The Non-Public Space and the Self-Defeating Attempts of Capitalistic Maneuverings

Those that have attended more recent events at the CAID will have undoubtedly noticed several dramatic alterations to the building’s exterior.   According to administrators, recent theft has encouraged the implementation of several very significant security measures.  These measures include the addition of closed circuit cameras to various walls, and the barricading of the side entrance, that, at one time, opened directly onto the backyard of the institute.  These very physical alterations signify a significant reconfiguration of the space.  Unfortunately, this very reconfiguration seems to have debilitated the space’s worth; it’s value in the public domain.

                Although these alterations are still relatively recent, and the various effects have yet to be calculated by any concise means, it seems fruitful to consider the CAID by differentiating between two very distinct periods of operation.  For the purposes of this essay, the space will be considered both before and after the addition of these security precautions.  It will be considered, foremost, as a beneficial and valuable public space, and, second, coinciding with the transition to said security measures, in light of the ramifications that will hypothetically plague the CAID in the immediate future.  Here, the transition seems to be analogous to the various transformations in public space, rather, the move away from public space, that Mike Davis delineates in the prescient text City of Quartz: Excavating the Future of Los Angeles. 

                In an important section of the text entitled, “Sadistic Street Environments,” Davis works to explain the various innovative techniques used to deter public land usage.  Included in the arsenal of various ingenious, and, it must be said, utterly disturbing, tactics used by those that wish to “harden” the city surface in response to the poor, is the use of outdoor sprinklers to soak the homeless, the designing of barrel benches that prevent the impoverished from sleeping, and the installation of $12,000 dollar bag-lady-proof trash cans (Davis 233).  Here, as in earlier portions of the text, Davis adequately examines a certain desire for separation existing amongst those with the capital to partake in such expensive measures:

Where the itineraries of Downtown powerbrokers unavoidably intersect with the habitats of the homeless or the working poor, as in the previously mentioned zone of gentrification along the northern Broadway corridor, extraordinary design precautions are being taken to ensure the physical separation of different humanities. (Davis 234)

Viewed from this perspective, it seems that similar security measures currently in progress at the CAID, serve a curiously similar function.  This becomes even more evident in consideration of the third security measure that the CAID has implemented within the past couple of months.  Although the first two measures are more understandable components of a plan to reduce crime, in that they seem to prevent the intrusion of unacknowledged guests, and serve to provide a system by which the activities of attendees are constantly monitored, the third measure seems quite conflicting. 

Very recently, the CAID administrators decided that it would be appropriate to implement a fee to pay for damages incurred, although it is still quite unclear as to what these damages actually are.  It seems that, in consideration of this measure, capital is being used exclusively to marginalize or, more appropriately, to further the marginalization of a group to which a certain criminality is often attributed.  That is, the administrators expect that crime or risk is associated with those that will be unwilling or unable to pay the three dollars required for admittance.  Considering that this fee was implemented in conjunction with the other “security” measures, it seems quite evident that administrators at the CAID assume that monetary capacity serves as appropriate grounds for differentiating between the criminal and the acceptable person.  This, as Mike Davis suggests, is the very problem plaguing many urban developments that have occurred in Los Angeles.  As the public domain moves in the direction of privatization, certain classes, those unable to afford admittance, are neglected.  Public space becomes something that must be purchased.  One must congregate in malls or other megalomaniac structures that insist one be financially stable or well off. 

It seems that this is a more general trend in spatial affairs.  Inevitably, when a particular space or situation is deemed or can be identified as economically viable, dominate capitalistic modes work to incorporate this space into the realm of the profitable.  Funk Night, an event that has grown increasingly popular in recent years, seemingly for its very “anti-capitalistic” atmosphere – formerly, an attendee did not have to purchase alcohol or admittance at the event – has been realized as a pool of untapped capital.  It matters little whether one considers the precautions at the CAID preventative measures or not.  Whether or not these measures where designed to control a potentially problematic situation is of no apparent significance.  What is, instead, of increasing importance, is the very ways in which the space has transformed.  No longer is the CAID a free public domain at which students and homeless alike can drink and listen to funk music without physical or monetary restriction.  Instead, students and others who can afford to pay for drinks and admission are admitted, while all others are excluded.  It seems that these measures have actually debilitated the supposed ideal.  Furthermore, one can assume that where the drive to acquire capital is asserted most forcefully, the public domain will dwindle.

What becomes equally as interesting, at this particular junction, is the means by which capitalism produces defeating processes.  Although capitalism is often, and appropriately, I might add, equated with the all consuming; the invasive entity that effects/affects all, it seems that the CAID provides an interesting example of the means by which capital driven enterprise might actually be self debilitating.  As stated previously, part of the initial appeal of the CAID was the amalgamated mass of people that collided on Friday Funk Nights.  At the institute, one could expect to see college students, the homeless, and more elderly constituents.  This heterogeneous, socially and financially differentiated mass was part of the draw of the event.   There were few limitations, and no visible administrators to impose restrictions.  Interestingly, in a badly disguised attempt to draw on this pool of capital, the administrators are actually operating against the very economy of the CAID.  In debilitating the atmosphere, the appeal of the CAID, it can be assumed, as was noticed during previous attendance, that fewer will inhabit the space.  This is not to applaud the group that attends, for capitalism exerts its forces elsewhere; in the liquor or beer purchase at the local convenience store; or the purchase of gas and food.  Rather, this is an effort to suggest the cyclical nature of the capitalistic cycle as it is related to current youth movements.  It seems that the only means one can exert suitable economic control over such spaces, is to subsequently debilitate the very capital pool that the space once fostered.

 

Affective Labor: A Mixed Bag

Hardt’s text “Affective Labor,” is simultaneously provocative and dissapointing.  After detailing the emergence of the third system, that of affective and immaterial labor, Hardt suggests that the affective can actually be used to debilitate capitalism.   Here, Hardt is remniscent of Massumi, in that they both argue that we can use affect to free ourselves.  Though, it seems that Massumi is much more vague in reference to that which we are free from.  Sometimes it seems that Massumi thinks affect is the cure all solution to everyday problems facing humanity.  In any event, he is quite vague.  Returning to the text, Hardt provides that although affective labor is the means by which capitalism operates, it can also be used in a subversive capacity.  In fact, he argues that the intimacy of affect to the immaterial system, insists that it must be used.  Although this suggestion is momentarily provocative, Hardt fails to provide a suitable follow through to his ambitious proclamation.  Although it seems that this argument is acceptable, Hardt fails to provide a concise synopsis or, even, a simplistic suggestion, of the means by which one can use the affective-bottom to subvert the affective-top.

Despite Hardt’s greater failure, several portions of the text are quite beneficial to those hoping to develop a better, more concise, understanding of the new economy.  First, it seems entirely evident, as Hardt suggests, that new and interesting divisions in labor are occurring.  Hardt argues, quite effectively, that there are three types of immaterial labor.  On one level, as he denotes, industrial production has become more informational.  Also, there is the category of the analytic or symbolic task.  This category can be subdivided into the routine manipulation of symbols, and creative or intelligent interaction.  Finally, there is also exists a subsection of the system responsible for the production and manipulation of affect.  In consideration of the immaterial or informational system, this seems to be the contention that many fail to perceive.  One forgets the divisions inherent to a system, and assumes that the arrival of the informational occurred in conjunction with the disolution of divisions.

Second, another important success in Hardt’s work, is the means by which he demonstrates that the agricultural, industrial, and immaterial systems exist simultaneously.  Hardt suggests that it is not a simple matter of progression from one point to another; an evolution from the agricultural to the immaterial.  It is not that the immaterial replaces the agricultural, but, rather, that both exist simultaneously.  If anything, the agricultural becomes inextricably bound to the immaterial, instead of being subsumed or replaced.

Despite these successes, the conclusion, or lack there of, is actually quite debilitating.  Although Hardt’s revision of Foucault’s concept of biopower is provocative, it is ill pursued.  It seems quite acceptable that biopower actually comes from both below and above.  The problem, again, is not related to the argument.  Rather, it is, as stated previously, that Hardt provides little more than a suggestion as to the means by which one can use this affective power to subvert the system.  Perhaps, this text would not have been so entirely dissapointing if Hardt had not have suggested the subversive capacity of affect in the first place.

Rape films: Authenticity and Ambiguity

 

“And most of it goes on for way too long: real people don’t have sex that vigorous for that long unless they have real issues…” (Posted on blog by felagund)

I am interested, as stated previously, in recent pornographic trends or developments.  Most specifically, my curiosity arises in relationship to those films that work to attribute sexual events an air of authenticity.  Although this is the case for most pornographic films, aruably all, I find it to be most intense in the case of ”rape films” or “snuff films.”  These films are quite chilling or sexually gratifying, depending your inclinations, because they highlight “deviant” activities that are both illegal and morally reprehensible. 

What interests me most about these films is that it is by means of the authenticity, the degrees by which the films approach the barbaric act (rape or homocide), that they are effective.  Here, the effectiveness can be measured in viewer gratification.  The films exist and proliferate because some find them pleasurable.  But it is here that there is an inherent complication.  If one is interested in the authenticity of the film, which seems to be the case with most viewers, than isn’t one breaching the very moral/ethical standards that one refuses to denigrate in everyday life?  That is, in theory, we pay taxes in order to protect our neighbors, our family, ourselves from crimes of this nature, and yet, we also take pleasure in films that we can never be quite sure whether a rape or homicide is actually occurring.  Perhaps, ambiguity provides us a certain assurance, a certain pleasure.

It seems though, in any event, that there is a means by which one can effectively use the snuff film or rape film tactic.  Perhaps, it is possible to attribute a work a similar authenticity; a productive authenticity.  It seems that there is a means of producing a text that uses authenticity to propel an intended effect.  Two questions arise.  First, how does one attribute a text authenticity?  Second, and more importantly, how does one design a text that will perpetuate an ambiguity about the authenticity?  As I stated earlier, this ambiguity seems to be an essential characteristic.

Image-narrative and Kuleshov Effect

In light of today’s conversation concerning image-narrative, I give to you the “Kuleshov Effect.” 

Lev Kuleshov was a Soviet filmmaker and theorist, that was influenced enormously by Vladimir Gardin.  Gardin is often considered the father of the Soviet montage style, as he delivered many crucial concepts at a conference of some significance.  In a temporal context, Kuleshov preceded both Eisenstein (Ivan the Terrible), and Pudovkin.  Whereas Eisenstein incoporated dramatic shot juxtapositions, and extreme transitions (for example, the movement from extreme long shot to extreme close up), and Pudovkin attempted multi-shot builds emphasizing particular themes (long shot, medium shot, close-up, medium shot, etc.), Kuleshov was interested in a shot technique consisting of three seperate and distinct shots.  He created what are most often termed or considered agitational films. 

The three shots would consist of different elements emphasizing important themes.  In juxtaposition, these shots insist a certain associational aspect; a relationship, perhaps narrative, between each shot.  Yet, at the very same time, a typical or full narrative is denied.  This seems very similar to the images and brief narrative provided at the MOCAD.

“The Unbearable Automaticity of Being”

“The Unbearable Automaticity of Being,” is quite reminiscent of Malcolm Gladwell’s text Blink.  This becomes especially evident when considering the fact that both texts reference many of the same sources (specifically, Rosenthal’s work).

Bargh and Chartrand initiate this text by explaining the limitations inherent to consciousness.  Drawing on these very limitations, they argue that the unconscious or automatic is actually responsible for a much larger percentage of brain activity than most are willing to concede.  Here, the authors reference a general unwillingness, amongst many people, to accept the unconscious as a significant arbiter of thought.  As is suggested by the Nietzsche quote that immediately precedes the text, human vanity supposes everything to be conscious.  Perhaps, this unwillingness is, in a similar vein, related to a refusal to disavow the predominance of the mind over the body.  Instead of applauding consciousness, as has been the dominant approach in scientific/theoretical discourse, Bargh and Chartrand work, instead, to posit the unconscious automatic response to environmental stimuli, and its significance.

One important distinction that Bargh and Chartrand develop, quite beneficially, is that the unconscious and conscious should not be considered wholly separate or distinct.  It is not that processes are either conscious or unconscious, but rather, that the conscious often becomes unconscious through evolution into the automatic (463).  The unconscious serves the purpose of taking over all of the activities or tasks that don’t necessitate conscious attention: “They are all devised and intended to free us from tasks that don’t really require our vigilance and intervention, so that our time and energy can be directed towards those that do” (464).  This is the very evolution that the student driver experiences while learning to drive, as Chartrand and Bargh suggest.  Simply, automated or unconscious mental processes free the limited conscious capacities of a subject.

Moreover, Chartrand and Bargh explore the ramifications of the environment upon a subject.  They suggest that perceiving an action, perhaps the action of an acquaintance, will increase the likelihood or probability that one will undertake the very same action (465).  Perception, according to the authors, is the means by which the environment causes mental activity.  As a result, perception and behavior are inextricably bound.  Thus, stereotypes, or behavior resulting from stereotypical beliefs is triggered by, “skin color, gender characteristics, and other easily detected features of group members” (466).   Interestingly, this theory implies that there is a certain fluidity of self.  The body becomes the site of a constant unconscious interchange with the outside world.  It seems quite evident that this distorts what might be considered bodily boundaries.

Furthermore, the text provides evidence that the very process of automation is actually automatic.  Goals, as Chartrand and Bargh suggest, develop by a means that bypasses will (469).  We may not even have an awareness of pursuing a goal.  Such is the case with the restorative and retaliatory actions of those that experience a denigration of the self (470). 

After establishing the very importance of the unconscious, Chartrand and Bargh examine the benefits of automatic logic.  Here, the text bears striking similarities to Gladwell’s work.  Chartrand and Bargh argue, as in Gladwell’s text, that the unconscious or automatic operates by means of thin slicing.  Here, the unconscious is often much more effective than the conscious.  Interestingly, the more conscious thought that one puts into analysis, the less accurate the judgments or assessments often are (475).

Genesis P-Orridge and the Sigil

Despite the praising banter – the numerous suggestions that Genesis P. Orridge exists as some form of art-deity - that generally plagues biographies of this manner, the discussion concerning Orridge’s work is actually quite fruitful.  At this particular junction, I am most interested in the more general discourse relating to the use of the sigil as communicative medium.  Though, as is asserted in Painful but Fabulous, the sigil actually functions to distort that which is communicated.  It seems simplistic, and yet necessary to acknowledge that it is the very elements of the sigil, as with any artistic medium, that contribute to its significance.  The most significant element of the form is the means by which it presents explicit mythological and historical elements, in image or pictoral form, in conjunction with more contemporary visuals.  Here, as the contributor proclaims, the sigil disrupts spatial and temporal modes of being.  The sigil operates by a logic that creates an important dislocation in time.  This temporal dislocation alllows for the merging of the artist and art, providing the opportunity for distinctions between artist and artwork to dissolve.  Moreover, and much more significantly, by disrupting the very spatial and temporal modes by which we generally function, the sigil provides the opportunity for an important mythologization to occur.  This is the mythologization of the contemporary images.

“…images created during the process of ritual are frequently incorporated into the work, a strategy which mythologizes location and space.”

In consideration, it seems quite befitting to this discourse to argue that the sigil allows the contemporary to become mythic.  Perhaps, it is in the very melding of past and present, of a recognizable history with a yet un-cannonized present, that the present is attributed a certain interesting historical significance.  If the boundary between past and present is distorted, dissolves, or becomes entirely unrecognizable, than the sigil begins to serve a more significant function.  

Take, for instance, the sigils that I am designing for this project.  They incorporate contemporary feelings, those of the author, into a historical discourse.  They do more than that, for these feelings conveyed as distorted images become as much a part of the past.  They are interwoven and inseperable.  I might include something of the recognizable Egyptian hieroglyphic in a sigil pertaining to the much more contemporary act of writing with permanant marker upon the body.  Here, the present and past are not as oil and water.  Rather, a more appropriate analogy might be the adding of vodka to water.  Despite the different components that compose each element, the solution is visibly inseperable.  As the designer of the sigil, I lose the distinctions myself.  For the viewer of the sigil this serves a significant aesthetic (sorry Foucault) import.  It means that the contemporary becomes mythological.  The present is embedded in the discourse of the past, and vis versa. 

Such, it might also be argued, is one of the more important functions of Burroughs cut-up texts.  Burroughs selects fragments from a literature in order to accomplish certain, more contemporary, goals.  Though, the difference is that with Burroughs’ texts the past is distorted.  The fragments are often unrecognizable.  With the sigil, on the otherhand, the past seems to overwhelm, to subsume the present.  But then, what could be the importance of lodging contemporary images in the throat of a past body; of distorting distinctions?  To this effect, the answers hardly obviate themselves.  Perhaps, the import of this form is that by making the present part of a more general mythology, one distorts the ever-present emphasis on a different now.  Here, the function of the sigil is to argue, in form, against a seperationist discourse.  Such is the form of virtual discourse  that forgets or refuses to acknowledge the existence of the prior.  Rotman’s text on the three stages of the virtual is so entirely provocative for it refutes this seperation; a distinction.  Similarly, Foucault describes the carceral in an important historical context; that of the scaffolding; of early torture.  In both cases, the historical contributes significantly to present discourse.  If anything, the sigil provides a more extreme amalgamation of present and past.  Another significant function of the distortion might be that the sigil attributes the present more significance (here, the present is not devoid of the past).  The contemporary is attributed a significance by association.

Project Notes: Masochism and the Anti-Spontaneous Body (From section two of “Feigned Spontaneity”

II. Masochism

The masochistic corporeal exists as the exemplar of delayed satisfaction, and, by means of extension, what might be considered the anti-spontaneous body.  Through the delaying of orgasmic pleasure, the pleasure afforded by ejaculation, the masochist derives satisfaction: 

“There is a desire for scientific observation, and subsequently a state of mythical contemplation.  The masochistic process of disavowal is so extensive that it affects sexual pleasure itself; pleasure is postponed for as long as possible and is thus disavowed.  The masochist is therefore able to deny the reality of pleasure at the very point of experiencing it, in order to identify with the ‘new sexless man.’” (Coldness and Cruelty 32) 

In masochistic interaction, the delaying of gratification is itself gratifying.  Here, there is a certain present pleasure.  This is not a matter of linear causality, for the masochist derives pleasure from a network of events that occur between what might be considered the beginning and concluding events.  There is, as Deleuze provocatively suggests, the occurrence of a certain satisfying suspension.  This is explicitly referenced in his arguments concerning the female that participates as torturer.  As the “woman torturer” whips the body of the male recipient, she poses intermittently.  The torturer suspends her actions briefly in order to look into a mirror.  Here, according to Deleuze, masochistic interaction is prolonged and a photograph is produced.  This continues to occur as the torturer satisfies the specific inclinations of the tortured.  This is not merely a characteristic of this form of interaction.  This suspension is itself integral to the pleasure experienced by the masochistic body: “The same scenes are reenacted as various levels in a sort of frozen progression” (33).  This repeated suspension – a succession of frozen moments – is what differentiates Masoch from Sade, and correspondingly, masochism from sadism.   

It is in the masochistic body, and the masochistic act that spontaneity is denied.  Not only is the orgasm delayed or forsaken, as the body is made to wait, but this waiting is further accentuated by the suspended movements of the torturer.  Not only is the masochistic body suggestive of the anti-spontaneity that must be attributed to Funk Night, a very similar corporeality is assumed by those that participate.  Here, the body of the individual Funk Night attendee can be described as the body of the masochist.  The attendee awaits the arrival of the next event, the next planned occurrence – the pleasurable moment – while deriving a certain pleasure in waiting.  At intermittent moments, the attendee receives messages and photographs by means of extensive network, generally composed of other attendees (friends, recent acquaintances, etc.).  It is this informational network that takes the place of Deleuze’s “woman torturer,” in interaction.  Arguably, the wait is generally more satisfying than the event itself.  At no point is this more evident than in consideration of the denial of the orgasm. 

If one returns to Deleuze’s fruitful understanding of the masochist as the “sexless man,” his analysis becomes applicable to funk night.  The attendee, again, is stimulated by the various suspensions that preclude the actual event.  Interestingly though, it is the event itself that denies gratification.  Continuing in this discourse, it becomes quite evident, that as the masochist the attendee is often denied the sexuality of orgasm.  This is not to denigrate Funk Night, for it serves an important cultural function, but rather to attribute its significance to that which precedes the event – the masochistic interplay that occurs for an attendee that experiences a continual suspension in relationship to an informational network.  Arguably, it is by means of the anti-spontaneous that pleasure is derived. 

Sigils (Continued)

I.

II.

III.

IV.

Sigils

Tags: “Sperm Collective,” “The Voiceless are Powerless?,” “Quote the tail/tale,” “Dr. Clock”

Tags: “Roman Numeral Four…the why and what for” “X/Y” “Sexed Parenthesis”

Following Vowel Omission Technique:

I.

II.

Project Ideas/Ideals (Part infinity)

Sigil

The diagrammatic as outlined by Deleuze and Guattari:

“The diagrammatic or abstract machine does not function to represent, even something real, but rather constructs a real that is yet to come, a new type of reality.” (A Thousand Plateaus 142)

“The third component is diagrammatic: it consists in taking regimes of signs or forms of expression and extracting from them particles-signs that are no longer formalized but instead constitute unformed traits capable of combining with one another.”

As I construct the various fragments which will  eventually compose larger diagrams, I return to chapter five of A Thousand Plateaus.  Specifically, I am considering this chapter from a structural perspective.  How while I form a diagram that is effective, imaginative, provocative, and, most significantly, useful?  Shouldn’t the text/images serve a purpose beyond the informative level?  The answer seems evident already, especially in light of the conversation Professor Pruchnic and I had concerning Foucault’s texts (“Pruchnic here.  Hello Pruchnic”).  In regards to Deleuze and Guattari it seems quite evident that the diagram is inherently “combinatory.”  Here, I mean that the various pictures/mini-diagrams can and will work in conjunction with each other.  Yet, despite what the diagram already functions to provide - a system by which unformed traits extracted from particles-signs readily combine with one another – it still seems significant to recall that the relationships existing between said unformed traits must be considered thoroughly.  It seems that it is not simply enough to allow the pictures to be placed on the page together.  Diagrams of particular interest connect meaningfully or usefully.  This is where the digital asserts its significance as medium.  Interesting digital diagrams provide fruitful/useful links between various portions of the text.  It seems obvious that this can be considered the “real that is yet to come.”  Possibly this is the future-language, as Rotman suggests, an early form of Imageology, an interesting intervention on older sources, or, the force.

“The force is strong with you…”

In any event, my efforts so far have led me to consider the opportunity for layering.  This works on several levels.  First, the images will be attributed a certain texture or depth, in that I will use super imposition, and I will attribute them a certain form of tag (semantic).  Moreover, I will also work to provide as many sub-windows as possible, so that one can move from image to image, from subset to subset.  This structure will resist conventional narrative progression, in that it will allow intensities instead of an ultimate or definitive climatic experience. 

In total, the digital provides fruitful opportunities for the pursuit of the diagrammatic.  Yet, as suggested previously, it remains necessary to remember that the continuum of intensities is not chaotic; it is not without planning:

“…Continuum of intensities, combined emission of particles or signs-particles, conjunction of deterritorialized flows: these are the three factos proper to the plane of consistency; they are brought about by the abstract machine and are constitutive of destratification.  Now there is no hint in all of this of a chaotic white night or an undifferentiated black night.  There are rules, rules of “plan(n)ing,” of diagramming, as we will see later on, or elsewhere.  The abstract machine is not random; the continuities, emissions and combinations, and conjunctions do not occur in just any fashion” (70-71)