Re: [-empyre-] Introductions and beginnings (October on -empyre-)

On Oct 24, 2006, at 9:11 AM, Renee Turner wrote:

At the beginning of this months discussion, Ryan wrote:

.. what are the consequences of different tactics

I think this is still an important question which is worth further exploring... So far, we have focussed on appropriation as a tactic and touched on its weaknesses, but tactics for building critical mass* have not been covered. And it's connected to the idea of research, efficacy and sustainability. I am thinking again about Crandall's project. If you go to one lecture or discussion, it's a singular event. But when you review the bulk of work over time, meaning the books, discussion lists, lectures and exhibitions, critical mass starts to build. Or for example, from a more curatorial perspective, Catherine David's project, Contemporary Arab Representations which has occurred across different institutions. These projects establish a mode of study.

Good segue Renee!
To go back to something that has been in the foreground during this (and many other) discussion as well as in the thinking behind the Under Fire exhibition can be explained by the following excerpt from Bruno Latour's "Matters of Fact, Matters of Concern" ( http:// www.journals.uchicago.edu/CI/journal/issues/v30n2/300201/300201.html )
<quote>
My argument is that a certain form of critical spirit has sent us down the wrong path, encouraging us to fight the wrong enemies and, worst of all, to be considered as friends by the wrong sort of allies because of a little mistake in the definition of its main target. The question was never to get away from facts but closer to them, not fighting empiricism but, on the contrary, renewing empiricism.
What I am going to argue is that the critical mind, if it is to renew itself and be relevant again, is to be found in the cultivation of a stubbornly realist attitude—to speak like William James—but a realism dealing with what I will call matters of concern, not matters of fact. The mistake we made, the mistake I made, was to believe that there was no efficient way to criticize matters of fact except by moving away from them and directing one's attention toward the conditions that made them possible. But this meant accepting much too uncritically what matters of fact were. This was remaining too faithful to the unfortunate solution inherited from the philosophy of Immanuel Kant. Critique has not been critical enough in spite of all its sore-scratching. Reality is not defined by matters of fact. Matters of fact are not all that is given in experience. Matters of fact are only very partial and, I would argue, very polemical, very political renderings of matters of concern and only a subset of what could also be called states of affairs. It is this second empiricism, this return to the realist attitude, that I'd like to offer as the next task for the critically minded.
</quote>
It's also why i think Jordan's extended project is so interesting and vital, and maybe why the term "critical mass" makes sense Renee? When it seems "facts" are not enough to change the course of events, or even just to "understand" events, engaging in discussions that go "beyond" facts and frame things through discursive, yet not relative, "concerns" (the "spirit of study" Renee refers to maybe?) is i think productive.
The deGeuzen work in the Under Fire exhibition, for example, not only deconstructs the current moment of fear and media consumption, it produces a means to discuss the "reality" of data and image flows that is arguable, contestable and locatable. Rather than point out the problems of politicized data, it assumes the political nature of all data and visualizes specifics - what does this specific set of political data enable us to say? What is our concern?
best,
ryan
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