NAILING THE WHATNESS OF ABSENCE

Lecture performance

A reenacted welcoming speech based loosely on „Official Welcome“, a monologue by Andea Fraser. The natural sciences talk in a positivistic way about what is out there (in the world) or in there (inside the human itself) and how this “it” is perceived. This talk will be a repeated multifaceted attempt to express something about what is NOT there. The presentation is conceived to outline playfully what is LEFT OUT and LEFT OVER without filling it – maybe even without „outlining“ it. What might be the right methodology to grasp something which is not present? On which nail do you hang deconstructions of holes, breaks and failure? What is in between the art of understanding and the science of knowing? The unattended and the unutilised is not to be explained or put into formulas, but presented as an invitation to visit unpleasant and pleasant blind spots – realms which are not devised neither by rationality nor irrationality, neither by dichotomy nor representation. Explanatory gaps as greyzones of indifference, playgrounds which may evade formal description as well as artistic research.

1 BAG OF BONES

Lecture performance

Bag of Bones is a monologue that was commissioned by The University of Applied Arts, Vienna, and first performed during the Book presentation of „An Envelope for arts, sciences, politics and us. Mixing realities and mediating myths & methods” of the Art & Science class of the University of Applied Arts at the Museumsquartier, on December 12, 2011, before an audience of invited guests. The script below was first published and performed at this very venue (Room D).