, which is drawn out by the city’s psychogeography. Through derive, people are able to live in their own utopia and escape the effects of spectacle.

            Here is the first example where facebook offers itself as a contradictory space. I use facebook as an example, but this applies to internet surfing in general. People who “surf” the internet engage in a form of derive. It does not occur in physical space, but derive is a mental state, so theoretically it can occur online, as long as it is occurring in the mind. Although the internet is surely part of the “spectacle,” while “surfing,” people glaze over pages; scan past images and text without really seeing them. They escape the spectacle in this way. They also escape the spectacle of “real life.” We can agree that the internet is a method of escape for many. Furthermore, while scanning through pages, something catches our eye: a link. We click on it, without purpose, and sometimes not fully conscious of where we are going. We browse from page to page in a dream-like state, until we awake and wonder whose picture we are looking at, or how we ended up reading about “Günther von Etzel” (I don’t know who that is either). Is this spectacle or derive?

            Furthermore, we engage more intimately with people online than we do in “real life.” We message people that we would otherwise never see or talk to. It is true that real relationships are much more overwhelming and a burden to maintain than the derive-like facebook relationship. If you disagree, consider this: someone might have 1000 “facebook friends.” Even if they talk to 1/10th or 1/20th of them, that is still 50-100 somewhat-active relationships. Imagine maintaining 100 active relationships in real life. There is a huge gap in effort. Do real relationships become part of the “spectacle” that we are trying to escape from?

            If we follow the way of derive in relationships, and use detournement as a defense, it is likely that “the way of least resistance” would be to have as many meaningless relationships as one would like, and as few meaningful relationships as possible. This might be the closest to a struggle-free “utopia” as we can get.

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Rosalind Krauss: A Voyage on the North Sea

Oct. 24, 2011

Rosalind Krauss: A Voyage on the North Sea

Focus: Post-Greenberg, Post-Medium Era.

Maurice Denis: A picture contains a layered, complex relationship that is a recursive structure: some of the elements of which will produce the rules that generate the structure itself.

            Beginning with this idea of the recursive structure, I think that Denis captures an important relationship of medium to the artwork. Although we are now in the “post-medium era,” we cannot dismiss medium altogether, precisely because medium IS the recursive structure of art. Medium adds layers and complexity that would otherwise be absent. Furthermore, the rules that generate the artwork depend on medium; it is medium that creates the artwork and governs its laws.

            Furthermore, we cannot dismiss medium because the subject is still under much debate. Marcel Broodthaers’ front cover design of Interfuntionen reads: “View, according to which an artistic theory will function for the artistic product in the same way as the artistic product itself functions as advertising for the order under which it is produced.” The simple explanation for this somewhat complex quotation is that theory itself (hence discussion) acts as advertising for whatever is being discussed. Even if artistic theory criticizes some subject, it functions as advertisement for whatever it is criticizing. Art theory promotes its artistic products, and the artistic product promotes whatever it is that is discussed in the theory.

            So, even if we criticize medium, and make artworks to convey this denouncement of medium, here is the result: The artwork is raised up due to the theory behind it—it is “critical” and “conceptual.” However, as a result, it promotes medium even by the denouncement of it. There are always antagonistic forces in Art.

            However, I do think that the term medium is a problematic one. To say that the site has replaced medium in contemporary art is valid, but to label the site as a “new medium” does not make sense. The site is not new, and neither is medium. If the site is a “medium,” then it has always been a medium, and is an “old medium,” not a new one. However, it acts similarly to the medium in the sense that it is a recursive structure: it dictates how the art functions. Also similar to medium, the site adds layers of context. But I think that there is a clear distinction between medium and site. Both equally add meaning to an artwork, but on separate layers. This is important, as it adds more aspects to the artwork, whereas merging the two aspects reduces the significance of both.

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GAM Gallery - Aesthetics Exhibition Critique

Oct. 21, 2011

GAM Gallery - Aesthetics Exhibition

            The first aspect of the show that needs to be taken into account is that the central theme revolves around a specific aspect of Susan Buck-Morss’ paper. The critique will follow based on this context.

            The critique starts off with Ye Jin Song’s piece featuring Da Vinci’s Vitruvian Man. The Vitruvian Man represents the ideal man (an allusion to the pursuit of the ideal in Art), but Song adds ironic notes, indicating symptoms of disease (Sandoff Syndrome? – can’t remember the specifics). This is a perfect metaphor for the state of aesthetics that the exhibition explores. Aesthetics begins as a pure sensual response, but as philosophical discussions of aesthetics continued, the term became far removed from its original meaning. It began as something ideal, but has been perverted throughout time.

            One key point of discussion during the critique is on the relationship of aesthetics to trauma. Trauma is not actually a direct result of experience, but is the result of analysis of experience. If aesthetics is originally sensory experience itself, then through the long history of analysis of aesthetics, it is now a source of trauma. The meaning of aesthetics has changed from experience to trauma.

            Does aesthetics need to be traumatizing? Perhaps we are in such a state of modern shock that trauma is the only form of sensory experience remaining. Something may not be traumatizing, and yet, we still sense it, but we feel the constant need to evaluate the world around us, and to evaluate our sensations. Does this process of evaluation results in trauma? Buck-Morss claims that we experience trauma when something makes an imprint on our memory.

            This connects with the discussion of false intimacy. It is this sense of false intimacy that creates an imprint on our memory. Several artworks invite the spectator to engage with the artwork through tactile or olfactory senses. The viewer comes closer, smells the perfume on the paper, and nostalgic, half-forgotten memories are renewed. This evocation of memories is traumatic in the sense that it acts opposite to the anaesthetic barrier to trauma whose defense mechanism suppresses memory. Many of the pieces invite the viewer to interact intimately with them, but in the space of the art gallery, intimacy is lost—hence the resulting false intimacy of Art.

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Foucault's Heterotopias

Oct. 21, 2011

Michel Foucault: Heterotopias

            An interesting point that Foucault begins with is the comparison between humankind’s conquest of time vs. the lingering sanctity of space. He claims that “the present epoch is the epoch of space.” Our society is clearly separated by specifically designated spaces. These spaces are “sacred” in the sense that each space has its own rules and regulations. This is one key difference between humans and animals. Animals are primarily governed by time—by the seasons, by daylight, by landmarks that are set in their biological clocks. Their lives revolve around this natural sense of time, and the element of space is secondary to (and in some cases dependent on) time. On the other hand, humans have broken this natural cycle. Foucault speaks of the de-sanctification of time through our obsession with history, but I talk of a more fundamental de-sanctification of time. Humans no longer migrate. We don’t sleep when the sun sets, or wake when it rises; Our lives do not revolve around the seasons; Food is not scarcer during winter than during summer; And if we want to ski in the summer and surf in the winter, only money, not the seasons, will stop us.

            While time has been desanctified, space is still "sacred" and inviolable. There is a clear distinction between family space and social space, between cultural space and useful space, and between leisure space and work space.

            Foucault introduces the idea of HETEROTOPIAS. He defines them as being outside of all places, even though they are located in reality. They are based on microcosms of utopias, but are separated from utopias because they mirrored in the real world; therefore they are subject to real-world dystopic elements. 

            The most important concept to take from the reading is that our lives are sectioned into and governed primarily by spaces, and that heterotopias are unique, contradictory spaces that make up the walls of alienation within society. I say this because by entering into one of these spaces, whether an object or person, that person or thing will undergo a change in his/her/its relationship to elements around him/her/it. New meanings are automatically attached. By being in a “sacred” space, there are always certain expectations to be taken into account. And so, we make assumptions and place labels on the person or thing found within the heterotopia. For example, a child at school is a student, and we attach certain student-ly qualities to him. A child in a hospital is a patient; he is no longer a student in our eyes; instead he has other qualities attached to him, etc…

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Aesthetics Artwork Notes

Oct. 17, 2011

Aesthetics Artwork Notes

What my artwork will aim to do:

1. Sensory: Aesthetics based on the origin of the word aesthetics: “Aisthitikos is the ancient Greek word for that which is 'perceptive by feeling.' Aisthisis is the sensory experience of perception.

The artwork must create a sensory experience and engage several sense organs in a potent way.

2. Corporeal: Buck-Morss claims that we find ourselves returned to the origin of the word aesthetics through the “Benjamin revolution,” which demands of art to: “undo the alienation of the corporeal sensorium, to restore the instinctual power of the human bodily senses for the sake of humanity's self-preservation.”

"The original field of aesthetics is not art but reality--corporeal, material nature."

The artwork should draw on the idea of the corporeal—of the visceral body. Use fleshy pink and red tones. Bubblegum gives it a soft, moist, palpable but uncomfortable feel, as well as a strong scent. It is reminiscent of the body interior.

3. Instinct: "so little does aesthetics have to do intrinsically with the philosophical trinity of Art, Beauty, and Truth, that one might rather place it within the field of animal instincts."

The artwork should look like something instinctual, and alive, rather than something wilted but beautiful. The artwork is independently functional—like a heart, which is self-propagating, and beats of its own accord, independent from the brain. This also refers to autogenesis, in the sense that a “living organ” (the artwork) is created out of inanimate matter.

4. Autogenesis: From the Futurist manifesto: “War is beautiful because it initiates the dreamt-of metallization of the human body.”

This dreamt of metallization of the human body is based on this leitmotif of autogenesis. The light bulbs add a mechanical aspect to the artwork, as they seem either suffocating or intrusive within the visceral mass.

Title: The Head, the Heart, and the Gut defines to the artwork as a functional, living thing that can sense its surroundings just as the viewer can sense it. The artwork has these 3 necessary organs, which, on their own, only speak of cold, inanimate objects: the mechanical head (light bulbs), the muscle fibers of the heart (yarn), and the disgusting gut that digests all (gum).

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Artist Run Centres

Oct. 14, 2011

Artist Run Centres

            The idea of the Artist Run Center works in theory, but perhaps only for a short period of time. Art is always trying to get away from the market, but the issue is that space is needed to exhibit art, and space is never free. How do we solve this problem without resorting to the bureaucracy that comes with Artist Run Centers?

            First of all, I think that Vancouver is not the best place for young emerging artists. The biggest problem is the price of real estate. Young artists cannot afford gallery space in Vancouver. Furthermore, Vancouver is a thriving art community that is recognized as an "international" art scene. This is both good and bad. It is good because we have access to a fair amount of galleries, culturally diverse works, and a decent sized population that is interested in Art and coming to see Art.

            It is bad because it is no longer a new art scene. It has already been established, recognized for photoconceptualism in the 80s and is home to many well-known artists. I think these elements are deterring to young, emerging artists, because I believe that they have less room to move around in, when walled in by these pillars of the art community. The ideal environment would be a possible up-and-coming artist community, in a less cultured, pretentious city, in which there is a strong alternative community of emerging artists, musicians, etc. Although a smaller public is exposed to their art, the collective of young artists would be noticed more easily than in a place where they are surrounded by many well-known artists.

            I am not saying this because Vancouver's art community is "too intimidating," but because I believe it would be more exciting, affordable, realistic and beneficial to be part of a community or movement right from its roots.

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Straight Line Designs Studio Visit

Oct. 7, 2011

Link: Straight Line Designs

            Quite a different change from "Art" as we are used to studying it. Can something functional such as furniture be considered "Art?" This is the obvious question that stands out, but it's been discussed to death and frankly doesn't interest me. What does it matter if it is Art?

            However, this is an interesting cultural space in which we find ourselves to which its history adds some depth. The space begins as a warehouse of some sort, so we are in a commodity space--a place where things of various nature and value are stored that are to be sold at such and such a price. None of these things are made on the site. It is a transitory space for the exchange of commodity.

            Next, it becomes studio space. It is a social, semi-public, community space, but obviously private as well. It is still a transitory space. People come and go, as do objects. But now, things are being made on site. Art is being made, supposedly. The site is now one of production, and things originate from it.

            In its present state, furniture is made on the site, and perhaps art is made as well. It has become a small microcosm of mass production, not on a grand scale, but it has similar qualities of mass production. Orders are taken, and supply is determined by demand. Labour is hired by demand, and now things are being made to meet a supply-demand market. There are workers who are trained to make specific objects, which are mass-produced on a small scale, and sometimes unique objects are made as well.

            We are unsure whether the objects made are "Art," but perhaps we can say that the people occupying and working in the space are "artists." They are not necessarily artists in this specific space, but maybe in other spaces, or on certain days. Of course, artists are not free from the market. That would be unfair for the rest of the population.

            We end up with an interesting space where Art is implied and in its history, where artists work, but not where Art is necessarily produced.

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Aesthetics & Anaesthetics Part 2

Sept. 30, 2011

Anaesthetics

            Buck-Morss talks about anaesthetics as our body's defensive approach to over-stimulation, or excessive aesthetic (sensory) reception. In this sense, aesthetics causes trauma, and anaesthetic is our body trying to numb ourselves to that trauma. In Benjamin's article, he talked about the "trauma of film." Film is traumatizing because it isn't whole like a picture was. It is a constant bombardment of fragmentary images. This leads to a fragmentation of the world, which is traumatic. Similarly, War also causes a fragmentation of the world on various levels. By constant bombardment of fragments, we are unable to take in and contemplate each one, our senses cannot recover quickly enough to fully indulge each image. This is similar to memory, in which the study of trauma shows itself. With an anaesthetic shield, the mind prevents images from being imprinted on the memory so we are not traumatized. On the other hand, trauma is often seen as suppressed memories, or these "unimprinted" memories, so actually, we are being traumatized but simply unaware of it.

            However, I have to disagree on this point. It's often the case in theorizing about art or about any subject to make connections that look similar, perhaps parallel, and say that they represent the same thing. If aesthetics has the same effect of trauma, we say it is traumatizing. It is a form of definition that uses analogy, and it is important to remember that it is an analogy--it is related but not the same. We feel bored or dull, and claim that this is a symptom of anaesthesia, which is caused by over-stimulation. Theoretically, maybe it works; logically, it makes no sense. If there was one tenth of the amount of stimulation as in this example, we would still feel bored or dull, perhaps even more so. This cannot be due to over-stimulation then. Any kind of constant stimulation of one sort will dull the senses, but I don't believe that it is cause by phantasmagoria, or that it is a new phenomenon.

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Aesthetics & Anaesthetics Part 1

Sept. 23, 2011

Aesthetics (the following quotations are from Buck-Morss)

            Aesheticization of politics - sensory alienation lies at the source

"communist response to this crisis is to 'politicize art'"

            Demands of art to "undo the alienation of the corporeal sensorium, to restore the instinctual power of the human bodily senses for the sake of humanity's self-preservation"

            Reversal of meaning: "to be applied first and foremost to art--to cultural forms rather than sensible experience, to the imaginary rather than the empirical, to the illusory rather than the real"

            Origin of aesthetics: "Aisthitikos is the ancient Greek word for that which is 'perceptive by feeling.' Aisthisis is the sensory experience of perception."

            "The original field of aesthetics is not art but reality--corporeal, material nature."

            "It is a form of cognition, achieved through taste, touch, hearing, seeing, smell."

            The original meaning of aesthetics was very different than its meaning after various changes it went through. After the reversal of meaning, and perhaps the cause of "anaesthetics", we find ourselves returned to the origin of the word aesthetics through the "Benjamin revolution." Referring back to the aestheticziation of politics, the "Benjamin revolution" demanded a politicization of art. We return to the original meaning of art, in art's attempt to reverse the anaesthetic effects it inflicted through aestheticization of politics.

            Instinct: "so little does aesthetics have to do intrinsically with the philosophical trinity of Art, Beauty, and Truth, that one might rather place it within the field of animal instincts."

            Also linked to the origin of aesthetics. The term aesthetics is applied to Art, but often art works against instinct.

            autogenesis - the leitmotif that runs through all of these alterations in meaning

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UBC Faculty Show & MFA Grad Show

Sept. 16, 2011

Faculty Show - Only When the Shades of Night Begin to Gather

MFA Grad Show - Happy

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Faculty Show:

Gu Xiong - Synchronize I, II, III (2011)

            Photos of an assembly of elementary schoolchildren in present-day China. The children are at morning exercise, spread out in an orderly grid, "synchronizing" their motions.

            Shows an ordered society with small individual discrepancies. The children are not all in sync. We see some out of sync, some looking around. They all wear different clothes--a very different sight than earlier communist China society. Each child has about one arms-length of freedom to express him/herself, but not to be overly expressive or he/she will likely be singled out and punished. The message is direct, but not literal. The title is ironic and the piece is comical.

Barbara Zeigler - Touched by Fire (2011)

            The fire could represent many things: life, civilization, energy. Paradox of fire vs. water--> the fire is in the water; the water actually is the fire.

Phil McCrum - Boys Club (2011)

            Title implies the exclusivity of the male gender. Arms around each others shoulders, holding hands--it is homoerotic, "manly," stoic. Exposes the bonding intimacy of macho culture.

            On the other hand, there is a strong feminine edge as well. The flannel draws connections to artworks that use textiles and "soft" materials, that in the past were used primarily in feminist artwork. In addition to the softness of the material, the word "boys," not "men," in the title suggests an immaturity, youthfulness, and softness of boyhood. Perhaps this intimacy of macho culture reveals a soft point in their hard bodies.

            In relation to the public, the shirts are turned away from us, facing the wall. Again, this implies exclusivity. It is ironic, since the show itself is rather exclusive: intentionally because it appeals to an exclusive demographic, and unintentionally because the remote setting of the empty library excludes the show from public access. Thus, due to site, the show itself is further excluded from a public that is already excluded from the art world.

Dana Claxton - Zapa Lama (2006-2011)

            Demonstrates the beauty of resistance, in terms of the power structure of the catholic church in the background, and its suppression of indigenous people who show resistance in the foreground. Again, in the second picture, the Dalai Lama, a symbol of liberation, floats transparent over the backdrop of power structures.

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MFA Show:

            I found the chairs to be interesting. They refer to the Vienna Secession, who were concerned with the "total work of art." Buck-Morss also talks about this "total work of art" in relation to phantasmagoria. The chairs themselves are not phantasmagorical. Wagner's Gessammtkunstwerk (total artwork), which combined various "arts" to saturate the senses and immerse the viewer completely in the work, did so in a way that the viewer was passive and mere spectator. In the chairs, the only way that the viewer is actually immersed in the artwork, is if he/she chooses to sit in one of the chairs. In contrast with Wagner's complete artwork, the chairs act as a complete artwork only when they are functional. The viewer's role is active and participatory rather than passive, and by actually becoming part of the artwork, this action perhaps makes the artwork more whole than by any other means possible.

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Benjamin and Buck-Morss

September 9th, 2011

Susan Buck-Morss: Aesthetics and Anaesthetics

Walter Benjamin: The Work of Art in the Age of Mechanical Reproduction

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Notes on Benjamin:

"Art has left the realm of the "beautiful semblance" which, so far, had been taken to be the only sphere where art could thrive."

            In the face of mechanical reproduction (introduction of photo and film especially), there was a shift in meaning for art. The realm of "beautiful semblance" was given to photography instead. Art could no longer live there and had to find a new purpose.

            All this is pretty old history now. Benjamin mentions the symptoms of the problem here. The deeper underlying cause was that Art lost its functional purpose and had to come up with a new one. Since then, Art has continuously been losing its purpose (which isn't even functional anymore; in fact, it can't be functional) and trying to find a new one. Mostly certain people and styles go into and out of fashion. In the contemporary world, people care less about what is in style or not in art. The spectrum of Art has expanded substantially. I believe that it is this general multiplied amount of choices of the current era that has led to a widespread sense of purposelessness in the current generation. With that comes the need to search for a purpose, but perhaps we are looking at the wrong problem altogether. Some believe that each of us is put here for a purpose, but that hypothesis is only backed by religious beliefs and self-righteousness.

"the masses seek distraction whereas art demands concentration from the spectator."

"A man who concentrates before a work of art is absorbed by it."

"In contrast, the distracted mass absorbs the work of art."

            This is one of the points that Buck-Morss also brings up, and the basis behind the aesthetic/anaesthetic theory--that we are so overwhelmed by aesthetics that we become numb to it. I don't really agree with this argument. There is no objective definition of what art is meant to be, so there's no proof that art should necessarily "absorb" the viewer entirely. Through repeated actions/sights and through learning, our nervous system becomes accustomed to every-day routines. We pay less attention to our environment through repetitiveness. This is not really a numbing, but a way to free up our senses to pick up on the more unusual aspects that we don't see every day.

"The logical result of Fascism is the introduction of aesthetics into political life."

"All efforts to render politics aesthetic culminate in one thing: war."

"[Mankind's] self-alienation has reached such a degree that it can experience its own destruction as an aesthetic pleasure of the first order."

            Buck-Morss' essay takes off on these above points by Benjamin...

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Notes on Buck-Morss:

"external world must be included to complete the sensory circuit"

            The body itself cannot stand alone as a vessel for sensory reception; it must be placed in an environment that provides the elements of sensation.

            This leads to the introduction of the term "the synaesthetic system," which is an "aesthetic system of sense-consciousness" wherein external perceptions interact with internal images.

Marx--> phantasmagoria "describes the world of commodities that, in their mere visible presence, conceal every trace of the labour that produced them."

            Possible symptom of the aestheticization of politics? In this case, the distracted masses, who are "distracted" from evidence of labour in commodity objects, "absorb art" (Benjamin). In turn, these masses are also absorbed themselves by aesthetics in the phenomenon of phantasmagoria, since it is the masses who produce the labour to make the objects. Their labour is absorbed by aestheticization, and they are absorbed even more when they purchase these objects and invest themselves further into the commodity world.