curt cloninger
Since the beginning
Works in Canton, North Carolina United States of America

ARTBASE (7)
BIO
Curt Cloninger is an artist, writer, and Associate Professor of New Media at the University of North Carolina Asheville. His art undermines language as a system of meaning in order to reveal it as an embodied force in the world. His art work has been featured in the New York Times and at festivals and galleries from Korea to Brazil. Exhibition venues include Centre Georges Pompidou (Paris), Granoff Center for The Creative Arts (Brown University), Digital Art Museum [DAM] (Berlin), Ukrainian Institute of Modern Art (Chicago), Black Mountain College Museum + Arts Center, and the internet. He is the recipient of several grants and awards, including commissions for the creation of new artwork from the National Endowment for the Arts (via Turbulence.org) and Austin Peay State University's Terminal Award.

Cloninger has written on a wide range of topics, including new media and internet art, installation and performance art, experimental graphic design, popular music, network culture, and continental philosophy. His articles have appeared in Intelligent Agent, Mute, Paste, Tekka, Rhizome Digest, A List Apart, and on ABC World News. He is also the author of eight books, most recently One Per Year (Link Editions). He maintains lab404.com, playdamage.org , and deepyoung.org in hopes of facilitating a more lively remote dialogue with the Sundry Contagions of Wonder.
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DISCUSSION

Re: Re: Re: notes for a hypothetical essay on relocating the aura


Offlist Alexis challenged me to stop referencing the usual suspects. I was just getting started, but OK. I want to interject some Badiou, because he's dealing with war, art, and what he identifies as the "trace" of artistic creation (a possible way to better understand non-object aura). I relate to Badiou because he's arguing for the return of an understanding of the human soul. As I read him, our contemporary war arises in large part due to a strict materialistic, bodily, ultimately animalistic understanding of the human, coupled with a kind of dictatorial anti-dictatorialism. Every world view is equally valid, except for those world views that disagree with the statement, "every world view is equally valid." Such world views are dictatorial, invalid, oppressive, and intolerable. They must be dictatorially intervened upon (all in the name of anti-dictatorialism, of course). When this kind of demand for "universal human (materialistic) rights" supplants a compassionate understing of our fellow human souls, it's pistols at dawn. (cf: http://www.radicalphilosophy.com/default.asp?channel_id!88&editorial_id175 ).

So here we have a leading contemporary French philosopher (former colleague of Deleuze and Lyotard) who sees strict materialism and relativism as problems rather than the solutions.

Below are some excerpts. 1st paragraph is on the the relationship of the "new body" (the work of art) to its "trace." 2nd paragraph advocates what I interpret to be a kind of incarnational artmaking practice which arises from a holistic integration of body and spirit. He argues against a practice totally identified with the material body (such a practice explores enjoyment via "death in life" -- think body mutilation performance art). Likewise, he argues against a practice totally identitfied with the transcendental spirit (such a practice explores sacrifice via "life in death" -- think jihad martyrdom).

++++++++++++++++++++++++

What is a body? What is the construction of a new body? A new body in the artistic field is something like a real concrete creation

DISCUSSION

Re: MANIK'S AURA


Hi Manik,

No need to chide Alexis. I am the one focusing on aura, and she is agreeing with you that my focus is too cryptic and hypothetical. This seems to be a common contemporary criticism toward any artist who concerns herself with artmaking that is something other than overt, didactic, tactical political/social activist art.

This is the marxist critique, that unless something results in measurable physical change, it's not quantifiable as revolutionary. It may even be a spectacular placebo, and thus anti-revolutionary. It's a fair critique, but it doesn't allow for the subtle, real way that things change. I have seen rallies and protests. I have seen "the right man" elected. I have seen art supplanted by political activism as art. Is it working? Are things changing? Are these things making a difference? More importantly (and something few are asking), is the change that I'm told will do us all good the change that really will do us all good? Are the enemies of universal freedom really the ones I'm told are the enemies?

For example, I've found nothing but love and abundance and fellowship and community in Jesus and the local church, and yet I'm told these are enemies of my freedom. I find not a few people who fancy themselves activists to be bitter, cynical, haughty, santimonious, and barely able to repress a subliminal fury at their own impotence, and yet I'm told this is the way of a committed life.

To me, a ground up, interpersonal revolution of the heart seems the most effective. Jesus had a pretty profound impact on the world, but in his lifetime he was unknown outside of a 50 mile radius of his hometown, he was accused of instigating a political revolution that he didn't start, and he was killed by the church and the state at age 33. He failed in every immediately measurable politcal way, yet his subtle revolution continues. Mother Theresa was a contemporary heir of the revolution he began.

How may I best serve the people of Serbia? By awakening awe and wonder in those I know by any means at my disposal (art, writing, teaching, friendship, raising my children, loving and honoring my wife, praying for people in the grocery store, feeding people on the street, helping my neighbor catch her horses when they get out of the gate and she's babysitting her 2-year old nephew and her husband is at work, etc.). Must I stop driving my car, send a mail bomb to the White House, and move to Canada before I can ethically begin to pursue these things? If so, then I've failed you, and will continue to fail you.

Might Brecht's approach tp epic theatre be an effective way to awaken awe and wonder? Probably so. Might Benjamin's neo-marxian philosophy be an effective way to awaken awe and wonder? I have my doubts. I heard Alain Badiou talk recently. He proposed a hypothetical kind of revolution that maintained its structure in the initial stages of fervor and maintained its fervor in the latter stages of structure. Sounds great, but when I asked him how this might be practically accomplished (a zapatista model? a T.A.Z. model?), he demured and said (I'm paraphrasing), "I'm a philosopher, not a politician. Keep trying out new paradigms. Hopefully one of them will work." So much for politics.

I find it ironic that the coolest revolution of the century (may 68) was a revolution instigated by a group of people who had no overt political agenda whatsoever. As far as my knowledge goes, it was the only revolution in history that included people from all socio-economic backgrounds and political perspectives. They just wanted their sense of awe and wonder back. Did it have any lasting political or economic value? Probably not. The workers returned to the factories at their same wage. Did it have any lasting cultural value? Well, it managed to radically affect my own personal world view 20 years after the fact without me even knowing it. debord >> malcolm mclaren/jamie reed >> john lydon >> joey ramone >> sonic youth >> me. lipstick traces.

I'm sorry the country in which I live bombed the country in which you live. I'll try harder to live my life in a manner that will lead to real change. It may take several generations and not look like what you think it should look like.

peace,
curt

manik vauda marija manik nikola pilipovic wrote:

MANIK wrote:
Thanks!We're not quilt for Marie Antoinette('again'),it's other person thre=
ad.
We've just make weak attempt to pay Rhizomes audience's attention on other =
idea.
This is simple idea:we don't give a shit for AURA.What's that mean?
We want to pay your attention on whole W.Benjamin's life who was dedicated =
to
idea of social justice and human(istic) side of exchanging of welfare.
We are already in irretrievable process of oblivion of same ideas you enthu=
siastic exchange
with your friends(aura,different aesthetic...etc.)We believe it's bit humil=
iate to search in goggle-or-wiki
proof for our words.So,Benjamin's devotion and unselfish fight with/for
Brecht's progressive ideas in life/theatre is invaluable compare with aura.
(Berthold Brecht is man who was forced to set in front of American Congress=
to answer on their stupid anti-communist hysteric yelp...) It's much more =
important
than bit obscure,blurry,un-actual-in-it's-metaphysic idea of aura.And this =
obsession with
stale ideas,instead to answer on clear MANIK's question:are you
conscious that you support Bush's war policy with your every single act
who supported your way of life?(To remind you again:American baby
spend 400 time more material gods compare to African baby,America refuse to
sign "Kyoto"agreement against global pollute,American soldiers kill civili=
an in Iraq every day...
What would you like more?Ice cream?Or gallon of gas?)And,we're not so much
amazed with your threat(beat to death...MANIK) whether is joke or not.
We have experience with NATO/American brave soldiers who kill people in Ser=
bia 666I from air,from deepest night,
-disgrace,meanness,cowardice...We have no doubt you would very gladly bit u=
s to death.
Considered your pathetic contribution to discussion that's best you could t=
hink through.
MANIK

DISCUSSION

Re: Re: notes for a hypothetical essay on relocating the aura


Hi Ryan,

It is indeed ironic that I would be criticized as a Benjamin disciple. You and Marisa understandably challenge my reading of him, but I think my reading is defensible, with some caveats. I'm not referring to his entire canon, or to his biographical history. I am referring to one text. In that text he himself says, "We do not deny that in some cases today's films can also promote revolutionary criticism of social conditions, even of the distribution of property. However, our present study is no more specifically concerned with this than is the film production of Western Europe." Indeed, the footnoted connections he makes between film and politics seem largely tenuous and speculative, almost like they are incidental observations that he wasn't quite confident enough to include in the body of the text.

The epilogue seems particularly tacked on. He takes the marinetti quote and runs with it, but in his rush to the tour-de-force finish line, he doesn't satisfactorilly connect all the dots. Just because he wants me to focus on the epilogue doesn't mean I have to buy it. Just because I don't buy the epilogue doesn't mean I can't find use in some of his prior observations.

I probably should have prefaced my original post with some disclaimer like, "I know this goes against the accepted interpretation of Benjamin's aura, but..." Nevertheless, I don't think his observations are off limits simply because I disagree with the larger conclusions he draws from them. Am I not free to take his initial observations and draw my own conclusions? I don't think aesthetics are a fascist control mechanism of war just because Marinetti was loony and Hitler was an art school drop-out who dug "heroic" art. I don't fear the re-injection of aura into non-object art. I think it has probably already crept in anyway. I need not subscribe to Benjamin's politics in order to reference him (any more than he need subscribe to Huxley's politics in order to reference him). David used the sword of Goliath to chop off Goliath's head. It functioned.

peace,
curt

ryan griffis wrote:

> this isn't really a disagreement or contribution into this thread,
> other than an expression of my annoyance at the continuing
> interpretation of Benjamin's text as simply nostalgic for a lost aura.
> i thought Marisa already addressed this?
> he was pretty firmly situated in the camp that believed in the
> progressive potential of technology and mechanical reproduction to
> add to art's ability to be "radical" and become something other than
> a luxury while critiquing the aestheticized politics of fascism and
> politicized art of the communists. In a lecture delivered to a mostly
>
> Marxist crowd of Popular Front/anti-fascists, he basically stated
> that experimentation should be considered more politically radical
> than a reliance on subject matter-as-content, ala socialist realism/
> propaganda (the whole "commitment" debate). While there is some
> "mourning" that could be found in Benjamin's account, it's more
> related to the context of the larger changes that occurred in the
> experience of material culture in general, not specifically in visual
>
> art. it's a change in the relationship between cultural/material
> producers and audiences that seemed important.
> Digital art doesn't "defy the very, very notion of what Benjamin was
> discussing," it pushes the argument further. Think about all the
> discourse on gaming, communication and telepresence... this is a
> clearly documented extension of Benjamin's concerns (not that he was
> the originator of them). And the concerns of people working with
> technology for its relationship to mechanisms of war were preceded by
>
> Benjamin's concerns that mechanization was a favorable condition to
> war and dominant property relations.
> To be critical of "mechanical reproduction" is not the same as being
> nostalgic for a pre-mechanical past.
> i'm not advocating the importance of Benjamin or his writing, i just
> don't understand the consistent reference to a text, if what's
> contained in the text really doesn't matter and just gets used willy-
> nilly.
> best,
> ryan

DISCUSSION

Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: notes for a hypothetical essay on relocating the aura


Hi Alexis,

I will answer in turn.

alexis:
Do you find it rather absurd that you are trying to refocus the aura of
MECHANICALLY PRODUCED art? It defies the very, very notion of what Benjamin was
discussing. Digital art is the antithesis of what he was, and so many of his
accolytes continue to, carry on about so doey-eyed.

curt:
The issue is not whether the object is mechanically produced, but whether the object is mechanically reproducible. The title could also be translated "art in the age of its own mechanical reproducibility." The essay has to do with what happens to art when it is no longer a singular object. Hence my selection of Benjamin as a launching pad for this discussion.

Digital production techniques can lead to the creation of object art (a one-of-a-kind digital print), just as non-digital production techniques can lead to the creation of non-object art (a Shakespeare play). I don't necessarily care about digital art per se. I'm talking about non-object art.

alexis:
If you are truly committed to holding on to his idea so dearly, you should really take up oils.

curt:
I'm about as committed to holding onto Benjamin's original idea of aura as I am interested in taking up oils. Michael S. suggested that a more poetic contemporary reading of Benjamin is in order. Maybe that's what I'm inadvertantly doing. I am trying to advance a slightly skewed reading of one of Benjamin's texts in order to explore some artistic ramifications that interest me. Lyotard took a similarly skewed approach to Kant's idea of the "sublime." Forget Benjamin if he's such an anathema to you. Just talk about the ideas we're talking about.

alexis:
On the other hand, if you truly want to retain the aura in digital art, then
you must give Mr. Walter a kick in the pants and rethink the thing altogether, not
just sort of half-assed moving it around.

curt:
Benjamin seems more fruitful as a launching pad for dialogue than a target for my boot.

alexis:
Until you are willing to do that, I do not believe you will find the answer to your question. At the very least, you must decide if you want the aura the thing, or if you would be content to
illicit the effect of the aura, which you did actually seem kind of interested in, as your first post mentioned some level of desire to create "awe and wonder" in your viewer.

curt:
the aura will never literally "be" anywhere, because it's just an abstract notion. Art is not science. It's not simply some visual aesthetic formula coupled with some didactic "meaning" that acts on the mind and illicits awe and wonder. Maybe you're thinking about interactive design.

alexis:
I have simply posited that a more appropriate locus is in the viewer, as it
allows you to both have your cake and eat it, too (and please, I will personally
beat to death the first person that brings up that damn Marie Antoinette thread
again...MANIK). You get to say there is an aura involved with the piece, as
well as illiciting appropriately giddy responses in the viewer. Not to mention,
as Eric pointed out, that the meaning of an object and the artist's place as
clever educator is just SO much more interesting than the artist as a producer
of things that people want to have sweaty fantasies about. Nonetheless, this
is no doubt hard to swallow, as in order to do this I have just taken all the
magical, fetishistic, cultish power away from non-living art objects and put
them into the human mind.

curt:
you can't say the aura is located in the viewer. By definition, that doesn't make sense. The resultant awe and wonder (if the art is good enough) will be located in the viewer. But the art (whether it's an object or a non-object) is the vehicle (conductor) which instigates awe and wonder in the viewer. If the aura is already resident in the viewer, then no conductor is required and there's no need to make art (object, non-object, digital, painted, or otherwise). By definition, the aura "surrounds" the art somehow. Even if the aura is invested in the art solely by the viewer regardless of the artist's intentions, it still surrounds the art. If you're uncomfortable with the artist asking "where do I locate the aura in non-object art," then think of it as the artist asking, "how do I create a locus in non-object art which will illicit the investment of aura by the audience."

alexis:
A book is a book whether from the library, the rare
book room, or Amazon, notwithstanding my *personal* preference for the politics
of the first, the feel of the second, and the smell of the third.

curt:
here we fundamentally disagree. If you can't follow me this far, I understand why the rest of my argument seems inane to you.

DISCUSSION

Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: notes for a hypothetical essay on relocating the aura


Hi Alexis,

Just because a bunch of sucky contemporary artists waste their time delineating the nuances of a bunch of scatalogical theory that ultimately doesn't amount to a hill of beans or make their art any less sucky, this doesn't prove that all theoretical dialogue is bullshit. Merely asserting that something seems like shit from your perspective doesn't really dismantle that shitty something.

You assert that current art has no aura because it has no meaning. But art can have an aura without having meaning. A rock can have an aura without having artistic meaning. If certain pieces of contemporary art have no meaning, it's simply because they have no meaning. Yet they may still have an aura.

My understanding of humans also assigns thoughts and feelings to the mind. I further understand humans to operate out of a heart/core/will/spirit. Then of course there is the body and the social relations. All of these aspects are integrated into a single being. The integrating aspect is the soul. So goes my understanding of humans.

You assert that successful art must have three things: "all ultimately go back to the mind and how it processes said art: the work must be experienced, must have meaning, and must
have effect. None of these are magic." I disagree. Successful art need not have "meaning" per se. Furthermore, experience and effect don't solely happen in the mind. There is something "magical" about how we experience art and how it effects us (although magic connotes alchemy and a selfish manipulation of nature. I would say "spiritual.")

Explain instrumental music's effect on a listener in terms of mere psychology. For one thing, instrumental music has no "meaning." Is it effective because the mathematical relationship of the rhythms and melodies produce an ordered and harmonious effect that is interpretable psychologically? I've heard all that argued and don't buy it. Instrumental music has both psychological and spiritual characteristics. Of course, neither of us can prove that it does or doesn't, so we disagree.

Music aside, I definitely agree that good art is going to be about something other than merely its own mechanism of transference. That is hopefully a given. Nevertheless, regardless of genre and subject matter, there is something different about object art and non-object art. I'm not saying that this difference solely constiutes all there is to the art. I'm just saying this difference exists, and I'm thinking about it.

Is there not something different about a book from the library that has been checked out and read by a bunch of people and the exact same book new from Amazon? It's the same content, the same subject matter, but the library book has a kind of history and provenance. Is that provenance psychologically ascribed to the library book by the reader, or does it emanate from the spiritual history of the library book itself? Whichever it is, the library book is somehow different than the new book.

best,
curt

Alexis Turner wrote:

Sorry, I still have to say that it is about as useful to describe an object as
having an "aura" as it is to describe it as having honest-to-goodness "magic."

Historically, the art that awed, impressed, and created wonder was the
art that explained something fundamental about human nature or the world. It
showed people something they already knew (but in a new way), it improved upon
their existing body of knowledge, or else it exposed them to something they had
never realized was possible. For art to do this, however, it must have 3
things at a minimum, and all ultimately go back to the mind and how it
processes said art: the work must be experienced, must have meaning, and must
have effect.

None of these are magic.

That said, I suspect the reason current art has no "aura," as Benjamin feared,
is because current art has no meaning, insofar as it seems no longer to be
produced with the idea that it can inform or change the people that make it
or view it. Instead, it is just "stuff" produced by a bunch of post-modern
wankers who like the romantic idea of what it means to be artists, and so sit
around and hope that if they explain what they are doing in pretty enough words
(even if what they are doing is simply pooping for a peephole), that somehow
THAT makes it, not just art, but BETTER art and it will thus awe people in
accordingly bigger and better ways. Fetishizing an object or an act simply
because it exists (a podcast) or because of an intrinsic quality (it takes a
long time) does not imbue it with meaning, and the viewer is certainly adept
enough to understand this at a fundamental level, even if they might not be able
to put their finger on it. In the end, the art fails to spark the mind, or
have "aura."
-Alexis