Virginia Commonwealth University VCU Scholars Compass Theses and Dissertations Graduate School 2015 Z Axis Follies Adam Collignon Virginia Commonwealth University Follow this and additional works at: https://scholarscompass.edu/etd Part of the Art Practice Commons, Fine Arts Commons, and the Interdisciplinary Arts and Media Commons © The Author Downloaded from https://scholarscompass.edu/etd/3887 This Thesis is brought to you for free and open access by the Graduate School at VCU Scholars Compass. It has been accepted for inclusion in Theses and Dissertations by an authorized administrator of VCU Scholars Compass. For more information, please contact libcompass@vcu. © 2015 Adam Collignon All Rights Reserved Z AXIS FOLLIES A thesis submitted in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Master of Fine Arts in the Department of Sculpture + Extended Media at Virginia Commonwealth University.
by ADAM COLLIGNON BFA, Minneapolis College of Art and Design, 2005 MFA, Virginia Commonwealth University, 2015 Director: Gregory Volk, Assistant Professor Department of Sculpture + Extended Media Virginia Commonwealth University Richmond, Virginia May, 2015 Contents Introduction to the nature of text / mechanisms of reading Text as performance Body / object as prism Instrument interaction as surfactant / surface active agent Instrument interaction as simultaneity of past / present / future Performance as destroyer Performance as multiplier Documentation as instrument interaction Body / object as cavern of prisms Transcriber as apt aesthetic mechanism When the transcript precedes the transcriber (desire’s void and its ilk) Word as frame Mouth as window Abstract This document will detail the nature of performance / object interaction, and the roles of documentation and language in this interaction. In addition, I will explore the body / object as a site of multiplicities, the quality of simultaneity in the appearance and apprehension of such multiplicities, and traverse the triumphs and travails of the body / object’s journey from one state of being to the next. Within this text there are windows Within the window of how text performs there are windows Within the window of windows there are windows Wonder of wonders: a wellspring of windows most mast moist master measure muster miss move massage mauve masseuse muff mousse miffed mouse move muse must This document is performance. Not performance document.
You are performing the act of looking and reading, however your experience tells you, and with what equipment your culture provides. We are not in the same place at the same time, but we are performing together. I write You read Who is talking, who is receiving; a compact between one who makes and one who witnesses. Both assume a common currency of understanding -- if I am to write, it’s assumed I will write legibly, in a recognizable form, in words that adhere to quotidian standards of transmission.
If I write illegibly, my status as writer is suspect, and you question your status as reader. When the rules of transmission slide, the performance begins. We become aware of our surroundings. Who is doing the speaking? Who is listening? Where in space is this conversation taking place? If the agreement has dissolved, what kind of alien language is this? This is when the performance begins.
This is not an endorsement of poor writing skills. Rather, there is a special skill in elision, one that the performer excels at, is disposed toward, spends time studying and perfecting. Elision / Omission Transmission The dissolution of boundaries between things to reveal their closeness, their relationship to one another. The multiplicity concealed by the illusion of their singularity The body is a site of many multiplicities.
The body is a prism Face : mask, figure : form, thought : gesture Multiplicity Rhythm and tone and word are indistinguishable Performer and environment intertwine Performer is othered and intertwines with itself. Human animal Human human Human object Human vapor Human void Human tool Me and my shadows Me and my shadows Me and my shadows In acknowledging the permeability of boundaries, and their peculiar role in generating my experience of the world, I also celebrate their necessity. On one hand, all things, thoughts, and energies muddy together in an unquantifiable mass of interrelation. At this point the word “relationship” breaks down, as do most notions of language.
A relationship requires one thing to be “othered”; as we are taught: a “subject” and an “object”. One who speaks and one who listens. On this end of the spectrum all is turbulence. On the other is science, an art tasked with the creation of boundaries.
A scientist always systematizes. Even when the scientist synthesizes, the aim is the creation of a new system. A scientist’s duty is to distinguish one thing from another, to efficiently mathematize the exact breadth and width of an entity, to calculate and codify its origins and terminations. It has been said the scientist is a cutter, slicing the environment with a fine tool and removing the chunk to storage.
This has also been said of the institutions extending from science, such as the museum. turbulence science performance object This is admittedly an understatement. But it gives us an interesting way to talk about things: Per.ance per form ance Like perambulate: to walk through or around, and perceive: to gain knowledge through the senses, performance has developed as a word with throughness built into it; the throughness of form. When I’m performing well with an instrument, say a jackhammer, or a scissors, or a guitar, it can be said that I perform well because the resistance between my body and the instrument is eased, or not existing at all.
It can be said there is little to no surface tension between myself and the instrument. Performance as surfactant / surface active agent. In the truest sense of performance I am puncturing the form of the instrument. The instrument’s form now includes my body along with it.
I have become one with the instrument. At this point there’s no telling where I begin and the instrument ends. This is my joy as a human. As the myth was told to me, Prometheus’s brother Epimetheus was given the task of assigning qualities to all living things.
Each creature received a quality such as swiftness or strength, and was equipped with fur or armor to protect against the forces of the environment. All creatures, as a result, had the elements of their survival built-in to their being. Humans, however, had been overlooked and had to be given an equipment that was external to their being. Prometheus provided this in the form of fire, Hephaestus’ skill of metalworking, and Athena’s gift of the arts.
I experience joy by experiencing life the way the rest of the world does naturally -- a fully formed being entwined with the equipment of my survival. My fortune as a human is that I receive this joy with a quality of awareness; when I break through the boundaries of the instrument, I can appreciate it. Appreciation is something I’m equipped with. The instrument itself carries a dense history -- the origin of its materials and necessity, the proclivities of its maker, others before who have similarly communed with it.
In reaching a state of performance with an instrument I also commune with its interdimensional past. comm uni cate comm on comm union comm une comm unity Sometimes I know the instrument so well I can redefine its use. While I make contact with the denseness of its past, I can at the same time be altering the shape of its future. Instrument interaction as simultaneity of past / present / future Fümms bö wö tää zää Uu, pögiff, kwii Ee.
1 Oooooooooooooooooooooooo, 6 dll rrrrr beeeee bö dll rrrrr beeeee bö fümms bö, (A) rrrrr beeeee bö fümms bö wö, beeeee bö fümms bö wö tää, bö fümms bö wö tää zää, fümms bö wö tää zää Uu: 5 primera parte: tema 1: Fümms bö wö tää zää Uu, Fümms bö wö tää zää Uu, Uu zee tee wee bee fümms. ü1 pögiff, Kurt Schwitters rakete rinnzekete Kwii Ee. 1 rakete rinnzekete (B) tema 2: from Ursonate rakete rinnzekete Dedesnn nn rrrrr, rakete rinnzekete Ii Ee, rakete rinnzekete mpiff tillff too, rakete rinnzekete tillll, Beeeee Jüü Kaa? 2 bö ü3+ tema 3: 3a Rinnzekete bee bee nnz krr müü? fö ziiuu ennze, ziiuu rinnz- böwö krrmüü, 3 fümmsbö rakete bee bee, 3a böwörö tema 4 fümmsböwö Rrummpff tillff toooo? böwörötää fümmsböwötää böwörötääzää fümmsböwötääzää böwörötääzääUu fümmsböwötääzääUu böwörötääzääUu pö fümmsböwötääzääUu pö böwörötääzääUu pögö fümmsböwötääzääUu pögö böwörötääzääUu pögiff fümmsböwötääzääUu pögiff kwiiEe. The -ance suffix indicates a noun of action.
A thing doing something. What does a thing inside performance do? It shows up. A thing’s performance is its appearance before another thing. Like myself and the instrument, I perform when I appear before the instrument.
I am present with the instrument. Similarly, when an actor performs, the actor appears before the audience. The actor’s performance is the actor’s showing up before the audience. The actor need not do anything, simply appear.
Appearing is harder than one might think. My friend says the actor’s special skill is also the skill of the conjurer -- one who is talented at eliding basic principles of distance to summon from the audience a tangible sense of community. The summoner brings into the room a being from another world, a world that didn’t / doesn’t / won’t exist outside of this room. People witness to supernatural acts commonly say, “What happened in that room last night.” or, “There was something in the air.” Instrument interaction as simultaneity of past / present / future.
Performer as summoner of appearances. “All moments are contained in the singular moment” is the same as saying: “There is no singular moment.” Appearance is part of many creation rituals. In bringing things into the world of the visible, it is important to remember that which is destroyed. The ritual of showing is also the ritual of destruction.
In travelling from one world to the next, From the unseen world to the seen, A sheath is torn. Instrument interaction as fundamentally destructive / violent / consumptive. Performance as destroyer. The King of Pop In order for a thing to appear before another thing, it must first travel through many processes / spheres of interrelation.
In traveling from one sphere of relation to the next, from the unseen world to the seen, a thing experiences change. As in the documentation of a live performance, something of the performance is altered upon its capture and replay by other media. The performance retains enough of its essence to “other” the document The document is its own. Performance carries its own shadow / echoes itself in the spaces it creates.
Burnt Norton I Time present and time past Are both perhaps present in time future And time future contained in time past. If all time is eternally present All time is unredeemable. Other echoes What might have been is an abstraction Inhabit the garden. Shall we follow? Remaining a perpetual possibility Quick, said the bird, find them, find them, Round the corner.
Through the first gate, Only in a world of speculation. Into our first world, shall we follow What might have been and what has The deception of the thrush? Into our first world. been There they were, dignified, invisible, Point to one end, which is always pres- Moving without pressure, over the dead leaves, ent. Eliot In the autumn heat, through the vibrant air, Footfalls echo in the memory And the bird called, in response to Down the passage which we did not from Four Quartets The unheard music hidden in the shrubbery, take And the unseen eyebeam crossed, for the roses Towards the door we never opened Had the look of flowers that are looked at.
Into the rose-garden. My words echo There they were as our guests, accepted and ac- Thus, in your mind.