MISSING THE POINT ( text in English)

First, let me apologize for my English. Not for what's above but for what's following...

In what semantic field does this presentation of XX's work include me?
What is at stake politically?
Am I supposed to read this and find it OK?
Would it be more reasonable to shut up?
How do you feel about it? Insulted, not concerned, downhearted? 

Let me warn you. You're going to find me very very cruel here, to dare and say that this artist is actually doing something violent to the reader. Well, it is violent to me, anyway. So that it didn't sound too personal and resentful, I had to change names. XX can think I'll swallow the whole thing, but it would be nasty to mention xx's real name.
It's a bit sad really, as XX is not only supported by French institutions, she is also bringing that boring type of langage into independent and artists' run spaces. It's quite alarming in a way. Or maybe it's just sad. Or... maybe I'm overreacting.

I’d love to be able to write proposals as convincing as XX’s. She’s just been given a grant to spend three months in New York by A BIG FRENCH INSTITUTION. It's on their website, on which you'll find the link to the above text.
It shouldn’t be that difficult really, to copy her style or imitate what she does. Cut and paste... but I can’t. It's too difficult. When I was a kid my parents used to ask me not to sing the national hymn at school, since they didn’t agree with "impure blood", they told me not to say it, not to sing it.

My position and my practice as an artist are very far from XX’s, but somehow, somewhere, "my work also deals with issues of representation". But I just cannot write it. I’d have the feeling I betray someone. Or of being betrayed. Both actually. I’d be ashamed. I am ashamed. I feel stupid-ified, moron-ified, jerk-ified. And that's not what art is supposed to do to you, is it? Unless it's her thing, her art.

- You should maybe go and see someone then.
- Yes, you’re probably right. Doctor, I read and re-read it again: "I’m interested by the meaning of exhibition/exposition (as to strip, to be exposed to external effects) applied to the situation of being an artist" and I just don’t get it. I try to rephrase it but it quickly gets on my nerve because it’s impossible to guess what they intended to express in French… What does the meaning of exhibition/exposition imply? Does it refer to the terminology? Why do they translate exhibition? What exactly is lost in the translation from exposition to exhibition? What’s lacking in the English term that the French has? I don’t know. And to strip? Strip what from what? What is exposed to which effects? External to what? What is internal? Brussels sprouts internal and external effects? And the situation of being an artist? Does it refer to social status, to its political function within the community, to financial struggle or success? It’s really difficult to guess. Is it me, doctor? Do I have a sort of mental block? Am I going too far? Am I just missing the point here?
It’s not clear, is it? Or maybe it’s no true. Are we talking lies here, or just approximation?

STOP/ lies?

Am I supposed to swallow that her "wide range protean practice is process based and deals with issues of display, art institution, representation, originality, archives and documentation relating to her own work, as well as collaborations, invitations, subcontracting other artists or even including their arts works."? Maybe someone who wants to do some research here, or who has recognized XX’s protean work is ready to clarify it for me since I'm totally lost here - and I'd love to go to New York too.

- Let's take if from that bad dream of yours, where were we?
- We 're in New York where "she will pursue her research around forms generated by the notion of exhibition and display"
Do you think I'm being too personal? Malevolent? Do you find it unfair? Are we talking affect here? Am I being malicious? Is it pernicious to wonder what "forms generated by the notion of exhibition and display" are? Can you please help me here? The notion of exhibition generates… euh... the notion of visit? Criticism? Is she talking about plinths or the whiteness of the walls? Well that’s what I know of XX’s work, but it’s maybe wider than that. Let's think big here: it generates context, white cubes, press releases, web communication, the viewer’s point of view, international transport, insurance, sponsoring, documentation, openings,where to have dinner after the opening, shoes you shouldn’t wear, what you can and cannot say to the artist’s friends, kids in art spaces, museum's entrance price, questions related to posthumous work, a curator's fame, the gallerist tasks...

STOP/ what does is actually deal with?

I must admit I'm under the impression we're dealing with a fraud here. But...
- Is it cruel or dishonest to quote such a wobbly logic?
- Is it unkind to claim that this speech is weak or questionable?
- Is it really about me not understanding or am I taking the piss? Am I expressing resentment? Am I the bad one here?
- Is quoting too crude for the sophisticated French art world? Vulgar maybe?
- Can one actually comment on such texts, or should we just not say a word?
- Am I stupid to attack a French institution like THE BIG FRENCH INSTITUTION?

STOP/ What do people say about it?

- Oh, but you’re just jealous!
- Hummm, yes actually, a bit, 7 000€, New York... Envious for sure.
- What’s the point of being in opposition to XX? Why would you define yourself against someone’s weak position?
- Well, I cannot not listen if I’m talked to, can I? And this does give me a position. I can't do as if I didn't know. Or should I?
- Can’t you just take your own stand, without referring to something so negative? She hasn’t done you any harm, has she?
- No, but why should I accept this text? Why is it addressed to me? How am I supposed to react?
- Just don’t pay any attention to it…
- That’s true, that’s always an option, not to pay attention…
- Your newsletter is pure hate speech!
- Is it?
- You can't criticize her openly, it's not nice...
Do you know Kacem El Ghazzali this young Maroccan man, the first one to have said publicly -in his country- that he didn't believe in God. He must have been very courageous as his life is now threatened. Should I censor my disbelief in an artist's words?
- Try to make something good out of it.
- Well maybe I’m just naïve or stupid, but I just can’t repeat what a friend of hers said: "It’s one less person in the competition…" It’s weird, I’ve never thought of other artists competing with me. I always thought the brighter the artists are around me, the better… That must be because of my f...ing evangelical education. It's my problem, I know. It makes me think of the Bible or the Quran. The power and violence of speech acts. It takes me back to the time when my father was opening the Bible, after each dinner, and read from it... Then I couldn't close my ears, and I couldn't leave the house, whereas now of course, I could just no read XX's text... But here you go, I got the virus of text study...

STOP /VERFREMDUNGEFFEKT

Let's open the New York Times for a bit of Verfremdungseffekt, of rhythm... where Judith Shulevitz, reviews the "The Outsourced Self" by Arlie Russell Hochschild:
"Evan Katz is a love coach who teaches would-be online daters "How to Write a Profile That Attracts People You Want to Meet." One of his clients is Grace (virtually all names have been changed), a divorced 49-year-old engineer who wants to search for love as methodically as she solves an engineering problem. Katz tells her “to show the real you through real stories." When Grace comes up with a story about learning humility by scrubbing toilets at a Zen monastery, he reels her back in: "That might be a little too out there.” On a mass medium like the Internet, the best "real you" is average, not quirky: "Everyone needs to aim for the middle so they can widen their market," Katz says." Then I surf the net to find something funny for you, and find myself on info-bible.org: "To believe or not believe: in what? " Great init? It's like the other day I was looking for some Lawrence Wiener's work when I saw "A bit of matter and a little bit more." Pure genius, I know, but I also had the feeling it was a adverstising. Oups. I didn't like the feeling at all.

STOP/back to THE BIG FRENCH INSTITUTION

Let's go back to what both texts (XX’s and mine) deal with.
- Can a negative critique be morally acceptable?
- Is there any point in claiming opposition to the official discourse?
- Can one say no? Is it rather vulgar?
- Is it always better to say yes, when you deal with an institution?
- Can there be a dialogue with state-run institutions?
- Is it taboo to question what XX's presentation is performing?
- Hey you, who are you to be so cruel to XX? asks a nice person.
- Well that’s the question, the legitimacy of the nasty artist. May I then rephrase the question, as the play is nearly over?
- Who am I to read this text? I mean the one above. Who am I to be given such a weird speech act?
- Who am I to think that a French state-run National Institution shouldn’t be supporting such a weak discourse on art – and with so many English mistakes?
- Who am I to pinpoint the lack of seriousness in this presentation?
- Who am I to feel totally ridicule and humiliated? Who am I to describe what I feel?

STOP/Who am I to shut up?

OK. There are just a few lines left to convince THE BIG FRENCH INSTITUTION to grant me the 15 000 euros bursary.

I am applying to this grant to develop a research around the recent evolutions of performative speech acts within contemporary art communication. In parrallel to the theoretical research, I am also interested in experimenting how these issues get into my work and how the can be conveyed to an audience.
I've already worked on these ideas, with three pieces: a lecture/performance for Modern art Oxford (God is a Virus, 2011), a text published by the Belgian magazine Gagarin (Everything should be said before on could start talking, 2011) and another one by the French feminist magazine Pétunia (The Monstrosity of the Address, 2012), which all dealt with this issue within religious, advertising and contemporary art communication language. Since 2010, I've also sent about fifteen newsletters like this one through the web and on mails under the title la Fundación de la Rebellion.

The methodology of the research I would like to develop is primarily sociological but also based in linguistic theories as well as feminist and Foucaldian reading of the notion of discourse and strategies of power.
It will focus on what constitutes the particularities of these speech acts, what words and grammar they use, and what concepts they convey. The inherent political questions will include who can talk and say what, when and where and for what purpose. To put it on other words, it will try to identify and analyse what is said and what is at stake, how this specific language performs (in the Austinian sense). I will at the same time try to define what aims such statements pursue, through which structures they operate and how they have an influence on the practice of art. To be able to thoroughly investigate these issues I need time to read, concentrate, attend seminars, meet scholars or artists. (...)

www.fabienneaudeoud.com