Adrian Piper On Wearing Three Hats(1996)

These remarks were originally delivered 1. »Do you keep (fight) or escaping (flight). I prefer escap- at a symposium at Brandeis University ing because it is, all things considered, on multi-talented women in March your different more energy-efficient. 1996.1 The organizers and audience of selves separate, And when I was considering having the symposium posed certain questions children, I interviewed friends of mine of the participants, and we did our best or do you integrate who did (they didn’t realize they were to answer them. I mention this at the them?« being interviewed, of course, but they outset because the questions were in were). I like other’s people’s children some ways like the polite query, »How There are no discrete selves to separate very much. But if I were to have children, are you?« and the following remarks or integrate. My variety of professional I would get exactly the children I deserve. like a certain kind of answer to that activities are all different, equally essential I saw, from coming to appreciate my query. Under some circumstances »How expressions of one self. When I am alone parents’ efforts as well as from interview- are you?« can elicit a sudden self- in the solitude of my study or studio, I am ing my friends who had them, that raising awareness of how one in fact is that one completely out of the closet: I move back them properly would have to be any may not have sought; and an over- and forth easily among art, philosophy, parent’s central preoccupation, just as my whelming desire to unburden oneself of and yoga (my third hat). It’s the only time work is for me. I was not even tempted that uninvited self-knowledge, expressed I feel completely free to be who I am. So to try, and feel no regrets for lost options. – at least internally – with a snarl: Oh, I will go to almost any lengths to protect The activities of art, philosophy, and yeah? You want how am I? I’ll give you my privacy. If I lose that, I lose everything. yoga themselves determine the life how am I …! It can thus elicit a kind Often when I describe the dilemmas choices I am free to make – to have and extent of answer the interlocutor I will shortly outline to some individual children or not, to relocate or not, to be did not really mean to elicit; the kind in the helping professions, their first in a relationship or not. But I am not free it would have been even worse manners response is, »Well, you’ll just have to stop to choose to be a different person than to volunteer unasked (and that I, as making art«; or »Well, you’ll just have to I am; so I am similarly not free to choose a well-brought-up middle-class person, cut down on the time you spend working not to engage in the activities that make would never dream of volunteering on your philosophy project.« This response me who I am. Not to be able to realize unasked). So in responding to the sym- makes me see how different from them or express the self I am in action is to die posium questions, I had to choose I am. They view making art or doing a slow and painful death. between indulging my desire to unbur- philosophy the way I view parenting or den myself of sudden and unwelcome relocating – as a choice I am free to make. self-knowledge on the one hand, and What is a choice for them is a necessity 2. »How do other observing good manners on the other. for me, and what is a necessity for them Then I realized that to answer these is a choice for me. Art, philosophy, and people react questions would also be to elucidate yoga are parts of me the way their to your different certain dimensions of my life that many children and their roots are parts of them. people find enigmatic or disquieting, I learned this about myself after having selves?« and so to reduce my risk of getting repeatedly and instinctively resolved burned at the stake. A pox on good conflicts between partnering relationships When I am with other people, I do keep manners, I decided. and my work in favor of my work. these different activities separate, and I instinctively perceive anyone who tries those I am with help me to do that. They to interfere with or compete with my work engage with the activity with which they as an enemy. I think this means that my feel most comfortable, and withdraw work is my self, and that I read a threat from others they find strange. If I insist 1 Originally presented at the Third Annual Tillie K. Lubin Symposium, Who Is She? to my work as a threat to my existence. on presenting more of myself than they Conversations with Multi-Talented Women I defend my self against such threats prefer, their withdrawal may turn to (with Mary Catherine Bateson, Perri Klass, instinctively, either by counterattacking resistance, rejection, or aggressive attack. Kristin Linklater, and Sherry Turkle) at Brandeis University / Rose Art Museum on March 17, 1996.

117 On Wearing Three Hats Adrian Piper

The first time I remember partitioning philosophy professors who had very mistrust the more advanced practices of the border, I have to decide whether to xenophobia is similarly an instance I find among philosophy students myself in order to accommodate other strong views about a field with which they yoga (although of course they don’t mind change the subject, lie, leave, or say what of anomalophobia. Other instances of and professionals for whom the process people’s needs for an oversimplified other were largely unfamiliar. After a time a good workout). Analytic philosophers, is true and thereby destroy our connection. anomalophobia include a philosopher’s of venturing into the alien territory of an was in the mid-s. Like many others I simply refused to take the bait. like most academics, also tend to be Only the avoidance of connection succeeds experience of anxiety, violation, or author’s mind, by reading, attending to, at that time, I had started doing yoga, and The third time (since there are three hermetically engaged with their particular in avoiding the danger. disorientation in the presence of contem- and analyzing closely her or his written had gotten seriously committed to it – hats, you get three anecdotes) was in order areas of specialization, and so mistrust These manoeuvres, particularly between porary art, and an artist’s experience work is so threatening that they cannot taking classes, doing postures at home, to protect my work in analytic philosophy contemporary art. And the contemporary art and philosophy, make me feel like of anxiety, violation or disorientation in bring themselves to do it at all. Similarly, and reading Vedanta philosophy. During from the art world. The attacks came from art world’s susceptibility to transient an adulterous spouse. Each field demands the presence of philosophy. some artists’ perceptual anomalophobia art school I then developed an interest male artists who had earlier defined their intellectual fashion leads it to mistrust my full energy, attention, and commit- Because philosophers are trained to is expressed in rabid avoidance of the in Western philosophy: Jasper Johns was own art practice in relation to analytic the rigor, discipline and traditionalism ment; each resents my involvement with navigate the highways of abstract logical cutting edge, and in work that celebrates, reading Wittgenstein, so everyone else philosophy. But as I became more deeply of analytic philosophy. the other; each suspects such involvement reasoning, and to clear away the under- replicates, or permutes artistic convention. in the art world did, too. Both interests involved in it, and particularly after I was I practice yoga, moonlight in art and when I am absent; each feels personally brush in order to pave new ones, the moved me to start taking summer courses admitted to the Ph.D. program at Harvard, hold down a tenured day job in philosophy. betrayed when this suspicion is confirmed; best tend to have a comparatively high 5. »Does your in philosophy at CCNY. My first philoso- they became progressively disenchanted My day job is particularly hostile to my and each is absolutely and uncondition- tolerance for logical complexity and phy instructor, an analytic philosopher by it, and quite vocal in their criticisms work as an artist. But it requires me to ally unwilling to concede any legitimacy conceptual unfamiliarity. But philosophers involvement in in the Anglo-American tradition, made of its academic and class elitism. Some maintain standing self-protective defenses to that involvement, much less make any also tend to have a correspondingly low more than one field disparaging remarks in class about »fuzzy- of them ignored me when we met on the of various kinds against attacks on the accommodation to it. Each field is morally tolerance for sensory stimulation and headed Eastern mysticism«. I responded streets of New York, or made pointed legitimacy of both of my two other outraged by the suggestion that I am a perceptual anomaly. They often live quietly influence your by tucking the fuzzy part of my head remarks about not needing a Ph.D. in essential activities: fighting for institu- resource that might be shared with the and conservatively; prefer traditional perception of each? safely out of sight, under my hard-nosed philosophy to make good art, or dropped tional recognition and support of my role other, to the ultimate advantage of both. Western art, music, dance, and literature; analytic philosopher’s hat. I didn’t doff me from the anthologies and group as an artist, or concealing it in order to It is almost as though I had suggested choose conventional lifestyles; and wear If so, how?« that hat in a professional philosophy shows in which we had, up to that point, avoid institutional antagonism; or con- group sex. classic, tailored clothes in muted colors context for twenty-five years. Happily, exhibited together. Later, I learned not fining my interest in Vedanta to reading Some people are lucky enough to have (tans, tweeds, navy blues). While withholding the anomalous parts it’s no longer politically acceptable to to mention my philosophical interests and exercise classes. multiple talents that are publicly compat- By contrast, contemporary artists are of myself from view, I rely on them in be quite that publicly contemptuous of around my art world colleagues for other I have survived in each of these ible, such as being a history professor trained to seek out, discern, and transmute judging the one before me. I survey each a foreign culture’s worldview. reasons: they became restless when respective fields through camouflage. and a pianist, or a computer programmer perceptual anomaly. So the best tend to community with an outsider’s eye, and The second time I oversimplified I discussed it, or took my interest in it to Since I am committed fully and in equal and a swimmer, or a nurse and a poet. have a high tolerance for sensory stimula- sometimes find it lacking in some respect myself was in order to protect my undermine my authenticity as an artist. measure to all of them, I am familiar I know of several academics who, in their tion and unfamiliarity. But many artists the others supply. The yoga community’s commitment to art from attack by philos- I don’t have a similar anecdote to tell enough with the language and practices time at the computer, sometimes do other also tend to have a correspondingly low depth balances the art community’s ophers. It was right after I’d graduated about yoga. Since Vedanta places a high of each to present myself as an authentic kinds of writing: poetry, fiction, food tolerance for those uncharted highways of shallowness, and the philosophy commu- from art school. I had already established priority on the values of receptivity and »native speaker« in whichever one criticism, journalism. They don’t need the abstract logical reasoning that post no nity’s rigor balances its vagaries. From myself professionally, and had attained a insight into everything life has to offer, I happen to be in at the moment. And subterfuges that are necessary when the directional signs or geographical markers. the perspective of philosophy and yoga, certain degree of visibility as an artist. A it is generally less resistant than art I have learned to blend in professionally professional communities that exercise They often live dangerously and precari- the art community looks undisciplined, philosopher friend had introduced me to or philosophy to perceived anomaly, and with each, by temporarily suppressing my those talents are at one another’s throats. ously, define in their sartorial choices the impulsive, and gratification-oriented; Kant’s Critique of Pure Reason, and this correspondingly more welcoming of all interests and involvement in the others. fashion of the moment, choose unconven- materialistic, obsessed with the fashion had motivated me to enroll at CCNY full- of my activities. One philosopher attempted blackmail tional lifestyles, and tend to be drawn of the moment, and fundamentally uncon- time for an undergraduate degree in by threatening to expose my art activities 4. »How do the to cutting-edge work not only in the fine cerned with standards of quality – which philosophy. I was  years old. After read- to our colleagues. I called her bluff by members of each arts, but in music, dance, literature, and seem to be invoked only as a rationaliza- ing a review of my art work in the news- 3. »How do you encouraging her to by all means publicly field differ from theory as well. (As for me, I live quietly tion for maintaining the status quo of papers, one of my philosophy professors deal with other parade her philistinism. and precariously; prefer traditional money and power. On the other hand, the took me aside after class to explain to There’s an edgy, sinking feeling in the the others?« Western and cutting-edge art, music, art community offers a perspective of me why what I was doing was not art at people’s reactions?« pit of the stomach you get when you are dance, and literature; have an unconven- untrammeled spontaneity and unpredict- all. Our brief conversation established riding with a garrulous cab driver and you Hegel thought art and philosophy were tional lifestyle; and wear classic, tailored ability from which both the philosophy that he had not kept up with developments I have never found a professional context both wander too close to the limits of safe a good combination. If it’s good enough clothes in muted colors.) and the yoga communities seem staid in contemporary art since Impressionism. anywhere that was not hostile in some conversation. You know that beyond those for Hegel, it’s good enough for me. But So whereas philosophers tend to suffer and controlling, achieving depth and rigor He wasn’t sure Picasso’s cubist imagery measure to at least one, and sometimes limits, your friendly repartee will freeze the practices of art and philosophy are from anomalophobia of the senses, artists at the expense of inventiveness. was really art, either. Lord, please wake two out of the three of my hats. Jnana into stony silence, turn ugly, or deteriorate also diametrically opposed in certain often suffer from anomalophobia of Similarly, the art community’s me up, I prayed silently. He did not want Yoga, the yoga of analysis and scholar- into a shouting match. As he nears the ways. Everyone is to some extent afraid the intellect. Present one with the creative inclusiveness balances the philosophy to hear about Duchamp, Dada, Surrealism, ship, is not well established in this coun- danger zone, your heart sinks, your pulse of what is strange, unfamiliar, or un- products of the other and the reaction is community’s provincialism, and the yoga or Minimalism, and I was too immersed try, so many yoga afficionados mistrust races, and your hackles rise simultane- known. Call this anomalophobia. (Some usually instant antipathy. That is why community’s self-reflectiveness balances in the newly emerging practice of Concep- the intellect in general, and academic ously. I get that feeling a lot, with many people are also drawn to it, by curiosity, I never do so unless asked, and then only its intellectual glibness. From the perspec- tual Art to convey its importance. I found philosophy in particular. Like many of my colleagues, in each field. Greater attraction, or the desire for mastery. with great trepidation. tive of art and yoga, the philosophy the exchange futile and enervating, a real academics more generally, analytic conversational depth, breadth, and self- Call this anomalophilia.) Just as racism, Of course it can work the other way community seems rigid, narrow-minded waste of time. That was only the first of philosophers are often dismissive about revelation set off warning signals. As sexism, anti-Semitism, homophobia, around in particular cases. I have been and petty; emotionally stunted, obsessed many such diatribes I had to listen to from matters of the spirit, and so tend to my colleague innocently wanders too near and so forth are instances of xenophobia, struck by the intellectual anomalophobia with professional hierarchy, and fatally

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self-deceived by its conflation of stitched to my head. The longer I meditate been duly reprimanded – or ridiculed, adapt to each community by presenting into going ahead with it, by threatening gives me the very great satisfaction of entrenched socioeconomic status with on the subject of race, the more bizarre or bullied, or threatened with professional myself in such a way as to maximize easy to sue me in court if I backed out. (She proving to them that you don’t have to philosophical worth. On the other hand, and pathological it strikes me that some retaliation – for getting out of line by categorization. I do not demand any more now denies she did this, but in fact she reject your family and misrepresent who the philosophy community offers a pink, beige, cream, tan, salmon, pale those gatekeepers of the field whose self- recognition, of any more of me, from any did. I remember. I was there.) you are in order to make it in this country. perspective from which both art and yoga yellow, café-au-lait, mocha, chocolate, imposed duty is to safeguard its purity particular specialized audience to my Through this recognition I experi- After my parents died, I came to see that communities seem blind to the pleasures and mahogany-colored people should against my contaminating influence. On work than I sense it is able to give. When enced for the first time the connection and they, and I, are of a species that is slowly of what Plato would describe as the realm designate themselves as »white« and my first job a senior professor befriended I am in the art, philosophy, or yoga com- affirmation with an actual audience that becoming extinct. In one hundred years of pure form, achieving full physical other pink, beige, cream, tan, salmon, me and nominated me for membership in munities, I mostly just shut up about the I had always envisioned with my ideal there will be no families like ours left embodiment at the expense of intellectual pale yellow, café-au-lait, mocha, choco- an exclusive academic society. For doing other ones. This benefits others, by audience. It’s the experience of trying in the United States, and no one left who insight. late, and mahogany-colored people so he almost lost his own membership, reducing the conceptual anomaly I would to communicate something and knowing is like me and my relatives. They all will Finally, the philosophy community’s as »black« and then insist vehemently and so I lost his friendship. Another was otherwise represent; and it benefits me, that, even when you are not being fully have disappeared into the white main- rationalism and the art community’s open- on the self-evidence of these designations. ridiculed for socializing with me, and put by allowing me to focus fully on the task understood, you are at least being taken stream. By contrast, on my first visit to mindedness balance the yoga community’s It is particularly odd because optically, an end to the ridicule by putting an end at hand. seriously and listened to. I used to have Australia I was astounded to discover that intermittent anti-intellectualism. From white results from combining all waves to the socializing. Then there was the to do this for myself, which can lead to sand-colored, green-eyed, narrow-nosed the perspective of art and philosophy, the on the spectrum of color – the height colleague of long standing who moved a bad case of egomania. So it’s very Aboriginals of mixed ancestry had abso- yoga community seems protected, isolated, of mongrelization, whereas black is the to a prominent department and tried to 7. »What are the pleasant to have an actual audience help- lutely no interest in passing. Their pride and unworldly; rejecting of interrogative absence of color – the epitome of purifica- convince his colleagues to recruit me there costs and benefits ing me out. It’s part of what continues to in their Aboriginal ancestry was absolute dialogue, resistant to moral complexity, tion. I would have thought that this was as well. It took years for him to rebuild motivate me, not only to do my work, but and public. They made me feel even more and overly respectful of authority. On just the opposite of what devoutly white his credibility – at the expense, of course, of being multi- to present it in public arenas – galleries, ashamed of being an American than the other hand, the yoga community offers people would mean to say about them- of those recruitment efforts as well as talented?« museums, books, articles, or public fora. I usually do; and bereft of a community a perspective from which the art and selves. Now whenever someone refers of our collegiality. These are only a few Another part of that motivation is I had never imagined it was possible to philosophy communities seem so pre- to themselves or others using these terms, of many such cases. Not one of those so I’ve already described some of the rewards my awareness of the effect of my success have. In time, my public visibility will occupied with chasing transient and I feel as though I am trapped among pressured has had the courage of his (and and punishments, both personal and on my parents. They were very proud of have become a reliquary tribute – to my illusionary goods that they seem simply somnambulistic mannikins in a very bad it is always a »his«) convictions. social. But the serious costs came when me. One of the most profound satisfac- parents’ pride in their parents, in their to miss the basic point of being on the parody of a George Romero film – and, Similarly, in some ways, with my art the recognition I was receiving in one tions of my life, and their greatest gift to parents’ parents, and in their parents’ planet in the first place. Yoga’s doctrine what’s more, expected to play a part. I world colleagues. I have gotten kicked out field grew beyond my ability to confine me, is my knowledge that in doing what parents – that will be even more incom- of detachment and nonpossessiveness keep on trying to get off the set, and can’t. of the art world twice: the first time in  it to that field. Between  and  I most wanted to do and felt best suited to prehensible to future generations of counsels a critical and removed attitude In the case of race, I have traded when it became generally known that there was virtually no audience to do, I made them happy. I have countless Americans than it is to this one. towards all three communities, and belies greater professional recognition for I was a woman; the second time in  my work in art, and I was for most of photographs of them in later life, My increased visibility as an artist the Marxist and communitarian objection the privilege of publicly affirming my when, after considerable exposure in group that time either a student or an assistant laughing, smiling, hugging me, hugging itself increased my visibility as a philoso- to the foundations of social contract African-American heritage, and so shows of women artists involved in second- professor with relatively low visibility each other. In earlier photos, taken when pher. The philosophy community’s discov- theory, that there is no self metaphysically confusing those who rely on crude racial wave feminism, it became generally in philosophy. Under these conditions, it I was a bratty, bitchy teenager from hell, ery of my »other life« as an artist returned independent of social circumstance. In categories. I have been struck by the known that I was African American. After was easy to avoid the antagonism of each they looked anxious and worried, uncer- its attention to my philosophy research – fact there is, and the aim of yogic practice number of philosophy colleagues for that happened I had plenty of time, privacy community toward the other. I instituted tain and apprehensive. But in later ones, attention that had lagged considerably is to arrive at it. To engage in all three whom I seemingly ceased to exist after and solitude to pursue my artistic interests, the policy of not engaging in professional they begin to look more and more light- after its discovery that I was black. So activities deeply, rigorously, inclusively, my racial identity became generally compatibly with teaching and doing art activity in the area where I live and hearted and content. When I look at those being a successful artist served to score self-reflectively, rationally, and open- known. There are many who expressed research in philosophy and keeping up my teach philosophy, so that neither commu- photos I am reminded that I lightened back some of the professional points I’d mindedly is the greatest personal fulfill- their interest and regard during my first yoga practice. It was not until the late nity would have to deal with my involve- their hearts. That reminder lightens mine. lost among some philosophers by being ment there is. It’s better than sex. years out of graduate school from whom s, when the topic of gender, race, and ment in the other, and I would not have to I also take vicarious pleasure in African-American. Among others, it has I no longer receive greetings when our difference became fashionable in critical deal with their hostility to that involve- competing on my parents’ behalf and merely increased my notoriety. paths cross at conventions, nor invitations circles that I was rehabilitated. At that ment. For thirteen years this arrangement winning the recognition and validation 6. »Does being dif- to speak at their departments, nor biblio- point I became very popular, and many allowed me to pursue both activities in I receive from the audience to my work. ficult to categorize graphic citations when they make use of the individuals for whom I had ceased relative peace. Since I didn’t have siblings, I have never 8. »How has being of my work in their publications, nor even to exist rediscovered my existence. Our My visibility as an artist took a sharp felt comfortable competing with my multi-talented make it difficult to standard letters of acknowledgment or reunion was joyful. It was as though we’d upward turn in , as the result of my various professional peer groups. (It took rejection when I submit papers to their never been parted. – Up to a point: many first, twenty-year retrospective. When me a long time to figure out that they affected your life?« be recognized? If journals. Of course it works both ways: such individuals have a definite sense of the Alternative Museum asked to do this were nevertheless competing with me. so, in what ways?« When my racial identity became known how much recognition is fitting for some- retrospective, I was very pleased at the What a revelation! All those years my All this has meant an exponential increase to them, their true characters became one of my status, and I am often repri- prospect of being rehabilitated. But colleagues were thinking of me as a in press exposure, invitations, demands, Here I would contrast being a light- known to me. So these are individuals manded for overstepping myself. I intuitively knew that the fragile balance competitor for professional rewards, obligations, and paperwork from both skinned African-American woman with who have largely ceased to exist for me In the case of being a Jill-of-all-trades, that had enabled me to pursue my interests I was thinking of them as cute guys.) fields that continues to this day. These being »multi-talented«. I consider both as well. by contrast, having three hats to wear has in all three fields, without interference The groups I am competing with, in all constitute the language of public recogni- my white appearance and my black Many others who have had the temer- not made it more difficult to be recog- from the others, would be destroyed. aspects of my work and conduct, are those tion and appreciation to creative producers identity to be fourth and fifth »hats« ity to befriend me professionally, or to try nized, because I have no scruples about I was extremely ambivalent. In the end, branches of my family who are passing in any field. But managing these expres- I would gladly take off if they were not to recruit me or promote my work, have wearing only one hat at a time. I try to Jane Farver, the curator, twisted my arm for white. Every public success I achieve sions of appreciation is a full-time job in

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itself. If there is no one to take on this job, whose members committed suicide rather seen it in major museum shows. Some who proposed to write a book evaluating occasion for celebration. Instead I feel favors, the exclusions of some people, or to pay its salary, it can consume all of than permitting themselves to be sold into have gotten confused about the kind of my work in both fields – and dismissed anxiety and foreboding. I now know from with never a word mentioned.« one’s time and energy; and this has been slavery. That’s why there are so few work I do in each field: Since I make art my warnings about the special training experience how this event could further That world of course has an analogue true for me. My increased visibility as an remnants of Igbo culture and ancestry to that targets racism and xenophobia, they philosophy requires – eventually took the damage my work, my health, my safety, in contemporary academia. It is the world artist has been almost entirely due to be found among African Americans now. infer that I must work in this area of only face-saving way out of the impasse and my professional relationships. of high-profile research institutions, whose the critical and intellectual reception of They are also the tribe who chose to be research in philosophy as well, which this created, by picking a fight, terminat- I anticipate disaster. I spend a lot of time primary commitment is to research inno- my work among writers, curators, critics, massacred rather than cut a deal with the is false (my primary philosophy research ing our friendship, and thereby the book mentally casting about for avenues of vation. Its currency is the »mutual favors« academics, and other artists. Most collec- British in Biafra. Unlike all other African is in metaethics and Kant’s metaphysics). project. Others who have intuited the escape (perhaps I’ll emigrate to Berlin, – the exchange among all of its members tors avoid it, and some museum trustees tribes, the Igbo form of government is Or, what is worse, they read into my importance of delving into my philosoph- I fantasize; or look up my maternal Hindu of the assistance, resources, contacts actually boycott board meetings at which a parliamentary democracy rather than philosophy research a »subtext« of com- ical research in order to fully understand relatives in New Delhi and join an ashram; and opportunities – that encourage and curators attempt to propose it for acquisi- a monarchy. And unlike most other mentary on race of their own devising, my art work have distanced themselves or in any case give geographical founda- facilitate its »frictionless functioning«. tion. Since increasingly, America’s rich languages excluding English, Igbo does then respond to that rather than to what from me and my work altogether; or have tion to my alien status), and avoiding the I am not now in that world, and no longer people feel that they are not rich enough, not distinguish between the familiar and I actually say. Among others, this new complained that it is over-intellectualized; reality that such people are everywhere hungry for it. As the worlds in which this trend among collectors and trustees the polite forms of address, so the Igbo information about me has elicited precise- or have reasoned that it can’t be that to be found. It’s difficult to imagine going I live multiply, combine and divide – art, is likely to worsen. If there is a case for are considered rude and disrespectful by ly the reactions I feared: I have lost friends significant if it can’t stand on its own. on this way for another thirty-odd years, philosophy, yoga, African-America, Euro- my work to be made, most would prefer other African tribes. The Igbo are known in the field who had defined their relation- so I avoid that thought, too. pean-America, music, dance, literature, to please just put a sock in it. So I am throughout Africa for being daring, ship to me in nonpolitical or non-cultural Instead I remember how much satis- German culture and politics (of course famous without being rich. This means ambitious, resourceful and enterprising terms, and found these new variables too 9. »Does being faction I would give these floating patches I have hobbies, just like everybody else) – that I must manage my visibility- on the one hand, but proud, bellicose, difficult to deal with; or who had assumed multi-talented of pond scum if I were to let them win. it occupies an ever smaller place connected professional and administrative idealistic, arrogant and uncompromising I worked in traditional art media, and Reading biographical accounts of histori- in the larger one. affairs more or less single-handedly, in on the other. Like the Klingons on Star had no way of coming to grips with the cause hostility cal figures who triumph over adversity Nevertheless I cannot bring myself to addition to teach full-time, do research Trek, they will gladly die defending their »experimental« forms my art work often in others? If so, is also very inspiring. Besides, you can condemn unconditionally this contempo- in philosophy, produce my artwork, and honor. When you’re almost as hard-wired takes; or who have felt obligated to take learn a tremendous amount about human rary version of the »Victorian gentlemen’s raise money to pay for materials and for martyrdom as Commander Worf, some sort of stand on this other work what do you do nature from being on the receiving end club« of »rich, upper-class white male[s]«. assistance. there’s not a whole lot you can do about it. I do, and have not known quite what stand about it?« of this kind of thing. Plus you get an I owe the most crucial opportunities of Needless to say, this is impossible. Since my rehabilitation I have also to take. Still others pretend it doesn’t unending source of material for your work. my professional life to the generosity and I have collapsed from physical exhaustion received many more threats to my privacy exist, or accord it the status of a private The sheer numbers of people in both fields So I protect myself by doing my work and support of upper-class white males: John at least once every year since . I have and safety than I had simply in virtue of hobby, or attempt actively and explicitly who have personally demonstrated to me staying as far away from such people as Rawls and Roderick Firth in philosophy, completed no new body of art work since being a black woman of the professional to thwart my success at it. (I watch what people do rather than what possible. And I remind myself that things Sol LeWitt and Hans Haacke in art. It . And my progress on the three- class. Most well known artists are I have found similarly hostile reac- they say) how much they want me to fail could be much worse. If I’d been born is not their fault I turned out so differently volume philosophy project I began in  available to the public only through their tions among some of my art colleagues at my work – or go off somewhere else, two hundred years ago, I would’ve been from what they might have expected. has virtually ground to a halt just four galleries. They thus have intermediaries to my professional status as a philosopher. do something else, or just plain disappear a slave. I wouldn’t be having these Besides, I think the business of harping chapters short of completion. For the last to screen public access to them. Because Many are like those philosophers who from their line of vision – is staggering. problems at all. So I certainly wouldn’t on »the exclusions of some people« can five years I have spent most of my out-of- my position as a philosophy professor assume that their general level of education It is also deeply demoralizing. Really, want to seem ungrateful or anything. be carried too far. When I read Budd classroom time answering the phone, at Wellesley College is public knowledge, entitles them to pass judgment on the sometimes these people behave so badly, I recently read Stephen Jay Gould’s Hopkins’ and John Mack’s research into filing paperwork, giving outside talks to many individuals simply bypass my specialized field of contemporary art with so clumsily, and so shamelessly that it is essay on the multiple and nonstandard extra-terrestrial abductions,3 my first reac- pay for assistance, and trying to recover gallery in an effort to gain direct access to which they are largely unfamiliar, and impossible not to speculate on what must types of intelligence that enabled Charles tion was not incredulity or skepticism. It my health. I am aware of constantly me. They call (or write or Fed Ex or fax) then react negatively when it does not have been done to them in early childhood. Darwin not only to formulate his theory was hurt feelings at being left out. How trespassing the outer limits of my physical me at my office in the philosophy depart- meet their preconceptions. Similarly, many One suspects at the very least youthful of natural selection, but to publish and come the little creatures aren’t abducting ability to function. This, in turn, reduces ment to discuss art-related business while of my art world colleagues reason that schooling deficient in Austen and Tolstoy, gain recognition among his peers for it. me? I asked myself. Aren’t I interesting my ability to keep up the yoga practice I am in conference with students; or leave since they are generally well-read and and overly devoted to The Three Stooges. He comments that »all the world’s bril- enough for them? that has been so important in helping me messages with the department secretary, intelligent individuals, and since philoso- But I can handle them. When I am liance, and all the soul’s energy, cannot to cope with all of it. Now, I don’t know and sometimes even with my colleagues; phy is a discursive discipline (rather than bed-ridden I read many, many novels, each combine to produce historical impact where my hot flashes are. But let me or travel to the Wellesley campus and turn technical and symbolic like mathematics of which provides me with a consoling without (...) the health and peace required assure you that when they finally do up in my classes, appear at my office door or physics), they should be able to grasp narrative in which, to suit the occasion, to live into adulthood; sufficient social arrive, it would be better for everybody during my office hours, or go to the cam- a specialized philosophical argument or I may appropriately recast myself as acceptability to gain a hearing; and life if I were at least doing my yoga. pus police to try to get my home address. text simply by reading it carefully. Given someone else. I also write this essay. in a century able to understand (...)«.2 He Of course I could reverse this down- Increased recognition has made it the turgid impenetrability of the decon- (Here I envision myself as Marcel Proust, goes on to quote George Eliot on the pain ward spiral by making work that was impossible to control my self-presentation structionist texts in art theory they are hard at work on Remembrance of Things of brilliant women without opportunity, more palatable to those who are wealthy to any particular subset of my professional expected to master, this is not an unrealis- Past, the coverlet up to my chin, the and to comment on Darwin’s good luck enough to buy it. But I am not willing to colleagues. For example, my philosophy tic expectation. But when they approach bedroom curtains drawn, and Mozart’s in being a rich, upper-class white male do that. This kind of obstinacy is typical colleagues have come to know more my work in philosophy with this attitude Jupiter symphony keening and throbbing who had at his disposal the »pervasive, for those blessed with Igbo forebears, as about my artwork than they learned from and discover that it is not that easy, they obligingly in the background.) silent, and apparently frictionless func- I am on my mother’s side. You may recall me, from having read about it in national often react antagonistically or disparag- I have a two-volume art-related proj- tioning (...) of the Victorian gentleman’s 2 Stephen Jay Gould, »Why Darwin?«, in: The New York Review of Books XLIII, 6 that the Igbo were the Nigerian tribe newspapers and periodicals or having ingly, or simply withdraw. One art critic ect coming out soon. This should be an world – the clubs, the networks, the mutual (April 4, 1996), S. 10 –14. 3 Budd Hopkins, Intruders: The Incredible Visitations at Copley Woods, New York 1987; John Mack, Abduction: Human Encounters with Aliens, New York 1994. 122 123 On Wearing Three Hats Adrian Piper

on my part. At the same time, if I had not When my person or presence itself elicits musical form and /or content, and for furniture music, and similarly with what- 10. »How does pursued my philosophical and theoretical 11. »What do you a too vehemently xenophobic response, I inscribed and /or enacted body language, ever speech I am hearing. I don’t ask any the strengths interests as a professional philosopher, personally get out can turn to my artwork as an intermediary as well as visual symbology. Most view- more of my audience than I am prepared my artwork would not have had the ethi- for communicating with those who suffer ers spend approximately seven seconds to give as an audience to someone else. you develop in cal, political, and epistemological focus of pursuing such a from anomalophobia of the intellect, and in front of a work of art, and can »do« Lately I have been having the humbling each field affect it has. And if I were not tenured in a variety of interests? to my work in philosophy as an intermedi- a gallery in a few minutes and a museum experience of going back to some of completely different field, I would have ary for communicating with those who show in an hour. By contrast, Bach’s more obscure cantatas that I’d the others?« no independent vantage point from which What makes it suffer from anomalophobia of the senses. my work typically demands much more thought were not very good the first time As to the effect of multiple strengths to make institutionally and politically worth the trouble?« Finally, it is in my own interest to than that just to fully take in one piece. I heard them because I hadn’t listened on each part, the effects themselves are subversive art without fear of professional achieve with all such individuals a quality One reason I make these demands, closely enough, and realizing, after multiple. My artwork has a purifying and retaliation. My work in philosophy has As you can see, my concerns in all three of relationship, a mode of functioning, I think, is because of my early training as repeated and attentive listening, that I just strengthening effect on my philosophy given me a taste for the challenge of fields have a large self-interested compo- and a level of awareness that transcend a painter. When I look at paintings, I not hadn’t been ready to hear what was there. work. For example, I am rabidly conserva- making art that addresses the universal nent. I am a conceptual anomaly who the rigid and provincial conceptualizations only look from a distance at framing, I’ve discovered the piercing sweetness of tive on matters of philosophical curricu- issues – integrity, justice, autonomy, elicits xenophobic responses from most of experience that turn me into an anoma- placement, and composition. Most of my Kurt Huber’s tenor, the celestial majesty lum and practice. One philosopher friend freedom – that connect people across people. So it is in my own interest to ly in the first place. My yoga practice looking is up close to the canvas, reading of the opening chorale to #, and the has attributed my »purist« attitude toward cultures and historical periods, indepen- confound crude stereotypes and bring enables me to do this. Together, all three the brushwork for the history of the artist’s humorous self-cannibalization of #, philosophy to my having other outlets for dently of the aesthetic idiolect of a the viewer to a greater awareness and activities enable me to know that my aesthetic and strategic decisions: what which Bach there carries to new and my »creative« and »experimental« tenden- particular time and place. acceptance of anomaly, singularity and experiences have not been for nothing. parts were rubbed out? overpainted? outrageous lengths. This reminds me cies. I think there’s some truth to that. It’s Doing yoga, by contrast, has influ- individual complexity. My art practice They are ways of transforming pain into painted quickly, with short, rapid strokes? never to delude myself into thinking I’ve also true that the activity of doing philoso- enced my work both in art and in philoso- is a tool for doing that. meaning. or slowly, with long smooth gestures? grasped a work – in art, music, or phy functions for me as a sanctuary from phy from the beginning, in their strategies It is similarly in my own interest to What forms are rendered in painstaking literature – just because I’ve skimmed it the issues and experiences I feel com- as well as their content. In order to be able to understand the structure and detail, and which ones with broad but once; and so never to dismiss what I’ve pelled to address in my artwork. Philoso- confound crude racial stereotypes, my functioning of the individual self in such 12. »These fields suggestive brushstrokes? What is the skimmed with some easy rationalizations phy is the place where I am free to think artwork attempts to bring its viewers a way as to explain why that awareness linear and spatial relation between one that happened to come to mind. abstractly, comprehensively, rigorously, into what I have elsewhere called »the and acceptance of anomaly is so very are very different area of brushwork and another? and and precisely; to indulge my need to indexical present«.4 It deploys certain difficult to achieve. My work in philoso- from one another. so on. It is only this kind of looking that conceive the biggest possible picture in psychological, theatrical, or literary phy offers the consolation of insight when What are the enables me to see what is there, and it 13. »Where in your the greatest possible depth on the one devices for heightening the viewer’s self- awareness and acceptance are lacking. typically takes hours. The first time I went life history do these hand, and split all the hairs there are to awareness of her immediate and present constants?« to see Cezanne’s »Bathers« at the Museum split on the other. At the same time, if relation to the work, as a unique and of Modern Art, I stood in front of it for multiple talents I could not address the concrete and singular entity that addresses her directly. 4 See Adrian Piper, »Xenophobia and the In each area of activity there are certain four hours. »Is everything all right, Miss?« practical issues of racism and xenophobia This strategy is inspired by a yogic Indexical Present«, in: Re-Imaging America : basic elements or vocabulary that are the museum guard asked me solicitously. and interests come The Arts of Social Change, ed. Mark O’Brien, in my art work, my many repressive meditation technique known as samyama. Philadelphia 1990; reprinted in Kontext constants. In art, I almost always deploy »Just fine, thank you«, I answered. from?« and xenophobic professional experiences In philosophy, I develop a Kantian con- Kunst, ed. Peter Weibel, Köln 1994, S. 490 – the frontal gaze, discursive or compressed And then I read some monographs on it, in philosophy would have turned me into ception of the self as maintaining its 498; and in Out of Order, Out of Sight, text, and indexical language; in philoso- written language that guided me even All three activities have deep roots in a much more twisted and seriously internal unity and integrity through the Volume I: Selected Writings in Meta-Art phy, the analytic style of argumentation, further into Cezanne’s language of ges- childhood experience. I was the only child 1968 – 1992, Cambridge 1996). damaged person than I already am. My synthesizing activity of rational conceptu- 5 See, for example, Adrian Piper, »Two detailed scrutiny of texts, and Kantian ture, and so came back and looked even in an extended family of four adults for work in art helps me to love philosophy alization. This preserves ego-coherence Conceptions of the Self«, in: Philosophical epistemological and metaethical orienta- longer and saw even more. I do not see whom political argument and analysis for what it is, and not to demand of it on the one hand, but obstructs fine-grained Studies 48, 2 (September 1985), S. 173 – 197, tion; in yoga, yogic meditation integrated many exhibitions, because when I do (of McCarthyism and racism in particular) reprinted in: The Philosopher’s Annual VIII more than it can give. perceptual discrimination and self- (1985), S. 222 – 246; »Pseudorationality«, in: with sequences of physical postures and I know I will look until my head is split- were the dinnertime conversational norm. Similarly, doing philosophy removes knowledge, and reduces tolerance of Amelie O. Rorty and Brian McLaughlin, eds. breathing exercises as the foundation for ting and my eyeballs are rolling down There I learned quickly that reasoning any temptation to pump up my artwork conceptual anomaly, on the other.5 My Perspectives on Self-Deception, Los Angeles all other practices. So whatever works my cheeks. After the Met’s »Painting in rationally and logically was the best way » with large infusions of theory, theorizing, cognitive analysis of ego-coherence, and 1988, S. 297 – 323; and Two Kinds of pop up during these cycles are never a Renaissance Sienna« I was so teary and to command attention, authority, and Discrimination«, in: Yale Journal of Criticism or philosophizing, and directs those my evaluation of its benefits and limita- 6, 1 (1993), S. 25 – 74; reprinted in Out of total surprise. unfocussed that I caught the wrong bus respect for what I had to say. One of my impulses to a context in which I can give tions, is partly inspired by the yogic Order, Out of Sight, Volume II: Selected By »language« in art, I mean not only home. By contrast with the intensity of earliest memories is of my mother ex- them free reign. This frees up my artwork tradition of Vedanta philosophy that seeks Writings in Art Criticism 1967 – 1992, the language of images and words, but looking and seeing that traditional paint- claiming to me in exasperation, »Does Cambridge 1996). to proceed entirely from intuition. I never to relax and transcend the constraints of 6 So, for example, in part one of Die also the language of music, lyrics, and /or ing demands, my work is a piece of cake. there have to be a reason for everything?!« try to force it into any preconceived theo- the individual self. Kant was familiar with Religion innerhalb der Grenzen der bloßen the body. Whether spoken, written, formed, Another reason why I feel entitled to and my vehemently retorting, »Yes!« retical framework, and resist most of this tradition.6 Vernunft, Kant demonstrates a surprisingly or performed, my work usually makes demand so much of my audience is my My maternal grandmother kept an eye on those which others try to impose on it. detailed knowledge of Hindu cosmology in many demands on the viewer to read early studies in Medieval and Renaissance me while both of my parents worked. She his passing comment that »in einigen Although the connections among all three Gegenden von Hindostan der Weltrichter und deeply and complexly in many languages, musicology, which emphasized listening encouraged the drawing, painting, and of my central activities become clearer Zertörer Ruttren (sonst auch Siba oder Siwen to pay attention for an extended period, over the study of scores in order to detect sculpting in which almost all children to me every day, my art work has its own genannt) schon als der jetzt machthabende and to compute with not just one, but two the structure of a composition. This leads naturally engage. And although I did not logic and structure, which are quite Gott verehrt wird, nachdem der Welterhalter and sometimes three or four channels me to treat whatever music I am listening discover yoga until I was sixteen, it was Wischnu, seines Amts, das er vom Welt- independent of any intellectual meddling schöpfer Brahma übernahm, müde, es schon receiving: for writing and /or speech, for to as foreground rather than Satiean continuous with earlier experiences and seit Jahrhunderten niedergelegt hat.« Imanuel Kant, Die Religion innerhalb der Grenzen der bloßen Vernunft, hg. von Karl Vorländer, Hamburg 1978, S. 17. 124 125 On Wearing Three Hats Adrian Piper

habits: of spontaneously focussed older and crankier I get, the more difficult combined with other materials or media, addictive-compulsive drives that express sometimes combine to form chords, or awareness on the richness, vividness and it becomes. Since my only resources are the space or context in which they should my fundamental discontent with and separate to form counterpoint. You can mystery of some present but otherwise the very same traits that got me in trouble be realized, etc. optimism about the world, by changing tune in to one – i.e. turn up its volume, unremarkable moment; and of the medita- in the first place, it is usually a losing This process – of gradually forming and adding to it. So it is not within my and bring it into the foreground. The others tive discipline of certain kinds of physical battle anyway. I am accustomed to moving and realizing a work, in whichever field, power to control them, and it would be continue, but more quietly, in the back- activity such as dance, playing catch, through most social interactions in a and then leaving it behind me while I go a waste of valuable time and energy even ground. Then that one may return to the or jumping rope (which, at the age of six, particularly challenging yogic posture, i.e. on to the next one – proceeds in natural to try. When I am in the midst of a project background, while the volume goes up I once did for eight hours nonstop). with one foot planted firmly in my mouth. cycles I cannot predict. These cycles, too, in any one of my three areas of activity, on two others, and you hear the shifting The deep-rootedness of all three are multiple and simultaneous in nature, I am fully absorbed in it, and work at it sequences of chords and counterpoint activities has seriously undermined my since more than one work of more than obsessively. Nothing else exists and they form in combination. And sometimes successful socialization. They have 14. »Does one role one type is usually in some stage of the everything else – schedules, meals, rest, you can hear all of the individual melo- fashioned adult personality traits that process of formation at any particular other people – falls by the wayside. dies, chords, and counterpoints, distinctly complicate or thwart my relationships or talent take moment. (Any professional plates that remained in and in partial and full combination, even with others in a variety of circumstances. priority over the When external pressures obstruct the the air will come crashing to the ground though all are playing simultaneously. Part of the problem, of course, is the way natural course of these cycles, I simply at this point.) Over the course of a week When that happens you are floating in I look. What people see is a nice white others?« accumulate more and more unrealized or a month or longer, I may either focus a billowing, rushing stream of sound, lady, and what they get is another difficult ideas and visions, of all kinds, in my exclusively on that project, or else – what composed of rivulets of voice and instru- black woman. But philosophy, art, and When I am free of the constraints imposed mind. These ideas exert increasing inter- is more typically the case – alternate my mentation. Then you just relax, and let yoga make the problem even worse. My on me by each of the communities of nal pressure on me to realize them, to focus between two or even three such it carry you wherever it will. reliance on rationality in communication which I am a part, none of them do. I have transcend them by putting them out into projects sequentially, moving back and makes me insensitive or blind to other no professional discipline whatsoever. the world. When I don’t have the time forth among them as they demand my © Adrian Piper Research Archive  kinds of social nuance in interpersonal I have always mistrusted those articles or to realize all of them, this can cause attention. And sometimes as I’m doing interactions: I often respond to transactions interviews with writers that describe how, painful internal conflict and sometimes this, connections among them will appear of power, assertions of hierarchical superi- six days a week (they rest on the seventh), paralysis. When I am too exhausted to or influence the direction each is taking. ority, or signs of emotional investment they get up early in the morning, work for realize any of them, the tension between The more time I have to follow this inappropriately, with rational analysis or three hours, then eat a hearty breakfast, my inner life and my outer life increases through before new obstacles appear, the argument rather than diplomacy. Similar- go jogging, then get in another two solid unbearably. The natural connection more the processes of realizing different ly, my ingrained disposition to self- hours of work, after which they have a between idea and action on its behalf works even out. They gradually become expression results in an impulse control nutritious lunch, then a good nap, fol- is severed, and the activity of doing my less tornado-like – more balanced, moder- problem: I often express my thoughts, lowed by two hours for answering corre- work itself recedes to a distant, tantalizing ate, and integrated with other activities um, forthrightly, at moments when it spondence, a brisk walk, a light but memory. I feel as though I am grieving (such as brushing my teeth); and I become would be in my best interests to button nourishing dinner, and an evening spent a death. increasingly even-tempered and charming. my lip. Finally, my penchant for probing reading an edifying volume. Who are Then I turn into a really bad person, Harmony is orchestrating all processes the appearances in search of deeper these people? I wonder to myself. What and – even worse – an absent-minded one. simultaneously, each at its own pace. Bliss realities often leads me to violate conven- planet are they on? This is when I start letting a lot of my is being able to give each the measure of tions of polite discourse or conduct: I ask My creative life consists in multiple professional plates drop. I forget dead- attention and energy it needs at that tactless questions, make hurtful or awk- pro-active processes – intuitive, concep- lines, appointments, meetings, bills, moment, while the others purr quietly in ward observations, or pursue an explana- tual, visual, verbal, auditory, and kinaes- correspondence, and a few more basic the background. tion far past the point of comfort for thetic – that are in operation simultane- things such as brushing my teeth. Then the relation between all three anyone else. ously and at all times. These processes I become obsessed with the proliferating kinds of cycles of work can be compared These traits make me extremely have something to do with grasping and contents of my mental space, and spend to the process of recording and mixing difficult and irritating to work with. And forming. I can’t be any more specific many bedridden or physically immobilized an early Renaissance mass by Johannes the more irritated others become, the more than that. (By contrast, emotions for me hours mentally envisioning the series Ockeghem. Ockeghem’s method of baffled I become and the more I act out are reactive, and so are among the experi- of steps by which I would realize them composition was polyphonic, in which these traits in an attempt to find out why. ential data these pro-active processes if I could. This is how, in my mind, I have each voice or instrument was scored to (Of course I feel deep indignation and operate on.) Ideas or images or words or long since completed my three-volume a different melody, and all played more outrage whenever some impertinent young arguments gradually coalesce in my mind, philosophy project, and have made a great or less simultaneously. The relation whippersnapper behaves in these ways or sometimes appear fully formed. As deal of art in the last four years. To among them was musical, and numerically toward me.) Knowing these things about they become sharper, clearer, and more envision those steps in complete detail proportional, but not strictly harmonic myself, I work hard to sensitize myself to intense, they thereby become more without being able to carry them out is (since the harmonic scale had not yet social convention and cultivate empathy, demanding of realization. Then I start to be imprisoned, trapped in my body been discovered). Listening to this kind by imagining what it must be like to be making strategic decisions about how to and strangled by circumstance. of composition is a little like mixing it in the other person. But the better I get at do that: in what medium they should be When the external obstacles disap- the recording studio: within an ongoing, this psychological exercise, the more realized, what materials or colors should pear, those natural cycles lurch forward complex band of sound, you can hear disturbing and painful it is to do. And the be used, how, if at all, they should be on their own course. They are basically different, ongoing strands of melody that

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