Hi Alan and good luck in your month here! Interesting in reading about Monika's work, I was very concerned with these topics when I wrote my book about torture and violence and history. As maybe many or you know since my earlier participation in -empyre I was a political prisoner in Uruguay when I was very young. I was tortured, waterboarded and so on, but could not cope with these memories until now, four years ago I wrote. And when I was writing I was in physical pain, my body remembered things I had deleted or forgotten. To be able to write the book I read many books written about pain and evil, body and memory, Judith Butler, Susan Sontag, etc etc. I am sad I was not aware about Monika's work at that time! Ana
On Tue, Oct 2, 2012 at 1:04 PM, Alan Sondheim <sondh...@panix.com> wrote: > > > Hi - Monika Weiss, Sandy Baldwin, and myself are on together for the first > week. I've been fascinated by Monika's work for years, and earlier this year > we performed together, in dual performances, at Eyebeam in New York, while I > was a resident there. Her work is concerned with anguish, memory, violence, > cultural debris, and related concerns. It is multi-media, involving > performance, installation, video, and sound. She writes > > "The transdisciplinary work of Monika Weiss examines relationships between > body and history, and evokes ancient rituals of lamentation as traditionally > performed in response to war. Her current work considers aspects of public > memory and amnesia as reflected within the physical and political space of a > City." > > We're asking her to begin the week; later, Sandy and I will also post, in > sections, a text we wrote together on pain, avatars, and virtuality. > > I just want to say a few words here, in relation to my own interest in the > topic. The internet, inscreasingly dominated by social media, is a safe > place for many people; at the same time, it is a Kristevan "clean and proper > body" that hides or bypasses pain and suffering - not through content, but > through the nature of the online media themselves. I think this has > troubling psychological repercussions, Levinas, say, on one said, and > Baudrillard on the other. Alterity, the presence of the other, disappears > into pixels, and simulacra, all the way down, take over. > > So how do we feel, convey, or act in relation to, pain, suffering, and > death, online? How can we deal with the political beyond petition? How can > we situate ourselves in a world of images and the imaginary? > > Sandy and I both moderate email lists, but we're a bit unused to this format > - if it's a bit rough at the beginning, bear with us! > > We'll begin with Monika, and later, intersperse the discussion with the text > we wrote back and forth. Because we're beginning October 2, we'll continue > for the next seven or eight days; our weeks aren't exact. > > Thanks for reading, > > Alan > > > _______________________________________________ > empyre forum > empyre@lists.cofa.unsw.edu.au > http://www.subtle.net/empyre -- http://writings-escrituras.tumblr.com/ http://maraya.tumblr.com/ http://www.twitter.com/caravia158 http://www.scoop.it/t/art-and-activism/ http://www.scoop.it/t/food-history-and-trivia http://www.scoop.it/t/gender-issues/ http://www.scoop.it/t/literary-exiles/ http://www.scoop.it/t/museums-and-ethics/ http://www.scoop.it/t/urbanism-3-0 http://www.scoop.it/t/postcolonial-mind/ cell Sweden +4670-3213370 cell Uruguay +598-99470758 "When once you have tasted flight, you will forever walk the earth with your eyes turned skyward, for there you have been and there you will always long to return. — Leonardo da Vinci _______________________________________________ empyre forum empyre@lists.cofa.unsw.edu.au http://www.subtle.net/empyre
