Assignment Two preparation: Notes from ‘The Feathers of the Eagle’ by Sven Lütticken

In this essay Lütticken considers that a reappraisal of appropriation art (‘AA’) is needed, moving away from the stance that appropriation is critical in nature.  He looks at the argument that the more radical appropriationists were modern ‘mythologists’, inspired by Barthes.

Contemporary culture built on appropriation – digital technology has made it easier to reuse and manipulate images – photoshop, TV channel-hopping.

AA – emerged in 1980s > ‘clear intimations of transgression and illegality’ (p.109).  Objections to claims that appropriation art is an ‘artistic strategy’  – why should it have special status? > Crimp (who supported AA) ‘if all aspects of culture use this new operation, then the operation itself cannot indicate a specific reflection upon the culture’ (Crimp 1982, cited in Lutticken 2005:109)

Graw – AA theory treats the appropriation artist as a ‘fully conscious, detached and critical subject’ (p.110), therefore denying that influence of the appropriated material may affect outcome of the new work.  Goes against post-structuralist views on originality and authorship.

Barthesian thefts

c.1980 – Richard Prince (rephotographed contemporary ads), Sherrie Levine (rephotographed well-known photographs) and Louise Lawler (rephotographed works of art).  Considered by Crimp and [Hal] Foster to be ‘Barthesian mythologists who ‘steal’ and subvert media myths’ (p.111).  Crimp on Levine: ‘Drawn to pictures whose status is that of a cultural myth …[she] steals them away from their usual place in our culture and subverts our mythologies’ (Crimp 1977/79, cited in Lutticken, 2005:111)

Barthes’ ‘Myths’ – discussed in his Mythologies (1957) > bourgeois ideologies of our time – ‘hijacking signs and giving them a saturated surplus meaning’ (p.111). ‘Myth was a second-degree semiotic system grafted onto a first-degree one’ (ibid.)  Example of black soldier saluting before the French flag – literal meaning but also second ‘mythical’ meaning – signified greatness of France, its universal principals, different races pledged their allegiance.

Barthes > defined his mythology as a synthesis of semiology and ideology.  Historical dimension present in latter.  Positioned himself as a mythologist of modern media (p.112)

AA anticipated by Flaubert – ‘Bouvrard et Pecuchet’ > re-writing,copying, appropriating > second-degree writing – quoting and paraphrasing. Turned into a progressive strategy by Barthes > ‘hints at a true mythology in which logos and mythos critcize, transform and liberate each other’ (p.114)

Divine spirit, conquest, imperialism

Marcel Broodthaers – ‘The Eagle from the Oligocene to the Present’ exhibition (1972) – ‘direct artistic response to the challenge posed by Mythologies’ (p.114).  Eagle – real bird (not imaginary) yet with mythical connotations (Zeus’ pet) >  shows how ‘an object can be appropriated by myth and still have same meaning on different levels’ e.g. power, authority, divine spirit, imperialism etc.

Broodthaers then presented photos and slideshows of eagles on various products.  Oppitz (an anthropologist) claimed that Broodthaiers weakened the mythical power of eagle by multiplying eagles.  [CS note – link here with Benjamin and the art of mechanical reproduction – weakening of the original]

Photographs and readymades

Barthes ‘advocated stealing myths rather than specific images or texts’ (p.116).   Image or text (or fragment of one) in new context can make the myth it hosts explicit – more common in visual art than in literature.  Camera ‘facilitates the two-dimensional appropriation of objects’ (p.116) > Duchamp’s readymades can be viewed as ‘a radical manifestation of a culture informed by photography’ (p.116)

Barthes – ‘recasts the distinction between first- and second-degree (mythical) semiological systems as the difference between denotation and connotation’ (p.116) > reading of pasta advert in ‘Rhetoric of the Image’ (Barthes 1964, cited in Lutticken, 2005:117)) > cliché of ‘Italianness’

Readymades – ‘ordinary objects which serve as their own representation through alteration of context and negation of their original function: in the process they accrue strangely solipsistic surplus meanings’.

Duchamp’s appropriated industrial images – ‘the negated and represented element is already a representation, already a negation of presence’ (p.117).

Broodthaers – also used images as readymades > photography became more dominant in his work – moved further away from the appropriation of images as objects to the appropriation of images through photography/re-photography.

‘Art which aims to reflect on media myths by a conceptual use of photography risks becoming mythified itself’ (p.118) > embodies the myth of ‘critical’ art.

Decodings

Situationists International – ‘the re-representation of images in an artistic context would only mean their integration into an art world that is itself part of spectacle’ (p.119) so SI détournement (= subverting elements of popular culture) had to go further > demands for ‘the negation of art itself as one prerequisite for an end to the spectacle’ (p.119)

Debord’s spectacle = representation > the spectacle of commodities – ‘Duchamps’ appropriated images but [and] all his readymades would be representations, or at least elements within the spectacle as the hieroglyphic transcription of social relations’ (p.119) >> Marx – commodity fetishism.

De Brosses – posited that ‘fetishism was the most original and primitive form of myth’ (p.120) > commodity fetishm is therefore defined by Marx as ‘a creature of myth’. Myth and capitalism > Debord and Raoul Vaneigem >> the spectacle is a representation of myth.

Debordian view – ‘The destruction of spectacular myth and its fetishist illusions cannot be achieved by a mere artistic appropriation of commodity-images’ (p.121) > ’Situationist détournement is the proper way of appropriating spectacular myth’ (p.121)

Sameness and repetition

Debord and Deleuze – concentrated on the temporal dimension of myth, drawing from work of modern mythologists such as Eliade.  Mythic time – ‘cyclic repetition of archetypal events in a remote, aboriginal past’ (p.121) > Debord  – pseudo-cyclic time of the spectacle.

Deleuze ‘identifies representation with the copying of models, and hence with mythical repetition; in this respect mass culture as a culture of cliches remains in thrall to myth.  Art can appropriate these representations and turn them into something else’ (p.122) > Pop art starts in the artificial and then can turn into the simulacrum.

Warhol – emphasised the second-degree nature of his images > often repeated into grids ‘to empty out the image’.  Strong fetishist and believer in mythical commodity – ‘his repetitions reinforce the images of the spectacle, and bring them into question precisely by doing so’ (p.122)

Inside myth

Warhol – started to be aware of copyright problems so started to take his own photographs – 1981 Myths portfolio.

Louise Lawler – makes numerous photographs of works by Warhol > appropriation of appropriation

Pop – omitted from discussion of AA – why? Is its ‘embrace of the commodification of art [was] too uncomfortably close to home?’ (p.124)

Defenders of ‘critical’ art – both Pop and Situationism undermined art – Pop ‘for’ the spectacle, Situationism against it. Pop’ collapsed the difference between artistic and other commodities’, Situationism ‘demanded the abolition of both artistic and other commodities’ (p.124) >> ‘Both can serve as a corrective for the tendency to idealise art as inherently critical’ (p.124)

Crimp – ‘doubted that critical reflection on culture could use a procedure that is an important part of the same culture’ i.e. appropriation (p.124)  Appropriations can end up reinforcing myths.  Second-degree mythology can also become its own myth – the myth of appropriation.

Criticality – ‘Criticality’ is only to a limited extent a result of the artist’s subjective intentions. Nor is it a stable attribute of any image or text. Rather, it is something that results from the use of a text or image by an artist or critic, or other viewers.’ (p.125, author’s italics)

My thoughts

Lütticken’s essay takes a completely different angle on appropriation than my other readings so far.  Although easy to read I found it quite difficult to digest, hence a number of readings and  these fairly detailed notes.  One of my initial issues was to convince my brain to retain the meaning here (and as used by Barthes) of the word ‘myth’ to refer to a dominant ideology of our time rather than a folklore legend.  I was also glad that I had read about the ideas of Benjamin, Debord and the Situationists before tackling this essay as having some knowledge of these helped my comprehension immeasurably.

I find the concept of appropriation of appropriation interesting – with the passing of time there is always the possibility that, through the receipt of additional mythical connotations, an appropriated image may end up losing its original individuality, its own message.  Hence the work of artists such as Louise Lawler (appropriating the appropriated work of Andy Warhol) and Michael Mandiberg (appropriating the appropriated work of Walker Evans) are important in keeping the intentions of edginess, the subversiveness that characterises so much of appropriation art works at their inception.

Bibliography

Lütticken, S. (2005)  ‘The Feathers of the Eagle’. In: New Left Review 36 November-December 2005.  [online].  At: http://dspace.ubvu.vu.nl/bitstream/handle/1871/21431/182536.pdf?sequence=2  (accessed on 08 March 2016)

Project 2-2: Barbarous taste #2 (Notes on the Situationists)

For the second part of this project we are asked to research the Situationists as individuals and their origins and make notes.

Although I don’t like using Wikipedia as a research tool I am beginning to find it helpful as a first ‘go to’ when looking at a new topic as it often provides an outline and, more importantly, more credible references to follow up on.  I found its article on Situationist International particularly clear and well laid out with a number of references.  I have used some of these references, as well as others that I had to hand, to cross-check statements made in the article.

All information is taken from the Wikipedia article Situationist International (Wikipedia, 2016b)  unless otherwise stated.

Situationists – group of social revolutionaries – avant-garde artists, intellectuals and political theorists.

Situationist International (’SI’) – formed in 1952, disbanded in 1972.

Main members: Guy Debord (theorist and de facto leader to SI), Raoul Vaneigem (theorist), Constant Nieuwenhuys (painter), Alexander Trocchi (writer), Ralph Rumney (artist who was expelled shortly after the formation of SI), Asger Jorn (artist), Attila Kotanyi (architect), Michele Bernstein (writer)

At first SI had predominantly artistic focus > moved towards revolutionary and political theory => theory of the spectacle and Marxist critical analysis.  Critical of advanced capitalism  – recognised that capitalism had changed since Marx but argued that his analysis of the capital mode of production was still correct > critical of alienation, fetishism of the commodity which they considered had spread to all areas of life and culture.

Influenced by Dada, Surrealism and Lettrism (Marshall, 1992)

Distance from orthodox Marxism > Dada and Surrealism ‘whose provocative style, demands for immediacy, and cravings for autonomy were carried into the situationist project (Plant, 1992:3)

Creation of ‘a comprehensive strategy of resistance to the sterility and alienation of modern life’ (Williams, 2009:237).

‘They [the Situationists] rejected the idea that advanced capitalism’s apparent successes—such as technological advancement, increased income, and increased leisure—could ever outweigh the social dysfunction and degradation of everyday life that it simultaneously inflicted.’

(Wikipedia, 2016b)

Main concepts

The spectacle and its society

Central to situationist theory, this is the idea debated by Debord in his book ‘The Society of the Spectacle’ (Debord, 1970) that capitalism has replaced the authenticity of modern social life with its representation:

‘The entire life of societies in which modern conditions of production reign announces itself as an immense accumulation of spectacles.  Everything that was directly lived has moved away into a representation’

(Debord, 1970:3)

Plant, writing in The Most Radical Gesture: The Situationist International in a Postmodern Age  tells us that:

‘The situationists characterised modern capitalist society as an organisation of spectacles: a frozen moment of history in which it is impossible to experience real life or actively participate in the construction of the lived world. They argued that the alienation fundamental to class society and capitalist production has permeated all areas of social life, knowledge, and culture, with the consequence that people are removed and alienated not only from the goods they produce and consume, but also from their own experiences, emotions, creativity, and desires. People are spectators of their own lives, and even the most personal gestures are experienced at one remove.’

(Plant, 1992:1)

The ‘spectacle’ is often understood to be the mass media, advertising etc, however Debord writes

‘The spectacle is not a collection of images but a social relation among people mediated by images.’

(Debord, 1970:2)

and

‘The spectacle cannot be understood as the abuse of a world of vi­sion, as the product of the techniques of mass dissemination of images. It is, rather, a Weltanschauung which has become actual, materially translated . It is a vision of the world which has become objectified.’

(ibid.)

> so more far-reaching, a wider concept. Basically anything formulated by society that alienates us  – ‘The spectacle within society corresponds to a concrete manufacture of alienation.’ (Debord, 1970:12)

Détournement

Subverting elements of popular culture.  A technique which came from the Lettrists – counter-technique to the spectacle – ‘turning expressions of the capitalist system against itself’ (Holt and Cameron 2010:252) – slogans and logos turned against the advertiser, subversive political pranks, challenging dominant culture.

Art and politics

SI > Art should not be separated from politics – belief that ‘the notion of artistic expression being separated from politics and current events is one proliferated by reactionary considerations to render artwork that expresses comprehensive critiques of society impotent’ (Wikipedia, 2016b)

Psychogeography ,

Defined by Debord (1955) as

’the study of the precise laws and specific effects of the geographical environment, consciously organized or not, on the emotions and behavior of individuals. The adjective psychogeographical, retaining a rather pleasing vagueness, can thus be applied to the findings arrived at by this type of investigation, to their influence on human feelings, and even more generally to any situation or conduct that seems to reflect the same spirit of discovery.’

Dérive

Meaning ‘drift’ in English, dérive was defined by the Lettrists as ‘the art of wandering through urban space’ (Wikipedia, 2016a) and became one of the basic Situationist practices (Debord, 1956).

Not flaneur concept > ‘a technique of rapid passage through varied ambiances.  Dérives involve playful-constructive behavior and awareness of psychogeographical effects, and are thus quite different from the classic notions of journey or stroll.’  (ibid.)

More explanation from Debord:

‘In a dérive one or more persons during a certain period drop their relations, their work and leisure activities, and all their other usual motives for movement and action, and let themselves be drawn by the attractions of the terrain and the encounters they find there. Chance is a less important factor in this activity than one might think: from a dérive point of view cities have psychogeographical contours, with constant currents, fixed points and vortexes that strongly discourage entry into or exit from certain zones.

But the dérive includes both this letting-go and its necessary contradiction: the domination of psychogeographical variations by the knowledge and calculation of their possibilities. In this latter regard, ecological science — despite the narrow social space to which it limits itself — provides psychogeography with abundant data.’

(ibid.)

My thoughts:

The more that I researched the Situationists the more I felt attuned to some of their principles.  Not all I hasten to add as I am neither an anarchist or a hippy (which is where in my mind some of their ideas lead to) but bearing in mind the influence of the internet and how its tentacles reach relentlessly into most aspects of society and our lives today – and I see the internet as today’s modern version of Debord’s Spectacle; Debord’s statement above that ‘the spectacle is not a collection of images but a social relation among people mediated by images.’ (Debord, 1970:2) sums up our obsession with the internet and social media these days rather nicely I think – I do feel the need on occasions to take part in a ‘derive’, to get away from the incessant media frenzy and the commodity fetishism that it feeds.

However society today provides people with more choices than were available during the Situationist International years of the fifties and sixties. There is a greater tolerance nowadays to the different lifestyles (materialistic or otherwise) that people lead and this modern open-mindedness in my opinion does rather date some of the Situationist ideals.  Reality television provides us with  examples of superficial ‘spectacles’ where we often witness social disfunction, yet participants have the choice as whether to take part in such programmes and the public has the choice as whether to watch (the latter can become a fixation but that is not a discussion for this post).

Bibliography

Debord, G. (1955) Introduction to a Critique of Urban Geography.  At: http://library.nothingness.org/articles/SI/en/display/2  (accessed on 23 March 2016)

Debord, G. (1956) Theory of the Dérive.  At: http://www.cddc.vt.edu/sionline/si/theory.html  (accessed on 23 March 2016)

Debord, G. (1970)  The Society of the Spectacle.     Detroit: Black and Red

Holt, D. and Cameron, D. (2010) Cultural Strategy: Using Innovative Ideologies to Build Breakthrough Brands.  Oxford: Oxford University Press

Marshall, P. (1992) Guy Debord and the Situationists.  At: http://catless.ncl.ac.uk/Obituary/debord.html (accessed on 21 March 2016)

Plant, S. (1992) The Most Radical Gesture: The Situationist International in a Postmodern Age   London: Routledge

The Tate Guide to Modern Art Terms (Wilson and Lack, 2008)

Williams, R. (2009) Art Theory: An Historical Introduction (2nd ed.)  Chichester: Wiley-Blackwell

Wikipedia (2016a) Dérive.  At: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dérive  (accessed on 23 March 2016)

Wikipedia (2016b) Situationist International.  At: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Situationist_International (accessed on 23 March 2016)