[-empyre-] self and others

[Johanna Drucker]

Nice turn to these exchanges. I also really appreciated Gabriela's  
point and the follow-up by others.

If we think of art as the act of form giving, we recognize that forms  
partake of symbolic systems. As social creatures we  
'interpellate' (hideous theory word) shared symbolic systems (signs,  
stories, genres, dance moves, rules of the game etc.). But of course  
collectively and individually, we shift those symbol systems (for  
better and worse--think of personal choice and fashion trends).

I've fallen from my pure structuralist beliefs. I no longer think we  
are only 'subjects.' Individualism may be a founding mythology of  
western culture, absorbed in the most opportunistic ways into  
contemporary consumer culture, but I think it has grounding. You are  
not me, even though, to recap all the polit-theo-talk in Pogo's terms,  
"We have met the enemy and he is us."  A great deal of cult studs  
analysis comes to that.

Life is short. One of the pressing questions is what does one want to  
spend time on? The term "therapy" seems to carry a dismissive tone. I  
find making art pure pleasure, but it is the pleasure of bringing  
something into being, an act of making-as-knowing, that intensifies  
awareness. I'm an awareness junky.

Johanna