Re: <documenta X><blast> Reintroducing vitruvius

Jordan Crandall (xaf@interport.net)
Mon, 28 Jul 1997 17:34:10 -0400

Angus Trumble wrote:

> vitruvius... is a creature
> of the stage, with an ageing wardrobe staff and a crooked agent. If I
> were pressed for a definition, I would say that her performances consist
> mainly of dance, although elements of song - a kind of muffled shriek -
> articulate the whole.

I appreciate Greg's search for a method, perhaps borrowed from the arts
as such, which would involve a different relation to the object of
study. It would not seek to explain, assuming the direct, instrumental
approach - developing research, issuing reports, 'how to end X,' 'how to
change Y,' etc. It would, instead, seek to inquire differently, from a
position that stands in an alternate relationship to the problem. And
so Greg proposes a triangulation of sorts, which would displace the
one-on-one relation (me -- > problem) into a kind of network. And this
would, perhaps, displace the 'me', the authority from which I speak, and
indeed the very constitution of the problem itself. And so like Angus,
who enters into the discourse via vitruvius ('vitruvius is…my next-door
neighbour'), enstages him/herself within the discourse in a circuitous
route to the 'my', erupting from within like a dancer out of a party
cake. And as Robbin remarks, regarding vitruvius, that he 'caught her
act' years ago on a double bill, the discourse entangles as one tries to
map the positions. It is this 'catching of the act' that operates, that
makes the bind, the relation, while the 'double billing' splits it
again.

As Greg explains, the object of study is appropriated as a vehicle with
which to explain or engage a condition (the 'feeling of how things are',
*Stimmung*, attunement). The question is, how to model this approach?
It's an exciting issue. I don't think the 'artist project' provides an
approach, but whatever does, it would speak for the space in which the
online art work is situated too.