Concerning Consequences STUDIES IN ART, DESTRUCTION, AND TRAUMA Kristine Stiles The University of Chicago Press Chicago and London KRISTINE STILES is the France Family Professor of Art, Art Flistory, and Visual Studies at Duke University. The University of Chicago Press, Chicago 60637 The University of Chicago Press, Ltd., London © 2016 by Kristine Stiles All rights reserved. Published 2016. Printed in the United States of America 24 23 22 21 20 19 18 17 16 15 12345 ISBN-13: 978-0-226-77451-0 (cloth) ISBN-13: 978-0-226-77453-4 (paper) ISBN-13: 978-0-226-30440-3 (e-book) DOI: 10.7208/chicago/9780226304403.001.0001 Library of Congress Cataloguing-in-Publication Data Stiles, Kristine, author. Concerning consequences : studies in art, destruction, and trauma / Kristine Stiles, pages cm Includes bibliographical references and index. ISBN 978-0-226-77451-0 (cloth : alkaline paper) — ISBN 978-0-226-77453-4 (paperback : alkaline paper) — ISBN 978-0-226-30440-3 (e-book) 1. Art, Modern — 20th century. 2. Psychic trauma in art. 3. Violence in art. I. Title. N6490.S767 2016 709.04'075 —dc23 2015025618 © This paper meets the requirements of ANSI/NISO z39.48-1992 (Permanence of Paper). In conversation with Susan Swenson, Kim Jones explained that the drawing on the cover of this book depicts directional forces in "an X-man, dot-man war game." The rectangles represent tanks and fortresses, and the lines are for tank movement, combat, and containment: "They're symbols. They're erased to show movement. 111 draw a tank, or I'll draw an X, and erase it, then re-draw it in a different posmon.... But when they're killed they're erased and fl A gh0St image- 80 the erasing is 3 vefy 'mPortant elemen of the war drawings.... The important thing is that it's always 2005^ (SUSan Swenson' conversation with Kim Jones: April 25 0 1 4 W"°rkC'ty; WarP™<*™^ NY: Pierogi 2005], 4). Two years earl.er, Jones described his "war drawings" as mages 0 •, hat ^ ends„ ^ q ^ ^ ^ A Studio Vuit wuh Km Jones, a fifteen-minute video codirected bv ' David Schmidlapp and Steve Staso (2003). Franz West's Dialogic Pafistiicke (2003) You begin. "I want to talk about Franz West's Pafistiicke, a word that means 'adaptives' in English. (The German singular is Pafistiick.) These odd objects call to mind the one in the double, or the one in the many [fig. 10], They suggest both Louis Lavelle's philosophical considerations of the similarities between Narcis­ sus and Pygmalion (in his 1939 The Dilemma of Narcissus), and Paul Ricoeur's meditations in his 1990..." "Hold on," I break in, arresting your rush to discuss West's work in relation to these two French philosophers. "Why bother with 'the one' in a postmodern age of rhizomes, autopoesis, epigenetics, string theory, and other system ap­ proaches to the entanglement of life? And let's not forget the large number of multiple personalities flooding psychiatric offices these days—a veritable 'epi­ demic in the United States and Holland, if one is to believe Ian Hacking," I laugh (but not at the multiples).2 'tou laugh too. Because West's objects begin with the body, that singular center..." Wait, 1 interrupt again. "Before you proceed, please describe a Pafistiick." But of course." You take a deep breath. "West began making the Pafistiicke in 1973. They are curious semiabstract forms that suggest vaguely identifiable objects, but whose identity is undecipherable. They have a strong surrealistic character, something like a wrapped object by Christo or Man Ray, or like a d object that Miro might have assembled into a sculpture. West made the / icke predominantly in wire, plaster, papier-mache, and polyester. He con- strutted the earliest Pafistiicke with bandages he had found in his mother's den- R an^ tlleSC Particu'ar Pafistiicke might suggest wounding and healing. t want to overstate this, as the Pafistiicke seem more whimsical and on rh n th\n traumat'c'in ^'s exhibitions, West often installs the Pafistiicke tak h' Rr°r 3ngS them fr°m the Wa"' Sometirr>es he places them on pedes- hI!TS3diStinCtly SCU 'Ptural Presence.All arewhite. While some a, TJ ShaPCS' °thCrS 3re qUitC SimP'e" importantly, he encour­ ages viewers to wear them." "Wear them?" I wonder. FIGURE 10. Franz West, Pafistiicke, ca. late 1970s. Performed by Johann Szeni (aka Jane Szeni and Jane Sceniczei) at the Wittgenstein House, Vienna. Bandage, wire, plaster, papier-mache, and polyester. Photographer unknown. Courtesy of Archiv Franz West, Vienna. Yes, you answer. "For example, one rectangular Pafistiick is rather flat, about sixteen by six inches with a protruding wire used to attach it to one's body. Photographs show people wearing it in front of their eyes as a mask or a kind of screen. Another Pafistiick resembles a large oar. It is well over five feet in length, with protrusions on each end. I have seen someone carry this Pafistiick over his shoulder like a very large tool, while another person relates to it quite differently, hugging it close to her body like a beloved person." When you pause, I encourage: "Please continue." West wants viewers to handle the Pafistiicke, to move them around, to carry them, or to wear them like prostheses. Critic Achim Hochdorfer offers an excel­ lent description of this process: 'The visitor is invited to place a Pafistiick in any desired relationship to his or her own body. These fragile, rather awkward ob­ jects do not fit the body in any organic way that would engender a relaxed atmo- 101 | FRANZ WEST'S DIALOGIC PASSSTUCKE sphere. On the contrary: the "actor" is actually compelled to assume a pose that robs him or her of any natural poise and not infrequently leads to comical con­ tortions. The piece inhibits, disrupts and caricatures the natural movements of the body. Handling West's Pafistiicke has some of the paradoxical quality of being told to "be spontaneous".'"3 "Oh yes!" 1 exclaim with gusto. "I once saw a photograph from 1975 of West standing on a very low plinth, a kind of pedestal. He was holding an arc-shaped Pafistiick over his head like a halo by inserting the index and little finder on both hands into holes positioned at either side of the arc's midpoint. He then bal­ anced the Pafistiick in the middle of his forehead, from a hornlike protrusion that extended from its back. The image is memorable. West looks like a devilish angel, distinctly impish and almost childlike in his delight both in his object and in its use. It is the way that he appeared in relationship to the Pafitiick that convinced me that I would like him as a person." "In fact, you have touched on a key aspect of the Pafistiicke." You suddenly become all business. "Pafistiicke communicate something of the nature of a per­ sonality. West himself observed that 'if one could visually perceive neuroses they might look somewhat like Pafistiicke. In other words, the Pafistiicke are anthro­ pomorphic representations of neuroses, capable of motivating a person to per­ form certain types of movements.'"4 "Neuroses? Certain types of movements?" I ask. Your patience seems to be wearing thin with my interruptions, but you continue to explain. "In psychology, the word 'neurotic' has come to be asso­ ciated with anxiety disorders.5 For West, the Pafistiicke can visualize aspects of a wearers anxiety, stress, and phobias, all of which distort the patterns of so- called normative behavior. Hochdorfer considers the Pafistiicke to be 'deeply unsettling presentations of the individual's own attitudes, habits and desires. revealfing] the unbridgeable divide between an inner state of mind and a socialized behavior pattern.6 In addition, neurotic (or anxiety) symptoms may be characterized bv a wide variety of somatic and mental symptoms, many of which evolve from dissociation. In dissociation, specific mental processes mories, ideas, feelings, and perceptions) are lost to conscious awareness become unavailable to voluntary recall. Dissociation provides a mechanism ^splacing unpleasant, painful, and anxiety-provoking concepts and memo- m consciousness. Such lost memories, feelings, and perceptions may re­ turn symptomatically in one's interaction with the many in the one revealed by the Pafistiicke." I am suddenly reminded of the lifesize doll of Alma Mahler that Oskar Ko- aronnH in 1919- AftCr the end of their love affair, he carried the doll the Par rT m h'S Carnage and took il everywhere with him. So I note, "While doll he m d C T ?0t eXpl'Clt in the same way as Kokoschka's ersatz lover, the wlMahler revealed neurotic obsession with her. Thus, WestsPcfistucke analogously function as that kind of surrogate object." ou appear hesitant to agree. Nevertheless, you tolerate my point 102 ' FRANZ WEST'S DIALOGIC PASSSTUCKE and caution: "But the Pafistiicke have another function, that of adapting wearers to their internal psychological conditions. Remember, Pafistuck means 'adap­ tive' in English. As a tool for adaptation, the Pafistuck may express neuroses and simultaneously accommodate wearers to their anxieties by externalizing stress and phobia in the form of this odd material alternative for invisible suffering. Or, as you pointed out about the picture of West wearing one of his Pafistiicke, they might help to exhibit one's sense of humor, one's appetite for play, the qualities of one's imagination, etc., etc. In short, wearing the object, I could confront mul­ tiple aspects of myself." "While it is obvious that clothing expresses one's personality, how does inter­ action with objects do the same?" I ask. "The use of any everyday object can, but does not necessarily, reveal aspects of identity.