First published in INTELLIGENT AGENT, March 1997

Venues of Process: The Road Unraveled

by musEleanor
Certified Muse in the Service of Art

ECO'S DRAWING

This 20th century labyrinthine line drawing by Umberto Eco* traces the development of a pun created by James Joyce for Finnegan's Wake. It illustrates a decoding of the pun, tracing possible nodes of association which link the words: Neanderthal, Meander and Tale from which Joyce formed the transformative word Meandertale. The newly constructed word meandertale appears to signify the very name of the process that forms it; a meandering quest for associations between words where these associations simultaneously tell the story of their evolution and transform them. In such a well-ventilated world, perhaps one necessary constraint might be to assume that no word suffers more than six degrees of separation from any other.

* Diagram by Umberto Eco from The Limits of Interpretation, A Midland Book, Indiana University Press, Bloomington and Indianapolis, 1994, Illustration 9.2, p. 141.

CLUES WITHOUT CONTEXT?

How far astray can the routers of imagination take us from what we can consider true? Can we be sure such a quest on a well-trodden path is revealing good metaphorical expression? Clues without context, i.e., the names without the lines, makes the subject of the drawing cease to resonate its potential and simply become a representation of itself where everything is equal or in a simplistic hierarchy (some are upper case, some are lower) . The labyrinthine journey defined by the convoluted node line occurring between words is sprinkled with alchemical events - occurrences in language where two words together form another that leads to a whole new expression of association and meaning. Such events stimulate vernacular, slang and new languages.

MYSTERY WITHOUT [E]MOTION?

Then again, in Eco's drawing, selecting the nodes, without their names or connections offers mystery (go ahead, connect the dots) - but the literary metaphor suffers a loss of its muscular tone, its life-like exuberance. As the depiction of convoluted connections disappear in the above drawing, the resonance also falls away, dwindling to nothing.

If we absent everything but the line, its function as a pointer to possibilities suffers. we have uniformly subtract from this path any of its significant elements.

ORDER WITHOUT SIGNIFICANCE?

In the modernist notion of exhibition the curator and the viewer are sequestered on opposite sides of the proscenium. The curator presents as well a "story" of the exhibition with a beginning a middle and an end. An "opening" commences the exhibition, the exhibition period is even and consistently passed, and the "closing" announces the fall of the curtain, cased closed, on to the next cultural construction. Documentation is arranged prior to the tenure of exhibition, usually in the form of a catalogue published simultaneously with the show's appearance. During the tenure of the exhibition, or shortly thereafter, the show is reviewed by "others" - critics who stand apart as specializing in placing the exhibition in a context .The significance of a link is provoked by the relationship of the material at either end of it. This type of exhibition structure has a kind of pedagogic implication; providing a set piece for drawing conclusions, making comparisons, sustaining a particular set of ciphers constituting what we call culture.

Now we are seeing more and more the appearance of an exhibition venue harboring more intent towards the artist's process than product. These are also opportunities for artists where the relationship of one work to another, whether solo or group exhibition, conjures up additional language in the reader's mind which makes the leap from one work to another. This invisible text, an emerging hieroglyphic structure in the reader's mind, is the activity which conjures up a new language of the links and a new mode of presentation. Hypermedia links are pockets, absences, lapses, synapses, indicating what is inexpressible or interactively assumed by the viewer or reader. The subtext of the work can be embedded, even inconsistently, in the linkages and left to the viewer to decipher.

VENUES OF PROCESS:

There are experiments going on now all over the world venues offered with open arms to artists where a work can initiate, grow and take on a form that is purely of its own conclusion. These venues of process of course are affected by the circumstances and constraints under which they are developed and presented. Each venue forms its own unique envirionment for process. 







	
	
BLAST, xaf Foundation 

Sandra Gering Gallery, New York  - 

November 22, 1996 -January 4, 1997

http://interport.net/~xaf/theatre.html


	In my article in the January issue of IA, I defined the Blast
exhibition as an "ever-changing cat's cradle of collaboration....making history
of history making history". I was referring to the development of works
--whether documentary, object-oriented, display and/or performance--over the
time of an exhibition's tenure.   The designated particular theme (Drama)
signaled a call to the artist to develop or a new work or adapt an old, or at
least to see a pre-existing work in a new context.  



	New works of course require time to develop, and there was a time when new
works were developed privately, in the studio and the various  stages of its
development were not seen nor discussed.  Blast's in-depth sweep of good works
was enhanced by the fact that all the works were changing over time, whether
literally or by perception.  Artists were, to different degrees, influenced by
their experience of the each others' work.  This seems to me to be more than
process and/or collaboration - it offers the same kind of alchemic events
inherent in Eco's drawing.  Because the more artificial borders between artists
are broken down by "interest",  more and more directed possibilities emerge,
creating a vibrant theater of operations.


	







	




	
TECHNOSEDUCTION 

The Cooper Union for the Advancement of Science and Art, New York

January 17- February 15, 1997

http://www.cooper.edu/techno


	Technoseduction was an art exhibition of very varied technologies and
processes.  It was based on a discrete and specifc "interface":  thoughts of
technology and seduction where the seducer and seduced are chameleon-like and
transformatively interchangeable.    At the exhibition opening, trays of food
held high and moving through the room echoed the exhibition's mode of
presentation itself -- the coinage of a fixed idea handed to viewers on a
platter.   This appears to be  straightforward ideology.  In choosing between
process and/or product orientation for an exhibition one would think the former
would be the riskiest.  But there is risk in the "platter of objects" mode too
in that it hangs on one statement rather than many possible interpretations and
the exhibition may be judged on the nature of the statement rather than on the
works itself when that is not the intention.



	A muse-educated colleague of mine described Technoseduction as a "3-ring
circus". meaning that in a derogatory way.  I see it as quite noble and brave
in the face of current theoretical ground.  The circus is exciting, and often
frightening because of all the possible things that can go wrong in a way that
cant be masked or denied.


	Technoseduction's presentation does incur  a "representational" aura since its
nature tends to make viewers and curators alike break it down into "types of
work".  Installations, display, interactive. interface topography, etc..
Perhaps this was intended to show how technology offers many possibilities, and
will not homogenize our endeavors.  But   emphasizing a criteria of  "visual or
physical  differences" to define the exhibition  undermines its tenor,
diminishes its muscular power, takes all the scariness out.  This  may be
secondary to the fact that there were wonderful works in the exhibition and
that it was very much worth seeing,  but it will be interesting to see how
wonderful works sit in the context provided for them from this point on.










	
PORT - -January 25 - March 29, 1997

On-line and at The List Visual Arts Center at M.I.T.

http://artnetweb.com/port/


	PORT of course, is the epitome of real-time risk; a space and time where an
artist has the oportunity to develop not only a work, but the process of
developing the work itself.  The closest analogy I can find to it is in the
development of choreography or orchestration where the process is visible to
audience.



	Port has three stageset space-and-time layers of venue. A live audience, as in
physical presence where the work is being made (in the studio, etc.), an online
real time presence, and a physical presence at  its "destination" - the four
screens at the List Visual Arts Center at M.I.T.  



	As muse, I am encouraging this sort of venue for artists  - where an idea can
be born, tested, evolved, and even revolutionized over a period of time while
visible to others, where artists can overlap and collaborate while retaining
their individuation (in this case, designated by time slots). PORT is an ideal
venue beause an artist can afford to surrender their preconceived belief
systems and undergo a wavering, analysis, deconstruction, loss of faith and
tossup up onto a new path.   Speaking for one of the artists in the PORT
exhibition, "It is the closest thing to artists being able to  follow Dante's
footsteps through The Inferno in real time."


	If any exhibition endeavor has achieved this recently it is the Port
exhibition and its process itself is very apparent and very evident throughout
the performative development of the work.  




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