[-empyre-] whose "our systems"

[Susan Kozel]

Diving in once again, after missing a day and then being tossed by the maelstrom of ideas for another day or so.
First, looking back to Tim Morton’s post, a question: What aspects of Irigaray’s thought were you channeling unconsciously? As a long term reader and ‘appreciator’ or Irigaray’s thought I am most curious.
I would like also to pick up on the ‘horror aspect of much speculative materialism’ from his same post. We probably have different takes on this, but I agree that it is valuable to draw some aspects of speculative materialism into conjunction with discussions of the virtual, particularly because the ‘speculative’ has become an important notion in design and cultural critical writing. We are seeing a real interest in what the speculative might mean in the light of the intractable political, environmental, and social/economic problems now facing us. There is a seduction to activities and thought processes that may be truly speculative, offering radically discontinuous solutions to intractable problems.  Some approaches to the virtual (Deleuzian inspired) frame the virtual as so unformed and as yet unknowable as to have similar qualities of the speculative.
But Speculative Materialism tends to take us far away from mundane or embodied existence, as if true virtuality has to be liberated from physicality. Of course I push against this assumption (from Meillassoux), and have begun to explore the concept and practices of Somatic Materialism, a way of taking note of the radically unknown and possibly unknowable within our bodies and across bodies. Possibly a way of keeping this knowledge at least in part unknowable. Hence an interest in encryption.
Picking up on John Hopkins’ formulation:
<This suggests that any discussion of the virtual not be limited to material ‘delivery’ mechanisms or mediatory (digital) devices. Rather, a broad consideration of the character of flows between the Self and the Other, the Self and the cosmos, is needed: especially the relation between those flows and embodied sensory presence.
 I like to see somatic materialism as being based on flow and as John says, not tied to a cosmic realm. Embodied sensory presence is key, I would go further to say embodied affective presence (playing on a distinction between the senses and affect). I have a feeling that what Sue discussed below regarding breath, pressure and resonance, working from internality radiating ourwards and letting external forces richochet inward has something to say to this project but am still thinking about it

On Jul 4, 2014, at 5:26 AM, Sue Hawksley wrote:

----------empyre- soft-skinned space----------------------
Dear John

Many thanks for the link to these thoughts on glass and your propositions on the virtual, I love the notion of window-weather, What a great word - gluggaveðri - how do you pronounce it??  I'm thinking of in relation to some of the choreographic experiments I've been doing with imaginative windows into different 'layers' of bodily experience, exploring practices for accessing and inhabiting different spaces, real or imagined, tech or not.

Here's an example from a year ago (exactly to the day, as it turns out) at the start of an R&D period at Bundanon in NSW, with Simon Biggs and Garth Paine to develop a work called 'Crosstalk'. Working with dancer Lucy Boyes the choreographic practice started with dance improvisations focusing attention inward to our bodily sensations and out to the environment(feeling/listening/looking in or out)and following any felt/heard/seen impulses to move. This draws on practices such as Bodyweather and Authentic Movement, and the notions of 'active imagination' which I'm thinking about in terms of virtuality. Here's an extract from my notebook:

"July 3 2013 - We need to get inside our movement, at the moment we are flapping about in a very empty way. Starting with Bodyweather first sequence to get into the breath & bone. Then working back-to-back to give counter-pressure, and later tried pushing hands, but this doesn't feel right as a way in - we need to establish distinct identities and then the system will create the logic for how we relate. Lucy spent time focusing on BREATH - in-breath creating pressure out against the universe, out-breath allowing the universe to press against you. She then took herself to a remembered space and explored inhabiting it, measuring, constructing it around herself, feeling the surfaces, textures, temperatures, consistencies, sounds."

We took the practice outdoors and improvised from listening/looking/feeling outward to the highly complex environment of the east-Australian bush. I then introduced a punctuated breath pattern to create a temporal and physical discipline: breathe in for 4 while moving, out for 2 & pause, out for 2 & pause. In the active breathing spaces we attended and responded outwardly to our surroundings, in the pauses we focused on and inhabited and moved in any imaginative space that came to bodymind. My idea on applying the time constraint was to make us transition rapidly between different experiential spaces, to reveal the kinetic/kinaesthetic melodies of being in each space (I'm using the term kinetic/kinaesthetic melodies in the sense proposed by Maxine Sheets-Johnstone). I'm exploring the premise that places of experience and memory are always latent in our body, with the potential to occupy awareness, aiming to shift between them as if one jumped through a window (like the cat in Philip Pullman's Dark Materials). THis practice introduces pauses and disjunctures into open-ended improvisation, while bringing attention to the physicality of the breathing, the pressure and resonance of the activity, regardless of whether we are trying to be attentionally 'here' or somewhere else. It also seems to dissolve the boundary between 'real' and 'virtual' in bodily terms. John raised the problem of <virtuality's indelible link to the digital>  I agree: it's limiting to let the term be hijacked by one particular or current aspect of human mediation, and to indicate only specialised environments such as digital installations, online games and worlds, performance etc. My example above is of a no-tech practice of 'virtual embodiment'. This was part of development of an 'hi-tech' mediated interactive performance environment, but it could apply to any environment. Simon and Johannes have mentioned the assemblage.  In 'Crosstalk' where we specifically make no distinction between human and machine in the system, my experience of making and performing it is of being-the-system, rather than being 'in' the system. (Referring back to Johannes question to Simon - <are you saying "we" are / become the dispositif?  I always assumed I was merely attendant to the technical assemblages …>) I used to feel that alienation, but these days i'm really not able to differentiate 'me' in the assemblage, whether in a specialised technical environment or everyday life.

best, Sue


On 4 Jul 2014, at 01:47, John Hopkins <jhopkins at neoscenes.net<mailto:jhopkins at neoscenes.net>> wrote:

----------empyre- soft-skinned space----------------------
Hei folks --

As a gadfly, I'd point you to a short text excerpted from my dissertation that proposes a novel definition of the 'virtual' or 'virtuality'. It may be demonstrated as directly connected with last months sonic (energy!) explorations.

That might however require more of a discussion than I can afford to engage in in the moment, unfortunately -- I'm rebuilding a small house in the mountains of central Arizona with the aim of reducing the GHG energy footprint...

The discussions so far are going far too fast for me to make cogent contributions. I was on empyre years ago but left after a couple years, then a colleague told me about last months discussion which was right down my area of work, so I re-subscribed, but wasn't able to contribute much to a dialogue.

Anyway, I thought I'd throw it out there ... The definition (model) addresses a number of the problematic issues around the use of the word -- formost in my mind, virtuality's indelible link to the digital, and because of this, the vague historical sourcing/usage of the term.

http://tech-no-mad.net/blog/archives/75283

Cheers,
John

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Dr. John Hopkins, BSc, MFA, PhD
http://tech-no-mad.net/blog/
CV: http://www.neoscenes.net/info/cv/index.php
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SUE HAWKSLEY
independent dance artist
sue at articulateanimal.org.uk<mailto:sue at articulateanimal.org.uk>
http://www.articulateanimal.org.uk




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