R&M1: Claudia Kappenberg

On methodologies

[Points in italics are my own insertions]

To offset the dryness of the material, Claudia chopped up and positioned juicy fruit and veg inbetween making her points.  Some of these positionings could be interpreted as enhancing these points.

Methodology n. 1 a body of methods and rules employed by a science or discipline 2 the analysis of the principles or procedures of enquiry in a particular field (Longmans dictionary)

Research methodologies incorporate theory and practice.  How do they work? – this is the source of ongoing debate.  Here are a few possibilities:

1.  Jim Mooney argues that the scientific paradigm which tends to be used is inappropriate as it cannot cope with the narrative quality of much contemporary art.  For Deleuze this scientific model is arborescent – linear and constraining.  He proposes instead a rhizomatic model which has multiple roots emanating  from a centre 

So if I make a piece of art, that could be seen as a centre into which various ideas feed and from which other ideas emanate.

2.  JM argues that the methodology could mimic the art-making in agglomerating various strands, combining high levels of information (without impeding communication) and recording fluidly

And some of those strands might derive from and feed back into the art work.

3.  A model of translation and resistance to translation, where translation means a kind of crossing over between practice and theory that sets up a disturbance i.e. an unsettling of familiar interpretations.  Barthes suggests that this leads to a re-ordering and creation of new meaning.  

So my art process might be ‘disturbed’ by new ideas, or generate disturbing new ideas for the theorist.

4.  Umberto Eco in ‘The Open Work’ writes of a mutually interpreting relationship between the two, an open dialogue.  

5.  Hide argues that accidents are needed to bring change into an orderly system.  Jacques Monod suggests this happens where two causal chains cross paths (symbolized in Yoruba culture by the trickster who stands at the crossroads) 

So I-in-my-art-process might bump into a new idea (itself part of a process) which encourages me to move in a different direction.

How do methodologies relate?  Perhaps in a piecemeal, shifting way.

The values of the interpretant are crucial, shaping conclusions which are therefore by nature subjective.

New art may require new methodologies, and methodologies can provide a framework out of which new artwork emerges, they can inform artwork (e.g. Susan Hiller, Louise Bourgeois)