Monday, February 23, 2009

Crying "UNCLE!"

1.  I spent an inordinate amound of the weekend reading (okay, that's an exageration... becoming frustrated because I could not read) Shannon's “A Mathematical Theory of Communication."  I tried reading it sober.  I tried reading it after a little too much Gnarly Head Cabernet. (An amazing wine for about fifteen bucks a bottle, if you're a wine drinker, but it won't help you with the Shannon one bit.)  I tried reading some of it to my husband, who is himself a scientist, to see if he could help me figure it out.  "I think there are clothes in the dryer that need to be folded, and I'm busy," he said.

Then, this morning, I went downstairs to wish Lori D'Angelo a belated happy birthday.  She wasn't in her office, but Tony was there, half-hidden by the jumble on Lori's desk.  And he, who has a thick math background said something to the effect of, "I don't think this is what it proports to be."

So I came home and I opened it again.  I read around the parts that had previously given me a headache, and I came to the same conclusion.  And so now my question:  Is this art, rather than science (or, more accurately, engineering)?  Because, on closer inspection (and without the Gnarly Head, so it wasn't very pleasant closer inspection), I think maybe it is something of a math poem?   Or perhaps a short story about fictive theories?  

2.  On the other hand, I loved Ron Rice's "A Brief History of Anti-Records and Conceptual Records."  And not just because Adorno made another cameo, though it's always nice to see him in these bit parts.  The litany form here is lovely, although I guess this isn't a workshop class, so maybe nobody cares that I think the essay is lovely.  My question:  So many of these works seem to exist simply to problematize our willingness to accept the validity of recording in general.  Is there, then, a point at which they stop speaking to us as an audience and end up only in conversation with one another?  How dependent is each peice on being part of the larger body of works, and does this dependency require again another idea of recording--an idea that has also something to do with curating?
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1 comment:

  1. Sandy BaldwinMarch 23, 2009 at 2:23 PM

    1) Hee. Well, Shannon's is a serious as it gets. I mean, this is the Theory of Communication at the basis of the computer, the CD, etc. And it is difficult - not what we (humanities scholars) are trained for, but one get get the gist, and certainly that mapping of the communication circuit is key.
    2) Isn't you're critique here one leveled at conceptual art in general? Since it works on concepts, it's hard to find it's "use." It works on a concept and then moves on. Interesting that you bring up curating. Certainly curating conceptual art has been an issue.. makes me think of the root etymology of curating in care or cura. Conversation must be about cura.

    Have you ever read Adorno's Aesthetic Theory? Great, unfinished book. Well worth reading.

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