Document generated on 10/01/2021 1:37 p.m.

Inter Art actuel

Change It or Kill Me Stephen Sarrazin

Arts et électroniques Number 63, Fall 1995

URI: https://id.erudit.org/iderudit/46532ac

See table of contents

Publisher(s) Les Éditions Intervention

ISSN 0825-8708 (print) 1923-2764 (digital)

Explore this journal

Cite this article Sarrazin, S. (1995). Change It or Kill Me. Inter, (63), 53–55.

Tous droits réservés © Les Éditions Intervention, 1995 This document is protected by copyright law. Use of the services of Érudit (including reproduction) is subject to its terms and conditions, which can be viewed online. https://apropos.erudit.org/en/users/policy-on-use/

This article is disseminated and preserved by Érudit. Érudit is a non-profit inter-university consortium of the Université de Montréal, Université Laval, and the Université du Québec à Montréal. Its mission is to promote and disseminate research. https://www.erudit.org/en/ Technologies Evolve The analogy of « virus entering host » may be 5 Marshall McLUHAN. Understanding Media-The As HOBERMAN explains, newer machines are applied to STELARC's 1994 performance of Stom­ Extensions of Man, McGraw-Hill, New York, 1964, p. 70- created to respond to stricter performance de­ ach Sculpture. For this performance, he created 71. 8 STELARC and James P. PAFFRATH, - The Split­ mands. DARWIN stated that when environmen­ and attempted to swallow a minute technologi­ ting of the Human Species » .The Obsolete Body. Davis. tal conditions change within an ecological sys­ cal sculpture that included an illuminating light California. J.P. Publications. 1984, p. 74. tem, natural selection weeds out less adapted bulb and expendable mechanical arms. Manoeu­ ' STELARC and PAFFRATH, p. 74. individuals and allows more genetically advan­ vred down his oesophagus, this sculpture can be " Contemporary vocabulary usage reveals that hu­ taged individuals to reproduce". Yet, biological read as mimicking the role of the virus-like tech­ mans already treat some technologies as though they evolution is often slow — incomparable to the nologies within the human host. were alive ; in the same way that living organisms do, alarmingly high turn-over rate that is visible with It can be argued that the quality that has ren­ computers become • infected by viruses - that endan­ the development of technologies'2. Nevertheless, dered humans evolutionarily advantaged over ger their « health ». 9 it can be speculated that the recurring manufac­ other species is their ability to make tools. It is Norman WHITE, - Description of Sixteen Selected Works », distributed to the author April, 1994. turing cycles of technologies indicate an evolu­ this « tool-making drive » that has allowed the 10 Ginette MAJOR and Hervé FISCHER, Images du tionary similarity to that of living species. human species to survive despite its physical Futur 93. 14 Mai — 19 Sept. Montréal: : Cité des Arts To manage this phenomenon conceptually, it mediocrities. This instinct may be interpreted as et des Nouvelles Technologies, p. 19. is believed that there is an urgency for the human an internalvirus whose DNA program dictates tool " Charles DARWIN. The Origin of Species, New body to evolve or - catch-up ». This has been ex­ production. Norman WHITE'S artistic philosophy York, The New American Library, 1958. pressed in works like STELARC's performance confirms this assessment : 12 Although the body's immune system can be ar­ Handswriting (May 22, 1982, Maki Gallery, To­ There has evolved into man's mental nature gued to deal with foreign particles in a relatively fast, kyo). With his third arm prosthesis operating, an insidious quirk which has caused him to be­ pseudo-evolutionary manner, at a macro level the hu­ STELARC composed the word • evolution » with come constantly restless, bored with accepted man morphology has not changed its physical shape for hundreds of years. his three upper - limbs » simultaneously on a values, images, definitions and such... One shares 13 STELARC and PAFFRATH, Strategies and Trajec­ blackboard. STELARC's concern with the theme the growing belief that man's inventiveness has tories, p. 45. of evolution is revealed as he often asserts that been the primary means by which he has achieved 14 Ronald M. ATLAS, Microbiology — Fundamentals the human body is obsolete. His usage of The his own downfall. Our inventions have widely and Applications , New York, MacMillan Publishing Third Arm to suggest the necessary direction of despoiled ourworld, and have led us into the most Company. 1984. pp. 288. 290. 9 the human species is relayed directly when he unhealthy, unfulfilling sorts of activity' . 15 Norman WHITE, Norman White, Vancouver, The states, « When we attach or implant prosthetic This conviction has motivated WHITE to cre­ Vancouver Art Gallery, 1975, p. 5. 16 devices to prolong a person's life, we also create ate electronic art that often expresses the futility McLUHAN stated : • Man appears as the repro­ the potential to modify the future evolution of the of technologies, opposing its highly esteemed ductive organ of the technological world. - McLUHAN, 3 p. 112. human species' * norm. One of the earliest electronic works exhib­ 17 « Computer Virus a Life Form ? » Globe A" Mail. ited in Canada, WHITE'S State of the Art U 974), August 3, 1994, p. 1. gets it name from this preoccupation. In this piece, A Parasitic Relationship ? " STELARC. • Triggering an Evolutionary Dialectic -, There exist many types of relationships be­ WHITE wired electronic circuitry to flash one row Obsolete Body Suspensions: :Stelarc, p. 65. tween species in the study of biology, for exam­ of lights at a time, creating an undulating effect '• WHITE, p. 5. ple, parasitic and symbiotic. Initially, technologies that coincides with the sounds emitted by nearby 20 WHITE, p. 5. may be determined to exist symbiotically with speakers. The work contradicts frequent promises 21 McLUHAN, p. 71. humans, indicating a mutually beneficial relation­ of technology to provide a superior environment ; ship. However, once the environmental and physi­ instead, it basks in its own uselessness and of­ ological damages of various technologies is con­ fers little aesthetic reward20. The use of techno­ sidered, the relationship between humans and logical materials in WHITE'S work may imply a technologies may be interpreted as quasi-para­ disappointment in the promises of technologies, sitic more than symbiotic. The process of the bio­ challenging popular opinion that technologies are logical infection of humans by viruses provides created to meet the supposed needs of society. an enlightening analogy for the speculation that Viewed collectively, the work of some elec­ technologies parasite the human species. The tronic artists indicates that not only can technolo­ analogy that technologies mimic the behaviours gies be viewed as McLuhan-esque extensions of of viruses challenges the role and ultimate fate of the body2', but they also possess distinct species­ the human race. like behaviours. In some ways, the similarities of On an aesthetic level only, an examination of the reproductive patterns of viruses to that of tech­ « T-even phages », a specific group of viruses, nologies may indicate a threat to high-tech hu­ reveals that their twenty-sided heads, coiled tube man populations. On the other hand, the virus­ shafts and extendable mechanical arms are simi­ like nature of technologies may not be external lar to advanced pieces of technology, a lunar but integral to the human body, having its origins module or a syringe, for example'4. When writing deep within the human instinct of « tool-making ». about his electronic art, artist Norman WHITE re­ Being a characteristic of humans, this internal lays, • Turning to the biological level of compli­ program may indicate the eventual replacement CHANGE IT OR KILL ME cation, we would be told that the « lower » organ­ of the human species by a more resilient, Stephen SARRAZIN isms exhibit a mechanistic sort of behaviour'5. » - techno-adapted » species. Are some electronic This « on/off » mechanistic behaviour is indicated artists visionaries by their ability to collectively, Of the nearly five hundred channels that promise by the inert state of viruses during non-reproduc­ even unconsciously, warn us of this emerging Cable TV in America, more than half of them will tive phases. Although viruses do not ingest food, techno-species ? If so, the future holds the an­ be showing • real » TV : archives, history, por­ move, breathe, excrete, they replicate when they swer as to whether or not humans will live in traits, tourism and travelogues, as well as home come in contact with a host. In the same way, we peaceful co-existence with techno-beings or face shopping, weather and direct theme channels, consider technologies inert, made of lifeless, in­ their ultimate failure. • etc. Moreover, « channel surfing » already permits organic materials. Like viruses, technologies rep­ access to the image banks if one possesses the licate at an alarming rate and humans can be necessary hardware : in addition to PBS, we find viewed as the energetic force behind their prolif­ The Discovery Channel, The Learning Channel, eration'". A British physicist, Dr. Stephen HAWK­ The Life and Health Network, Arts & Entertain­ ING, illustrates this point with the example of man- ' Mary Anne FARAH, • Machines in the Garden: In­ ment, QVC C-Span, which diffuse American Con­ made computer viruses where « a computer vi­ teractive Video Art — Bringing Video to Life », gressional hearings and assist in court trials. CNN rus fits the definition of a living system even Parallélogramme, vol. 18 (4). 1993, p. 48-54, and, Mary and MTV still figure among the top channels on though it has no metabolism of its own. Instead... Anne FARAH, - Telematic Performance Loops Toronto the global scale by inventing within the scope of it uses the metabolism of a host computer and is and Quebec », Fuse, vol. 17(1), Fall 1993,41-42. their thematic mandate new forms of television parasitic.'7 » - TV Bra was premiered by PAIK and cellist Char­ production ; hybrids issuing forth from their re­ lotte MOORMAN on May 17, 1969 at the Howard Wise spective identities and from their numerical tech­ An examination of the life cycle of the typical Gallery, New York. TV Penis premiered during a perform­ nological capabilities. For example, at the begin­ virus leads to a parallel between the parasitic re­ ance by Stuart Craig WOOD on June 29, 1972 at the production cycle of viruses and technologies. The Kitchen, Mercer Arts Centre, New York. ning of 1995, CNN broadcast one part of the O. life cycle of viruses necessitates that a virus pen­ 3 See Wulf HERZOGENRATH, Nam June Paik Video J. SIMPSON trial and the investiture of Newt etrates a compatible host cell. In his writing, Works — 1963-88. London, Hayward Gallery. GINGRICH, the new Speaker of the House of Rep­ STELARC's philosophies unknowingly confirms Southbank Centre, 1988, p. 36. PAIK also created a hu­ resentatives, who from now on sits on the right the virus-like penetration of technologies into the man-modelled technological artwork in 1964 titled K- side of Vice-President AI GORE. During the same 456. human body : week, CNN broadcast a daily program titled Talk 4 Luc Courchesne — Interactive Portraits. National Technology begins as an external, explosive Back Live, with GINGRICH or a repesentative for Gallery of Canada, Ottawa, 1993. phenomena away from the body, proliferating in O. J. SIMPSON, in which the public interrogated and modifying its environment. This phase culmi­ the invited guest, in the studio on camera, by tel­ nates with technology encircling, assaulting and ephone, fax machine, or via the CompuServe net­ finally regulating the body's rhythms'8. work. The exchanges could equally be transacted through tele-conferencing. Within the framework of the program, CNN not only created scoops, but also represented communication technology in does proclaim a direct complicity between the the riots that followed, TV produced its proper action, by transmitting these models of exchanges director and the object of representation. This- I » version, from the height of a helicopter, of the as pure information for the TV viewer. Thus the will later confirm itself with the arrival of the beating of truck driver Reginald DENNY. Note that operator, camera on the shoulder, could always camscope and low-tech recording tape, which the document of George HOLIDAYfigured promi­ find in the hall a young man with a Powerbook on adapts itself readily to the form of diary, the news nently in a group of artworks shown at the con­ his knees reading to us the questions being for­ correspondent and travel notes. The creation troversial biennial at the Whitney Museum in New warded on-line. The staging for the captions and documentary is making history for itself by the York in 1993. Another artist present at this mani­ the transmission of the information were, from the showing and the narrating of the real. The collec­ festation, Sadie BENNING, withdraws to her room beginning, part of the imagemaking of CNN and tive, TVTV, went to the floor of an assembly for with a Fisher-Price camera and recites to us en­ has since been widely adopted elsewhere. At each the election of a Presidential candidate, armed tries from her diary, in which emerge the neces­ pause, several seconds of credit titles are dif­ with Sony porta-packs, mixing with the crowd, sary elements for the construction of an asser­ fused, credits whose style and form we owe to... asking questions prohibited by the biggerTV net­ tive lesbian identity. Another approach to this MTV (with its programs such as Rockumentary, works, etc. We know that during the 1970's and subject revealing in its deconstruction, is the MTS Sports and MTV's Real World, a reality show 1980s PBS established a « TV Lab », a profes­ heart of one of the most revealing works of Lynn that brings together six young Americans from sional administrative board at the disposal of HERSHMAN LEESON. Direct descendant from a different regions of the country ; each given ac­ video artists such as John SANBORN and Kit contemporary art milieu (performance and pho­ commodation in the MTV « loft «with an MTV film FITZGERALD (their Olympic Fragments on the tography) her work touches on themes of schizo­ crew put in charge of chronicling MTV interactions Winter Olympic Games held at Lake Placid, New phrenia, the social possibilities offered by between each individual newcomer and his/her York, in 1980 inaugurated new rhythms for tape reinventing one's name, residence, profession socio-regional agenda), which in turn owes a de­ editing recuperated from the larger TV networks) ; and physical appearance. She creates the char­ terminant part of its aesthetic to art and video Bill Viola (his poetic perception of the desert of acter of Roberta, whose existence she documents creation, not only in their treatment of clips, but Chott el-Djerid, without commentary, his spot- during the course of her production. Lynn also credits, technical skills and a command of portraits of television spectators in Reverse TV, LEESON already investigates the real, the virtual. short subjects. This new look does not explain etc. ). However, this presence of new independ­ She poses the question as to what constitutes the everything, it's understood. The future of these ent artists did not lead to a regular diffusion of identity of the approached subject, its derivations, images, already designed, depend on their their creations, the works were brought together the sliding and manipulation of its identity. She method of broadcast, to their method of circula­ in the framework of a program that acted as a win­ furnishes a problematic choice and underlines the tion : cable, satellite, new technologies, modems dow of new support, but was often broadcast at a temporary dimension, the mutation, of what is and networks. We are in the era the Canadian listening hour unfavourable for exposure to a vast seen in front of our eyes. She undertakes a video theoretician, Athur KROBER, the Marshall audience. Other collaborations between PBS and practice during the 1980's in which she privileges McLUHAN of the end of the 20th CENTURY, calls these artists took place, one of which still contin­ the docufiction genre. She directs a masterful Data Trash. Within the context of an overabun­ ues to this day, that of William WEGMAN for the series of tapes, The Electronic Diary, retracing her dance of information, multiple alternative sites for educational program for children, Sesame Street. proper history of women : beaten, abandoned by the dissemination of information, what is at stake At the same period of time the first video art festi­ her first husband, her mother, a period of obesity, for the independence of the documentary ? vals appeared, and the work circulated in and illness... She uses her past as a performance art­ The history of the video has been well docu­ around this circuit. The video cassette, in so far ist and addresses herself directly to the camera mented and I don't intend to dwell on it except to as being a reproducible object, opened the path­ by exploring not only the events of her life, but by recall the role of PBS played in setting up of their way to another form of information exchange. The inserting the stereotypes propagated by social early productions. It was in 1969 that PBS first networks recreated themselves, the methods of problems, thus mixing up the public and private presented The Medium is the Medium, a program the alternative broadcasting became a little more to the point of confusion. She touches on the pos­ in which the viewer assisted in the first televisual democratic. PBS, like ARTE, today sells commer­ sible of the flesh, of the relations that these main­ experiments, which announced a new treatment cially, or by correspondence, video cassettes of tain in the social context, including the first inter­ of the electronic imagery, as well as the their documentary productions. active video installation created by an artist, Deep globalization of this same image. These two les­ In this period, the big TV stations retained the Contact, in which a woman invites the spectator sons, taken from Marshall McLUHAN, trace the style and form that flowed parsimoniously from to join her and proposes, on a tactile screen, a road that independent video might travel through. their gridlike schedules. In 1989, during an inter­ series ofroutes to reach her. Lynn LEESON has In one segment, we were presented with portraits view that he gave for the series El Arte de Video, lived in San Francisco for the past twenty years. of artists directed by Nam June PAIK, including produced by TVE, a pure example of the recupera­ She was a witness to the birth of cyberculture in the celebrated Tribute to John Cage ; on the other, tion by a big TV network of the « creation docu­ this region and has integrated it into her work. the birth of collective videos such as TVTV, DCTV, mentary style », Woody VASULKA explained that Today at the summit of her art, she is directing and Art Farm. The link between an artist like PAIK for the directors of his generation, in Eastern Eu­ tapes such as Virtual Love (1993) and Twists in and a collective like TVTV shares a bond in its rope, the 16mm cinematographic image in black the Cord (1994). These docufiction realizations political and social engagement, which continues and white incarnated the icon of truth. Today, it is place at the same time virtual reality, the networks even today to animate an important part of elec­ the image of camscope. This economic new tech­ such as Internet, through a series of interviews tronic creation in America. The expressive qual­ nology corresponds to the act of taking power with specialists, theoreticians and engineers who ity of this mobilization brings with a series of new (empowerment) by artists who did not have ac­ explain the principle of interactivity (an illusion criterias in the realization of artworks, thus stir­ cess to Betacam recorders, including those from at the same level as documentary cinema), the ring up another analysis of what is the object of diverse socio-ethnic minorities. It has lead to a virtual body, as well as the fictions of couples documentary, beginning with critical work on the « guerilla » style practice in the gathering of in­ called upon to question the motivations of their heroic mythologies established by the movie in­ formation and puts into place a fragile system of relationships by reason of their professional links dustry. The specificity of the documentary has no resistance which permits the transmission of the with the same milieu of new technologies. In the prop to hold it up now, the CD-ROM is flagrant latter. For example, the Public Access Services TW/sfs in the Cord, things get scrambled up a bit, proof of that. Among these criteria, we should note in the US, the community cable networks... Evi­ as the fictional woman establishes intimate the critical distance facing the principal of objec­ dently, an aesthetic is emerging from this telematic contacts on the WELL with R. U. SIRIUS, tivity, which has been translated by artists by the economy, establishing itself moreso in the shift­ one of the principal collaborators of « the review use of » I », as well as the refusal of the authorita­ ing/leanings, rather than movement. of cyberculture, Mondo2000. Note in passing that tive voice-over, psychologizing (from a murmur to From 1980 to 1992, video creation mobilized ARTE and ZDF have participated in the produc­ a grave, strong voice, from an awkward to a re­ itself around the necessity to take action with the tion of Lynn HERSHMAN LEESON's tapes. laxing tone, the narrative remains a performance politics the Reagan and Bush administrations and To finish, I come back to television to conclude act), receptacle of learning, in the narrative. This its consequences on the socio-cultural life in on a work which appears to me the most exem­ critical distance however does not evacuate the America. The political rectitude of « arts media » plary and pertinent in the framework of the crea­ dramatic bearing of its complicity, its humour ; it of this period, that which is now characterized as tion documentary, that of Stephaan DECOSTERE. clearly shows that it is not being duped. Nam June « politically correct », held fast to the duty of ex­ The Culture Department of BRT has produced, PalK goes down into the street with a robot, cre­ cluding all points of the compass which did not since 1979, the documentaries of DECOSTERE ; ates performances with Charlotte MOORMAN, correspond with the conservative vision of the all have been broadcast in Belgium and several allows John CAGE to tell stories, in his portrait of country. Brenda MILLER, James C. FINLEY, Tom times in Holland. His realizations have won him the composer. PAIK • represents » the cultural KALIN and Gran FURY, as well as Shelly SILVER numerous prizes and have been presented in nu­ universe of John CAGE, and the significant range and Scott RANKIN, produced works which were merous museums. They incarnate, at one and the of his thoughts on art, instead of the history of employed to » denounce, inform, re-establish », same time, a real contemporary sensitivity to the CAGE. We find in his homage to CAGE, or those without loosing sight of a wheel to contribute to treatment of documents, a rigorous intellectual of PAIK on Merce CUNNINGHAM, Julian BECK, an aesthetic project. Paul GARRIN, independent ethic, as well as a modesty in the hands-on pro­ the origin of the creation documentary. To begin video artist and collaborator with Nam June PAIK, duction element of his projects. Other than the with, we are meeting up with the production of a filmed the evacuation of the homeless in Tompkins remarkable documentaries such as creator who operates as much in the field of art Square, in New York, but was not sensitive to the Danse+Camera, Warum wir Manner die Technik as that of a plastician, whose video supported forces of the order who did not wish him to de­ so lieben, L'esprit du Mal, DECOSTERE has pro­ artworks are acquired by museums. In it, we trace liver this image as a public service. But, in 1991, duced two series of testimonials during the course the explicit manipulation of raw material, of the a Canadian living in Los Angeles, George HOLI­ of the last decade, Charbon-Velours and Trav­ real, the subject, during the course of an elabo­ DAY, recorded the aggression on Rodney KING elogues. DECOSTERE's method tends to estab­ rate period of post-production work. This manipu­ by the L. A. Police. The tape was broadcast by lish a mosaic of approaches, perspectives and lation was not manifestly ideological, though it CNN, then by all the other TV networks. During sources with the intent of enlarging the framework of the representation of the subject matter. He Skin-body. Skin-self. Borderline condition. surrounds himself with a team of - consultants- THE BODY OF DANCE AND ITS Can the body of dance be thought only in terms collaborators » ; artists, critics, historians, jour­ of surface ? Is it surface ? Does it become sur­ nalists, philosophers, and theoreticians. He is INTERACTIONS WITH THE face once it is translated with video and equally active as a producer by ordering the works infographie tools into representations and pro­ of other artists which will them be integrated into MACHINE jected onto the two transparent screens hanging the documentary. Among his collaborators we find from the structure ? Are we to deal here with a Maria SUESCUN-POZAS Paul VIRILIO. Dan GRAHAM and Jeff WALL, body-self or a skin-self ? Does this distinction Chris DERCON, Jacques CHARLIER, Tony Montréal. Galerie La Centrale. September 25, confuse the object of our concern ? It does, since OURSLER, Arthur KROKER, Henri-Pierre JEUDY, 1994.8 : 20 pm.. A metallic structure is being filled at the heart of the performance's inquiry into rep­ Geert LOVINK'. DECOSTERE draws his materi­ up with images, light, and sound, while a dancer resentation lies the lived body of dance, one als largely from history of images, of cinema and seems to be orchestrating the whole event with whose phenomenal appearance, and psychologi­ of television, art and photography. This approach her movements'. Le Partage des Peaux : • What cal effects, extend beyond the level of surface. seems to have as its origin a certain concern for is this all about... ? » I wondered for a while. And Three sets of bodies with their respective di­ archaeology (a constant return to archival strata). after that day, I kept wondering and thinking on mensions constitute the motifs of the multimedia But the splicing of these appropriated images re­ what had been presented on stage, but this time event according to CHOINIÈRE : the real body, veals a concern for the encyclopedic information. in the company of the performer, Isabelle the vidéographie body and the infographie or vir­ More and more in his work it is the subject itself CHOINIÈRE, who agreed to regularly meet with tual one. Their respective dimensions, it is worth that delivers this paradox ; assurance, conviction, me in order to open up a space for discussion and noting, are to be thought not in terms of three di­ rage and the urgency of the form underlining the reflection on the work. This was a unique oppor­ mensions, as the audience experiences it, but of conviction in the treatment of the subject, all the tunity to start an art historical inquiry into artistic four dimensions, four spatial variables none of while suggesting that this intention is not fixed in production and create a channel of communica­ which is time. Thus, the event unfolds within a a self-assured truthfulness, but that it is unshake- tion between two parallel discourses. conceptual realm whose impossibility (for our able and unharmed. A recent major work, Déjà vu • If you really want to know about it, then, be­ senses) already points towards that notion of the (1994), well illustrates this state. Last documen­ fore saying a word, listen and reflect on what you body lying beyond mere perception and visible tary in the series Travelogues. Déjà vu makes a will hear », I told myself. Before our first conver­ completeness : the body-in -progress, the body stop at the virtual world that Japan created for sation took place, I already had several ideas in which is in a state of becoming, the lived body : those people who would like to be elsewhere with­ mind, those I had availed myself of in order to the simple notion of surface (as skin, as screen) out ever leaving the country. These pretend worlds understand, to see, to remember what had only must be expanded. are theme parks of a Europe preserved by its cul­ lasted 25 minutes. As any one does, of course. Our point of departure is then a body dressed tural signposts (Holland with her tulips and ca­ What had I seen ? What had I heard ? Had I expe­ up in cables, playing the game of interactivity3. nals, the Austria of MOZART... ) of a multifarious rienced anything ? What was expected from me ? But it is neither plugged in nor is it interactive with Japan : a Samurai village, Tokyo's high-tech ho­ There was the body... the bodies, the choreo­ the audience avid for high-tech deployments. The tels, room for sado-masochists... All these pos­ graphy... the choreographies... and some techno­ body of dance is too demanding and complex for sibilities represent for the Japanese on one hand logical mediations I could not really explain. The the actual state of technological development. an eco-technological quest to be one with the mystery would be resolved later : there was no High-tech's empty promises are made evident. world, as well as proof that faith in the virtual is mystery, they were the most elementary This encourages an interaction between the or­ the solution. To what ? That is what Déjà vu tries vidéographie and infographie technics. ganic and the synthetic which defies the idea that to establish, by avoiding the traps of an One thing was clear to me since the very be­ the machine devours the body, that the lived body « occidental -discourse but tackling, at full whip. ginning : the materiality/immateriality of the body disappears into the machine. A body in action the ethical part of this rapport with the real. We was at the core of the experience of the performer demands inter-action, not just technical are very far here from the travel notes of the great and the technological devices were there to am­ prolongations, to provide it with equally existen­ French videomakers (characterized by the con­ plify its qualities, the lived ones. Thus, one should tial representations. The body of dance — lived, cern for the aesthetic, pictorial, pedagogic, lyri­ be suspect of any discussion of the work which in flux — cannot be thought of as an alienated cal, impressionistic, etc. ). There exists many does not acknowledge the presence of the body object and the organic/synthetic dichotomy is great things, such as La peinture cubiste de of dance or does not reflect on it in terms of its resolved into a state or spatial dimension for ex­ Philippe GRANDIEUX and Thierry KUNTZEL, relationship with the technological devices in an change and amplification evolving around the Godard-Sollers : L'entretien de Jean-Paul 4 integrated way. I realized that questions such as : body of action whose autonomy is confirmed . FARGIER, Hong Kong Song de Robert CAHEN, • What is this performance about ? What does it Thus, the lived body ought not to be thought of as and most recently J'étais Hamlet, a portrait of mean ? How does it mean ? », could only be an­ something external to technology, nor as an ex­ Heimer MULLER, by Dominik BARBIER. The po­ swered by going through that site in which all tension of it, but intimately linked to the realm of litical, the social, the theoretical, brought together originates and for which the explorations into the the experience of the technical itself. the past few years in America under the expres­ virtual world are valuable : the lived body of dance, The lived body is the offcenter center of the sion • cultural theory », has not yet found a taker which unfolds in the passage from appearance to experience of the performance5. It is the product in France. Déjà vu was co-produced by BRT (Bel­ disappearance always overcoming a threat of loss of exclusion and acceptance of the possible. The gium), VPRO (Holland) and the INA. It was broad­ and a sense of limitedness. notion of an original body of representation is thus cast in Belgium and Holland ; in Paris it was pre­ I want to restore back to the performer that permanently undermined. Nevertheless, despite sented in the framework of programs from the space of signification from which art historical and this multiplicity, the body of dance is grasped as association of X WORKS, then at the Centre critical discourses often remove her/him because one, as a constant and stable body by the tech­ George-Pompidou2. In fact, television preserves • ... what else ought to be done if we are talking nological devices, and if it were not for of the fact in its turn its indépendance from television : in Art » ? The following reflections are meant for that the lived body permanently enacts all the Canada, where the cultural landscape is socially contemporary works which both resist categori­ realm of the possible it would be cancelled as a and politically engaged, the CBC English Network zation and devise a framework for discussing the performative referent, as one which achieves refused to broadcast the fourth travelogue of notions of the technologically mediated and the representation without mere repetition?. DECOSTERE, Coming from the Wrong Side, body of dance which has been put into a sate of Once the body/dance dichotomy is overcome, which treats the economic links between West­ crisis. a sense of agency is recovered by the performer. ern Canada and the tourism generated by the peo­ To write about performance is an acknowl­ It is an individualized one, non-idealized, which ple of the First Nations. * edgement of our impossibility to fully grasp what is and means in multiple ways, not just as an in­ the experience of reality is. Despite our efforts to strument for repetition and imitation. The per­ ' The last documentary of Stephaan DECOSTERE. approach the work in its totality or to gain more former as imitator ceases to be a creative agent Lessons in Modesty, was to be shown in March, 1995, knowledge of it through the interactions with the and just perpetuates the transmission of a norm, on BRT, and presented at the Berlin Videofest. artists(s), we are confronted with the sense of and only becomes one when she/he is able to DECOSTERE has worked on this project with Arthur and limitedness and failure in securing a complete enact her/his capacity to construct her/his own MariLouise KROKER, Paul GROOT, Gert LOVINK, and reading of the work. To render an experience sense of body/self. It is the body's lack of defini­ Mark van TONGELE. 2 meaningful becomes an exercise on loss and a tion and the constant state of becoming which The broadcast of X WORKS took place in March. 1994, and at the Centre George-Pompidou in June, 1994. continuous attempt to move beyond one's own provides it with new significations. The body is in boundaries. the making, thus the shift from the notion of body as transparent medium to the body as an opaque Traduit du français par Richard RIEWER Bodies acting beyond appearance : site of production. between the visible and the invisible The lived body is the condition forthe techno­ C'est par un jeu de relais des peaux, naturelles logical amplification, which becomes a site of et artificielles, que [l'amplification du langage excess and behaves as a visual rhetorical device. physique] aura lieu. Le relais, ou ce partage des With this, the question of visibility emerges. We peaux, redonnera un caractère (...1 organique à strive to know the body we see, and the body we cet échange du corps et de la technique. know is there despite not seeing it. The gap be­ L'interaction des membranes — le tissu corporel, tween • seeing » and « knowing » is insurmount­ le costume de données, l'écran vidéo, le moniteur able through our visual apparatus. Our senses fail d'ordinateur, l'écran transparent — engendre un to successfully prove that what we sense is. The processus de reconnaissance, d'apprentissage et world cannot be equated to our experience of it, finalement d'amplification de la corporalité2. * nor the notion of the body to the one we think we