[-empyre-] networked self and the netopticon

[simon]

Thank you Simon and Heidi for your generosity. I'd like to have list 
time to respond to you both ... but as these things appear, at 23:30, 
Jan 31, I do not have the luxury of so doing before <<empyre>> rolls out 
its topic for the coming month.

I would like to add two scenes:

The Netopticon is a witticism that is here in the process of being 
skinned alive. Later, while we beat dreams, the chief will wear the skin 
and dance around the fire.

Then we will wait, grimly sorting the bones. We will speak of this in 
hushed tones.

Later still, the god will not have come.

And:

The crisis is that from the point of view of representation art has 
escaped. From now on, we will have to show the strategy it used, the 
physical evidence of escape, even, in some cases, the dead body left 
behind.

We cannot follow it. Or do not want to. Enough.

In fact, wouldn't we rather collect tickets by the door, standing 
outside the last place it was seen, like guards? with cordons and 
take-home pay?

Is the multiplication of this scenario the situation described by the 
Netopticon?

And, yes, in some cases, we will slip inside the tent or theatre and lie 
or sit there pretending to be alive while the spectators file through, 
or, at least, in expectation that they will, that they are coming.

You know how, when you have a puppet, if it touches itself it seems to 
be more alive? How the touching seems to invoke pathos? A 
self-consciousness of embodiment? So will the simulacrum of life be 
enhanced in our own self-reflexive performance.

Best,

Simon Taylor

www.squarewhiteworld.com
www.brazilcoffee.co.nz