Zizek, Casablanca and Post-Code Hollywood

Watch the Video Here


Slavoj Zizek is a Marxist/Lacanian psychoanalyst. His psychoanalytic observations of Cinema is very interesting and different. In this video he briefly talks about Casablanca, one of those mediocre Hollywood hits that to my opinion has been over-rated. He also approaches the Post-Code Hollywood censorship, on the level of its subconscious affect.

I really encourage you to check other Zizek videos on youtube. There are two full length features also called: the reality of the virtual and Zizek, that are really interesting.

My Man Godfrey and The Great Depression

Gregory La Cava’s My Man Godfrey (1936) was released in the midst of the Great American Depression. Like many other films of this time, My Man Godfrey served as an escapist solution for the lower classes that struggled with unemployment, specially that the hero was someone they could relate to. My Man Godfrey points the finger at the government and the snobbish higher class, as the main reason for financial hardships and It offers an amusing comedy that concludes in the prosperity of the poor.
The Depression’s social consequences, such as unemployment, bankruptcy, poverty, and clashes of social classes, are some of the main elements that shape the narrative. My Man Godfrey looks at the Depression from the perspective of the rather elite class. On one hand the film is extremely critical of the high society and it represents them as “empty-headed nitwits” through a comic portrayal, and on the other hand it reveals the people in the dump, who are tagged “forgotten” by the rich, as what Godfrey (William Powell) calls: “the society of really important people.”My Man Godfrey is formed around the comic divergence of Godfrey Parks with the negligent upper-class Bullock family. The Bullock family is symbolized as the mindless partying, irresponsible elite who belong to a class that are too occupied by leisure and are somewhat the answer to the unemployment. Mrs. Bullock (Alice Brady) is portrayed as an unintelligent “amusing” person who supports his protégé Carlo (Mischa Auer) , a pianist whose responsibility in the family is rather that of a royal joker. The cold monstrous older daughter Cornelia (Gail Patrick) is described by Godfrey as:
the Park Avenue brat. A spoiled child who's grown up in ease and luxury, who's always had her own way, and whose misdirected energies are so childish... that they hardly deserve the comment even of a butler on his off-Thursday.
The childish and naïve Irene (Carole Lombard) steals a horse from a cab and leaves it in the family library. Mr. Bullock (Eugene Pallette) however seems to be the most rational of all, yet a shareholder whose mediocre understanding of the stock market almost results in his bankruptcy.
The bullock family’s involvement in the scavenger hunt is also to emphasize their idiocy. The inanity of the game and their treatment of the poor illustrate the boredom and silliness of the high society of the time and comically criticize its snobbish intellectualism. The scavenger hunt creates a contrast between the two extreme social classes, the poor in the dump and the elite. While the rich are in search of “something that nobody wants-a forgotten man” just as a matter of amusement, the poor must also scavenge among the rubbish, rather as means of survival. The destiny of those who participate in this game is clear, when Irene explains to Godfrey that not all of them are hunters, but some are receivers, he suggests: “Sounds like a bankruptcy proceeding.”
The film criticizes the wealthy class and holds them somewhat responsible for the misfortunes of the poor, not because of their wealth but rather their arrogant, irresponsible behaviors. For instance in the scene where Godfrey for the first time as the butler serves Mrs. Bullock’s breakfast, she is unable to recall him:
- What's your name?
- Godfrey.
- Are you someone I know?
- We met last night at the Waldorf Ritz.
- Oh, yes, you were with Mrs. Maxton's party at the bar. Or were you?
- I'm the forgotten man.
- So many people have such bad memories.
It is suggested that people like Godfrey have become “forgotten” mainly due to the negligence of the ignorant upper class that are deeply involved in their leisure life. Another example would be Mr. Bullock’s suspicious first encounter with Godfrey. Even though Godfrey is well dressed and relaxed, Mr. Bullock identifies him as a burglar, which indicates not only Mr. Bullock’s suspicious nature but also his superior power over Godfrey. Cornelia’s constant act of humiliating Godfrey to the extend of setting him up for a theft of her pearl necklace, was also along the lines of snobbish higher class cruelty towards the poor. Even Irene, who is in love with Godfrey, finds herself in a superior position over him. She stubbornly obliges Godfrey to love her throughout the film and at the end she marries him by force. By mostly framing her higher and on the left of the Godfrey, the dynamic forces of power are suggested.
The film is also critical of the government interference in the crisis, and shows a preference for laissez-faire instead. In the very opening scene a tramp complains to Godfrey about the police intrusion in his business: “ If them cops would stick to their own racket and leave honest guys alone, we’d get somewhere without all this relief and stuff.” We see that at the end the survival of the forgotten men from unemployment is because of Godfrey’s project which does not involve any welfare or governmental funding. My Man Godfrey also deals with the notion of tax in wealthy families. In the scene where Mr. Bullock warns the family about their spendings, so that he would be able to pay the taxes, the family reacts to the high percentage of the tax taken by the government. Mrs. Bullock argues: “Well, why should the government get more money than your own flesh and blood?” what is evident in this scene is that the wealthier families are also being effected by the Depression, where at the time it is not taken seriously by the family members, as they are far detached from reality, living in their world of leisure.
The film offers a rather capitalist conclusion to the crisis. Godfrey, with the help of his friend Tommy Grey, finances a project where he not only provides jobs for the forgotten men in the dump, but also saves the Bullock family from bankruptcy, due to his understanding of the market. The conclusion suggests that it is Mr. Bullock’s wrong decisions that result in his bankruptcy rather than the harshness of the stock market. By transforming the dump into a nightclub, Godfrey creates the means to earn money and benefit the poor, out of the snobbism and desire for leisure of the high society. The very act that through out the film was demonized and held responsible for the forgotten men’s misfortunes has become their survival solution.
According to Peter Roffman and Jim Purdy, Godfrey’s psychological state is a metaphor of the country’s condition. He has coped with his Depression by joining the common people in the dump. Godfrey describes his experience to his old time college friend Tommy Grey:
when you begin to feel sorry for yourself. And boy did I feel sorry for myself! I wandered down to the East River one night, thinking I'd just slide in and get it over with. But I met some fellows living there, on a city dump. They were people who were fighting it out and not complaining. I never got as far as the river.
The character of Godfrey Sympathizes with, and praises those who struggle through financial difficulties and poverty, mainly due to the Depression. His perfection at work and his effort in being a “GOOD butler,” shows not only his disciplined attitude, but emphasizes his need for the job as well. While visiting the dump with Tommy, which looks even filthier in the daylight, Godfrey stresses the importance of the employment: “the only difference between a derelict and a man is a job.”
Apart from the fact that movies like My Man Godfrey were an escapist solution for the audience, from their troubles and financial difficulties, they provided characters that people could relate to. While everybody blamed a different person or organization for their financial hardship, My Man Godfrey depicts a certain class and points the finger at them and the government state. Following the destiny of a poor forgotten man, the film fulfills the lower class’s fascination with the wealth, by setting the plot mainly in luxurious locations. The film concludes in a way that provides hope, the capitalist solution, which seems to be the only way of having everybody, both wealthy and poor, happy.

New Look, New Policies

Dear Visitors,

I appreciate all your support. I know I don't have that many frequent visitors, and I know the reason. As my variety of submissions are very wide, I get a lot of one time visitors and not many returning ones. So as of now I will categorize the postings in different genres, which are: Cinema, Music, Visual Arts, and Philosophy.

I am happy to have visitors from as far as Saudi Arabia, and Chile. I hope you find the material here helpful to your research and/or curiosity.

There had been also a funny incident. Something like 4 month ago I had a posting on Guerrilla Girls, and in that post there was a non explicit image which was called nude.gif, now because of this image the traffic to my blog has been almost tripled. So a special thanks to perverts for boosting my google location! :)

A historical Look at the production of Munau's "The Last Laugh"

The Last Laugh which had the original German title of Der Latzte Mann- Like the French title Le Dernier des Hommes- was an exteremely well appreciated and valued Film at the time. Bioscope called it: “the greatest film ever made” or referring to The Times, it was “unusually good.” It was the collaboration of three men, F. W. Murnau, Carl Mayer and Karl Freund, which resulted in a picture that with almost no inter-titles managed to be still intriguing and simulating.
The Last Laugh is a portrait of an elderly doorman, who identifies himself with his uniform. Once this uniform is taken away from him due to his age incapability, he finds himself depressed, destroyed and low. Especially that he is transferred to lavatory services, forced to wear a new mediocre white coat.

The story of The Last Laugh is simple, yet the context, in which it is represented in, is complex. The social cruelty that the film criticizes is not presented in the plot, rather in the impressions that the whole complex cinema visualization will leave on the mind, as well as social consciousness. “It is less a narrative of occurrences than a record of psychological experience.”
Although at the time of the screening of The Last Laugh, most of the credits were given to Murnau, scenarist Carl Mayer played an important role in the development of the film. Mayer wrote Scherben and Sylvester, the first two of the Kammerspielfilme trilogy, both directed by Lulu Pick. His disagreement with Pick resulted in Murnau directing The Last Laugh. Quoting Barton Palmer: “Murnau more than Pick was able to realize Mayer’s ideas about dynamic and flexible point of view.” Because of Murnau and Mayer’s understandings of each other The Last Laugh as an outcome was both technically and aesthetically brilliant.
More than anything else this film has been praised for its great use of mobile camera, a concept very new at the time. The Last Laugh’s reputation for great cinematography was a result of Mayer’s concern in writing for camera, describing in details perspectives, positions and movement , also, Murnau’s awareness of camera aesthetics and Karl Freund’s techniques. The utilization of a fully automatic camera, capable of all sorts of movements, enables Murnau to create Mayer’s desired fluidity in the title-free narrative structure.
Murnau and Karl Freund introduced the entfesselte or the “unchained camera”. Murnau employed this technique to create the famous drunk scene, illustrating porter’s distorted, dreamy vision. Freund achieved this kind of picture by attaching the camera to his chest using straps and staggering around the set. In the opening scene, the camera descends in the elevator, goes through the hall way and then exits the hotel entrance to where porter stands, having it all in a long traveling shot. According to Palmer: “Freund achieved this effect by mounting the camera on a bicycle. Another extraordinary shot was the passage of the camera through the glass wall, which was achieved by a discreet dissolve in the montage. Murnau also beautifully showed the movement of sound through camera: the trumpeter turns towards the camera, in a way that the opening of his horn fills the frame, then the camera tracks backward quickly, as if the sound of the trumpet was flying. Same method was used in the scene where the doorman’s neighbors shout the news of his degradation.

The Last Laugh’s set was entirely studio-built, and the whole film, except for the shot in the railway station interiors, was staged there.
What Mayer called ‘in Licht und Glanz’ in Sylvester, which means ‘luminous and resplendent’, was dramatically taken to another level by Murnau: The movement of flashlights, the reflective black oily and wet raincoat, glass surfaces with glitter, shinny coat buttons or the lighted windows of the apartments. Quoting Marc Silberman:
“Light here is not the reflection of an outside source or even an ornamental element but rather suggests in its intensity and dispersal another world, he unseen world of darkness and shadows opposed to such clarity.”
The objects as part of the mise-en-scene play an important role in the narrative structure of the film. For instance the doorman’s obsession with mirrors and the constant act of checking himself in them, which signals his crises over the notion of self-knowledge, or the use of swinging door for creating the ‘expressive framework of the protagonist’s actions’ . But more than anything else it was the doorman’s uniform that contributed to the narrative. Served as a symbol of authority, power and respect, it determined the doorman’s high “rank”(Stand) even though he was from a lower “class”.

Emil Jannings who played the role of the doorman, received a large amount of publicity at the time. Jannings, who was already well known in UK and US for his performances, was a key factor in the plot progression, especially that there was no inter-titles and everything must have been acted out.
One of the interesting instances that happened during the production of The Last Laugh was Hitchcock’s encounter with Murnau. Hitchcock who visited Berlin as an assistant director of an Anglo-German production, filming The Background at the UFA studios, was situated in the neighboring set to Murnau. Hitchcock carefully observed Murnau at work, and was fascinated by his methods. In an afternoon that Murnau and Hitchcock spent together, Murnau “proceeded to point things out” to Hitchcock, such as the use of the perspective.
It was Murnau’s Sense of direction, along with Mayer’s imagination and Freund technical creativity that created the appropriate fluidity in a film with no inter-titles. The mobile camera was a great asset in creating the flow, in a narrative story that was simple, yet complex in context.

Embodied Mind

short reflections on Varela, Thompson and Rosch's idea of cognitivism:

We find ourselves living in a world which has inherited most of its norms from the previously lived cultures which have established an evolving common sense, including our self- knowledge. Technology as an “amplifier” acts in transforming the social practices and making this knowledge possible.

Our minds operate by manipulation of symbols that represent behaviors and features of the world. This “process of symbols” is to a degree that we humans tend to mistaken representations with the actual events and object, while internally representing them. For instance we usually tend to confuse our names, our thought and the ideas of ourselves, with ourselves. Something which results in what Lacan calls “the big other” or what the authors call “separate subjective WE.” Again this internal representation of symbols depends a lot on our historically influenced minds.

Propaganda Through Sound Logo

Last night while I was surfing the channels on my parents TV, I came across this music video on VH1 by Justin Timberlake, called “I’m loving it.” It immediately made me think of two things which I thought is worth sharing:

Of course all of you are familiar with McDonald’s Audio Logo and the punch line that usually comes with it: “I am loving it!” (And you don’t just love it, you are loving it, which means your love for it is increasing day by day! euww!) The song starts with same music and same words only in a more funky remix. This not the first time some big brand is advertised through a song, but what makes this one different is that previously the actually name of the brand was used directly in the song’s lyrics. The affects such advertisement is unbelievable, because when you hear the actual word, automatically you recognize it as advertisement. But in this new way you will even enjoy the song, memorize it and sing it along unaware of its affect.

The second thing is that, the importance of sound is becoming much more significant, and of course the corporations are also aware of it. There a quality about the sound that image lacks, and that is the control over having it in mind. How many times have you kept remembering a song that you don’t even like. If I put this in the form of the cliché Hollywood punch lines, it would be: They have found an even faster way into you brains.

Thinking With Somebody Else's Head

When I was back in Montreal, I discovered this podcast by a fellow called Richard Lloyd Jones.
I managed to Listen to several of his episodes before coming to Dubai, and they were really interesting. The guests whom are presented are very intellectual, and they usually share different point of view than that of those who are often invited to on-air radio station . It challeneges any subject that influences our view of the world: Science, philosophy, psychology, quantum physics, religion,...

Take a look at his blog and listen to some of the podcasts:
http://somebodyelseshead.blogspot.com/

Graffiti: Art or Vandalism?

Not very long ago I used to consider graffiti at the same level as Popular Rap Music. My experience of graffiti was limited only to the gang symbols and rude racial words scratched on the buses and metro’s plastic windows, or the very colorful yet meaningless spray drawings on the walls of Montreal.

While staying in Dubai, a place surrounded by disgusting advertisements as big as skyscrapers, I really felt like drawing something on them because a) they would make huge canvases and b) the messages on them were absolutely filthy. Sharing this idea with a friend who just arrived from UK, made him introduce me to BANKSY.

The first visit to his website made me fall in love with his work, at the same time gave me some great laughs. His sense of humor is keen and smart. The quality of his works is absolutely amazing, and his messages are strong. It very much reminded me of some of the 80’s and 90’s Art groups such as the General Idea or Guerilla girls, yet Banksy’s approach is very new to its kind as Internet is his main venue of showcasing his work. But Internet hasn’t been his only medium of advertisement. He has used tricks like writing on bank notes, painting on the Israeli West Bank Barrier, installing modified reproduction of classical paintings in museum, or simply painting on the walls wherever possible. He has remained anonymous (like guerilla girls), while he has gained an international reputation.

Banksy's website:http://www.banksy.co.uk/

Society of control vs. Disciplinary societies

Deleuze recognizes disciplinary societies as an ended system which has given its place to the society of control, a new intellectual way of applying control over the society. This happens according to Deleuze by blending what Foucault calls “closed environment”. Also other methods like specializing, dividualizing are key points in this process.Today every person has a personal password which is recognized by a machine; a machine that works with a program designed for dealing dividually with individuals.

Delueze's notion of the capitalism in the today’s society of control is also very interesting as he calls it capitalism for the product rather than capitalism for the production, as most of the products are made in the third world where there is cheap labor. And this is why marketing have become the core of the financial society, to an extend where Toni Morrison recognize Fascism a marketing for power rather than just an ideology. By making people paying their tax and debts, today were are enclosed to these methods of control through power where we are consumers in form of numbers and statistics.

Virilio and Minh-Ha on Reality and representation

Virilio tries to express reality through speed of light and time. How the speed of light affects our notion of reality, the fact that we perceive every incidence not at the very moment it occurs; the idea of trans-appearance, and how time plays an important role in our perception rather than the space. Therefore the speed of light which is related to time is more important than the light itself in the way we conceive the reality of appearances. And that is why the image is what Virilio calls shadow of time, referring to Plato.

Virilio also cites Walter Benjamin’s idea of “aura” and discusses how technology made us so close to the things that we are no longer affected by them. We are trying our best to develop systems of control where we are able to do everything simultaneously without necessary being present in different spaces, and here is the notion of mobility which doesn’t necessarily refers to space.

Minh-Ha argues how we are subjective and the technology is absolutely objective; that is why when we hide technology as much as possible, the images we are presenting become far more detached from the reality.

Discussing Minh-Ha, why do we think that the reality is neutral? Can the reality itself be biased as well? Reality, Being untouched and raw whether it may seem biased, is neutral.

Also, if “a bad shot is guaranteed of authenticity" then is a beautiful piece of art, even if it is reflecting reality, always a lie?

Image, Technology and Political Economy

With the emergence of new technologies and the developments in reproduction, “Image” acquired a whole new definition, which no longer maintained the notion of its physical component, and considered the mass production means.

Reproduction has always existed, but with new technologies it has entered a new level. Digital imaging, along with Internet, has created a shift in the visual culture, by providing the easiest reproduction and access tools. A reproduction, no matter how accurate and perfect it is, comparing to its original, lacks an element which Walter Benjamin calls “aura.” The fact that the reproduced image is no longer present in time and space, specially in the digital world where it may even not have a physical existence. (Benjamin, 50)

One of things that make the original, for instance a painting, valuable is its uniqueness. The “aura” of the original, what gives it its cult value, is its oneness, and also the phenomena of “distance.”(Benjamin, 52) Mainly due to its inaccessibility, the original always tends to keep this “distance” with its viewer, even though s/he might be physically close to it.

But with the digital technology where the copy is absolutely identical with the original, the original becomes a copy where at the same time all copies can be considered original. On the top of that is Internet where all these originals are distributed, and can be accessed easily. So the question is that in such a system, does there still exist a notion of “aura.”

The other thing, that has been redefined frequently, after the appearance of digital imaging and Internet, is copyright. Once protecting the uniqueness of an image, now it has entered a whole new level. Images can easily be stored in personal computers and there are such a great amount of users that tracking everybody down, is impossible. The new technology enables the masses to get what they want without the involvement of any power structure or economic corporation. It has created a situation where the visuals can reach anybody in anywhere without passing through the filtering process of capital, and propaganda. It is for this reason that countries like China or Iran limited their people’s access to Internet.

Culture Industry, Propaganda and IMAGE

Image has had definitely a powerful effect, in establishing a visual culture and it has been overused, over centuries, politically to manipulate public perception and to set norms and standards, by political and capitalist economical administrations. Through the notion of representation, image has helped the establishment of the culture industry. In counter point artists have used the same medium to effect their audience, by delivering messages, emphasizing certain social and/or political issues, and exposing them to some realities. Image has also been a tool to document realities and events that are inaccessible to general public. Taking these notions further, because of the technological advances of the modern world, image has gained a new meaning and its use and impact have been moved into a new level.

Image, Culture Industry and Propaganda;
Image has always been culture Industry’s major tool in manipulating general public, and establishing a culture that encourages consumption and the empowerment of capital and power structures.

The term “Culture industry” was first used by Max Horkheimer and Theodor Adorno in their book, “The Dialectic of Enlightenment.” They expressed the modern culture as a standardized and uniform system that views the mass or rather consumers as only numbers and statistics and tends to force them towards passivity. Quoting Horkheimer and Adorno:

Culture now impresses the same stamp on everything. Films, radio and magazines make up a system, which is uniformed as whole and in every part. Even the aesthetic activities of political opposites are one in their enthusiastic obedience to the rhythm of iron system. (71)

Therefore, one of the key features of the culture industry is producing an illusion of variety and choice for the consumer, when in fact the perfunctorily distinguished products prove to be all alike in the end. All products are manufactured under a formalized procedure, which its mere purpose is the moral and financial benefit of the capital. An example, which explains such an idea well, would be Hollywood, where movies follow the same structure. Although at first they may seem different in content, but in fact they are identical to an extent where from the beginning of the film, it is quite obvious how the film will end and who will be rewarded or punished. Each movie is produced under the investment of the major corporations and thus the financial profits of the movie overwhelm its artistic values.

In culture industry “Image” plays a significant role in establishing power structure or rather Capital’s desired culture. The two of the most affective strategies employed, in which the use of Image is at its core are: propaganda and advertisement.

Political groups and power structures have always used propaganda as a key apparatus in fulfilling their objectives. According to Noam Chomsky:
When you can't control people by force, you have to control what people think, and the standard way to do this is via propaganda (manufacture of consent, creation of necessary illusions), marginalizing the general public or reducing them to apathy of some fashion. (1992)
Through the images that the power structure mediates, and also through imposing control over what is being produced and published, the general public is directed in a path, more likely in the benefit of such power structures.

President Bush and his administration are very well aware of the power of Images in establishing an impression of strength and resolve. Quoting Kenneth T. Walsh: “Throughout the past four years, the president's handlers have surrounded him with the kind of visuals that the camera finds irresistible.”(12/5/04) Patriotic scenes including president with the American flag, children, soldiers and etc. were mainly the center of photographers’ interest and were widely mediated. There were some iconic photographs, which were even key points in projecting Bush and his administrations’ patriotic image. One would be the photograph of Bush standing on the top of the debris of the world trade center, surrounded by police and firefighters, and giving a speech through a bullhorn; an image which portraits a strong authoritative representation of him. Another example would be the photograph of Condoleezza Rice Playing Piano with a string quartet.

She in Placed in the center of the photograph, Under the only light source which is in the frame, in the focused point of the picture, wearing a darker cloth comparing to others in the picture. These all together not only attract all the attentions towards her, but also suggest a powerful, intelligent and emotional persona for her.

Evidently the idea of propaganda is nothing new. For instance Napoleon Bonaparte, not long after his coupe d’tate in 1799, appointed the famous French painter, Jacques-Louis David to memorialize his crossing of the Alps. Although Napoleon crossed the Alps on a mule and in very exhausting circumstances, David painted him questionably theatrical on a white horse, with a victorious gesture. The reality was so distorted in that painting that the French painter Paul Delaroche decided to challenge David’s painting, by repainting the whole scene. He studied all the evidence of Napoleon’s crossing of the St. Bernard Pass and even visited the place himself, to acquire as much information as possible. Delaroche then painted his version of the “Napoleon crossing the Alps”, which marked a picturesque contrast between the Image Napoleon was delivering and the actual reality. (Walker Art Gallery, 2006)













Advertisement, on the other hand, is a kind of propaganda itself, but it has been mainly utilized by Capital and political economy, in order to manufacture a need for the consumption of commodities, rather than promoting a power, or concealing its missteps.

[…]the mechanical repetition of the same culture product has come to be the same as that of the propaganda slogan. In both cases the insistent demand for effectiveness makes technology into psycho-technology, into a procedure for manipulating men. (Horkheimer and Adorno, 98)

More than half of the images that one sees every day are advertisements, sponsoring goods. Most of them not only try to promote a product, but also a new culture or rather “style” that encourages consumption, and keeps the commercial power on scene.

Apple has spent a large amount of money over past years in order to only manufacture a need for their products, or at least create an illusion of need. It has used any kind of advertisement possible, from bus wrappings to TV commercials, employing the same simple attractive theme, which is a silhouette character on the top of a bright background. By leaving the character anonymous, Apple avoids addressing any specific class or cultural ethnicities, and leaves the decision to the public. By aiming at the general public it has represented a commodity, which could belong to any social class. Quoting Horkhiemer and Adorno: “the freedom is symbolized in various media of the culture industry by arbitrary selection of the average individuals.”(88)

As mentioned several times above, the culture industry’s main objective is to produce a need, to manufacture a consumptive culture, mainly by substituting what is being lived with a “representation.”(Debord, 1) In 1967 Guy Debord introduced the idea of spectacle: “The spectacle is not a collection of images, but a social relationship mediated by images.”(Debord, 4) As Debord describes, the spectacle is a social relationship or rather a culture, which is propagated through Images; the culture that defines the material basis of social life, and advertises commodity as a necessary part of the social power.

By Idolizing celebrities and creating positive, attractive but at the same time inaccessible icons, the ruling economy not only affects society’s objectives, but also at the same time moves away their life into something unreal. The affect of spectacles like Hollywood or Television becomes so fundamental, and changes many of the personal and social ideologies to a degree, that it directly effects the social life and forms it own culture. All the social relationships, even in the most intimate situations, the choice of words, and even the emotional reactions are all affected by the spectacle and tend to become similar to the models that the culture industry provides.( Horkhiemer and Adorno, 100)

Alan Watts :::: Time :::::

Alan Watts a western Philosopher, who has a very deep understanding of the Buddhist Zen, Talks about time, a very absurd notion which tends to keep us away from the Tibetan/Sufi ideology of living in the second:

High Art industry, women and Artists of color:::: Part II

As stated earlier the Guerilla Girls, a feminist group of artists formed in mid 80s, were well aware of the power structures that effected and had control over High art, and the strategies that they chose in order to fight back, were appropriate in its context. For Adorno, “although administration is inescapable, it is vulnerable to the fact that it lacks the ability to plan every detail of every eventuality in advance, and to the extent that it tries to do so, administration becomes consumed by its own inefficiency. This limit guarantees the possibility of something different which, because it is not planned, embodies the value of hope.”[1] Hence Guerilla Girls were able to, under the right circumstances, secure their position by forming autonomy within an organizational form, to which it was opposed, through the involvement of administrators who happened to share the same aesthetic values.[2]

In order to escape the organizations and institutional structures, underneath the power hierarchy that promote high art, Guerilla Girls chose ‘public art’ as the medium to communicate with their audience. Apart from posters which are their most public communication tool, they have also done billboards, bus ads, magazine spreads, protest actions, letter-writing campaigns, and putting up broadsheets in bathrooms of major museums.[3] In this way they have not only escaped the biased administrative selections, which happen within the museums and galleries, but they have also reached a much broader audience.

Another strategy used by Guerilla Girls in order to have the best impact on their audience, has been their reliance on the mass culture rather than the world of high art. Quoting Gertrude Stein, from the Guerilla Girls, “there is a popular misconception that the world of high art is ahead of the mass culture, but everything in our research shows that, instead of being avant-garde, it is derrière.”[4] Because of the honesty that was evident in their work, and the simplicity of their message which, communicated easily with the mass audience, their work didn’t allow any misinterpretation. Therefore the public could easily understand and appreciate their work, without feeling the need to refer to a critic in order to communicate with its message, although the critics still did criticize their work. In other words, in this situation, the public no longer identifies museums and critics as a superior ‘knower’, because the art work is ‘known’ to him/her by itself already.

Apart from the tactics, mentioned above, Guerilla Girls used other techniques as well, which are worth mentioning; they wanted to be shocking. By calling themselves, a group of grown women, ‘girls’ which can imply that they are not complete, mature or grown up, they attracted a lot of attention. Also wearing Guerilla masks as a disguise, in order to both earn attention and remain anonymous. According to Zora Neale Hurson: “being anonymous, operating under code names and alter egos, has meant there are no career gains to be earned by being a Guerilla Girl. This makes us all equal, gives each of us an equal voice, no matter what our position may be in the ‘real’ world.”[5] But one of the most important qualities of Guerilla Girls which earned them a lot of attention has been ‘humor’. By ridiculing and belittling the system that excluded them[6], they not only criticized the system in an amusing way, but, as said by themselves, humor gets people involved. [7]

But are any of the activities similar to Guerilla Girls, General Idea or any other ‘activist art’ movement effective? Do they actually make a difference? Without a doubt they have been indeed effective, but it is not in a way that displays a cultural shift at once. Putting it differently, the major effect of these activists arts happen in a very large time scale. Jeremy Valentine explores this concept, through Hardt and Negri’s Empire: “Empire is not a stable system that is limited and that can be weakened and overcome by direct attack.”[8] Referring to the power structures by the term Empire, Hardt and Negri support this idea, that it is impossible for any activity or protest against the empire to have an immediate effect on the power structure as a whole; the effect can only be gradual. Quoting Valentine again: “In terms of political significance of art, the idea of an oppositional sphere defined in terms of political casualty of aesthetics, […] has dissolved. This is not to say that art is suddenly without effects, including broader social changes. It is to say that these cannot be determined or guaranteed.”[9] Valentine believes these effects cannot be guaranteed mainly because the effect of any opposition to the power structure does not happen instantly. Of course when Guerilla Girls where asked whether they have made a difference or not, they believed they have made dealers, curators, critics and collectors ‘accountable’. They have been protesting for feminism and artists of color for more than 20 years now, and things have certainly changed over these decades.

As demonstrated here and in the previoua post, because the whole power structure that imposes an authority over the art, is affected by white-male-heterosexual-western prejudice, the groups who share a value different than that of the system, do not get the recognition they deserve. Different strategies have been employed by activist artists, such as Guerilla Girls. Such Strategies may have not shown its impact; its influence is gradual over large time scales. But these protests have certainly been effective.

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[1] Valentine, Jeremy. “Empire and Art: Aesthetic Autonomy, Organizational Meditation and Contextualizing Practices” Art, Money, Parties: New Institution in the Political Economy of Contemporary Art. (Liverpool University press, 2004), 199.

[2]Ibid, 200.

[3] Guerilla Girls (whoever they really are). “Guerilla Girls bare all: An Interview” Confessions of the Guerilla Girls. ( HarperPerinial, 1995), 18.

[4]Ibid, 26.

[5] Ibid, 20.

[6] Ibid, 15.

[7] Ibid, 15.

[8] Valentine, Jeremy. “Empire and Art: Aesthetic Autonomy, Organizational Meditation and Contextualizing Practices” Art, Money, Parties: New Institution in the Political Economy of Contemporary Art. (Liverpool University press, 2004), 192.

[9] Ibid, 196.

High Art industry, women and Artists of color

In order to examine the effectiveness of the ‘activist art’ as a tool, protesting the recognition that women and artists of color deserve in the art scene, a basic understanding of the systems in which art gets exhibited, exchanged, and criticized is necessary. Oppositional groups such as Guerilla Girls certainly do have an influence on the power structure within the art industry, but their influence is gradual, rather than immediate.

When The Guerilla Girls were asked whether art is judged based on quality, or if women and artists of color are simply victims of racist biased intentions, their response pointed several issues. Quoting Lee Kranser, one of the Guerilla Girls: “The world of high art, the kind that gets into museums and history books, is run by a very small group of people. Our posters have proved over and over again that these people, no matter how smart or good intentioned, have been biased against women and artists of color.”[1] What Lee Kranser points out is the very fundamental conditional relation between art and its own institutions and organizations, and studying this relation leads us to the issue of power, both of art and over art. Referring to Jeremy Valentine: “Sometimes this question [the question of power] takes banal and mundane, perhaps trivial form, with issues such as dealers, collectors, critics, curators and administrators. At other times the question is posed in more elevated terms of the relations between art and life.”[2] In other words, art has always been subjected to the power structures that control and influence the high art industry, which is according to Valentine dealers, collectors, critics, curators and administrators and of course museums. But Valentine takes another factor into account as well: the relation between art and life. How one’s views and ideologies may effect art, or in particular high art industry. Citing Joy Senack: “Ideologies are super structures based on the ideas, or systems of ideas, that prevail at any given time in any social group. They are erected upon the realities of the social structure but they may reflect these realities in a biased manner.”[3] Most of the influential participants of the art industry are affected by white male heterosexual western ‘ideologies’, Thus the art administrations act biased against works of women, artists of color, homosexuals, and non-western artists.

At the core of this power structure are the critics, whose influence or general impression of a work of art cannot be overlooked. According to Jeremy Valentine, “The political significance of art cannot be determined by any established political or aesthetic critical criteria, precisely because the relation between the two terms has increasingly become arbitrary.”[4] That is to say the relation between the art object and its interpretations, established by the critics who share different political values, is so arbitrary that a misinterpretation is very likely. Therefore in such circumstances that the authority of the critical misinterpretations conceals the actual meaning of an art work, the white-male-heterosexual-western gaze influences critics, and results in disrespect of the actual value of any art produced against such ‘ideologies’.

Another part of the power structure is museums and organizations that exhibit works of art. Jeremy Valentine, a critic of these institutions argues that: “the museum codifies and bureaucratizes cultural experience, imposing uniformity and eliminating difference.”[5] As a result of this, museum displays a restricted relation to knowledge, that Bennet called the ‘exhibitory complex’, which structures a hierarchy of power over that which is known. Yet visitors are encouraged to identify the museum as a superior ‘knower’ over what it represents as ‘known’.[6] Therefore because the museum has this selfish perspective, and at the same time it is part of a bigger power structure which shares unified ‘ideologies’ with critics, collectors and dealers, not every type of art gets exhibited. Only those are qualified that either agree with its mentality or take a neutral position. Perhaps a very famous example of art which questioned the museum administrations and the above issues was Marcel Duchamp’s Fountain. By questioning the categories through which art was interpreted and displayed, Duchamp’ Fountain not only criticized the institutional spaces such the gallery, the museum, and even the archive, but it also extended its criticism to both employers and users of such spaces, and the public and private conditions that made them possible.[7]

The third part of the power structure is the political economy in the art industry, which views art as a commodity. Becoming a commodity, an art work not only may lose its value for what it is, but it also becomes the subject of dealers and collectors’ evaluation. As the critical theorist Max Horkheimer and Theodor Adorno put it over fifty years ago in their work Dialectic of Enlightenment, in capitalist market the tendency is that: “everything is looked at from only one aspect; that it can be used for something else, however vague the notion of this use may be. No object has inherent value; it is valuable only to the extent that it can be exchanged.”[8] This part of the power structure’s concern is only the exchange value of art work, and it follows, like the rest of the power structure, the white-male-heterosexual-western ideology, mainly because it believes: this is what sells.

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[1] Guerilla Girls (whoever they really are). “Guerilla Girls bare all: An Interview” Confessions of the Guerilla Girls. ( HarperPerinial, 1995), 25.

[2] Valentine, Jeremy. “Empire and Art: Aesthetic Autonomy, Organizational Meditation and Contextualizing Practices” Art, Money, Parties: New Institution in the Political Economy of Contemporary Art. (Liverpool University press, 2004), 200.

[3] Senack, Joy. “The Economics of Value” Value, Art and the Market: A Study in the Political Economy of Value and the Evolution of a Modern Art Market. ( Concordia University Press, 2004), 33.

[4] Valentine, Jeremy. “Empire and Art: Aesthetic Autonomy, Organizational Meditation and Contextualizing Practices” Art, Money, Parties: New Institution in the Political Economy of Contemporary Art. (Liverpool University press, 2004), 195.

[5] Ibid, 201.

[6] Ibid, 201.

[7] Ibid, 203.

[8] Theodor Adorno and Max Horkheimer. Dialectic of Enlightenment. (Continuum, 1995), 158.

Michael Foucault and Noam Chomsky

A very neat dialog between two of the most influential contemporary Marxist theorists:

Our Indefensible Ears

A Response to Hillel Shwartz's "Indefensible Ear"
First Paragraph Summery by Thomas Benoit.

At the end of last century, understanding of the ear sifted from a passive and indestructible organ to a sensitive, complex and active organ. There had been a reassessment of the ear in many fields like science, medicine, psychology and even fashion. Hearing became central to human experience with innovations of the 20th century (gramophone, radio, telephone). At the same time, the ear was overexposed to the noise of all this new inventions (machinery, subway...) although the ear is the most indefensible perception organ - we cannot shut our ears as we do for our eyes -, its vulnerability has been much considered. As the faculty of hearing reduces with age, it has been commonly thought that there is no reason trying to protect an organ, which is bound to degenerate. The author is an anti-noise advocate. He proposes to fight surrounding noises endangering our faculty of hearing by studying our sonic environments and make people aware of the threats of bad sonic vibrations.

The author draws our attention towards the dissimilarity of hearing as an involuntary phenomena and Listening as voluntary, and demonstrates how some notions like noise are bound to this difference. The question that raises here is: does noise loose its meaning if it is heard voluntary? (i.e. if noise is “listened” to is it still noise?)


As a consequence of modern technology the variety of the noises produced is wide. The sounds produced by us, as a result of unfamiliarity with the technology (ex. raising our voices over telephone). The sounds that the technological devices produce, And finally the sounds of commercials, public announcements, shopping mall radios… which most of us does not pay slightest of attention to them and yet they exist. Therefore we are living in an atmosphere where our ear, which is our most indefensible perception organ, is “overtaxed”.