[-empyre-] MATTER, mysticism and modes of existence

[Jan Robert Leegte]

Dear list,


Thanks for inviting me to add to this discussion. I enjoyed reading the posts from the previous week and found the perfect bridge in the final paragraph by Sally Jane, and would like to post a “mode of existence” I commonly use in my work regarding the digital object. 

To introduce myself, I entered art school in the mid nineties at the sculpting department after a couple of years studying architecture. After discovering the browser as stage / studio / exhibition space / canvas / something to make art in, I swiftly exchanged my physical material for this new “stuff”, one reason being its inherently embodied material dilemma: being immaterial and material at the same time.

(http://www.leegte.org/work/theimmaterialmaterialised, 2014)

Here a recent work of mine to illustrate these thoughts. I would like to encourage others to also illustrate their thoughts with their own (or others) work, to offer a parallel image based thread to the mainly theoretical discussion so far.

Cyberspace is often brought forward as metaphor for the magical or mystical realm. The concept of Mara or Maya in respectively Buddhism and Hinduism as the deity responsible for the illusionary world we live in, has been interpreted in many science fictions f.i. “The Matrix”. It seems that all the dreams within classic mysticism and occult practices have been answered by cyberspace (haven’t used this word in a long time… it’s fun! ;-)

I often talk with my students about the dual nature of the digital object. It has the unique property of being a passive programming code as well as the executed program. It is the invocation as well as the invoked. I often use terms like invocation or emanation, due to the similarities between software and the various traditions of mysticism. The history of trying to manifest material through language in forms of chants, spells, scrolls, etc. are as old as humanity. Though here we seem to have created a platform, which does nothing but that. It’s like we’ve deliberately created an invocation machine.

Through thought in the form of code, we are currently applying apportation, psychokinesis, astral projection, precognition, etc. etc. (Have fun running through the list, and yawn at the fact that most of it is what we do now every day.)

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_psychic_abilitie

Ok, so the digital is not Real Life. But the whole premise, on which mysticism is based, is that Real Life isn’t real either. It’s an illusion, and by piercing through the veil, you will be able to control and manipulate it. So cyberspace could be seen as a Real Life construct + open source tools to manipulate it. And in contrary to mystical experiences, which hardly anybody ever encounters first hand really, everybody on the planet can experience the cyber magic. And even better, everybody can also manipulate them…

So in reply to Dragan, I think the “Matter” question should be answered in relation to in digital object, that comes to life after the execution of the code, instead of the code itself. Our favorite hyperlink emanates from the executed software as wondrous teleporting material after having been invoked into existence. Before that it was just another dead piece of text.


Jan Robert Leegte
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