New Discussion Section Policy

Dear Rhizome Discuss Community,

After a few weeks of testing, we have set in place a new policy for the discussion section. All posts containing off-topic advertisements or bogus links are now subject to moderation by the Rhizome Staff. We hope that this policy will prevent unwanted spamming and maintain this section as a forum for critical and creative engagement.

Thanks again for your patience and understanding.

Sincerely,

Nick Hasty

Comments

, curt cloninger

Hi Nick,

Following Derrida, it is worth noting what is being implicitly preferenced here (as opposed to what is being explicitly subordinated):
"on-topic" posts
"non-commercial" posts
"authentic" links (no rickrolling?)
"desirable" unspamming

And what is being implicitly subordinated (as opposed to what is being explicitly preferenced):
uncritical, uncreative non-engagement

The means by which one distinguishes "authentic creative" non-sequitir absurdity from "bogus uncreative" opportunistic spamming might be worth a bit of "critical engagement." According to Barthes, artistic tactics that try to evade the mythologizing of language (tactics like dadaist/surrealist absurdity, essentialist poetry, or precise mathematical language) eventually wind up getting mythologized whole cloth ("E=MC2" as a myth of math itself, "the chance meeting on a dissecting table of a sewing machine and an umbrella" as a myth of absurdity itself). The critical efficacy of these tactics is diluted once they are thus mythologized.

So absurdist jodi.org ascii text passes the filters as approved neo-dada (authentic, desirable, critical, [safe, mythologizable, art-world contextualizable]), but not-quite-on-topic spam is filtered as unapproved commercialism (bogus, undesirable, uncritical, [dangerous, having-already-been-recouped, art-world uncontextualizable]).

The initial 1917 filtering of R. Mutt's "Fountain" was justified (in part) because it was a mass-produced, utilitarian, overtly commercial object.

For great deals on fountains, shop home depot!

Patiently,
Curt

, Brian Droitcour

If this is a joke, it's almost funny.

, Eric Dymond

The initial 1917 filtering of R. Mutt's "Fountain" was justified (in part) because it was a mass-produced, utilitarian, overtly commercial object.

I don't think that Fountain had anything to do with those reasons (in part or not) . In fact I am sure of it.

, curt cloninger

"Our merry Montaigne is a garruolus and gullible old man, neither safe nor scientific."

http://sdrc.lib.uiowa.edu/dada/blindman/2/05.htm

, Eric Dymond

That's such a cool scan. I still think that fountain, as per Duchamps own pleading, was a porcelain vagina.
I just like that concept. Immersed in Freud, trying desperately to be contrary, the receptacle becomes the focus of our eyes. Yet our eyes can't experience the pleasure that the function/device demands.
Oh well
On a complete aside.
The analogue begets the digital, where so many think it all ends…, but what will the digital beget?
HAHAHAHAH
yes it's a quandary.
Where is the paper?