Recently in What The Body Cost Category

I thought I would post a quick update on my slime mold project now that the semester is over. It is a project that I want to continue, but it is also one that I need more time to conceptualize and to write up (in poetry form) before seriously executing the visual component.

I think I am attracted to the wordplay between "sublime" and "slime," so I've been reading up on the sublime as a concept (or have been, prior to the always mad rush that is the end of the semester). I also think the weird ways in which slime mold functions--taking on different states, sharing nuclei, growing in systems--can be related to the sublime in various ways. Especially the morphed, weird post-modern iterations of the sublime that can be found in The Sublime (Whitechapel: Documents of Contemporary Art), which I've been using for ideas on things to read related to the subject (in regards to "the subject," pun intended).

I also think I learned a lot from the project we did at the end of the semester--a project that I'm really happy with. I was thinking about doing some time lapse with slime mold, but I wasn't sure how to execute it (I had downloaded some software and so on). So, at some point I threw out the idea to my (awesome) group members that we should maybe try something with time lapse. I really didn't know enough about what was involved and I was playing around with it (with little success). Anyway, we ended up making the "Subterranea Project" and I feel like I learned so much from it--I can't wait to get back to incorporating some of the things I learned into my own work.

At some point my slime mold samples got too contaminated (even the original sets of petri dishes I kept on the side as backups), but I did start doing things like dye both the agar and oats with food coloring before growing the mold...

Here I colored, dried, and ground the oats (to use in text stencils):

I also colored just colored whole oats:

[I would post some of the growths from these, but I was vaguely obsessed with learning DIY sterilization at the time, so most of my "infected" attempts did not get photographed... I think I'm going to try ideas that "intentionally infect" in the future so I have to worry about this less]

...I also keep trying new sterilization techniques (I haven't executed some of these yet, but I did manage to pick up a pressure cooker and steam basket to use as a DIY autoclave). Once I have some poetry/text written that gives me ideas in terms of what to include in my mold experiments, I'll order some more mold.

I got the idea to dye the oats from this book (which is awesome):

I also picked up a copy of Jane Blocker's book What the Body Cost (that she presented on earlier this semester, so I suspect this class is infecting my practice in all sorts of ways). I had seen the book before (since I took a class with her), but I had no idea how much it overlapped with some of the stuff in my previous book--which includes a series of "somatic portraits" on petri-dishes. Given that I want to use the Slime Mold "stuff" as an extension of my previous project (and that I want to include more bodily samples, etc), it seemed like an awesome place to get some inspiration. I've been enjoying reading it and thinking about how I can better conceptualize various body parts in relationship to the poetry/visuals that surround them textually within a book project. I was also thinking about the Cell Storm project and how that pulled the micro up into the macro level in an interesting way--which is also something that I'm interested in thinking about (and I think my ideas on it have matured through the work that Kate, Sara, Christy and I did for our project--especially in terms of thinking about how to execute a project related to it).

Anyway, I won't dwell too long. But I'm interested in what other people think they'll pull from the class going forward?

I loved listening to Jane Blocker's presentation. Her approach to art history, at least in her book What the Body Cost, is intriguing as it is not a analysis of the art itself but rather an analysis of the responses to body art by other art historians. She is revealing the assumptions and prejudices prevalent within the art historian community. In a way, her writing is trying to do what the art she studies tries to do: essentially revealing something about the preconceptions of society. Her writing is mostly observation without including suggestions how to change these assumptions and prejudices. Yet by pointing them out, she does seem to be suggesting that the art historian community needs to be a little bit more self-aware.

My conflict with her work is that this analysis is a bit highfalutin and focused towards and written for academics. It brings into questions which audience body art is meant for and what meanings that audience derives from it. She has focused her writing towards a very small community, and this book in particular encourages the insular nature of her professional community.

One thing I thought was particularly interesting from her presentation was her role as "contemporary historian." I think the issue is something that musicians have somewhat solved with the use of the term "musicologist" over "music historian."

I think there is something under-addressed in both fields. I feel like contemporary historians sometimes forget that there are living artists they can talk to and perhaps gain a better understanding through. Of course, artists are not always the best communicators about their work, but it does seem like something that could be explored more by contemporary historians.

Jane's talk was quite enlightening. For a long time I have had a distaste for video art, which seems to align frequently with body art. It was a bit relieving to hear that someone was sifting through the plethora of artists who create 'body art'. I was finally free to feel that not every single one of those artists was an earth shaking genius because he flail his limbs in front of a camera or move around while a woman holds his penis in her mouth. I have, or had, the assumption that it is wrong to question art, or that one will be labeled as closed-minded or chastised for doing so.

Her discussion brought me a little closer to pulling the layers of human nature such as psychology that cover up our pure biological selves. I think her evaluation of body artists is a weeding process in which ultimately, those that are left are artists and work in which the body has truly transcended previous media.

i was totally on board with the jane's argument on gendering art. i didn't really understand it from the reading but when she broke it down into bullet points it because much clearer. it made me realize that i am not fluent at all in the subject matter she presented in her book and so reading it was like reading shakespeare or an opera for the first time.

one thing that never entirely became clear to me was what body art actually is. i have a hard time drawing a line to define it. it seemed to be a mash up of many types of artistic expression including performance, theatre, dance, film making, and photography. although, that seems to be true about a lot of things that were going on in the late 60's/early 70's across the board...

I think Jane Blocker's argument is that this gendered division between the inner self and the body exists not only in art, but pervades our entire culture. One discipline which can be identified as expressing this phenomenon is art and art just happens to be the discipline upon which Blocker has chosen to focus her research.

Jane really cleared up for me what it is she's writing about - and that is just pointing out that, in history, there is a gendered division between the self, "I" or the subject (male), and the body, "it" or the object (female). I am fascinated that she is able to point it out without giving her opinion on what that means or what the stakes are for this division (I'm not sure what my opinion is on it myself, but I know that I would develop a strong opinion on what I think should be done about it if I had been studying if and researching it for as long as Jane has). I don't think it's a bad thing, that's not what I'm saying at all. Rather, I think that makes her an excellent historiographer for being able to point something out while showing as much control over a desire (if she has any) to try and portray the information a certain way by putting her own frame of reference and her own opinions about this division in her writing.

My next question for her would be, (even though I know she said she doesn't really have an opinion on the matter, she just sees it and points it out, but curiosity is getting the best of me) if art is the way to challenge this very notion of division (even though the division is so heavily present in art). In other words, she points out how performance art isn't challenged or thought about critically, rather it's just praised downright for some of the boundaries it pushes. However, we actually need to think about it more critically and not just praise it because that fosters a kind of ignorance and perpetuates underlying themes such as this gendered division that go unnoticed and unnamed. So my question is: is it possible for art to overcome itself? Is it possible for art to challenge the very thing art is creating? Or is the art world too loaded; is it too steeped in this idea of division that it (or the people analyzing it) just don't have the capacity to challenge these ideas art has been labeled with?

Hannah S

Jane presented a tremendous amount of material for consideration, in just the introduction and first chapter of her book. What I find really fascinating is the approach to history: viewing the documentation of performance art through the lens of the critical writing. She is analyzing the analysis from a feminist, and contemporary perspective. Her reports on the reactions of those viewing these performances are persuasive examples of the conflict between mind/male/I and body/female/it. It seems that, from her perspective, there is a tendency toward comparison/contrast in the analysis, and mentions conflict and difference are evident in the discourse. Having only read the first chapter, I'm interested in how these arguments may be posed in other than comparative terms. Can we talk about gender/body issues in other than him/her terms?

-Anna

I was particularly intrigued by the ideas about the body versus the person whom the body belongs to and if it belongs to us at all ("us" being all individuals). In her introduction, Blocker says,

"Our experience of the world is embodied, deeply physical, and sensory, but we also conceive of ourselves and our bodies as separate entities - I and it - that exist in a relationship whereby "I" am the presumed subject and "it" is the presumed object" (7).

This notion of the relationship every individual has with his, her, or its body as being rooted in separation rather than integration made me question if this was a problem or not.
1) So, I'm interested to find out if Jane thinks this is a problem -
a. should we be thinking in these terms of separation or should we be more integrated and have a more unified sense of self?
b. Or, if this isn't really the problem, do you think this idea of "I" being the subject and "it" (the body) being the object should be reversed? Should we be more focused on the body being a subject rather than an object and on the idea of self as the object that is influenced and controlled by the body?
c. This leads me to the idea that this separation is what arguably makes us human. We are our own greatest desire - the likelihood of animals, for example, thinking this way is hard to imagine. They probably don't separate their sense of self from their physical body - this leads back to 1a. - is this a problem that we separate our own sense of self? Should we perhaps strive to be more animalistic and integrate our selves with our bodies in order to become more human, or would that lead to becoming less human?

Upon further reading after this idea was introduced, Blocker does acknowledge that this is somewhat of a problem; however, she says,

"I do not presume to solve the problem of the body but rather I want to dwell in that problem for a while, to consider more carefully the nature of the anxieties and desires it has produced" (7).

2) So, yes, it is a problem, but I'm still curious about it -
a. Is it a problem that needs to be solved? She talks about the problem in great length, but doesn't address whether or not it is something we should be thinking about changing or how we should go about changing it.
b. Do you think this is a problem that can be solved? Should we even bother with an attempt to change?
c. What are the stakes of simply living with the "problem"? If the body is, "that condition of not knowing that results in the conflict between what we undeniably are and yet remain distanced from" (7), what are the concerns we should be worried about our relation to the rest of the world if we can't even relate to our own selves?

1. In her introduction, Jane Blocker clarifies that when she refers to the term body she is "referring, in the most basic sense, to that condition of not knowing." She goes on in her book to expound on this idea by addressing concepts of sex and pain in relation to the self. How does the body inadvertently affect the self and vice versa? When do they become the same: "the moment when the lips shape the air that pushes past them, when body and word are one"? How can these questions be applied to the body as a living breathing organism that consists of many other organisms? How do the other organisms that are part of our bodies relate to or change the self? How do we change them? Are they inherently part of who we are?

2. In this part of her book, Blocker relates sex, power, mouths, the nude body and pain to the concept of love. She admits that it is a post-modernist view of love. However, this analysis seems shallow and tends to dismiss, or not address, relationships outside of the romantic or sexual. How do children fit into this concept of love, or are the conclusions reached only to be applied to adults? When is the line crossed between innocent love and that of pain, power, and sex? Is she posturing that this analysis is a universal condition?