Re: [-empyre-] public lament and gardening

[Ana Valdés]

I think I am here trying to discuss with myself the value of my
memory. It took me 32 years to write the book about the time on jail
about torture and my own story. But before these book I wrote and
published nine other books, fiction, short stories, two novels. In
none of those books I adressed my own life or what happened me.
I was shy and didn't know if my personal tale was of literary value.
When you rea Primo Levi's or Viktor Frankl or Dostoievskis "Memoir
from a cellarfloor" or Mandelstam's description of his time in Siberia
or Kertesz book about Auschwitz, all other tales seem to bleach and
pale.
But I travelled to Palestine for first time in the year 2001 and when
I was asked why should a Latinamerican live in Sweden, so far from the
city I was born, I answered with the explanation of the jail and the
exile.
And almost every Palestine I met had own stories about their own jail
or the time in prison or some relative in prison just now.
The common of our fate gave me the distance and the tools to write
about my own experience, not with the aim to resalt my own but with
the humble goal to make literature of those memories, to rise them
from the testimonial level to the literary level.

And that's the common denominator we share, I think, our griefs and
pains and sadness are collective and there are the ones making us part
of the same specie.

Ana

On Fri, Oct 5, 2012 at 2:38 PM, Johannes Birringer
 wrote:
> dear Alan, Ana, and all
>
>
> I am very sorry if I tried, unsuccessfully, to combine a great respect for 
> the seriousness of the issues raised here,  the lived experience reported 
> here by you Ana in memory of the time of incarceration and torture, and for 
> example Alan when you talk about the dying of your mother, and when you, Ana 
> talk about your re-immigration to a less 'glamorous' southern city, 
> Montevideo, and the artwork shared with us here, like Alan's haunting homage 
> to Barber and Droste, and the poem you write to it, so if i tried to combine 
> that with a sense of weary irony, and a glance at some questions raised by 
> the work that I am trying to understand as gestural (Monika's). I found your 
> video not dis/tracting at all, Alan, but on the contrary. I thought that was 
> obvious, sorry if it wasn't.
>
>  in fact these historical traces now mingling with the discussion (of  the 
> thin lines you speak about, at historical moments in the last century, 
> already evoked with bitter ambivalence, perhaps, in Monika's reference to 
> Zygmunt Bauman's "garden state") are important for the interrogation of 
> contexts I propose.
>
> Re:  "garden state";   i found a very critical text on Bauman, and pondered 
> it.  If you like to read it:  http://shaunbest.tripod.com/id11.html
>
> with regards
> Johannes
>
>
> [Alan schreibt]
>
> On Fri, 5 Oct 2012, Johannes Birringer wrote:
>
>> [strangely I am trying to re-read them while watching Alan's machinima
>> on Anita Berber and Sebastian Droste, now that is a very strange
>> dis/traction to the 1920s and the queering of Berlin's underground &
>> performance, cabaret and film scene)
>
> Those performances were incredibly complex, and spoke to issues of
> suffering, addictions, and death, as you know; I don't see this as a
> distraction any more than any other past history is. These people - I'd
> include Valeska Gert - were walking a very thin edge, and some of them
> escaped and some didn't; some escaped themselves and some didn't. So here
> are performances that are recorded at best in film and with Berber hardly
> that - yet through text and images, they're uncanny.
>
> Why wouldn't empathy or affect work through video etc.? I've seen video
> from films shot at safaris for example which still haunt me, as well as
> Martha Stewart's video she made for PETA, which I assigned students (yes,
> it's _that_ Martha Stewart). My own work (which you'd probably find a
> distraction here) is very much concerned with these issues online - that
> was the basis of my Eyebeam residency.
>
>> Grave matters here this week. After Alan, may I also dis/tract you by
>> passing on to you a brief message just received from Argentine friend
>> asking me about the camera work in Madrid during recent public unrest
>> and protests, when drones?/surveillance helicopters?  flew over the
>> city, like angels, taking a look at the wounding?
>>
> - Alan
>
> ___
> empyre forum
> empyre@lists.cofa.unsw.edu.au
> http://www.subtle.net/empyre



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Re: [-empyre-] public lament and gardening

[Johannes Birringer]

dear Alan, Ana, and all


I am very sorry if I tried, unsuccessfully, to combine a great respect for the 
seriousness of the issues raised here,  the lived experience reported here by 
you Ana in memory of the time of incarceration and torture, and for example 
Alan when you talk about the dying of your mother, and when you, Ana talk about 
your re-immigration to a less 'glamorous' southern city, Montevideo, and the 
artwork shared with us here, like Alan's haunting homage to Barber and Droste, 
and the poem you write to it, so if i tried to combine that with a sense of 
weary irony, and a glance at some questions raised by the work that I am trying 
to understand as gestural (Monika's). I found your video not dis/tracting at 
all, Alan, but on the contrary. I thought that was obvious, sorry if it wasn't. 

 in fact these historical traces now mingling with the discussion (of  the thin 
lines you speak about, at historical moments in the last century, already 
evoked with bitter ambivalence, perhaps, in Monika's reference to Zygmunt 
Bauman's "garden state") are important for the interrogation of contexts I 
propose. 

Re:  "garden state";   i found a very critical text on Bauman, and pondered it. 
 If you like to read it:  http://shaunbest.tripod.com/id11.html

with regards
Johannes


[Alan schreibt]

On Fri, 5 Oct 2012, Johannes Birringer wrote:

> [strangely I am trying to re-read them while watching Alan's machinima
> on Anita Berber and Sebastian Droste, now that is a very strange
> dis/traction to the 1920s and the queering of Berlin's underground &
> performance, cabaret and film scene)

Those performances were incredibly complex, and spoke to issues of
suffering, addictions, and death, as you know; I don't see this as a
distraction any more than any other past history is. These people - I'd
include Valeska Gert - were walking a very thin edge, and some of them
escaped and some didn't; some escaped themselves and some didn't. So here
are performances that are recorded at best in film and with Berber hardly
that - yet through text and images, they're uncanny.

Why wouldn't empathy or affect work through video etc.? I've seen video
from films shot at safaris for example which still haunt me, as well as
Martha Stewart's video she made for PETA, which I assigned students (yes,
it's _that_ Martha Stewart). My own work (which you'd probably find a
distraction here) is very much concerned with these issues online - that
was the basis of my Eyebeam residency.

> Grave matters here this week. After Alan, may I also dis/tract you by
> passing on to you a brief message just received from Argentine friend
> asking me about the camera work in Madrid during recent public unrest
> and protests, when drones?/surveillance helicopters?  flew over the
> city, like angels, taking a look at the wounding?
>
- Alan

___
empyre forum
empyre@lists.cofa.unsw.edu.au
http://www.subtle.net/empyre

Re: [-empyre-] public lament and gardening

[Alan Sondheim]

On Fri, 5 Oct 2012, Johannes Birringer wrote:

[strangely I am trying to re-read them while watching Alan's machinima 
on Anita Berber and Sebastian Droste, now that is a very strange 
dis/traction to the 1920s and the queering of Berlin's underground & 
performance, cabaret and film scene)


Those performances were incredibly complex, and spoke to issues of 
suffering, addictions, and death, as you know; I don't see this as a 
distraction any more than any other past history is. These people - I'd 
include Valeska Gert - were walking a very thin edge, and some of them 
escaped and some didn't; some escaped themselves and some didn't. So here 
are performances that are recorded at best in film and with Berber hardly 
that - yet through text and images, they're uncanny.


Why wouldn't empathy or affect work through video etc.? I've seen video 
from films shot at safaris for example which still haunt me, as well as 
Martha Stewart's video she made for PETA, which I assigned students (yes, 
it's _that_ Martha Stewart). My own work (which you'd probably find a 
distraction here) is very much concerned with these issues online - that 
was the basis of my Eyebeam residency.


Grave matters here this week. After Alan, may I also dis/tract you by 
passing on to you a brief message just received from Argentine friend 
asking me about the camera work in Madrid during recent public unrest 
and protests, when drones?/surveillance helicopters?  flew over the 
city, like angels, taking a look at the wounding?



- Alan
___
empyre forum
empyre@lists.cofa.unsw.edu.au
http://www.subtle.net/empyre

Re: [-empyre-] public lament and gardening

[Ana Valdés]

As always a pleasure to read you, Johannes! I want only correct a
little bit when I wrote I "might bump into one of her torturers from
years back."
I did it, already. A man and a woman. The woman and me were waiting on
line to buy an ice cream in a popular iceparlor. There were two
parallell lines, she stood in one, I stood in the other. I looked at
her face and first could not place here, was she a neighboor? A former
class comrade? Some far relative? And suddenly I put on her a green
uniform and saw her became the sadistic female soldier participating
in our tortures as volontary (it was not her job, she offered herself
as volontary) or beating the jars of our cells on the nights to don't
let us sleep.
I froze, she froze, and the both of us left the place without buying anything.

The man was having a coffe in a place I was together wirh friends, he
looked at me intensely and I asked my friends if they knew him. Yes,
they said, don't you remember him? He was called "Little Bird" och was
the son of a socialistic professor. He killed his own cousin in Buenos
Aires (she fled from our jail in Montevideo and was kidnapped by
Argentinian and Uruguayan militars in Buenos Aires) and called his
onkel, the father of the girl he killed, to tell him that.

He was there, undisturbed, drinking a coffe and talking in his mobile.
The reason I didn't recognize him was the most of our torturers
interrogated and tortured us with masks covering their faces, they
didn't want to be recognized by us when we were free.

Ana
>

On Fri, Oct 5, 2012 at 2:05 PM, Johannes Birringer
 wrote:
>
> thanks Monika for these very illuminating and profound responses you wrote 
> (answering Maria's and my questions),
>
> [strangely I am trying to re-read them while watching Alan's machinima on 
> Anita Berber and Sebastian Droste, now that is a very strange dis/traction to 
> the 1920s and the queering of Berlin's underground & performance, cabaret and 
> film scene)
>
> and what you say about your "polluting" strategies:  < the polis through staining it with empathy and affect, that drives my recent 
> work>>, which i can now also understand much better since your posting on the 
> "Shrouds" project.
>
> I wonder what others here think about your postings? and your responses?
>
> Monika schreibt:
>>>What comes to mind is that the work always exists in the context of the site 
>>>and the context of one's life work, even one's writing. the projects I did 
>>>in Dresden, New York. Potsdam, Warsaw or now Santiago -- and many other 
>>>places -- the past are inscribed in the body of the city, so this forms one 
>>>level of context.
> The prolonged moment, the experience of the passerby (I don't like the word 
> "viewers" or "audience" and I always insist on "experiencer"), offers a 
> possibility of a dialogue, the ABA, a return and circularity between 
> presences.
>>>
>
> Yes, I see the significance of context/site and its histories inscribed, or 
> its wounds still visible of not, or adapted/restituted.
>
> I now think of Ana Váldes telling us she walks through the streets of 
> Montevideo and might bump into one of her torturers from years back.  What 
> would one do?
>
>
> Ana, what catharsis?
> and how does the traveling artist who comes to Dresden and Santiago affect 
> catharsis (amongst the locals, the audience?)  I think you can call them 
> experiencers, if you wish, but for artworks and ritual
> performance exhibitions, i think one can also see them as viewers and 
> audiences, after all, it is not clear to me how empathy or affect works 
> through video, installation, and why artworks should affect experiences in 
> the profound ways you claim (for the polis community of ancient tragedy, the 
> funeral gathering in Palestinia?). Video or body installations  are, a a 
> category, different from the funerals that Ana seems to have in mind. I would 
> insist so, and won't  need to mention Marina Abramovic or others at 
> galleries, biennials and museums 'under'-going  their fasts and durational 
> self-exhibition spectacles
>
> One would need to discuss funeral practices in context then, too, and examine 
> them; the agonized groans, the tears, the gestures, the silence, the 
> repetitions  (such as the protests of the madres de desaparecidos in Buenos 
> Aires).
>
>
> Grave matters here this week. After Alan, may I also dis/tract you by passing 
> on to you a brief message just received from Argentine friend asking me about 
> the camera work in Madrid during recent public unrest and protests, when 
> drones?/surveillance helicopters?  flew over the city, like angels, taking a 
> look at the wounding?
>
>>>
> Era cuestión de horas. De los cientos de cámaras personales que grabaron 
> disturbios en Madrid han aflorado hoy vídeos que están recorriendo las redes 
> sociales y se asoman a veces a medios de comunicación. Elegimos algunos de 
> los más difundidos.
>
> La primera carga en Neptuno vista desde arriba.
>
> Un policía inf

Re: [-empyre-] public lament and gardening

[Johannes Birringer]

thanks Monika for these very illuminating and profound responses you wrote 
(answering Maria's and my questions), 
 
[strangely I am trying to re-read them while watching Alan's machinima on Anita 
Berber and Sebastian Droste, now that is a very strange dis/traction to the 
1920s and the queering of Berlin's underground & performance, cabaret and film 
scene)

and what you say about your "polluting" strategies:  <>, which i can now also understand much better since your posting on the 
"Shrouds" project.

I wonder what others here think about your postings? and your responses?

Monika schreibt: 
>>What comes to mind is that the work always exists in the context of the site 
>>and the context of one's life work, even one's writing. the projects I did in 
>>Dresden, New York. Potsdam, Warsaw or now Santiago -- and many other places 
>>-- the past are inscribed in the body of the city, so this forms one level of 
>>context. 
The prolonged moment, the experience of the passerby (I don't like the word 
"viewers" or "audience" and I always insist on "experiencer"), offers a 
possibility of a dialogue, the ABA, a return and circularity between presences. 
>> 

Yes, I see the significance of context/site and its histories inscribed, or its 
wounds still visible of not, or adapted/restituted.

I now think of Ana Váldes telling us she walks through the streets of 
Montevideo and might bump into one of her torturers from years back.  What 
would one do?


Ana, what catharsis?
and how does the traveling artist who comes to Dresden and Santiago affect 
catharsis (amongst the locals, the audience?)  I think you can call them 
experiencers, if you wish, but for artworks and ritual
performance exhibitions, i think one can also see them as viewers and 
audiences, after all, it is not clear to me how empathy or affect works through 
video, installation, and why artworks should affect experiences in the profound 
ways you claim (for the polis community of ancient tragedy, the funeral 
gathering in Palestinia?). Video or body installations  are, a a category, 
different from the funerals that Ana seems to have in mind. I would insist so, 
and won't  need to mention Marina Abramovic or others at galleries, biennials 
and museums 'under'-going  their fasts and durational self-exhibition 
spectacles

One would need to discuss funeral practices in context then, too, and examine 
them; the agonized groans, the tears, the gestures, the silence, the 
repetitions  (such as the protests of the madres de desaparecidos in Buenos 
Aires).


Grave matters here this week. After Alan, may I also dis/tract you by passing 
on to you a brief message just received from Argentine friend asking me about 
the camera work in Madrid during recent public unrest and protests, when 
drones?/surveillance helicopters?  flew over the city, like angels, taking a 
look at the wounding?

>>
Era cuestión de horas. De los cientos de cámaras personales que grabaron 
disturbios en Madrid han aflorado hoy vídeos que están recorriendo las redes 
sociales y se asoman a veces a medios de comunicación. Elegimos algunos de los 
más difundidos.

La primera carga en Neptuno vista desde arriba.

Un policía infiltrado se identifica ante sus compañeros cuando intentan 
detenerle: "¡Que soy compañero, coño!"
>>

(video sources:  
http://www.eldiario.es/politica/videos-actuacion-policial-ver_0_51795275.html#comments)


respectfully
Johannes Birringer


Monika schreibt:

>>I consider lamentation as a communal mourning process in public sphere of 
>>polis, which in the ancient times was not supposed to be polluted by any 
>>openly expressed emotion (unworthy of citizen) nor by anything else coming 
>>from non-citizens such as were women at the time. In various geographies and 
>>traditions around the world women were the ones who organized themselves and 
>>then performed lament in response to war, response to the absurdity of war, 
>>often joining forces with the other mourners from the other side, the 
>>"enemies".  It's the pollution of the polis through staining it with empathy 
>>and affect, that drives my recent work. Even more so, I think the political 
>>force comes out of that unknown, permeable, leaky state of mourning, when the 
>>boundaries between you and me and the third (as in Levinas) are prone to 
>>overlap or momentarily melt, because we are indeed undone by each other.

 Soldiers are trained to un-think the Other as a no-body, through developing a 
specific language or vocabulary that avoids any reference to human beings 
(target, casualty etc.) and also through the strategic enforcing of the agenda 
of difference, we and them. It would be a military tragedy (and humanity's 
victory) if we were to actually look at one another with the understanding that 
the boundaries of Otherness are porous and permeable.

[very interesting, this makes me want to go back and have another look at 
Theweleit's "Male Fantasies"]

I think of Lament also as a form,

Re: [-empyre-] public lament and gardening

[Alan Sondheim]

Ana, thank you for this and for the site. I've spent some time with it; as 
with Monika's work, it's overwhelming.


I have never had these experiences; I've been shot at, but from a 
distance. My own grief is sourceless in a sense, and selfish.


I do understand about the silence. And the amnesia of cities, which is why 
it is so important that New York has been recognizing its own history of 
slavery and draft riots, and why the African Burial Ground National 
Monument in lower Manhattan is so important; I always sent my students to 
the site.


- Alan


On Thu, 4 Oct 2012, Ana Vald?s wrote:


The nearest I was from a massgrave was Jenin, 2002, people were eerie
silent around the hole wich was Palestine's ground zero. Under the
hole were dismembered people, restaurantes blown in pieces, ashes,
bones, lonely shoes.
I wrote some texts from there, http://www.this.is/jenin

In the total mourning people were silent and the silence were heavier
than any shouting...
Ana

On Thu, Oct 4, 2012 at 11:26 PM, Alan Sondheim  wrote:


mourning, lament, are acts, they're intended, they're cultural expressions -
as long as one can mourn...

but what happens when mourning, lament, end, not through desire
but because the unspeakable becomes manifest - i think this is
where celan comes in for example, or the spaces in jabes' books
with the words themselves removed -




On Thu, 4 Oct 2012, Ana Vald?s wrote:


I think mourning and lament are related to the ceremonies of the
death. When I did my research as anthropologist I travelled to Mexico
and did a fieldwork in Yucatan, the old Maya empire. Their funerary
pyramids, specially in Palenque, were very similar to the Egyptian
pyramids. Many scenes painted in Palenque's walls were about death,
mourning, ceremonies to placate the wrath of the gods. The gods mourn
as well, the Greek gods mourned lost sons, dead sons, lost wives. I
think mourning and the act of mourning is a very healthy state, when
the repressed grief comes ut and is shouted or cried.
Ana

On Thu, Oct 4, 2012 at 9:06 PM, Monika Weiss 
wrote:


yes, if I understood you correctly Maria, you say that I am not trying to
work with grief over ones own complicity or remorse. I am more invested
in
the notion and symbolic power as well as real experience of communal
grief
-- this is what oppressive systems fear most -- the symbolic "power" of
the
connecting tissue of our emotions but not those on individual level alone

On Oct 4, 2012, at 6:41 PM, Maria Damon wrote:

Yes, when I mentioned Lamentations, I meant the Hebrew Bible. Old.
Grieving
for ones city, ones polis, ones people. Also, it seems that this is *not*
where you were going, Monika, a sense of grief over ones own possible
complicity, real or imagined... remorse.

On 10/4/12 5:55 PM, Monika Weiss wrote:

While aware of some of the lamentations explored by artists such as
Martha
Graham (who is not my favorite although I have a great respect for her)
--
what I am working towards is a connection with the older, before now,
before
any specific time, lamentation. My dancer actually took me to Wender's
film
about Pina Baush last Spring, and while aware of her name I never really
knew of this work until quite recently (maybe even Alan mentioned her to
me
a long time ago) but it took a person whose body literally inhabited my
work
'Sustenazo (Lament II)' to "discover" this work and a feeling of
connection.

Monika

On Oct 4, 2012, at 4:05 PM, Alan Sondheim wrote:


which "Lamentations" are you refering to? (not Martha Graham's
Lamentation?)


Book of Lamentations in English

All Sandy and I are/were on about, I think, is the silence and the
obdurate
that occurs in relaton to severe pain; I'm thinking for example of my
mother
shortly before her death, when she had been anesthetized to alleviate her
suffering in the hospice. The silence is also the silence at the heart of
the signifier; the signifier is both suture and broken suture, covering
and
dis/covering pain, naming it for those who are suffering, who can no
longer
hear the name, who are no longer with us, coffin or not - when my father
died, there were issues at the cemetary about the burial of ashes.

- Alan





Alan schreibt:



public lament and gardening


On Thu, 4 Oct 2012, Maria Damon wrote:


Is there then (I'm sort of assuming the answer is yes, but asking anyway
in

order to make it part of the fabric of the conversation) a way in which

lamentation is also critique as well as community self-constitution, as
in

Lamentations?



Maria, I wonder what sort of critique would be possible? Lamentations

seems to bridge the political and the obdurate. When pain becomes

overwhelming, silence is at the core and the signifier dissolves; I think

this is also the core of anguish. One is left speechless. On the other

hand, how much clarity is necessary for political or 'rational' thought?

In an odd way this also brings up mathematical thinking - which, from an

outsider point-of-view, seems based on the manip

Re: [-empyre-] public lament and gardening

[Ana Valdés]

The nearest I was from a massgrave was Jenin, 2002, people were eerie
silent around the hole wich was Palestine's ground zero. Under the
hole were dismembered people, restaurantes blown in pieces, ashes,
bones, lonely shoes.
I wrote some texts from there, http://www.this.is/jenin

In the total mourning people were silent and the silence were heavier
than any shouting...
Ana

On Thu, Oct 4, 2012 at 11:26 PM, Alan Sondheim  wrote:
>
> mourning, lament, are acts, they're intended, they're cultural expressions -
> as long as one can mourn...
>
> but what happens when mourning, lament, end, not through desire
> but because the unspeakable becomes manifest - i think this is
> where celan comes in for example, or the spaces in jabes' books
> with the words themselves removed -
>
>
>
>
> On Thu, 4 Oct 2012, Ana Vald?s wrote:
>
>> I think mourning and lament are related to the ceremonies of the
>> death. When I did my research as anthropologist I travelled to Mexico
>> and did a fieldwork in Yucatan, the old Maya empire. Their funerary
>> pyramids, specially in Palenque, were very similar to the Egyptian
>> pyramids. Many scenes painted in Palenque's walls were about death,
>> mourning, ceremonies to placate the wrath of the gods. The gods mourn
>> as well, the Greek gods mourned lost sons, dead sons, lost wives. I
>> think mourning and the act of mourning is a very healthy state, when
>> the repressed grief comes ut and is shouted or cried.
>> Ana
>>
>> On Thu, Oct 4, 2012 at 9:06 PM, Monika Weiss 
>> wrote:
>>>
>>> yes, if I understood you correctly Maria, you say that I am not trying to
>>> work with grief over ones own complicity or remorse. I am more invested
>>> in
>>> the notion and symbolic power as well as real experience of communal
>>> grief
>>> -- this is what oppressive systems fear most -- the symbolic "power" of
>>> the
>>> connecting tissue of our emotions but not those on individual level alone
>>>
>>> On Oct 4, 2012, at 6:41 PM, Maria Damon wrote:
>>>
>>> Yes, when I mentioned Lamentations, I meant the Hebrew Bible. Old.
>>> Grieving
>>> for ones city, ones polis, ones people. Also, it seems that this is *not*
>>> where you were going, Monika, a sense of grief over ones own possible
>>> complicity, real or imagined... remorse.
>>>
>>> On 10/4/12 5:55 PM, Monika Weiss wrote:
>>>
>>> While aware of some of the lamentations explored by artists such as
>>> Martha
>>> Graham (who is not my favorite although I have a great respect for her)
>>> --
>>> what I am working towards is a connection with the older, before now,
>>> before
>>> any specific time, lamentation. My dancer actually took me to Wender's
>>> film
>>> about Pina Baush last Spring, and while aware of her name I never really
>>> knew of this work until quite recently (maybe even Alan mentioned her to
>>> me
>>> a long time ago) but it took a person whose body literally inhabited my
>>> work
>>> 'Sustenazo (Lament II)' to "discover" this work and a feeling of
>>> connection.
>>>
>>> Monika
>>>
>>> On Oct 4, 2012, at 4:05 PM, Alan Sondheim wrote:
>>>
>>>
>>> which "Lamentations" are you refering to? (not Martha Graham's
>>> Lamentation?)
>>>
>>>
>>> Book of Lamentations in English
>>>
>>> All Sandy and I are/were on about, I think, is the silence and the
>>> obdurate
>>> that occurs in relaton to severe pain; I'm thinking for example of my
>>> mother
>>> shortly before her death, when she had been anesthetized to alleviate her
>>> suffering in the hospice. The silence is also the silence at the heart of
>>> the signifier; the signifier is both suture and broken suture, covering
>>> and
>>> dis/covering pain, naming it for those who are suffering, who can no
>>> longer
>>> hear the name, who are no longer with us, coffin or not - when my father
>>> died, there were issues at the cemetary about the burial of ashes.
>>>
>>> - Alan
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>> Alan schreibt:
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>> public lament and gardening
>>>
>>>
>>> On Thu, 4 Oct 2012, Maria Damon wrote:
>>>
>>>
>>> Is there then (I'm sort of assuming the answer is yes, but asking anyway
>>> in
>>>
>>> order to make it part of the fabric of the conversation) a way in which
>>>
>>> lamentation is also critique as well as community self-constitution, as
>>> in
>>>
>>> Lamentations?
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>> Maria, I wonder what sort of critique would be possible? Lamentations
>>>
>>> seems to bridge the political and the obdurate. When pain becomes
>>>
>>> overwhelming, silence is at the core and the signifier dissolves; I think
>>>
>>> this is also the core of anguish. One is left speechless. On the other
>>>
>>> hand, how much clarity is necessary for political or 'rational' thought?
>>>
>>> In an odd way this also brings up mathematical thinking - which, from an
>>>
>>> outsider point-of-view, seems based on the manipulation of symbols, but
>>>
>>> from within is much more of clouded movements with indeterminate focus
>>>
>>> (see Jacques Hadamard). Thinking itself, in other words, may well have

Re: [-empyre-] public lament and gardening

[Alan Sondheim]

mourning, lament, are acts, they're intended, they're cultural 
expressions - as long as one can mourn...


but what happens when mourning, lament, end, not through desire
but because the unspeakable becomes manifest - i think this is
where celan comes in for example, or the spaces in jabes' books
with the words themselves removed -



On Thu, 4 Oct 2012, Ana Vald?s wrote:


I think mourning and lament are related to the ceremonies of the
death. When I did my research as anthropologist I travelled to Mexico
and did a fieldwork in Yucatan, the old Maya empire. Their funerary
pyramids, specially in Palenque, were very similar to the Egyptian
pyramids. Many scenes painted in Palenque's walls were about death,
mourning, ceremonies to placate the wrath of the gods. The gods mourn
as well, the Greek gods mourned lost sons, dead sons, lost wives. I
think mourning and the act of mourning is a very healthy state, when
the repressed grief comes ut and is shouted or cried.
Ana

On Thu, Oct 4, 2012 at 9:06 PM, Monika Weiss  wrote:

yes, if I understood you correctly Maria, you say that I am not trying to
work with grief over ones own complicity or remorse. I am more invested in
the notion and symbolic power as well as real experience of communal grief
-- this is what oppressive systems fear most -- the symbolic "power" of the
connecting tissue of our emotions but not those on individual level alone

On Oct 4, 2012, at 6:41 PM, Maria Damon wrote:

Yes, when I mentioned Lamentations, I meant the Hebrew Bible. Old. Grieving
for ones city, ones polis, ones people. Also, it seems that this is *not*
where you were going, Monika, a sense of grief over ones own possible
complicity, real or imagined... remorse.

On 10/4/12 5:55 PM, Monika Weiss wrote:

While aware of some of the lamentations explored by artists such as Martha
Graham (who is not my favorite although I have a great respect for her) --
what I am working towards is a connection with the older, before now, before
any specific time, lamentation. My dancer actually took me to Wender's film
about Pina Baush last Spring, and while aware of her name I never really
knew of this work until quite recently (maybe even Alan mentioned her to me
a long time ago) but it took a person whose body literally inhabited my work
'Sustenazo (Lament II)' to "discover" this work and a feeling of connection.

Monika

On Oct 4, 2012, at 4:05 PM, Alan Sondheim wrote:


which "Lamentations" are you refering to? (not Martha Graham's Lamentation?)


Book of Lamentations in English

All Sandy and I are/were on about, I think, is the silence and the obdurate
that occurs in relaton to severe pain; I'm thinking for example of my mother
shortly before her death, when she had been anesthetized to alleviate her
suffering in the hospice. The silence is also the silence at the heart of
the signifier; the signifier is both suture and broken suture, covering and
dis/covering pain, naming it for those who are suffering, who can no longer
hear the name, who are no longer with us, coffin or not - when my father
died, there were issues at the cemetary about the burial of ashes.

- Alan





Alan schreibt:



public lament and gardening


On Thu, 4 Oct 2012, Maria Damon wrote:


Is there then (I'm sort of assuming the answer is yes, but asking anyway in

order to make it part of the fabric of the conversation) a way in which

lamentation is also critique as well as community self-constitution, as in

Lamentations?



Maria, I wonder what sort of critique would be possible? Lamentations

seems to bridge the political and the obdurate. When pain becomes

overwhelming, silence is at the core and the signifier dissolves; I think

this is also the core of anguish. One is left speechless. On the other

hand, how much clarity is necessary for political or 'rational' thought?

In an odd way this also brings up mathematical thinking - which, from an

outsider point-of-view, seems based on the manipulation of symbols, but

from within is much more of clouded movements with indeterminate focus

(see Jacques Hadamard). Thinking itself, in other words, may well have

less content than its representations, and certainly its representations

in virtual worlds, where everything, one way or another, is determinate

and rationalized on a pixel-by-pixel level.


___

empyre forum

empyre@lists.cofa.unsw.edu.au

http://www.subtle.net/empyre


___
empyre forum
empyre@lists.cofa.unsw.edu.au
http://www.subtle.net/empyre


M o n i k a   W e i s s   S t u d i o
456 Broome Street, 4
New York, NY 10013
Phone: 212-226-6736
Mobile: 646-660-2809
www.monika-weiss.com
gnie...@monika-weiss.com

M o n i k a   W e i s s
Assistant Professor
Graduate School of Art & Hybrid Media
Sam Fox School of Design & Visual Arts
Washington University in St. Louis
Campus Box 1031
One Brookings Drive
St. Louis, MO 63130
mwe...@samfox.wustl.edu
http://samfoxschool.wustl.e

Re: [-empyre-] public lament and gardening

[Ana Valdés]

I think mourning and lament are related to the ceremonies of the
death. When I did my research as anthropologist I travelled to Mexico
and did a fieldwork in Yucatan, the old Maya empire. Their funerary
pyramids, specially in Palenque, were very similar to the Egyptian
pyramids. Many scenes painted in Palenque's walls were about death,
mourning, ceremonies to placate the wrath of the gods. The gods mourn
as well, the Greek gods mourned lost sons, dead sons, lost wives. I
think mourning and the act of mourning is a very healthy state, when
the repressed grief comes ut and is shouted or cried.
Ana

On Thu, Oct 4, 2012 at 9:06 PM, Monika Weiss  wrote:
> yes, if I understood you correctly Maria, you say that I am not trying to
> work with grief over ones own complicity or remorse. I am more invested in
> the notion and symbolic power as well as real experience of communal grief
> -- this is what oppressive systems fear most -- the symbolic "power" of the
> connecting tissue of our emotions but not those on individual level alone
>
> On Oct 4, 2012, at 6:41 PM, Maria Damon wrote:
>
> Yes, when I mentioned Lamentations, I meant the Hebrew Bible. Old. Grieving
> for ones city, ones polis, ones people. Also, it seems that this is *not*
> where you were going, Monika, a sense of grief over ones own possible
> complicity, real or imagined... remorse.
>
> On 10/4/12 5:55 PM, Monika Weiss wrote:
>
> While aware of some of the lamentations explored by artists such as Martha
> Graham (who is not my favorite although I have a great respect for her) --
> what I am working towards is a connection with the older, before now, before
> any specific time, lamentation. My dancer actually took me to Wender's film
> about Pina Baush last Spring, and while aware of her name I never really
> knew of this work until quite recently (maybe even Alan mentioned her to me
> a long time ago) but it took a person whose body literally inhabited my work
> 'Sustenazo (Lament II)' to "discover" this work and a feeling of connection.
>
> Monika
>
> On Oct 4, 2012, at 4:05 PM, Alan Sondheim wrote:
>
>
> which "Lamentations" are you refering to? (not Martha Graham's Lamentation?)
>
>
> Book of Lamentations in English
>
> All Sandy and I are/were on about, I think, is the silence and the obdurate
> that occurs in relaton to severe pain; I'm thinking for example of my mother
> shortly before her death, when she had been anesthetized to alleviate her
> suffering in the hospice. The silence is also the silence at the heart of
> the signifier; the signifier is both suture and broken suture, covering and
> dis/covering pain, naming it for those who are suffering, who can no longer
> hear the name, who are no longer with us, coffin or not - when my father
> died, there were issues at the cemetary about the burial of ashes.
>
> - Alan
>
>
>
>
>
> Alan schreibt:
>
>
>
> public lament and gardening
>
>
> On Thu, 4 Oct 2012, Maria Damon wrote:
>
>
> Is there then (I'm sort of assuming the answer is yes, but asking anyway in
>
> order to make it part of the fabric of the conversation) a way in which
>
> lamentation is also critique as well as community self-constitution, as in
>
> Lamentations?
>
>
>
> Maria, I wonder what sort of critique would be possible? Lamentations
>
> seems to bridge the political and the obdurate. When pain becomes
>
> overwhelming, silence is at the core and the signifier dissolves; I think
>
> this is also the core of anguish. One is left speechless. On the other
>
> hand, how much clarity is necessary for political or 'rational' thought?
>
> In an odd way this also brings up mathematical thinking - which, from an
>
> outsider point-of-view, seems based on the manipulation of symbols, but
>
> from within is much more of clouded movements with indeterminate focus
>
> (see Jacques Hadamard). Thinking itself, in other words, may well have
>
> less content than its representations, and certainly its representations
>
> in virtual worlds, where everything, one way or another, is determinate
>
> and rationalized on a pixel-by-pixel level.
>
>
> ___
>
> empyre forum
>
> empyre@lists.cofa.unsw.edu.au
>
> http://www.subtle.net/empyre
>
>
> ___
> empyre forum
> empyre@lists.cofa.unsw.edu.au
> http://www.subtle.net/empyre
>
>
> M o n i k a   W e i s s   S t u d i o
> 456 Broome Street, 4
> New York, NY 10013
> Phone: 212-226-6736
> Mobile: 646-660-2809
> www.monika-weiss.com
> gnie...@monika-weiss.com
>
> M o n i k a   W e i s s
> Assistant Professor
> Graduate School of Art & Hybrid Media
> Sam Fox School of Design & Visual Arts
> Washington University in St. Louis
> Campus Box 1031
> One Brookings Drive
> St. Louis, MO 63130
> mwe...@samfox.wustl.edu
> http://samfoxschool.wustl.edu/portfolios/faculty/monika_weiss
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
> ___
> empyre forum
> empyre@lists.cofa.unsw.edu.au
> http://www.subtle.net/empyre

Re: [-empyre-] public lament and gardening

[Monika Weiss]

yes, if I understood you correctly Maria, you say that I am not trying to work 
with grief over ones own complicity or remorse. I am more invested in the 
notion and symbolic power as well as real experience of communal grief -- this 
is what oppressive systems fear most -- the symbolic "power" of the connecting 
tissue of our emotions but not those on individual level alone
On Oct 4, 2012, at 6:41 PM, Maria Damon wrote:

> Yes, when I mentioned Lamentations, I meant the Hebrew Bible. Old. Grieving 
> for ones city, ones polis, ones people. Also, it seems that this is *not* 
> where you were going, Monika, a sense of grief over ones own possible 
> complicity, real or imagined... remorse.
> 
> On 10/4/12 5:55 PM, Monika Weiss wrote:
>> While aware of some of the lamentations explored by artists such as Martha 
>> Graham (who is not my favorite although I have a great respect for her) -- 
>> what I am working towards is a connection with the older, before now, before 
>> any specific time, lamentation. My dancer actually took me to Wender's film 
>> about Pina Baush last Spring, and while aware of her name I never really 
>> knew of this work until quite recently (maybe even Alan mentioned her to me 
>> a long time ago) but it took a person whose body literally inhabited my work 
>> 'Sustenazo (Lament II)' to "discover" this work and a feeling of connection.
>> 
>> Monika
>> 
>> On Oct 4, 2012, at 4:05 PM, Alan Sondheim wrote:
>> 
>>> 
 which "Lamentations" are you refering to? (not Martha Graham's 
 Lamentation?) 
>>> 
>>> Book of Lamentations in English
>>> 
>>> All Sandy and I are/were on about, I think, is the silence and the obdurate 
>>> that occurs in relaton to severe pain; I'm thinking for example of my 
>>> mother shortly before her death, when she had been anesthetized to 
>>> alleviate her suffering in the hospice. The silence is also the silence at 
>>> the heart of the signifier; the signifier is both suture and broken suture, 
>>> covering and dis/covering pain, naming it for those who are suffering, who 
>>> can no longer hear the name, who are no longer with us, coffin or not - 
>>> when my father died, there were issues at the cemetary about the burial of 
>>> ashes.
>>> 
>>> - Alan
>>> 
>>> 
>>> 
>>> 
 
 Alan schreibt:
 
 
 public lament and gardening
 
 On Thu, 4 Oct 2012, Maria Damon wrote:
 
> Is there then (I'm sort of assuming the answer is yes, but asking anyway 
> in
> order to make it part of the fabric of the conversation) a way in which
> lamentation is also critique as well as community self-constitution, as in
> Lamentations?
> 
 
 Maria, I wonder what sort of critique would be possible? Lamentations
 seems to bridge the political and the obdurate. When pain becomes
 overwhelming, silence is at the core and the signifier dissolves; I think
 this is also the core of anguish. One is left speechless. On the other
 hand, how much clarity is necessary for political or 'rational' thought?
 In an odd way this also brings up mathematical thinking - which, from an
 outsider point-of-view, seems based on the manipulation of symbols, but
 from within is much more of clouded movements with indeterminate focus
 (see Jacques Hadamard). Thinking itself, in other words, may well have
 less content than its representations, and certainly its representations
 in virtual worlds, where everything, one way or another, is determinate
 and rationalized on a pixel-by-pixel level.
 
 ___
 empyre forum
 empyre@lists.cofa.unsw.edu.au
 http://www.subtle.net/empyre
>>> 
>>> ___
>>> empyre forum
>>> empyre@lists.cofa.unsw.edu.au
>>> http://www.subtle.net/empyre
>> 
>> M o n i k a   W e i s s   S t u d i o
>> 456 Broome Street, 4
>> New York, NY 10013
>> Phone: 212-226-6736
>> Mobile: 646-660-2809
>> www.monika-weiss.com
>> gnie...@monika-weiss.com 
>> 
>> M o n i k a   W e i s s
>> Assistant Professor
>> Graduate School of Art & Hybrid Media
>> Sam Fox School of Design & Visual Arts  
>> Washington University in St. Louis 
>> Campus Box 1031 
>> One Brookings Drive 
>> St. Louis, MO 63130 
>> mwe...@samfox.wustl.edu
>> http://samfoxschool.wustl.edu/portfolios/faculty/monika_weiss
>> 
>> 
>> 
>> 
>> 
>> 
>> 
>> 
>> ___
>> empyre forum
>> empyre@lists.cofa.unsw.edu.au
>> http://www.subtle.net/empyre
> 
> ___
> empyre forum
> empyre@lists.cofa.unsw.edu.au
> http://www.subtle.net/empyre

M o n i k a   W e i s s   S t u d i o
456 Broome Street, 4
New York, NY 10013
Phone: 212-226-6736
Mobile: 646-660-2809
www.monika-weiss.com
gnie...@monika-weiss.com 

M o n i k a   W e i s s
Assistant Professor
Graduate School of Art & Hybrid Media
Sam Fox School of Design & Visual Arts  
Washington University in St. Lou

Re: [-empyre-] public lament and gardening

[Maria Damon]

Yes, when I mentioned Lamentations, I meant the Hebrew Bible. Old. 
Grieving for ones city, ones polis, ones people. Also, it seems that 
this is *not* where you were going, Monika, a sense of grief over ones 
own possible complicity, real or imagined... remorse.


On 10/4/12 5:55 PM, Monika Weiss wrote:
While aware of some of the lamentations explored by artists such 
as Martha Graham (who is not my favorite although I have a great 
respect for her) -- what I am working towards is a connection with the 
older, before now, before any specific time, lamentation. My dancer 
actually took me to Wender's film about Pina Baush last Spring, and 
while aware of her name I never really knew of this work until quite 
recently (maybe even Alan mentioned her to me a long time ago) but it 
took a person whose body literally inhabited my work 'Sustenazo 
(Lament II)' to "discover" this work and a feeling of connection.


Monika

On Oct 4, 2012, at 4:05 PM, Alan Sondheim wrote:



which "Lamentations" are you refering to? (not Martha Graham's 
Lamentation?)


Book of Lamentations in English

All Sandy and I are/were on about, I think, is the silence and the 
obdurate that occurs in relaton to severe pain; I'm thinking for 
example of my mother shortly before her death, when she had been 
anesthetized to alleviate her suffering in the hospice. The silence 
is also the silence at the heart of the signifier; the signifier is 
both suture and broken suture, covering and dis/covering pain, naming 
it for those who are suffering, who can no longer hear the name, who 
are no longer with us, coffin or not - when my father died, there 
were issues at the cemetary about the burial of ashes.


- Alan






Alan schreibt:


public lament and gardening

On Thu, 4 Oct 2012, Maria Damon wrote:

Is there then (I'm sort of assuming the answer is yes, but asking 
anyway in

order to make it part of the fabric of the conversation) a way in which
lamentation is also critique as well as community 
self-constitution, as in

Lamentations?



Maria, I wonder what sort of critique would be possible? Lamentations
seems to bridge the political and the obdurate. When pain becomes
overwhelming, silence is at the core and the signifier dissolves; I 
think

this is also the core of anguish. One is left speechless. On the other
hand, how much clarity is necessary for political or 'rational' thought?
In an odd way this also brings up mathematical thinking - which, from an
outsider point-of-view, seems based on the manipulation of symbols, but
from within is much more of clouded movements with indeterminate focus
(see Jacques Hadamard). Thinking itself, in other words, may well have
less content than its representations, and certainly its representations
in virtual worlds, where everything, one way or another, is determinate
and rationalized on a pixel-by-pixel level.

___
empyre forum
empyre@lists.cofa.unsw.edu.au 
http://www.subtle.net/empyre


___
empyre forum
empyre@lists.cofa.unsw.edu.au 
http://www.subtle.net/empyre


M o n i k a   W e i s s   S t u d i o
456 Broome Street, 4
New York, NY 10013
Phone: 212-226-6736
Mobile: 646-660-2809
www.monika-weiss.com 
gnie...@monika-weiss.com 

M o n i k a   W e i s s
Assistant Professor
Graduate School of Art & Hybrid Media
Sam Fox School of Design & Visual Arts
Washington University in St. Louis
Campus Box 1031
One Brookings Drive
St. Louis, MO 63130
mwe...@samfox.wustl.edu 
http://samfoxschool.wustl.edu/portfolios/faculty/monika_weiss








___
empyre forum
empyre@lists.cofa.unsw.edu.au
http://www.subtle.net/empyre


___
empyre forum
empyre@lists.cofa.unsw.edu.au
http://www.subtle.net/empyre

Re: [-empyre-] public lament and gardening

[Monika Weiss]

While aware of some of the lamentations explored by artists such as Martha 
Graham (who is not my favorite although I have a great respect for her) -- what 
I am working towards is a connection with the older, before now, before any 
specific time, lamentation. My dancer actually took me to Wender's film about 
Pina Baush last Spring, and while aware of her name I never really knew of this 
work until quite recently (maybe even Alan mentioned her to me a long time ago) 
but it took a person whose body literally inhabited my work 'Sustenazo (Lament 
II)' to "discover" this work and a feeling of connection.

Monika

On Oct 4, 2012, at 4:05 PM, Alan Sondheim wrote:

> 
>> which "Lamentations" are you refering to? (not Martha Graham's Lamentation?) 
> 
> Book of Lamentations in English
> 
> All Sandy and I are/were on about, I think, is the silence and the obdurate 
> that occurs in relaton to severe pain; I'm thinking for example of my mother 
> shortly before her death, when she had been anesthetized to alleviate her 
> suffering in the hospice. The silence is also the silence at the heart of the 
> signifier; the signifier is both suture and broken suture, covering and 
> dis/covering pain, naming it for those who are suffering, who can no longer 
> hear the name, who are no longer with us, coffin or not - when my father 
> died, there were issues at the cemetary about the burial of ashes.
> 
> - Alan
> 
> 
> 
> 
>> 
>> Alan schreibt:
>> 
>> 
>> public lament and gardening
>> 
>> On Thu, 4 Oct 2012, Maria Damon wrote:
>> 
>>> Is there then (I'm sort of assuming the answer is yes, but asking anyway in
>>> order to make it part of the fabric of the conversation) a way in which
>>> lamentation is also critique as well as community self-constitution, as in
>>> Lamentations?
>>> 
>> 
>> Maria, I wonder what sort of critique would be possible? Lamentations
>> seems to bridge the political and the obdurate. When pain becomes
>> overwhelming, silence is at the core and the signifier dissolves; I think
>> this is also the core of anguish. One is left speechless. On the other
>> hand, how much clarity is necessary for political or 'rational' thought?
>> In an odd way this also brings up mathematical thinking - which, from an
>> outsider point-of-view, seems based on the manipulation of symbols, but
>> from within is much more of clouded movements with indeterminate focus
>> (see Jacques Hadamard). Thinking itself, in other words, may well have
>> less content than its representations, and certainly its representations
>> in virtual worlds, where everything, one way or another, is determinate
>> and rationalized on a pixel-by-pixel level.
>> 
>> ___
>> empyre forum
>> empyre@lists.cofa.unsw.edu.au
>> http://www.subtle.net/empyre
> 
> ___
> empyre forum
> empyre@lists.cofa.unsw.edu.au
> http://www.subtle.net/empyre

M o n i k a   W e i s s   S t u d i o
456 Broome Street, 4
New York, NY 10013
Phone: 212-226-6736
Mobile: 646-660-2809
www.monika-weiss.com
gnie...@monika-weiss.com 

M o n i k a   W e i s s
Assistant Professor
Graduate School of Art & Hybrid Media
Sam Fox School of Design & Visual Arts  
Washington University in St. Louis 
Campus Box 1031 
One Brookings Drive 
St. Louis, MO 63130 
mwe...@samfox.wustl.edu
http://samfoxschool.wustl.edu/portfolios/faculty/monika_weiss






___
empyre forum
empyre@lists.cofa.unsw.edu.au
http://www.subtle.net/empyre

Re: [-empyre-] public lament and gardening

[Alan Sondheim]

which "Lamentations" are you refering to? 
(not Martha Graham's Lamentation?) 



Book of Lamentations in English

All Sandy and I are/were on about, I think, is the silence and the 
obdurate that occurs in relaton to severe pain; I'm thinking for example 
of my mother shortly before her death, when she had been anesthetized to 
alleviate her suffering in the hospice. The silence is also the silence at 
the heart of the signifier; the signifier is both suture and broken 
suture, covering and dis/covering pain, naming it for those who are 
suffering, who can no longer hear the name, who are no longer with us, 
coffin or not - when my father died, there were issues at the cemetary 
about the burial of ashes.


- Alan






Alan schreibt:


public lament and gardening

On Thu, 4 Oct 2012, Maria Damon wrote:


Is there then (I'm sort of assuming the answer is yes, but asking anyway in
order to make it part of the fabric of the conversation) a way in which
lamentation is also critique as well as community self-constitution, as in
Lamentations?



Maria, I wonder what sort of critique would be possible? Lamentations
seems to bridge the political and the obdurate. When pain becomes
overwhelming, silence is at the core and the signifier dissolves; I think
this is also the core of anguish. One is left speechless. On the other
hand, how much clarity is necessary for political or 'rational' thought?
In an odd way this also brings up mathematical thinking - which, from an
outsider point-of-view, seems based on the manipulation of symbols, but
from within is much more of clouded movements with indeterminate focus
(see Jacques Hadamard). Thinking itself, in other words, may well have
less content than its representations, and certainly its representations
in virtual worlds, where everything, one way or another, is determinate
and rationalized on a pixel-by-pixel level.

___
empyre forum
empyre@lists.cofa.unsw.edu.au
http://www.subtle.net/empyre


___
empyre forum
empyre@lists.cofa.unsw.edu.au
http://www.subtle.net/empyre

Re: [-empyre-] public lament and gardening

[Monika Weiss]

Thank you Patricia that means a lot.

Monika
On Oct 4, 2012, at 11:17 AM, Clough, Patricia wrote:

> Oh  I agree   the sounds  are exquisite   touching me.Patricia 
> 
> 
> From: empyre-boun...@lists.cofa.unsw.edu.au 
> [empyre-boun...@lists.cofa.unsw.edu.au] On Behalf Of Johannes Birringer 
> [johannes.birrin...@brunel.ac.uk]
> Sent: Wednesday, October 03, 2012 2:39 PM
> To: soft_skinned_space
> Subject: Re: [-empyre-] public lament and gardening
> 
> Dear all
> 
> thank you Monika for your text/introduction to your understanding of the 
> system of lament, and "public lament as performative and political act in 
> public domain"
> -- this is richly evocative and will have to go back to your writing after 
> looking at some of your work (the slides, and the films or film excerpts you 
> include on
> http://www.streamingmuseum.org/content/monika-weiss/
> I am listening to the sound now, of two of your videos.  I was struck, 
> entering the site, to also find your reference to Cage's silence.
> on first viewing/listening, your visual-sonic work has quite a mesmerizing 
> quality.  I am just responding now, without thinking, to my listening, and
> also watching the face(s) of the women in your films. (this listening is now 
> private, at a screen, in the dark of my room). so no public lament this.
> But you stage these works in public galleries or spaces, and they are visited 
> by the "public". how then does such work function in an art context?
> can it become a ritualizing space?
> 
> but i shall look forward to reading more concisely (see below) your position, 
> also in regard to the questions already brought up by Alan, when in his last 
> post he  speaks of
> the "overwhelming suffering of the world," stating that he does "not know how 
> to accommodate all of this".  This followed the conversation about
> pain, torture, memory begun by Ana.
> 
> This accommodation will concern us, in the coming days, i am sure.
> 
> Monika, could you expand a little on your reference to Zygmunt Baumann's idea 
> of "gardening" .
> What idea is this?
> 
> And Ana, I began to delve into your longer text on the migration from torture.
> It is a very complex and fascinating text, and i agree with Alan that the 
> "clickable words" are a rather amazing intrusion function of the website.
> 
> I clicked "perfume"
> 
>>> We did not find any results for perfume.
> Search tips:
>Ensure words are spelled correctly.
>Try rephrasing keywords or using synonyms.
>Try less specific keywords.
> Make your queries as concise as possible.
>>> 
> 
> 
> with regards
> Johannes Birringer
> dap-lab
> 
> Monika schreibt:
> 
>>> 
> Interesting question below from Alan about the nature of video as a catalyst 
> for memory, pain and lament and later I would like to expand that part of our 
> discussion towards the performative and the circular in terms of the 
> relationships between cinematic mirroring and lament as well as pain. Just 
> briefly for now -- about torture. I am more preoccupied with torture 
> inflicted by governments, institutions and systems that often hide their 
> violence -- as you know only recently in my city of origins, Warsaw, a CIA 
> compound was found in which "suspected terrorists" were kept for a number of 
> years and tortured by US forces, without any real knowledge amongst the civil 
> part of the Polish government. There are thousands of examples of course. 
> Massive, systematic pain and torture systems, the ones that are pre-designed 
> by others, "enlightened", designed by those who are in power or who represent 
> structures of power and hegemony not because of hate, anger or any other 
> emotion but becau
> se of fulfilling some abstracted and pragmatic goal, akin to Zygmunt 
> Baumann's idea of "gardening" .
>>> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> ___
> empyre forum
> empyre@lists.cofa.unsw.edu.au
> http://www.subtle.net/empyre
> ___
> empyre forum
> empyre@lists.cofa.unsw.edu.au
> http://www.subtle.net/empyre

M o n i k a   W e i s s   S t u d i o
456 Broome Street, 4
New York, NY 10013
Phone: 212-226-6736
Mobile: 646-660-2809
www.monika-weiss.com
gnie...@monika-weiss.com 

M o n i k a   W e i s s
Assistant Professor
Graduate School of Art & Hybrid Media
Sam Fox School of Design & Visual Arts  
Washington University in St. Louis 
Campus Box 1031 
One Brookings Drive 
St. Louis, MO 63130 
mwe...@samfox.wustl.edu
http://samfoxschool.wustl.edu/portfolios/faculty/monika_weiss






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Re: [-empyre-] public lament and gardening

[Monika Weiss]

Dear Johannes,

I think a lot of the interest in the visceral experience, in the choreographed 
language of gestures and the language of stillness, almost-silence --arrive to 
me from music - Thomas Mann wrote in 1943, as he was working on Doctor Faustus, 
that at the turn of the century, when music understood itself as music, it also 
understood itself as lamentation. There is a lot of research done around the 
origins of the form of Lament in music and in poetry (such as M. Alexiou) and 
the consensus seems to be that it came from a dialogue, most likely an imagined 
conversation with the dead or with their tomb. There is something powerful in 
this consideration, if we were to agree with Mann, that music, and by 
extension, all art, is lyrical, and it mourns.

What I have been developing though is a sort of machina memoralis where 
individual loss is merged with the loss on the scale of a genocide. What I take 
from music is the rhythm, its ability to permeate matter, at least in the way 
our body receives it, and the polyphony of voices. What I also always need are 
the stains and fractures of the real lived experience. Sometimes through life 
presence and communal gesture (such as lying down and leaving marks and traces 
together with other passersby as a drawing landscape, which I then film and 
edit into a new universe), or through an archive/presence of actual objects 
related to an event and their traces that accompany the filmed, silent gestures 
and the sound evocations. 

Your question about how it all functions is not an easy one but it's not 
impossible to answer. What comes to mind is that the work always exists in the 
context of the site and the context of one's life work, even one's writing. the 
projects I did in Dresden, New York. Potsdam, Warsaw or now Santiago -- and 
many other places -- the past are inscribed in the body of the city, so this 
forms one level of context. The prolonged moment, the experience of the 
passerby (I don't like the word "viewers" or "audience" and I always insist on 
"experiencer"), offers a possibility of a dialogue, the ABA, a return and 
circularity between presences. It happened to me many times that people, even 
very young people, would come to me and say  "I came yesterday and I decided to 
come back today to see it again" and there are those who come back many times 
or stay for a very long time in the space of the project... 

To be continued...

Monika
On Oct 4, 2012, at 1:14 PM, Johannes Birringer wrote:

> 
> which "Lamentations" are you refering to? 
> (not Martha Graham's Lamentation?) The lament of nation-building
> 
> I'd be interested in this idea of the critique of the ritual and the 
> community self-restitution,
> and also in a review how lament becomes a gesture (in performance and 
> film/filmed performance/then in stilled photograph)
> of witnessing and what Monika describes as "witnessing and enunciation  
> sequenced to non-linear time[with] compose[d] sound from testimonies, 
> recitations, laments, the environment..."
> I was interested in the staging of lament, Monika, and how it loses all aura 
> (in Benjamin's writing on something that may have been originary or original) 
> thereby, or retains some?, and how people today, 
> perhaps, are divesting themselves of having to witness ageing, decrepitude, 
> decay, catatonia, living absence, death. 
> 
> Not sure, i know many folks, in the old village, who are care takers and who 
> are
> witnessing the disappearance of loved ones, the sliding away, in pain or 
> tranced, stilled pain (medicated), but Yoko Ishiguro, a Japanese performance 
> artist who studied at my school, recently staged
> her symbolic passing outside the library, had herself placed and buried in a 
> coffin and transmitted all that action through the network to test whether 
> the net would be a kind or tomb archive for later generations to look back to 
> Yoko's death at the foot of the library and how would the data be preserved? 
> Yoko told me she was reacting to the crass commodification of death she 
> observed, with funeral trade shows and, for example, the Japanese 
> cyber-burial companies which invite the dead to be “buried” on the website so 
> that you can visit there online.She saw this commodification in the 
> Benjamin sense of raising questions about "work: (art) in the era of 
> technical reproducibility.
> 
> So my question (this is before Alan and Sandy's dense textdialiogue about the 
> signifier of pain arrived, which i have not been able to translate) was still 
> to Monika to try to describe how she sees her work function, and what effect 
> is produced, and how the audience is drawn into the long circle or not. And 
> can there ever be audience in lamentation/mourning? 
> 
> 
> (PS.  i personally have no problems with weeds (as weeds), i love them in my 
> garden and tend to them, and they are migrants too, some weeds have travel 
> from far but i didn't know there were wee

Re: [-empyre-] public lament and gardening

[Monika Weiss]

I wish I was there to witness it...

I think collective catharsis could be the very foundation of the political 
community of citizens.

On Oct 4, 2012, at 1:51 PM, Ana Valdés wrote:

> For me the lament is a kind of collective catharsis, as the mourning
> itself. I has been in Palestine several times and see and listened to
> the collective mourning of the women when some of their relatives or
> friends are killed or buried, a kind of powerful roaring, not the
> claiming not the whinning but the power of a repressed cry or
> shouting.
> Ana
> 
> On Thu, Oct 4, 2012 at 3:14 PM, Johannes Birringer
>  wrote:
>> 
>> which "Lamentations" are you refering to?
>> (not Martha Graham's Lamentation?) The lament of nation-building
>> 
>> I'd be interested in this idea of the critique of the ritual and the 
>> community self-restitution,
>> and also in a review how lament becomes a gesture (in performance and 
>> film/filmed performance/then in stilled photograph)
>> of witnessing and what Monika describes as "witnessing and enunciation  
>> sequenced to non-linear time[with] compose[d] sound from testimonies, 
>> recitations, laments, the environment..."
>> I was interested in the staging of lament, Monika, and how it loses all aura 
>> (in Benjamin's writing on something that may have been originary or 
>> original) thereby, or retains some?, and how people today,
>> perhaps, are divesting themselves of having to witness ageing, decrepitude, 
>> decay, catatonia, living absence, death.
>> 
>> Not sure, i know many folks, in the old village, who are care takers and who 
>> are
>> witnessing the disappearance of loved ones, the sliding away, in pain or 
>> tranced, stilled pain (medicated), but Yoko Ishiguro, a Japanese performance 
>> artist who studied at my school, recently staged
>> her symbolic passing outside the library, had herself placed and buried in a 
>> coffin and transmitted all that action through the network to test whether 
>> the net would be a kind or tomb archive for later generations to look back 
>> to Yoko's death at the foot of the library and how would the data be 
>> preserved? Yoko told me she was reacting to the crass commodification of 
>> death she observed, with funeral trade shows and, for example, the Japanese 
>> cyber-burial companies which invite the dead to be "buried" on the website 
>> so that you can visit there online.She saw this commodification in 
>> the Benjamin sense of raising questions about "work: (art) in the era of 
>> technical reproducibility.
>> 
>> So my question (this is before Alan and Sandy's dense textdialiogue about 
>> the signifier of pain arrived, which i have not been able to translate) was 
>> still to Monika to try to describe how she sees her work function, and what 
>> effect is produced, and how the audience is drawn into the long circle or 
>> not. And can there ever be audience in lamentation/mourning?
>> 
>> 
>> (PS.  i personally have no problems with weeds (as weeds), i love them in my 
>> garden and tend to them, and they are migrants too, some weeds have travel 
>> from far but i didn't know there were weeds, some one has to point out. that 
>> must be the signifier. I had never thought of them in the sense of homo 
>> sacer. This astonished me, Monika, that you mention Agamben,  after 
>> "Nowoczesność i Zaglada".   thank you for responding to my query, and in 
>> think Alan's answer is not quite responding to Bauman's critical analysis of 
>> the garden society, and what the writing may also have to tell us about 
>> politics of integration or assimilation of impairment, otherness.
>> 
>> respectfully
>> Johannes Birringer
>> 
>> 
>> Alan schreibt:
>> 
>> 
>> public lament and gardening
>> 
>> On Thu, 4 Oct 2012, Maria Damon wrote:
>> 
>>> Is there then (I'm sort of assuming the answer is yes, but asking anyway in
>>> order to make it part of the fabric of the conversation) a way in which
>>> lamentation is also critique as well as community self-constitution, as in
>>> Lamentations?
>>> 
>> 
>> Maria, I wonder what sort of critique would be possible? Lamentations
>> seems to bridge the political and the obdurate. When pain becomes
>> overwhelming, silence is at the core and the signifier dissolves; I think
>> this is also the core of anguish. One is left speechless. On the other
>> hand, how much clarity is necessary for political or 'rational' thought?
>> In an odd way this also brings up mathematical thinking - which, from an
>> outsider point-of-view, seems based on the manipulation of symbols, but
>> from within is much more of clouded movements with indeterminate focus
>> (see Jacques Hadamard). Thinking itself, in other words, may well have
>> less content than its representations, and certainly its representations
>> in virtual worlds, where everything, one way or another, is determinate
>> and rationalized on a pixel-by-pixel level.
>> 
>> ___
>> empyre forum
>> empyre@lis

Re: [-empyre-] public lament and gardening

[Ana Valdés]

For me the lament is a kind of collective catharsis, as the mourning
itself. I has been in Palestine several times and see and listened to
the collective mourning of the women when some of their relatives or
friends are killed or buried, a kind of powerful roaring, not the
claiming not the whinning but the power of a repressed cry or
shouting.
Ana

On Thu, Oct 4, 2012 at 3:14 PM, Johannes Birringer
 wrote:
>
> which "Lamentations" are you refering to?
> (not Martha Graham's Lamentation?) The lament of nation-building
>
> I'd be interested in this idea of the critique of the ritual and the 
> community self-restitution,
> and also in a review how lament becomes a gesture (in performance and 
> film/filmed performance/then in stilled photograph)
> of witnessing and what Monika describes as "witnessing and enunciation  
> sequenced to non-linear time[with] compose[d] sound from testimonies, 
> recitations, laments, the environment..."
> I was interested in the staging of lament, Monika, and how it loses all aura 
> (in Benjamin's writing on something that may have been originary or original) 
> thereby, or retains some?, and how people today,
> perhaps, are divesting themselves of having to witness ageing, decrepitude, 
> decay, catatonia, living absence, death.
>
> Not sure, i know many folks, in the old village, who are care takers and who 
> are
> witnessing the disappearance of loved ones, the sliding away, in pain or 
> tranced, stilled pain (medicated), but Yoko Ishiguro, a Japanese performance 
> artist who studied at my school, recently staged
> her symbolic passing outside the library, had herself placed and buried in a 
> coffin and transmitted all that action through the network to test whether 
> the net would be a kind or tomb archive for later generations to look back to 
> Yoko's death at the foot of the library and how would the data be preserved? 
> Yoko told me she was reacting to the crass commodification of death she 
> observed, with funeral trade shows and, for example, the Japanese 
> cyber-burial companies which invite the dead to be "buried" on the website so 
> that you can visit there online.She saw this commodification in the 
> Benjamin sense of raising questions about "work: (art) in the era of 
> technical reproducibility.
>
> So my question (this is before Alan and Sandy's dense textdialiogue about the 
> signifier of pain arrived, which i have not been able to translate) was still 
> to Monika to try to describe how she sees her work function, and what effect 
> is produced, and how the audience is drawn into the long circle or not. And 
> can there ever be audience in lamentation/mourning?
>
>
> (PS.  i personally have no problems with weeds (as weeds), i love them in my 
> garden and tend to them, and they are migrants too, some weeds have travel 
> from far but i didn't know there were weeds, some one has to point out. that 
> must be the signifier. I had never thought of them in the sense of homo 
> sacer. This astonished me, Monika, that you mention Agamben,  after 
> "Nowoczesność i Zaglada".   thank you for responding to my query, and in 
> think Alan's answer is not quite responding to Bauman's critical analysis of 
> the garden society, and what the writing may also have to tell us about 
> politics of integration or assimilation of impairment, otherness.
>
> respectfully
> Johannes Birringer
>
>
> Alan schreibt:
>
>
>  public lament and gardening
>
> On Thu, 4 Oct 2012, Maria Damon wrote:
>
>> Is there then (I'm sort of assuming the answer is yes, but asking anyway in
>> order to make it part of the fabric of the conversation) a way in which
>> lamentation is also critique as well as community self-constitution, as in
>> Lamentations?
>>
>
> Maria, I wonder what sort of critique would be possible? Lamentations
> seems to bridge the political and the obdurate. When pain becomes
> overwhelming, silence is at the core and the signifier dissolves; I think
> this is also the core of anguish. One is left speechless. On the other
> hand, how much clarity is necessary for political or 'rational' thought?
> In an odd way this also brings up mathematical thinking - which, from an
> outsider point-of-view, seems based on the manipulation of symbols, but
> from within is much more of clouded movements with indeterminate focus
> (see Jacques Hadamard). Thinking itself, in other words, may well have
> less content than its representations, and certainly its representations
> in virtual worlds, where everything, one way or another, is determinate
> and rationalized on a pixel-by-pixel level.
>
> ___
> empyre forum
> empyre@lists.cofa.unsw.edu.au
> http://www.subtle.net/empyre



-- 
http://writings-escrituras.tumblr.com/
http://maraya.tumblr.com/
http://www.twitter.com/caravia158
http://www.scoop.it/t/art-and-activism/
http://www.scoop.it/t/food-history-and-trivia
http://www.scoop.it/t/gender-issues/
http://www.scoop.it/t/

Re: [-empyre-] public lament and gardening

[Johannes Birringer]

which "Lamentations" are you refering to? 
(not Martha Graham's Lamentation?) The lament of nation-building

I'd be interested in this idea of the critique of the ritual and the community 
self-restitution,
and also in a review how lament becomes a gesture (in performance and 
film/filmed performance/then in stilled photograph)
of witnessing and what Monika describes as "witnessing and enunciation  
sequenced to non-linear time[with] compose[d] sound from testimonies, 
recitations, laments, the environment..."
I was interested in the staging of lament, Monika, and how it loses all aura 
(in Benjamin's writing on something that may have been originary or original) 
thereby, or retains some?, and how people today, 
perhaps, are divesting themselves of having to witness ageing, decrepitude, 
decay, catatonia, living absence, death. 

Not sure, i know many folks, in the old village, who are care takers and who are
witnessing the disappearance of loved ones, the sliding away, in pain or 
tranced, stilled pain (medicated), but Yoko Ishiguro, a Japanese performance 
artist who studied at my school, recently staged
her symbolic passing outside the library, had herself placed and buried in a 
coffin and transmitted all that action through the network to test whether the 
net would be a kind or tomb archive for later generations to look back to 
Yoko's death at the foot of the library and how would the data be preserved? 
Yoko told me she was reacting to the crass commodification of death she 
observed, with funeral trade shows and, for example, the Japanese cyber-burial 
companies which invite the dead to be “buried” on the website so that you can 
visit there online.She saw this commodification in the Benjamin sense 
of raising questions about "work: (art) in the era of technical reproducibility.

So my question (this is before Alan and Sandy's dense textdialiogue about the 
signifier of pain arrived, which i have not been able to translate) was still 
to Monika to try to describe how she sees her work function, and what effect is 
produced, and how the audience is drawn into the long circle or not. And can 
there ever be audience in lamentation/mourning? 


(PS.  i personally have no problems with weeds (as weeds), i love them in my 
garden and tend to them, and they are migrants too, some weeds have travel from 
far but i didn't know there were weeds, some one has to point out. that must be 
the signifier. I had never thought of them in the sense of homo sacer. This 
astonished me, Monika, that you mention Agamben,  after "Nowoczesność i 
Zaglada".   thank you for responding to my query, and in think Alan's answer is 
not quite responding to Bauman's critical analysis of the garden society, and 
what the writing may also have to tell us about politics of integration or 
assimilation of impairment, otherness.   

respectfully
Johannes Birringer


Alan schreibt:


 public lament and gardening

On Thu, 4 Oct 2012, Maria Damon wrote:

> Is there then (I'm sort of assuming the answer is yes, but asking anyway in
> order to make it part of the fabric of the conversation) a way in which
> lamentation is also critique as well as community self-constitution, as in
> Lamentations?
>

Maria, I wonder what sort of critique would be possible? Lamentations
seems to bridge the political and the obdurate. When pain becomes
overwhelming, silence is at the core and the signifier dissolves; I think
this is also the core of anguish. One is left speechless. On the other
hand, how much clarity is necessary for political or 'rational' thought?
In an odd way this also brings up mathematical thinking - which, from an
outsider point-of-view, seems based on the manipulation of symbols, but
from within is much more of clouded movements with indeterminate focus
(see Jacques Hadamard). Thinking itself, in other words, may well have
less content than its representations, and certainly its representations
in virtual worlds, where everything, one way or another, is determinate
and rationalized on a pixel-by-pixel level.

___
empyre forum
empyre@lists.cofa.unsw.edu.au
http://www.subtle.net/empyre

Re: [-empyre-] public lament and gardening

[Clough, Patricia]

Oh  I agree   the sounds  are exquisite   touching me.Patricia 


From: empyre-boun...@lists.cofa.unsw.edu.au 
[empyre-boun...@lists.cofa.unsw.edu.au] On Behalf Of Johannes Birringer 
[johannes.birrin...@brunel.ac.uk]
Sent: Wednesday, October 03, 2012 2:39 PM
To: soft_skinned_space
Subject: Re: [-empyre-] public lament and gardening

Dear all

thank you Monika for your text/introduction to your understanding of the system 
of lament, and "public lament as performative and political act in public 
domain"
-- this is richly evocative and will have to go back to your writing after 
looking at some of your work (the slides, and the films or film excerpts you 
include on
http://www.streamingmuseum.org/content/monika-weiss/
I am listening to the sound now, of two of your videos.  I was struck, entering 
the site, to also find your reference to Cage's silence.
on first viewing/listening, your visual-sonic work has quite a mesmerizing 
quality.  I am just responding now, without thinking, to my listening, and
also watching the face(s) of the women in your films. (this listening is now 
private, at a screen, in the dark of my room). so no public lament this.
But you stage these works in public galleries or spaces, and they are visited 
by the "public". how then does such work function in an art context?
can it become a ritualizing space?

but i shall look forward to reading more concisely (see below) your position, 
also in regard to the questions already brought up by Alan, when in his last 
post he  speaks of
the "overwhelming suffering of the world," stating that he does "not know how 
to accommodate all of this".  This followed the conversation about
pain, torture, memory begun by Ana.

This accommodation will concern us, in the coming days, i am sure.

Monika, could you expand a little on your reference to Zygmunt Baumann's idea 
of "gardening" .
What idea is this?

And Ana, I began to delve into your longer text on the migration from torture.
It is a very complex and fascinating text, and i agree with Alan that the 
"clickable words" are a rather amazing intrusion function of the website.

I clicked "perfume"

>>We did not find any results for perfume.
Search tips:
Ensure words are spelled correctly.
Try rephrasing keywords or using synonyms.
Try less specific keywords.
Make your queries as concise as possible.
>>


with regards
Johannes Birringer
dap-lab

Monika schreibt:

>>
Interesting question below from Alan about the nature of video as a catalyst 
for memory, pain and lament and later I would like to expand that part of our 
discussion towards the performative and the circular in terms of the 
relationships between cinematic mirroring and lament as well as pain. Just 
briefly for now -- about torture. I am more preoccupied with torture inflicted 
by governments, institutions and systems that often hide their violence -- as 
you know only recently in my city of origins, Warsaw, a CIA compound was found 
in which "suspected terrorists" were kept for a number of years and tortured by 
US forces, without any real knowledge amongst the civil part of the Polish 
government. There are thousands of examples of course. Massive, systematic pain 
and torture systems, the ones that are pre-designed by others, "enlightened", 
designed by those who are in power or who represent structures of power and 
hegemony not because of hate, anger or any other emotion but becau
 se of fulfilling some abstracted and pragmatic goal, akin to Zygmunt Baumann's 
idea of "gardening" .
>>






___
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___
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Re: [-empyre-] public lament and gardening

[Alan Sondheim]

On Thu, 4 Oct 2012, Maria Damon wrote:


Is there then (I'm sort of assuming the answer is yes, but asking anyway in
order to make it part of the fabric of the conversation) a way in which
lamentation is also critique as well as community self-constitution, as in
Lamentations?



Maria, I wonder what sort of critique would be possible? Lamentations 
seems to bridge the political and the obdurate. When pain becomes 
overwhelming, silence is at the core and the signifier dissolves; I think 
this is also the core of anguish. One is left speechless. On the other 
hand, how much clarity is necessary for political or 'rational' thought? 
In an odd way this also brings up mathematical thinking - which, from an 
outsider point-of-view, seems based on the manipulation of symbols, but 
from within is much more of clouded movements with indeterminate focus 
(see Jacques Hadamard). Thinking itself, in other words, may well have 
less content than its representations, and certainly its representations 
in virtual worlds, where everything, one way or another, is determinate 
and rationalized on a pixel-by-pixel level.


- Alan, foggier, apologies
___
empyre forum
empyre@lists.cofa.unsw.edu.au
http://www.subtle.net/empyre

Re: [-empyre-] public lament and gardening

[Monika Weiss]

Thank you Ana for those words. I would love to know more about the Antigona 
Oriental.

p.s.
Yes, we have lived through torture since time immemorial but with the 
Declaration of Human Rights and other international institutions, we had hopes 
for progress in that area. So, I don't subscribe to the idea that what was 
there once, is therefore explained today. the problem with the law and its 
ability to constitute law, and therefore, to go outside of itself, such as was 
the case with the concentration camps, and such as is the case today thanks to 
patriot act etc. otherwise under the umbrella of emergency. But there is a 
deeper underlying notion of "right" that certain powers have, like during 
Feudalism, the self-assigned right to inflict "law" upon others, including pain 
and torture, for the sake of "higher goals" or "security".  


On Oct 3, 2012, at 6:35 PM, Ana Valdés wrote:

> HI Monika I checked the links you post and they were stunning
> beautiful, as the cry of the mourners in the Greek tragedies. By the
> way a group of Uruguayan former political prisoners, many of them my
> former comrades, put together a beatiful piece called Antigona
> Oriental. It was a contrast between their texts and the text of the
> Greek tragedy and it worked perfect. The old crimes and the new
> shapes, but as Allan said probably Humanity has lived with torture and
> mayhem since Man (and Woman) were born.
> I think we deal different with pain and each one of us choose it's own
> strategy and have his own array of tools to do that.
> For me is writing for others is painting, for others dancing, etc.
> Ana
> 
> On Wed, Oct 3, 2012 at 8:17 PM, Monika Weiss  wrote:
>> Hi Ana,
>> I had the same feeling and wrote about it to Alan
>> By the way, can't wait to hear more from you as part of this discussion.
>> Monika
>> 
>> Sent from my iPad
>> 
>> On Oct 3, 2012, at 2:13 PM, Ana Valdés  wrote:
>> 
>>> Dear Johannes, as I wrote in my answer to Alan, I am sad I don't have
>>> a clue how to avoid these ads in my text, I guess this is the prize to
>>> pay for a free digital hosting :(
>>> I am now poor as a mouse :) moved back from the First World with all
>>> it's glamour to the non glamorous and poor Third World. It means I
>>> can't afford to pay any fee for a more fancy add free hosting :(
>>> But as I said Amazon still sell back copies of the book where the text
>>> is included, the Garden of the Alphabet, published by Serpent's Tail
>>> in London and New York.
>>> Best regards to all of you
>>> Ana
>>> 
>>> On Wed, Oct 3, 2012 at 3:39 PM, Johannes Birringer
>>>  wrote:
 Dear all
 
 thank you Monika for your text/introduction to your understanding of the 
 system of lament, and "public lament as performative and political act in 
 public domain"
 -- this is richly evocative and will have to go back to your writing after 
 looking at some of your work (the slides, and the films or film excerpts 
 you include on
 http://www.streamingmuseum.org/content/monika-weiss/
 I am listening to the sound now, of two of your videos.  I was struck, 
 entering the site, to also find your reference to Cage's silence.
 on first viewing/listening, your visual-sonic work has quite a mesmerizing 
 quality.  I am just responding now, without thinking, to my listening, and
 also watching the face(s) of the women in your films. (this listening is 
 now private, at a screen, in the dark of my room). so no public lament 
 this.
 But you stage these works in public galleries or spaces, and they are 
 visited by the "public". how then does such work function in an art 
 context?
 can it become a ritualizing space?
 
 but i shall look forward to reading more concisely (see below) your 
 position, also in regard to the questions already brought up by Alan, when 
 in his last post he  speaks of
 the "overwhelming suffering of the world," stating that he does "not know 
 how to accommodate all of this".  This followed the conversation about
 pain, torture, memory begun by Ana.
 
 This accommodation will concern us, in the coming days, i am sure.
 
 Monika, could you expand a little on your reference to Zygmunt Baumann's 
 idea of "gardening" .
 What idea is this?
 
 And Ana, I began to delve into your longer text on the migration from 
 torture.
 It is a very complex and fascinating text, and i agree with Alan that the 
 "clickable words" are a rather amazing intrusion function of the website.
 
 I clicked "perfume"
 
>> We did not find any results for perfume.
 Search tips:
   Ensure words are spelled correctly.
   Try rephrasing keywords or using synonyms.
   Try less specific keywords.
 Make your queries as concise as possible.
>> 
 
 
 with regards
 Johannes Birringer
 dap-lab
 
 Monika schreibt:
 
>> 
>>>

Re: [-empyre-] public lament and gardening

[Monika Weiss]

In Bauman's writing the "weeds" are what Agamben, and to some extend Zizek, 
call Homo Sacer (such as G. Agamben "Remnats of Holocaust" and Zizek's 
"Violence"). The idea of silencing is very important to me, which is also 
related to disappearing, to making disappear. Lament, which otherwise we could 
call the communal citizenry, the true citizenship, this is  response to the 
language of silencing power. Lament, lying down (refusing to march like 
soldiers) are present in my work to somehow direct or connect with this 
inter-connective tissue that firms itself when we are following our ability to 
respond, response-ability

[The silencing (milczenie) is like book burning -- you can burn Celan, but his 
work will never burn completely, just like silencing of the voices of those 
killed and tortured will always leave a stains, like stains on texts of Goethe, 
like stains of tortured in Guantanamo, shining on our hands as we speak here 
and now]


On Oct 3, 2012, at 9:34 PM, Alan Sondheim wrote:

> 
> Re - weeds - terms like 'weeds' and 'pests' and 'vermin' are very problematic 
> - they reflect only the speaker, not the spoken-for who often is placed in 
> the position of a Lyotardian differend, unable to speak, blotted out. 
> Whenever I hear them, I cringe...
> 
> ==
> blog: http://nikuko.blogspot.com/ (main blog)
> email archive http://sondheim.rupamsunyata.org/
> web http://www.alansondheim.org / cell 347-383-8552
> music: http://www.espdisk.com/alansondheim/
> current text http://www.alansondheim.org/rp.txt
> ==
> 
> ___
> empyre forum
> empyre@lists.cofa.unsw.edu.au
> http://www.subtle.net/empyre







___
empyre forum
empyre@lists.cofa.unsw.edu.au
http://www.subtle.net/empyre

Re: [-empyre-] public lament and gardening

[Alan Sondheim]

Re - weeds - terms like 'weeds' and 'pests' and 'vermin' are very 
problematic - they reflect only the speaker, not the spoken-for who often 
is placed in the position of a Lyotardian differend, unable to speak, 
blotted out. Whenever I hear them, I cringe...


==
blog: http://nikuko.blogspot.com/ (main blog)
email archive http://sondheim.rupamsunyata.org/
web http://www.alansondheim.org / cell 347-383-8552
music: http://www.espdisk.com/alansondheim/
current text http://www.alansondheim.org/rp.txt
==

___
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empyre@lists.cofa.unsw.edu.au
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Re: [-empyre-] public lament and gardening

[Ana Valdés]

HI Monika I checked the links you post and they were stunning
beautiful, as the cry of the mourners in the Greek tragedies. By the
way a group of Uruguayan former political prisoners, many of them my
former comrades, put together a beatiful piece called Antigona
Oriental. It was a contrast between their texts and the text of the
Greek tragedy and it worked perfect. The old crimes and the new
shapes, but as Allan said probably Humanity has lived with torture and
mayhem since Man (and Woman) were born.
I think we deal different with pain and each one of us choose it's own
strategy and have his own array of tools to do that.
For me is writing for others is painting, for others dancing, etc.
Ana

On Wed, Oct 3, 2012 at 8:17 PM, Monika Weiss  wrote:
> Hi Ana,
> I had the same feeling and wrote about it to Alan
> By the way, can't wait to hear more from you as part of this discussion.
> Monika
>
> Sent from my iPad
>
> On Oct 3, 2012, at 2:13 PM, Ana Valdés  wrote:
>
>> Dear Johannes, as I wrote in my answer to Alan, I am sad I don't have
>> a clue how to avoid these ads in my text, I guess this is the prize to
>> pay for a free digital hosting :(
>> I am now poor as a mouse :) moved back from the First World with all
>> it's glamour to the non glamorous and poor Third World. It means I
>> can't afford to pay any fee for a more fancy add free hosting :(
>> But as I said Amazon still sell back copies of the book where the text
>> is included, the Garden of the Alphabet, published by Serpent's Tail
>> in London and New York.
>> Best regards to all of you
>> Ana
>>
>> On Wed, Oct 3, 2012 at 3:39 PM, Johannes Birringer
>>  wrote:
>>> Dear all
>>>
>>> thank you Monika for your text/introduction to your understanding of the 
>>> system of lament, and "public lament as performative and political act in 
>>> public domain"
>>> -- this is richly evocative and will have to go back to your writing after 
>>> looking at some of your work (the slides, and the films or film excerpts 
>>> you include on
>>> http://www.streamingmuseum.org/content/monika-weiss/
>>> I am listening to the sound now, of two of your videos.  I was struck, 
>>> entering the site, to also find your reference to Cage's silence.
>>> on first viewing/listening, your visual-sonic work has quite a mesmerizing 
>>> quality.  I am just responding now, without thinking, to my listening, and
>>> also watching the face(s) of the women in your films. (this listening is 
>>> now private, at a screen, in the dark of my room). so no public lament this.
>>> But you stage these works in public galleries or spaces, and they are 
>>> visited by the "public". how then does such work function in an art context?
>>> can it become a ritualizing space?
>>>
>>> but i shall look forward to reading more concisely (see below) your 
>>> position, also in regard to the questions already brought up by Alan, when 
>>> in his last post he  speaks of
>>> the "overwhelming suffering of the world," stating that he does "not know 
>>> how to accommodate all of this".  This followed the conversation about
>>> pain, torture, memory begun by Ana.
>>>
>>> This accommodation will concern us, in the coming days, i am sure.
>>>
>>> Monika, could you expand a little on your reference to Zygmunt Baumann's 
>>> idea of "gardening" .
>>> What idea is this?
>>>
>>> And Ana, I began to delve into your longer text on the migration from 
>>> torture.
>>> It is a very complex and fascinating text, and i agree with Alan that the 
>>> "clickable words" are a rather amazing intrusion function of the website.
>>>
>>> I clicked "perfume"
>>>
> We did not find any results for perfume.
>>> Search tips:
>>>Ensure words are spelled correctly.
>>>Try rephrasing keywords or using synonyms.
>>>Try less specific keywords.
>>> Make your queries as concise as possible.
>
>>>
>>>
>>> with regards
>>> Johannes Birringer
>>> dap-lab
>>>
>>> Monika schreibt:
>>>
>
>>> Interesting question below from Alan about the nature of video as a 
>>> catalyst for memory, pain and lament and later I would like to expand that 
>>> part of our discussion towards the performative and the circular in terms 
>>> of the relationships between cinematic mirroring and lament as well as 
>>> pain. Just briefly for now -- about torture. I am more preoccupied with 
>>> torture inflicted by governments, institutions and systems that often hide 
>>> their violence -- as you know only recently in my city of origins, Warsaw, 
>>> a CIA compound was found in which "suspected terrorists" were kept for a 
>>> number of years and tortured by US forces, without any real knowledge 
>>> amongst the civil part of the Polish government. There are thousands of 
>>> examples of course. Massive, systematic pain and torture systems, the ones 
>>> that are pre-designed by others, "enlightened", designed by those who are 
>>> in power or who represent structures of power and hegemony not because of 
>>> hate, anger or any o

Re: [-empyre-] public lament and gardening

[Monika Weiss]

Dear Johannes and all,

Zygmunt Bauman's concept of garden is mentioned by him in his "Modernity and 
Holocaust" - which actually reads better in Polish, "Nowoczesność i Zaglada". I 
often talk about it in my own writings because it feels still very important 
today. The idea is that we are like gardeners, we make decisions such as 
mass-scale industrialized genocides as based on the desire for progress and of 
creating a beautiful design. He talks about getting rid of weeds not because we 
might hate them but because we believe they are useless of or the design we are 
planning, design of the world. More importantly he extends Arendt' assumptions 
about the danger of contemporary divorcing function and goal - the notion that 
others make decisions for us and we are basically only responsible for the 
immediate act or process that is our job. His claim is to return to some nine 
of, new but nevertheless morality which rests on our ability to think 
independently...

My take on this that it basically calls for our citizenship and active 
response-ability ann to Levinas.

I will continue this thought tonight - unfortunately now have to go back to 
meetings with my grads.

More later and thank you Johannes for your notes,

Monika 

Sent from my iPad

On Oct 3, 2012, at 1:39 PM, Johannes Birringer 
 wrote:

> Dear all
> 
> thank you Monika for your text/introduction to your understanding of the 
> system of lament, and "public lament as performative and political act in 
> public domain"  
> -- this is richly evocative and will have to go back to your writing after 
> looking at some of your work (the slides, and the films or film excerpts you 
> include on 
> http://www.streamingmuseum.org/content/monika-weiss/ 
> I am listening to the sound now, of two of your videos.  I was struck, 
> entering the site, to also find your reference to Cage's silence.
> on first viewing/listening, your visual-sonic work has quite a mesmerizing 
> quality.  I am just responding now, without thinking, to my listening, and
> also watching the face(s) of the women in your films. (this listening is now 
> private, at a screen, in the dark of my room). so no public lament this.
> But you stage these works in public galleries or spaces, and they are visited 
> by the "public". how then does such work function in an art context?
> can it become a ritualizing space?
> 
> but i shall look forward to reading more concisely (see below) your position, 
> also in regard to the questions already brought up by Alan, when in his last 
> post he  speaks of
> the "overwhelming suffering of the world," stating that he does "not know how 
> to accommodate all of this".  This followed the conversation about
> pain, torture, memory begun by Ana. 
> 
> This accommodation will concern us, in the coming days, i am sure.
> 
> Monika, could you expand a little on your reference to Zygmunt Baumann's idea 
> of "gardening" .
> What idea is this?
> 
> And Ana, I began to delve into your longer text on the migration from torture.
> It is a very complex and fascinating text, and i agree with Alan that the 
> "clickable words" are a rather amazing intrusion function of the website. 
> 
> I clicked "perfume"
> 
>>> We did not find any results for perfume.
> Search tips:
>Ensure words are spelled correctly.
>Try rephrasing keywords or using synonyms.
>Try less specific keywords.
> Make your queries as concise as possible.
>>> 
> 
> 
> with regards
> Johannes Birringer
> dap-lab
> 
> Monika schreibt:
> 
>>> 
> Interesting question below from Alan about the nature of video as a catalyst 
> for memory, pain and lament and later I would like to expand that part of our 
> discussion towards the performative and the circular in terms of the 
> relationships between cinematic mirroring and lament as well as pain. Just 
> briefly for now -- about torture. I am more preoccupied with torture 
> inflicted by governments, institutions and systems that often hide their 
> violence -- as you know only recently in my city of origins, Warsaw, a CIA 
> compound was found in which "suspected terrorists" were kept for a number of 
> years and tortured by US forces, without any real knowledge amongst the civil 
> part of the Polish government. There are thousands of examples of course. 
> Massive, systematic pain and torture systems, the ones that are pre-designed 
> by others, "enlightened", designed by those who are in power or who represent 
> structures of power and hegemony not because of hate, anger or any other 
> emotion but becau
> se of fulfilling some abstracted and pragmatic goal, akin to Zygmunt 
> Baumann's idea of "gardening" .
>>> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> ___
> empyre forum
> empyre@lists.cofa.unsw.edu.au
> http://www.subtle.net/empyre
___
empyre forum
empyre@lists.cofa.unsw.edu.au
http://www.subtle.net/empyre

Re: [-empyre-] public lament and gardening

[Monika Weiss]

Hi Ana,
I had the same feeling and wrote about it to Alan
By the way, can't wait to hear more from you as part of this discussion.
Monika

Sent from my iPad

On Oct 3, 2012, at 2:13 PM, Ana Valdés  wrote:

> Dear Johannes, as I wrote in my answer to Alan, I am sad I don't have
> a clue how to avoid these ads in my text, I guess this is the prize to
> pay for a free digital hosting :(
> I am now poor as a mouse :) moved back from the First World with all
> it's glamour to the non glamorous and poor Third World. It means I
> can't afford to pay any fee for a more fancy add free hosting :(
> But as I said Amazon still sell back copies of the book where the text
> is included, the Garden of the Alphabet, published by Serpent's Tail
> in London and New York.
> Best regards to all of you
> Ana
> 
> On Wed, Oct 3, 2012 at 3:39 PM, Johannes Birringer
>  wrote:
>> Dear all
>> 
>> thank you Monika for your text/introduction to your understanding of the 
>> system of lament, and "public lament as performative and political act in 
>> public domain"
>> -- this is richly evocative and will have to go back to your writing after 
>> looking at some of your work (the slides, and the films or film excerpts you 
>> include on
>> http://www.streamingmuseum.org/content/monika-weiss/
>> I am listening to the sound now, of two of your videos.  I was struck, 
>> entering the site, to also find your reference to Cage's silence.
>> on first viewing/listening, your visual-sonic work has quite a mesmerizing 
>> quality.  I am just responding now, without thinking, to my listening, and
>> also watching the face(s) of the women in your films. (this listening is now 
>> private, at a screen, in the dark of my room). so no public lament this.
>> But you stage these works in public galleries or spaces, and they are 
>> visited by the "public". how then does such work function in an art context?
>> can it become a ritualizing space?
>> 
>> but i shall look forward to reading more concisely (see below) your 
>> position, also in regard to the questions already brought up by Alan, when 
>> in his last post he  speaks of
>> the "overwhelming suffering of the world," stating that he does "not know 
>> how to accommodate all of this".  This followed the conversation about
>> pain, torture, memory begun by Ana.
>> 
>> This accommodation will concern us, in the coming days, i am sure.
>> 
>> Monika, could you expand a little on your reference to Zygmunt Baumann's 
>> idea of "gardening" .
>> What idea is this?
>> 
>> And Ana, I began to delve into your longer text on the migration from 
>> torture.
>> It is a very complex and fascinating text, and i agree with Alan that the 
>> "clickable words" are a rather amazing intrusion function of the website.
>> 
>> I clicked "perfume"
>> 
 We did not find any results for perfume.
>> Search tips:
>>Ensure words are spelled correctly.
>>Try rephrasing keywords or using synonyms.
>>Try less specific keywords.
>> Make your queries as concise as possible.
 
>> 
>> 
>> with regards
>> Johannes Birringer
>> dap-lab
>> 
>> Monika schreibt:
>> 
 
>> Interesting question below from Alan about the nature of video as a catalyst 
>> for memory, pain and lament and later I would like to expand that part of 
>> our discussion towards the performative and the circular in terms of the 
>> relationships between cinematic mirroring and lament as well as pain. Just 
>> briefly for now -- about torture. I am more preoccupied with torture 
>> inflicted by governments, institutions and systems that often hide their 
>> violence -- as you know only recently in my city of origins, Warsaw, a CIA 
>> compound was found in which "suspected terrorists" were kept for a number of 
>> years and tortured by US forces, without any real knowledge amongst the 
>> civil part of the Polish government. There are thousands of examples of 
>> course. Massive, systematic pain and torture systems, the ones that are 
>> pre-designed by others, "enlightened", designed by those who are in power or 
>> who represent structures of power and hegemony not because of hate, anger or 
>> any other emotion but becau
>> se of fulfilling some abstracted and pragmatic goal, akin to Zygmunt 
>> Baumann's idea of "gardening" .
 
>> 
>> 
>> 
>> 
>> 
>> 
>> ___
>> empyre forum
>> empyre@lists.cofa.unsw.edu.au
>> http://www.subtle.net/empyre
> 
> 
> 
> -- 
> http://writings-escrituras.tumblr.com/
> http://maraya.tumblr.com/
> http://www.twitter.com/caravia158
> http://www.scoop.it/t/art-and-activism/
> http://www.scoop.it/t/food-history-and-trivia
> http://www.scoop.it/t/gender-issues/
> http://www.scoop.it/t/literary-exiles/
> http://www.scoop.it/t/museums-and-ethics/
> http://www.scoop.it/t/urbanism-3-0
> http://www.scoop.it/t/postcolonial-mind/
> 
> cell Sweden +4670-3213370
> cell Uruguay +598-99470758
> 
> 
> "When once you have tasted flight, you will forever walk the ear

Re: [-empyre-] public lament and gardening

[Ana Valdés]

Dear Johannes, as I wrote in my answer to Alan, I am sad I don't have
a clue how to avoid these ads in my text, I guess this is the prize to
pay for a free digital hosting :(
I am now poor as a mouse :) moved back from the First World with all
it's glamour to the non glamorous and poor Third World. It means I
can't afford to pay any fee for a more fancy add free hosting :(
But as I said Amazon still sell back copies of the book where the text
is included, the Garden of the Alphabet, published by Serpent's Tail
in London and New York.
Best regards to all of you
Ana

On Wed, Oct 3, 2012 at 3:39 PM, Johannes Birringer
 wrote:
> Dear all
>
> thank you Monika for your text/introduction to your understanding of the 
> system of lament, and "public lament as performative and political act in 
> public domain"
> -- this is richly evocative and will have to go back to your writing after 
> looking at some of your work (the slides, and the films or film excerpts you 
> include on
> http://www.streamingmuseum.org/content/monika-weiss/
> I am listening to the sound now, of two of your videos.  I was struck, 
> entering the site, to also find your reference to Cage's silence.
> on first viewing/listening, your visual-sonic work has quite a mesmerizing 
> quality.  I am just responding now, without thinking, to my listening, and
> also watching the face(s) of the women in your films. (this listening is now 
> private, at a screen, in the dark of my room). so no public lament this.
> But you stage these works in public galleries or spaces, and they are visited 
> by the "public". how then does such work function in an art context?
> can it become a ritualizing space?
>
> but i shall look forward to reading more concisely (see below) your position, 
> also in regard to the questions already brought up by Alan, when in his last 
> post he  speaks of
> the "overwhelming suffering of the world," stating that he does "not know how 
> to accommodate all of this".  This followed the conversation about
> pain, torture, memory begun by Ana.
>
> This accommodation will concern us, in the coming days, i am sure.
>
> Monika, could you expand a little on your reference to Zygmunt Baumann's idea 
> of "gardening" .
> What idea is this?
>
> And Ana, I began to delve into your longer text on the migration from torture.
> It is a very complex and fascinating text, and i agree with Alan that the 
> "clickable words" are a rather amazing intrusion function of the website.
>
> I clicked "perfume"
>
>>>We did not find any results for perfume.
> Search tips:
> Ensure words are spelled correctly.
> Try rephrasing keywords or using synonyms.
> Try less specific keywords.
> Make your queries as concise as possible.
>>>
>
>
> with regards
> Johannes Birringer
> dap-lab
>
> Monika schreibt:
>
>>>
> Interesting question below from Alan about the nature of video as a catalyst 
> for memory, pain and lament and later I would like to expand that part of our 
> discussion towards the performative and the circular in terms of the 
> relationships between cinematic mirroring and lament as well as pain. Just 
> briefly for now -- about torture. I am more preoccupied with torture 
> inflicted by governments, institutions and systems that often hide their 
> violence -- as you know only recently in my city of origins, Warsaw, a CIA 
> compound was found in which "suspected terrorists" were kept for a number of 
> years and tortured by US forces, without any real knowledge amongst the civil 
> part of the Polish government. There are thousands of examples of course. 
> Massive, systematic pain and torture systems, the ones that are pre-designed 
> by others, "enlightened", designed by those who are in power or who represent 
> structures of power and hegemony not because of hate, anger or any other 
> emotion but becau
>  se of fulfilling some abstracted and pragmatic goal, akin to Zygmunt 
> Baumann's idea of "gardening" .
>>>
>
>
>
>
>
>
> ___
> empyre forum
> empyre@lists.cofa.unsw.edu.au
> http://www.subtle.net/empyre



-- 
http://writings-escrituras.tumblr.com/
http://maraya.tumblr.com/
http://www.twitter.com/caravia158
http://www.scoop.it/t/art-and-activism/
http://www.scoop.it/t/food-history-and-trivia
http://www.scoop.it/t/gender-issues/
http://www.scoop.it/t/literary-exiles/
http://www.scoop.it/t/museums-and-ethics/
http://www.scoop.it/t/urbanism-3-0
http://www.scoop.it/t/postcolonial-mind/

cell Sweden +4670-3213370
cell Uruguay +598-99470758


"When once you have tasted flight, you will forever walk the earth
with your eyes turned skyward, for there you have been and there you
will always long to return.
— Leonardo da Vinci
___
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Re: [-empyre-] public lament and gardening

[Johannes Birringer]

Dear all

thank you Monika for your text/introduction to your understanding of the system 
of lament, and "public lament as performative and political act in public 
domain"  
-- this is richly evocative and will have to go back to your writing after 
looking at some of your work (the slides, and the films or film excerpts you 
include on 
http://www.streamingmuseum.org/content/monika-weiss/ 
I am listening to the sound now, of two of your videos.  I was struck, entering 
the site, to also find your reference to Cage's silence.
on first viewing/listening, your visual-sonic work has quite a mesmerizing 
quality.  I am just responding now, without thinking, to my listening, and
also watching the face(s) of the women in your films. (this listening is now 
private, at a screen, in the dark of my room). so no public lament this.
But you stage these works in public galleries or spaces, and they are visited 
by the "public". how then does such work function in an art context?
can it become a ritualizing space?

but i shall look forward to reading more concisely (see below) your position, 
also in regard to the questions already brought up by Alan, when in his last 
post he  speaks of
the "overwhelming suffering of the world," stating that he does "not know how 
to accommodate all of this".  This followed the conversation about
pain, torture, memory begun by Ana. 

This accommodation will concern us, in the coming days, i am sure.

Monika, could you expand a little on your reference to Zygmunt Baumann's idea 
of "gardening" .
What idea is this?

And Ana, I began to delve into your longer text on the migration from torture.
It is a very complex and fascinating text, and i agree with Alan that the 
"clickable words" are a rather amazing intrusion function of the website. 

I clicked "perfume"

>>We did not find any results for perfume.
Search tips:
Ensure words are spelled correctly.
Try rephrasing keywords or using synonyms.
Try less specific keywords.
Make your queries as concise as possible.
>>


with regards
Johannes Birringer
dap-lab

Monika schreibt:

>>
Interesting question below from Alan about the nature of video as a catalyst 
for memory, pain and lament and later I would like to expand that part of our 
discussion towards the performative and the circular in terms of the 
relationships between cinematic mirroring and lament as well as pain. Just 
briefly for now -- about torture. I am more preoccupied with torture inflicted 
by governments, institutions and systems that often hide their violence -- as 
you know only recently in my city of origins, Warsaw, a CIA compound was found 
in which "suspected terrorists" were kept for a number of years and tortured by 
US forces, without any real knowledge amongst the civil part of the Polish 
government. There are thousands of examples of course. Massive, systematic pain 
and torture systems, the ones that are pre-designed by others, "enlightened", 
designed by those who are in power or who represent structures of power and 
hegemony not because of hate, anger or any other emotion but becau
 se of fulfilling some abstracted and pragmatic goal, akin to Zygmunt Baumann's 
idea of "gardening" .
>>






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