[-empyre-] Week 4 - Bio/Nano/Materialisms - the transperversal aesthetic of Texas grasshoppers

Fri Jun 29 22:56:24 EST 2012

I have been enjoying episodically lurking in this fine conversation. 
Just a quick comment -- just because old hierarchies have to be 
abandoned (like humans not being at the apex of some evolutionary 
pyramid) and have to learn they live in ecologies and webs of 
relationships doesn't mean that human are unimportant. We have the right 
to insist that our technologies serve good human purposes and not just 
yield to technological imperatives that arise from "invisible hands."

CS

  On 6/28/2012 11:42 AM, Clough, Patricia wrote:
> Yes Grosz.    Wonderful piece by her  on why she no longer is a materialist     Very beautiful  on matter and life.   Patricia
> ________________________________________
> From: empyre-bounces at lists.cofa.unsw.edu.au [empyre-bounces at lists.cofa.unsw.edu.au] On Behalf Of pinar yoldas [py16 at duke.edu]
> Sent: Wednesday, June 27, 2012 9:36 PM
> To: soft_skinned_space
> Subject: Re: [-empyre-] Week 4 - Bio/Nano/Materialisms - the transperversal     aesthetic of Texas grasshoppers
>
> Thank you Heather,
> Your question "how do we think of the human reaching beyond the human?" is of great importance to me.
> I want to quote Elizabeth Grosz here , who is a big influence for me and my project .
>
> "What is distinctively human in the humanities if man is again, in the light of Darwin's rearrangement of the universe, placed in the context of animals and animal-becomings?
> What would the humanities, a knowledge of the posthuman, be like far in the future, after mankind has evolved beyond man? "
>
> "What kind of new understanding of the humanities would it take to adequately map this decentering that places man back within the animal, within nature, and within a space and time that man does not regulate, understand, or control? What new kinds of science does this entail? And what new kinds of art?"
>
> ( Grosz, Becoming Undone, p12)
>
> Grosz  emphasizes Darwin's contribution in decentering of the human by placing the animal right next to the human , not above, not below. The nihilism Heather has pointed out is unavoidable at the moment of no-future future and nanocaust. Yet Grosz' approach fills my lungs with fresh , uncontaminated air, and a genetically modified desire to create rather than annihilate.
> If human is not at the center anymore we can look at future as a pool of animal possibilities. I personally strongly believe that the bio-nano realism surrounding us can at least pave the way to post-human ecosystems where the residues or 'cruft' of capitalism gives birth to new species , species beyond capitalism, beyond military and maybe perhaps hopefully beyond religion.
>
>
> Pinar Yoldas
> -----------------------------------------------
> {artist, designer, neuroenthusiast}
> -----------------------------------------------
> PhD Student
> Art , Art History and Visual Studies
>   Duke University
> -----------------------------------------------
> {http://pinaryoldas.info}
>
>
>
>
> On Jun 27, 2012, at 7:24 PM, Heather Davis wrote:
>
> The no-future future is definitely something that lays heavy on me, as a person and as a thinker, especially as it relates to what you call the 'nanocaust' with its differential racial/class distributions over this earth. it seems precisely at the level of the nano that these struggles are being played out, within and outside of our own bodies, other living organisms, the surface of the earth and the composition of water.
>
> what i have been struggling with for a while is a desire to avoid the kind of nihilism that would lead to a relishing in the terminal capitalism/empire moment we seem to be finding ourselves in. beauty in pure destruction  is at once a driver of social change and its expiration. This tendency, seen within certain strands of SR (I am thinking of Nick Land/Reza Negarestani) has an incredible appeal in its heightening of (nano) intensities, in maintaining destruction as an important political concept, but seems to also slide towards messianic end-of-the-world christian narratives of destruction and perfection. is it possible or desirable to think with this material moment, think with the dying cows, rapidly extinguishing species, without giving over to the pure pleasure of annihilation?  how do we think of the collective as necessarily reaching beyond the human, its transversal ontogenesis that encompasses the object revenge that you speak of (especially in relation to non-livin
>   g objects, such as chemicals, minerals, polymers, etc.) without falling into a kind of christian rapture of the end times. perhaps this is for me where art and theory provide a kind of breaking point/ambiguity that would enable a different kind of movement. in other words, the anti-anti-utopian position of art (through it's multiple negatives that leaves us where exactly?) provides this kind of useful ambiguity that pushes in the direction of new organisms (such as pinar's or ricardo's poetic nano-interventions)   operate as a magical object, that is, the object that wards off the devil by becoming the devil.
>
> I really love Pinar's categorization of 'post-natural ecosystems' and Elle's ethno-dysphoric cloning in this regard because this categorization offers a way to acknowledge the destruction of capitalism while refusing the scenario of apocalypse that gives too much weight to figures of origins and certainty. thank you for these interventions.
> heather.
>
>
>
> On Mon, Jun 25, 2012 at 5:57 AM, rrdominguez2 <rrdominguez at ucsd.edu<mailto:rrdominguez at ucsd.edu>> wrote:
> Hola Heather and all,
>
> The transperversal movement(s) that *particle group* attempts to trace via bio/nano scale(s) gestures may indeed call forth "a kind of material corollary" of affect/effect. Elle's capturing the EEG of "ethno-dysphoric cloning" or Pinar's new organ/ism pass and are passing between the utopian synthetics of particle capitalism(s) and the nanocaust (or the revenge of the object) - an apocalyptic materiality. The bio/nano aesthetic in the above work moves within and around a critical anti-anti-utopian condition of making these engines of imperceptibility visible - transperversal or a type of queering movement.
>
> But one does not have to look very far into the no-future future or the freeze dried past to see what grey ecology of bio/nano is manifesting via pre-set accidents or trans-effects at the bio/nano scale:
>
> Genetically modified grass linked to cattle deaths
> http://wtvr.com/2012/06/24/genetically-modified-grass-linked-to-cattle-deaths/
>
> Indeed a new materialism transmuting feed grass into poison which now only Texas grasshoppers are enjoying (the transperversal moment).
>
> As artists we are all Texas grasshoppers - but for how long?
>
> Very best,
> Ricardo
>
>
>
> On 6/24/12 5:27 PM, Heather Davis wrote:
> Hi all,
> Apologies for my tardy arrival. I am so excited to be a part of this conversation with each of you, and find myself stunned by the quality of thought and engagement of my brilliant interlocutors here. Thank you for your contributions so for and to Zach and Micha for initiating and curating this conversation. I am curious about the way in which the nano, in each of your work, becomes a kind of significant imperceptibility. I am thinking about how, in a previous discussion this month, the idea of 'queer is everywhere' was broached. My initial reaction to this was a kind of doubt, not trusting the utopic overtones, nor the amorphous quality of the statement that lacked the dissensus that characterizes politics. What I appreciate about the nano, in each of your works, Pinar, Ricardo, and Elle, is the way in which this kind of utopic moment of the viral meets with an politics of imperceptibility not as simply an aversion or counter-move to surveillant systems (of sex, the state, n
>   eoliberal corporate models, etc.) but as an imperceptibility that moves through the body to make significant changes. It makes me wonder about the nano as being a kind of material corollary of affect - that which carries a force, but is seen through its effects, rather than in a chain of causes or origins. this is indeed a queer position, a kind of passing that is important in its movement, of what it touches and shifts, that is locatable in its actions. the nano seems particularly adapted to this kind of effect, movement.
>
> I cannot present here as beautiful a summary of the work that I am doing, as it has yet to begin. Aside from dirt, which I love because of its contaminating/contaminated qualities, because of its amorphousness and its ability to be distinct while encompassing a range of materials, metaphors, etc, I have become increasingly fascinated with plastic. It marks our current age that is seemingly ubiquitous, unfathomable (in its scale, duration, reach) and also makes the nano a human possibility. for it is only because of the creation of purely synthetic polymers that we both have the ability to manipulate things at a nanoscale, and are able to perceive the nano as a separate measurable scale. I am interested in the way in which plastic, as a medium, connects to a politics of imperceptibility.
>
> heather.
>
> On Sun, Jun 24, 2012 at 11:57 AM, Clough, Patricia <PClough at gc.cuny.edu<mailto:PClough at gc.cuny.edu>> wrote:
> Thanks to all who engaged during week 3   and welcome week 4    Patricia
> ________________________________________
> From: empyre-bounces at lists.cofa.unsw.edu.au<mailto:empyre-bounces at lists.cofa.unsw.edu.au> [empyre-bounces at lists.cofa.unsw.edu.au<mailto:empyre-bounces at lists.cofa.unsw.edu.au>] On Behalf Of Elle Mehrmand [ellemehrmand at gmail.com<mailto:ellemehrmand at gmail.com>]
> Sent: Saturday, June 23, 2012 8:43 PM
> To: empyre at lists.cofa.unsw.edu.au<mailto:empyre at lists.cofa.unsw.edu.au>
> Subject: [-empyre-] Week 4 - Bio/Nano/Materialisms
>
> Hello out there,
>
> I am honored to have this opportunity to neuro-jaculate on this list. The notions of materialisms/ immaterialisms/ bio-materialisms/ -erialisms, within the context of the bio-political, bring to mind the pixellated flesh of my holographic/ fauxlographic clones who live in my most recent performative installation entitled fauxlographic. For the past year I have been working within the speculative space of an ethno-dysphoric cloning laboratory, where diasporic anxiety is analyzed through the process of fauxlographic cloning. The clones enact sonic rituals, singing in Farsi, English and Perz-ish [a faux-ish language], based on multiple sources of information including embodied memories, wikileaks cables, and textual/ visual/ aural references concerning Iran and Persia. The ethno-dysphoric scientist analyzes her dislocated subjectivity by performing a daily neurotic ritual within a glass computing chamber while wearing an EEG neuro-headset. As she neuro-jaculates with the clones
>   in order to (pars)e their data streams, the diasporic computing sounds of the EEG oscillate in pitch based on her neural activity. When high levels of CO2 are detected by the lab's sensors, the clones become aware of those gazing upon them, resulting in an anxious act of erasure and multiplication of their pixellated flesh on the fauxlographic screen, reciprocating the affective presence and implications of other bodies within the laboratory. The use of organic sensors transforms the lab into a cyborgian spatial interface, allowing for unconscious collaboration between multiple bodies in space, confusing the somatic architecture of the performance.
>
> // bodies
>
> [fragmented.dislocated.flesh]
>
> the metaphor of the split subject in a multitude of representations calls for the split subjectivity of the diasporic body. the hologram. the clone. the screenal flesh of the projection. the reflection on the glass. the live specimen with a neural prosthetic.
>
> //donna haraway's cyborg reconfigured
>
> the live specimen lays in a burst of stillness within the glass chamber for 30 minutes. the liveness of her naked body creates an affect that the clones cannot produce, but ultimately she will become a reproduction of herself. she performs analysis on the clones by means of neural computing. her experiments are open to the public, allowing for multiple bodies to inhabit the laboratory. the intersectionality of all of the bodies produce the organic energy that is necessary for the installation to function.
>
> the fauxlographic clones are fragmented and displaced as they interact with their ironic head scarfs from american apparel through gestural research. the black scarf cuts into their screenal skin, erasing their flesh due to the translucent nature of the fauxlographic screen. they are never fully in or out of the fabric, creating a fluidic relationship to the object, one that is not part of a binary construct, but one that arises from a unique space within the perception of being persian, and is expressed through the gestures of their diasporic anxiety. fractured elements of their being are echoed in the displacement of their body parts. they are vulnerable in their nudity with their pixellated flesh and informatic contents exposed, but that is the nature of the clone.
>
> - elle mehrmand
>
> --
> elleelleelle.org<http://elleelleelle.org/><http://elleelleelle.org<http://elleelleelle.org/>>
> assemblyofmazes.com<http://assemblyofmazes.com/><http://assemblyofmazes.com<http://assemblyofmazes.com/>>
>
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