(of a surface) tree

🌫 (of a surface) reflections 🌳

Notes towards a self-destructing manifesto:

The concept of community is imputed with consensus; of mutuality. In such circumstances, durable relations participating in shared values, vision, identity is negotiated alongside fissures, tension and nuances.

the necessity of struggle} to value challenges, discomfort in the search for new ways of being, to want to grow, learn and prosper.

interest and affection} to remain curious, engaged with other practices, research interests, questions. To empathise. To give. To take ownership.


Structural integrity:

Twitter•••The feeds, archive, chronologically scrolling-downwards as a resolution of the fragment within the totality of feeling; collectivised emotions. Honesty is recognising the moment, even when you appear unrecognisable. These tweets function as fractions of a manifesto that encompasses futurity, ambivalence and growth. A tendency towards eradication.

Instagram•••A visual repository exploring the sign, symbol, logo economy and turn towards a more image-based literacy. How can these images add a latitude to a project largely based on language and the discursive?

¡Notes! on Censorship

Julian Assange on a political society versus a fiscalised society:

“Correct, and optimistic about any organisation, or any country, that engages in censorship. We see now that the US State Department is trying to censor us. We can also look at it in the following way. The birds and the bess, and other things that can’t actually change human power relationships, are free. They’re left unmolested by human beings because they don’t matter. In places where speech is free, and where censorship does not exist or is not obvious, the society is so sewn up–so depoliticised, so fiscalised in its basic power relationships–that it doesn’t matter what you say. And it doesn’t matter what information is published. It’s not going to change who owns what or who controls what. And the power structure of a society is by definition its control structure. So in the United States, because of the extraordinary fiscalisation of relationships in that country, it matters little who wins office. You’re not going to suddenly empty a powerful individual’s bank account. Their money will stay there. Their stockholdings are going to stay there, bar a revolution strong enough to void contacts.”

When politics is deeply embedded with money, a ‘free’ society might just be deceiving, with less room for change as compared to a society whose power structure remains political and therefore more open to reorganisation:

“Censorship is not only a helpful economic signal; it is always an opportunity, because it reveals a fear of reform. And if an organisation is expressing a fear of reform, it is also expressing the fact that it can be reformed.”

In thinking about these in relation to Singapore, it is interesting to note how speech still matters here, how journalism and writing can invert power structures, how art can inflect reform. Perhaps, the condition to aspire here is to be censored.

How can knowledge and information be factually disseminated to the population? How can it circumnavigate censorship without the risk of being tainted by money, corruption and other exploitation by the power structure? How can we reinvent the power structure of society so that freedom is not illusionary but remain a core value, upheld by all?

...;;;...

ETA: December 28, 2016

"It is a myth that an art withdrawn from the realm of public inspection and disapproval is a freer and superior art. The impulse to evade censure can inspire raptures of ingenuity. (The passage of the prim Hays Code in 1932, which led to four decades of censorship in Hollywood, increased the sophistication and wit of American films by a magnitude.) We hear much about art enriching the human experience, which is an agreeable platitude. But it is the other way round. The human experience is needed to enrich art, and without a meaningful living connection to the society that nurtures it, art is a plucked flower."

Michael J. Lewis, "How Art Became Irrelevant," Commentary Magazine, July 1, 2015, accessed July 2, 2015.

 https://somerepository.wordpress.com/2015/07/02/111/

(of a surface) reflections2

on stamina> To endure till you get to a point of substance remains imperative. Ideas exist in abundance, the follow-through does not. Parts of sustaining an artistic practice involves searching for mediums that can deal with the dimensions of your question. If one were to know the ins-and-outs of a medium, there will be no motivation to continue as little growth or insight will transpire from the process. The process becomes nothing more than a cog within a machine, a kind of making for the sake of making–valueless. There is an important aspect of dynamism within stamina, to persist without being stale.

on conversing> What distinguishes ‘meaningful’ discursive forms from weather conversations? Under what conditions or behaviour does dialogue proliferates and transform? How can we better converse? Perhaps, paramount importance resides in the active process of encountering, interpreting and questioning the work at hand rather than making a conclusive or cohesive argument. Part of the transcendental potential of art involves being empathetic to position outside of yourself and these discussions should function as spaces to test out ideas, to be wrong and to destroy preconceptions, as opposed to promoting your agenda or reinforcing your beliefs. Experiences of the world are not limited to pithy statements of truth but remains a fertile (and perhaps, futile) struggle in one’s grappling of meaning. World-view is not a finite entity, but a speculative process in which arguments about the nature of reality is constantly being examined and investigated. We must be more inventive in our response, we must push ourselves to find new thoughts and structures, we must value risks, mistakes and the struggle.

ETA (December 21, 2016): Procrastination is rewarding in an increasingly content-laden, distraction-driven world. Attention span, extended period of time is a quality we should aspire to. 

∞venns∞ CommComm

Venns Foreground
Notes on No 3, – CommComm
non-occurrence


It fucks, it shits. bio-

We are alienated, distracted from the world, from each other, from ourselves. A life reduced to commodity exchanges. What does relationship mean today? How can we connect, interface and actually ‘live’? Perhaps, to combat this, we need a conception of the future on more biological terms: values that stems from and is grounded in nature and biology. We need to think about our shit.

We fuck and we shit, in that we proliferate. We consume and we dispose, yet in that it destructs. What becomes of waste when it is rethought of as nourishment, nutrients or fertlisers, when waste takes a life on its own and not be at the end of a life cycle?^1 In thinking more about our shit, man is widened and would be sensitive to what we devour and discharge, thereby affecting the nature of relationships–into something more biological, ecological and ethical.

A prefix to be added before man-made:
nature-man-made
man-made-nature
nature-made-man
made-man-nature

Read...
^1 In “Cradle to Cradle: Remaking the Way We Make Things”, the authors critiques traditional environmentalists’ urge for ‘reducing, reusing and recycling’ as an empty, shortsighted, mere downcycling gesture. In that, they call for a shift away from the current ‘cradle-to-grave’ manufacturing model to one of positive proliferation, capable of enhancing and propagating (similar to the gift economy).

“Every participant in the cycle literally lives off the others with only the ultimate energy source, the sun, being transcendent. Widening the study of ecology to include man means to look at ourselves as part of nature again, not its lord.”
– The Gift, p. 23


(of a surface) reflections

interdependence} I still maintain that the best conversations I’ve ever had in my life revolve around art. Discussions borne out of this domain are transmitted with staggering substance: there is something incredibly meaningful to listen and learn from people who imbue great magnitude of creativity, emotion, humanness in an endeavour that reaps little exchange value or affection. In many ways, art allows for individual autonomy whilst bringing people together. As we proceed, I hope that the space would afford us to intermix our individual practices, an entaglement-of-sort

capitalism} Reflecting upon the past session, we focused on a critique of capitalism as oppose to developing the concept, basis of capitalism. What exactly is capitalism? How can we better understand the mechanics of the system? And these readings cannot be insular, it must bleed just like how capitalism has managed to defy comprehension and remain formless (latching and co-opting upon existing and new forms). A reading about capitalism would not be thorough unless it is read with, against, alongside other specificities like gender, race, post-colonialism, the family, ecology, the news, pop culture, etcetera.

rigour and stamina} Uping the tempo. Reading more. Conversing more. Having the endurance to follow through, to come through. A level of intensity. A challenge.

on non-occurrence} I must admit that it is awfully disappointing. Perhaps, it wouldn’t hit that hard if you hadn’t thought that the dream of a community, incubator, catalytic environment was about to take off, was at its cusp, was just beginning to gain momentum. That you had many ideas, that you were excited to hear other ideas. It is lonely, but when have I never been? The project lives, even if it has to exists as a delirium or mumblings to oneself. In the echo chamber, reflected sounds can propagate, perhaps not as dynamic but we do the best with what we can afford.

unalienated labour} the engagement with art as a form of unalienated labour and in a lot of ways, !reading! as well. A reading group as a form of resistance against capitalism, against alienation, towards a peer-sharing community. The struggle of a text, the time required as threshold for committment. What is community without committment or belief?


Untapped potential
Watch: The Society of the Spectacle here
Watch: TedTalk: Cradle-to-Cradle here
Research: Situationist International’s technique of ‘Détournement’, often used by Debord in writing

∞venns∞ Commute and Commune

VNNDRM Foreground
Notes on No 2, - Commute and Commune
occurred on 20th September 2016


The agenda: original e-mail invite


__ Art is against us.

Anne Boyer made a point on how literature appears to be against us--with its relationship to the power imbalances governing the structure of the world. This could be applied to the art world for as open-minded, inclusive and progressive it makes itself out to be, the art world is still full of exclusions. From the way the system is still larger supported by the rich and powerful to the art bubble with its art speak and specialised audience. Nik Kosmas of AIDS3D left the art world, hoping to have a more direct engagement with a general audience as oppose to remaining within the circuit. He felt that while he had to dumbed down for the more general audience, it was therefore 'more effective and important'.

In a lot of sense, the fact that the nature of art production is difficult--where one has to sustain themselves through odd jobs on top of their practice--points to how art is a form of resistance against the system. But, is this act enough? Is it enough considering how isolating, exclusive and elitist the whole she-bang is?

Does art need to remain antagonistic to act as a form of resistance against the system? I am interested in models such as DIS or Nik Kosmas' companies, where their relationship towards capital isn't overtly pessimistic, but are operating through a more obscure manner, often flirting with what is taken to be 'bad'. A collapse of what is traditionally defined as 'good' and 'bad' is needed to open up a space for new ideas, discussions and debates. How can we work within capital to destroy it? Or, perhaps, besides and in adjacent?

Read...

'Literature is against us': In Conversation with Anne Boyer here.
Nik Kosmas, why did you decide to end your career as an artist? here.


__ Cultural Appropriation

Capital is indeed an unrelenting homogenising force, capable of commodifying anything and everything. In an economy fixated on growth and material wealth, money becomes a colonising authority, toppling all other forms of value. Cultural value is superseded by wealth accumulation, stripping away its weight, histories, problems and significance.

Thank you, Maria, for sharing Lionel Shriver's speech of being against cultural appropriation. While I admire and share some of her position of writing as an empathetic matrix or being against categories limited by identity, I cannot take to her lightness on the subject. Considering that she is speaking from a position of white privilege. She appears oblivious to the fact that inequality is rampant, that the political and economic structure of our society is still very much racialised, gendered, presupposed by class, sexual orientation, able-bodiedness...and it goes on and on. That our present condition is historically specific amidst colonialisation, slavery, violent wars and injustice. When certain voices and experiences are not heard or legitimised, when some of our identities have constantly been suppressed, deprived, twisted and distorted, we can't get to the point of being post-identity just yet.

The question of cultural appropriation is certainly tricky. At what point does such policing halt our own progress or contribute to the state of disruptive political correctness? Are individuals only allowed to participate in the representation of their identity? How can we interact with different cultures without exploiting, exoticising them? These days, with the ease of travel, what becomes of tourism?

I guess there is a need to have a strong understanding our one's own position, its problems and privileges, before situating it in relation with the other. I am interested in how residencies can create long-lasting relationships with the community involved as opposed to tourism, with its problematic reliance on spectatorship, commoditification and reduction.

Read...
Lionel Shriver's controversial cultural appropriation speech here.
Yassmin Abdel-Magied on walking out during the speech here.
Other writers' opinion here.


__ Untapped Potential | Things discussed but yet to be expanded on 

 

• 'Cognitive capitalism' 
• The process of valorisation. 
• The turn towards a image-based literacy: capitalism takes away our time / selling off our labour power just to survive / What becomes of reading and activities that takes time? What is the state of contemporary image-making? (read: Anne Boyer - 'Literature is against us') 
• Attention economy 
• Community, friendships and relationship (amidst an increasingly transactional time) 
• De-centralised mode of production and structures (rhizomes, fractals) 

__ Other links in circulation

• DIS magazine: The Time Complex. Postcontemporary

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Feel free to share your thoughts on the session.


ETA:

14/10/2016
And the idea of a post-colonial identity… how much of it is based/a reproduction of your coloniser’s projection?

What constitute the Singaporean identity? Much of ‘Singaporeaness’ is based on food and ‘Singlish’, which is skewed in favour of the Chinese (think: Halal, ‘Aiyoh’ being an Tamil but often interpreted as Mandarin). What becomes of racial identity when much of it is reduced to CMIO or how culture is suppressed in light of ‘social harmony/cohesion’? How can we talk about identity and its relation to the state, the government?


15/10/2016
Recognising that a critique of Capitalism isn’t merely pointing out all the negatives, but recognising what positive outcome it has bear...and the fact that the denunciation of capitalism has proven ineffective, otherwise it would have already vanished.


30/10/2016
‘Capitalism’ and ‘capital’ cannot be used interchangeably. In developing a rigorous critique, in expanding one’s knowledge, one must be sensitive and capable of distinguishing such terms.