astatic

Fascination, (/About/)-Face


A series of explorations into the representational cache and interplay of two old timers--the word and the face--, M's new work might best be approached as the ground (a space-demanding ground, as the smaller pieces veer inexorably into quarter-gestures) from which to ask a number of questions. Or, rather, one inexorable, eschatological question with an infinity of parts. Prior to the asking, though, it seems intuitive to map out a few overland routes—if only to ascertain a few cardinal points.

On its face, at a first glance directed slyly toward these pieces, we are confronted (bluntly) by an ungracious, stern, unwieldy usage of text, the text, the word, the Word, the entirety of baggage captured by and teased out of the slightest reference to institution. A usage of what might be the most clichéd solemnity-grabbing, overloaded reference in the book. The Book. And this is hardly a slight reference. Hardly quotation that permits fence-straddling metaphor. But quotation of such severity that it withholds a second glance—that reinforces every fundamentalist piety—that informs the re(f/v)erence for text, for the written word that has been damn near inescapable since Herr Gutenberg shot his load.

On the other hand, if you’ve somehow inured yourself to this reverence, through an intonational or gestural invocation of quotation marks, if satisfied in yr. escape….Well, escape through punctuation has a bit of the Chinese-woven-finger-trap. A struggle that ensures struggle. At best you’ve escaped the center of attention.

And this is as central as it gets. This text is traced, a facsimile, a less-than-exact replication. At its infancy, these pieces have already betrayed their father and Father, committed idolatry (and adultery). This is a reverence making clear that this reference cannot be made. This is, this is not a pipe. This reverence belies itself, laughs out at its direction, at conclusion. This is awe-full, full of fear, cataclysm, isolation, that exactly characterizes the sublimity of freedom. This is fascination, about-face.

Ah. The Face (setting aside the Other for a very, very, long time). Suffice it to say that these are as under-defined as the Word is over-defined. The gesture, against caricature, toward faces more pliable than the norm. Allow them to be indefinite, but only insofar as you allow the text finitude. The sublimity of freedom as a eureka-displacement of the inevitability of conclusion.

Which is more malleable, word or face, which more asymmetrical?


-Forrest Wing