Schizoid Methodologies...n+n=bad dinner conversation.

The space between the dream state and the awake mode has often been the starting point for what can only be described as discomfort. Waking up to the knowledge that you dearest friend is moving interstate without telling you, the very fabric of your existence is become fractured, you have lost all the work you were doing for the last year and a half from your non-functioning laptop, and to top it all off you no longer have any feeling in your legs, but with some effort you can glide over the city like seagull with attitude. As you make that first cup of coffee, the trauma sinks in and the real takes a very coherent materialisation. The physicality of each passing moment is palpable, the sense of sickness can be overwhelming. What's going on ?, you ask yourself, knowing that you may never answer this question, it is a bid for reassurance of some kind. You have been places that are overtly familiar, yet there is no possibility of making the return visit, there is simply no way to get back, as hard as you try to regain some semblance of direction it is a pointless exercise which is adding to the discomfort at rapidly increasing increments. To be trapped in the in-between for half the mourning has put you in a place that resonates for the remainder of the day, or more often for days to come unless the subsequent nightly adventures facilitate further disruptive processes. A similar process of in-between occurs when trying to inhabit your latest preoccupation at a micro-level. The state of existing in a micro-frissure. The grand epistemological narratives oscillating at the neurological level which emerge from their submerged state, becoming manifest in behavioral patterns and affecting the basic mediations with other people - like asking a group of electrical engineer's, over a wedding table dinner, for there take on Nanotech, and being very disappointed with the response - which is essentially that they are extremely interested in the process, however the company they work for does not use that form of technology, and that there JOB is to do what the company needs done and don't ask questions, don't think beyond the job, The de-materialisation of any self interest beyond the basic material requirements. But hey, the job pays well, and with two mortgages to grapple with thinking beyond the chip is simply not an option. Subject choices made in the first couple of years of university prescribe a life time of research which will be made redundant at the same pace as it has come into existence, if not at a greater pace. It is like residing in a permanent state of montage, though in this case the clash is not on the screen it is palpable, it is made physical and it is not at all comfortable.

On a recent interstate trip I came across some paintings by a colleague and friend. The canvas had been split, by image. One side depicting an architectural form, a significant construction in the evolution of the cities skyline. The other inhabiting the aesthetics of the Suprematist milieu. Thin bands of red and yellow on a monocrome background, the subtle brush work activated by a layering of the paints materiality. These two subject matters had been applied with direct reference points, not as obvious as they first appeared I might add, these were reduced of obvious reference points through dialogue. Again direct references can be drawn between these two movements, Architecture/Suprematism. So the point of engagement with the image became its dissection, the fold, the splice placed between the two image/subject formations. This line became a potent line of flight, just as the splice of the film material is the potency of the montaged image, the canvas had become - not a depictive mechanism, but a physical navigation of image through histrionics. The question moved away, as quickly as it had appeared in relation to the subject matter, the (a) point of contact with the dividing line, what is this split all about?The connectivity of image sublimated at almost the same time as it is contemplated. The edges of the canvas too, needed to be consumed, what will they reveal in relation to the split between history and fact? These are not polemic exercises, they are highlighting the physicality of the canvas as object, through a clever depictive device. They pose a question of the relationship the artist holds to subject, which can often be extremely objective in the way in which it is chosen, inhabited. Now we see the big question come to light - how long must the artist keep his/her subject matter consistent, a life time, a month, a week? What if the objective became the negotiation of an ever shifting subject matter facilitated through the same medium, or is this in fact art history in a nutshell? Same subject differing mediums, which will make for the most potent outcomes, is this what the institutions want, how quickly will they sublimate there own critique to amuse the masses? The museum of popular culture in the disguise of the gallery.

We are taken directly to the sublime moments that the city scape often posits upon us. Stay up all night then go for a bike ride through the city, it is a very different experience to getting up early and doing this - cicadian indeed, add a night of coctails to the mix and the fun really starts. This is where these paintings partly reside, on the surface of the sublime structure of the modern city, the avenues of wonder. Yes, they are monuments to cash, we know this, we also know that street level is always the place from which the money makers will subsume their fodder, they are slow to react but quick to sublimate for a dense bottom line. The kids at street level know this, for this is the next battle in the culture wars that are on right now!

Are they before and after shoots of a quantum experiment in full flight, de-materialisation in full affect. The quantum gun let lose on the Melbourne skyline, now there is a New Years eve spectacle, particle refabrication as entertainment. Jump into the fold for it is all we have left. The interstitial is a zone to be navigated - it is a defiant critique of a world full to brim with the overtly obvious. The sublime fold, the crack in the fabric of space-time is the place of solitude and consistant discomfort for the artist, not an easy task but one taken on, inhabit with glee, and the result...perhaps more discomfort. In a world of consumed happiness, and in the habit of requesting constant happiness, which is of course blatant delusion, these zones of discomfort, become comforting, the inhabitation of the interstitialis becomes comforting - knowing what the options are is where the real discomfort lies.

a symposium of 'pata-noology...

So, in the 'desert of the Real' Lacan is the cell leader - the departure point for our highly reflective psychosomatic noo-ville. The master of ceremonies swinging from the mirror ball, neuroses embellished on a freshly screen printed T-shirt, under a 'nice' tweed jacket and a new pair of hemp shoes. The audience has become despondent, frantically checking, sending, and re-checking their PDA's for an emphatic reassurance that they are indeed still alive. No wonder the good Doctor has cracked, "they just won't listen anymore" he screams as the mirror ball lets go, sending him hurtling across the theatre crashing head first into the belligerently drunk Debord, freaking out Trocchi, high on acid as usual. Guattari sniggers and steps outside for a smoke with Deleuze, Leary seizes the moment to spike the punch while Foucault goes down on Barthes in the mensroom. Guyatat takes photo's then calls his pimp, and Manovich, the pragmatist as always gets the whole thing on film. "Artaud would have loved this" Sontag says to Lippard, who places her book mark back into the fold, turning to Derrida to see if he has noticed, he hasn't, he's to engrossed in the hyper-text Zizek has recently emailed him...