Thanks Ruth and Mark for paying attention - that is stimulating. Ruth : the voice, the voices - how I understand it is that the voice is what makes a text, an idea an unique expression in a relation. It is the voice that loads words with affect and makes it an address to someone. (I'm still processing the quote on Bakthin by Lazzarato) It is the voice that filters the possible significations of the words to one unique expression.
No, I don't think there is "a voice" in the written word, not the same way at least. I can imagine that an extended range of voices you have access to, does influence your thought and writing. If a voice is an affective address, and if you can "change" voices, you get access to different registers of affect and address, your content as a consequence becomes richer, more diversified... Your style could change ... Maybe we should ask Curt Cloninger to react to this - he is the one who put me on the track of Bakthin. See here in his article on glitch (yes glitch) http://lab404.com/glitch/ Here are some Bakhtin quaotes from his article. "*Language enters life through concrete utterances (which manifest language) and life enters language through concrete utterances as well. The utterance is an exceptionally important node of problems.* *Only the contact between the language meaning and the concrete reality that takes place in the utterance can create the spark of expression. It exists neither in the system of language nor in the objective reality surrounding us. Thus, emotion, evaluation, and expression are foreign to the word of language and are born only in the process of its live usage in a concrete utterance.* *Each text (both oral and written) includes a significant number of various kinds of natural aspects devoid of signification... but which are still taken into account (deterioration of manuscript, poor diction, and so forth). There are not nor can there be any pure texts. In each text, moreover, there are a number of aspects that can be called technical (the technical side of graphics, pronunciation, and so forth).*" My interest is foremost in what our voices do in our *besides,* performances, how they function (when you don't see the person you are addressing), and what they do with the objects. To further investigate Martina and I planned to do a few short performances. Three very short performances : One as usual, one without voices, but with written text over the images of the things, and a third one with voices, but no text, no content. let's hope we get invited to do so. Mark : There are so many things going on at the same time in our performances; First of all it is a meeting between Martina and me. For us it is a way of getting to know the other by collaborating in a performance context. And so, yes it is always becoming. The understanding of a text is always a part of a relation. xxx Have a nice weekend Annie Communication without words and closed eyes : http://bram.org/distantF/ On Wed, Mar 9, 2016 at 7:31 PM, ruth catlow <[email protected]> wrote: > Thank you for sharing this Annie, > I have a question (I enjoyed reading the last Bakhtin quote about voice). > Do you think that voice is also conveyed in the same way in the written > word? > > I ask, because I recently participated in a residency in which a writer > was partnered with a voice coach. I was lucky enough to have a session with > the voice coach and feel that the extended range of voices that I accessed > through this session have added range to my thought and writing. > > Ruth > > > On 03/03/16 10:48, Annie Abrahams wrote: > > [image: light] > > This is a copy of my latest blogpost. I want to share it here too, because > it might be of interest to some of you who are not connected to me > otherwise. > (Next performance will be March 19th 20h in Im_Flieger in Vienna) > > Take care > Annie > > We started out with three very different meetings (See turbulence.org > <http://turbulence.org/commissions/besides/>) and then decided to > continue to explore one of them further; we restricted ourselves to a theme > and made the project on “meeting online =” also a research on the relation > between objects/things, text and the voice. > We began experiencing and experimenting the performances as *an other > method of thinking together about both object agency and online > collaboration*. > > – We stage a collaborative performance project online. > – Meeting online = > – We are meeting online, trying to get more grip on what is actually > happening in online webcam communication. > – This is a research project where we use performance as a tool. > – Using performance as a tool, is a way to create a common responsibility. > – We use an interface which doesn’t permit that either of us two can > become dominant, an interface that has flaws, glitches, bugs, an interface > that cannot be domesticated. > – We are not developing a performance – our performances are part of a > research process. > *My performances are a research tool, not an object ansich, not something > to show off. *(See allergic-to-utopias > <http://www.digicult.it/digimag/issue-058/annie-abrahams-allergic-to-utopias/> > ) > > *But the audience? Why should they be interested, What is it for them?* *They > can think with us!* > So far : > *besides, the person I am becoming *1/06 2015 > There are : > – *the interface *: two webcam images side by side, one managed by > Martina, one by Annie. Both images have exactly the same size and presence > there is no power relation. > * – a text *: a remix, done together, of phrases read and heard, > collected over one month by Annie and Martina individually. We determined > before who would read what part of the text. > – *objects* : things : we will not use personal objects, things with a > very specific personal history and they should not be too beautiful, as > ordinary, casual, daily as possible. > What did we mean by that, why? We didn’t want things to be symbols. We > almost entirely excluded also natural objects as flowers, leafs etc., > because, they are already alive on their own and so are too symbolically > loaded too. > The objects were placed in front of the webcam at before undetermined > intervals. > – *the hands* : hands who lay down the objects carefully. > – *two voices* : as neutral as possible. Because the interface merges the > sound of both webcams in one stream, there is no way for the audience to > distinguish if a voice comes from the one or from the other webcam. They > can only hear that there are two different voices, *there is a dialogue*. > > *What dialogue? Who is talking to who, who is addressed? Who receives? The > objects replace the faces we are used to see in webcam images. We see them > in close up – they become actors – we can believe them to be intimate, to > have a relation. They too have a / are in dialogue. They too are elements > being in the event. (1)* > > *This is where the two subjects meet. This is where we meet.* > In *besides, the city is not a tree,* 22/07 2015 we used a different, > more narrative, mix of the same text collection. We decided to abandon the > neutral voice and let the exchange be more natural allowing for affect to > transpire (2). We speeded the rhythm and alternations. > Hands should be just careful installers, shouldn’t manipulate, nor stay > too long in the frame. > For *besides, smaller than a single pixel* 28/11 2015 we made a new text > collection. No natural objects at all were allowed anymore. Would the > perceived agency of the thing change if we would enter and exit them at > specific moments in the text? If we stopped talking while changing the > objects? Would the objects become more present, have more influence if we > allowed for moments without text? > We stayed with speaking the text in an ordinary manner. Would the dialogue > be more fluent if we decided to use the texts fragments randomly? Would > that give more dialogical power to our voices and rhythm? Would that help > us to use text and objects equally in our perform thinking experience? > > *We perform experimenting thinking together using words and things and the > affects transferred via our voices. We experiment performing thinking > together using words and things and the affects transferred via our voices. > We think performing experiments together, We experiment thinking > performance together, We experiment performing thought …* > (1) “According to Bakhtin, in order to ‘overcome’ the separation and > opposition between art and life, between art and culture, the elaboration > of a ‘first philosophy’ is required: The philosophy of event-being. Art and > life cannot and must not tend towards identification, as was the case with > the Situationists, for example. But, in order that the enriching, excessive > and productive difference between art and life be able to express itself, > it is necessary to possess a theory which, whilst maintaining the > irreducible differences between these two dimensions, articulates them in > the achievement of the event.” Maurizio Lazzarato in Dialogism and > Polyphony. > geocities.ws/immateriallabour/lazzarato-dialogism-and-polyphony.html > <http://www.geocities.ws/immateriallabour/lazzarato-dialogism-and-polyphony.html> > (2) > “According to Bakhtin, the voice or intonation, not yet captured in the > ‘phonetic abstraction’ of language, is always produced ‘on the threshold of > the verbal and the non-verbal, the said and the non-said’ and it is through > it that it addresses itself to the other. This address is affective and > ethico-political rather than linguistic. It ‘appropriates, travels, avails > itself of linguistic and semiotic elements, confirms and drifts away, > critiques and legitimates meanings and established intonations’. ……………It is > only when the voice penetrates and appropriates words and statements that > the latter loose their linguistic potentiality and turn into actualised > expression. It is only at that moment that words and statements are > encumbered with the a *unique *and non reproducible role in verbal > exchange.” Maurizio Lazzarato generation-online.org/p/fp_lazzarato6.htm > <http://www.generation-online.org/p/fp_lazzarato6.htm> > > Notes on performance series *besides, <http://bram.org/besides/>* with > Martina Ruhsam, 03 2016, Annie Abrahams > > > _______________________________________________ > NetBehaviour mailing > [email protected]http://www.netbehaviour.org/mailman/listinfo/netbehaviour > > Tally Ho Corner, London N12 0EH. > > _______________________________________________ > NetBehaviour mailing list > [email protected] > http://www.netbehaviour.org/mailman/listinfo/netbehaviour >
_______________________________________________ NetBehaviour mailing list [email protected] http://www.netbehaviour.org/mailman/listinfo/netbehaviour
