Zurich Yearbook of the Arts Series edited by Hans-Peter Schwarz

Art and A rtistic Research

Edited by Corina Caduff, Fiona Siegenthaler, Tan Wlchli

Zurich University of the Arts Scheidegger & Spiess

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Zurich Yearbook of the Arts 2009, Volume 6 Series Editor ....... Hans-Peter Schwarz Art and Artistic Research Editors ....... Corina Caduff & Fiona Siegenthaler & Tan Wlchli Design ....... NORM, Zrich Copyediting ....... Jonathan Fox Translation ....... Steve Gander (Caduff, Langkilde & Winter, Mareis, Omlin, Schenker, Scheuermann & Ofosu, Schwarz, Toro-Prez), Jonathan Fox & Tan Wlchli (Preface, Grlich & Wandeler), Mark Kyburz (Editorial) Reproductions, Printing ....... Druckerei Odermatt, Dallenwil Binding ....... Buchbinderei Schumacher, Schmitten Typeface ....... DTL Documenta(otf)Dutch Type Library ....... Replica Pro(otf)Lineto.com All rights reserved 2010 the authors for pictures and texts 2010 for this edition Zrcher Hochschule der Knste/Zurich University of the Arts Ausstellungsstrasse 60 CH-8031 Zurich http:/ /www.zhdk.ch Publisher Verlag Scheidegger & Spiess AG Niederdorfstrasse 54 CH-8001 Zurich www.scheidegger-spiess.ch Printed in Switzerland ISBN 9783858812933

Zurich University of the Arts

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10 Hans-Peter Schwarz ....... editorial 12 Corina Caduff, Tan Wlchli ....... introduction

Places, Projects, Universities

Page 170 Hans-Peter Schwarz ....... from undisciplined to transdisciplinary (zurich) Page 180 Kirsten Langkilde, Stefan Winter ....... new morphologies (berlin) Page 190 Julie Harboe ....... art-driven research (lucerne) Page 200 Arne Scheuermann, Yeboaa Ofosu ....... on the situation of artistic research (bern)

Art and/as Research 24 Nina Malterud ....... can you make art without research? 30 Germn Toro-Prez ....... on the difference between artistic research and artistic practice Page 40 Johan berg ....... difference or diffrance? Page 46 Marcel Cobussen ....... the intruder Page 56 Michael Schwab ....... first, the second
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212 ....... contributors 218 ....... selected bibliography

Disciplines Page Page Page

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224 Meret Wandeler, Ulrich Grlich ....... the archive of the place

72 80 88 98 106

Henk Borgdorff ....... artistic research as boundary work Huib Schippers, Liam Flenady ....... beaut y or brains? Claudia Mareis ....... design research Corina Caduff ....... literature and artistic research Mats Rosengren ....... art + research artistic research

Artists Views
Page 122 Efva Lilja ....... throw the stones really hard at your target or rest in peace Page 132 Sibylle Omlin ....... guile of innocence Page 142 Claire MacDonald ....... in her acoustic footsteps Page 154 Christoph Schenker ....... value judgments

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value judgments

Value judgments
Christoph Schenker

More than with the intention of taking up the theme of art and research as a writing collaborator, but rather to permit an art practitioner have his say, I turned to the artist A.S. We had an intensive conversation and I reproduce a good part of his propositions here. They are declarations and assertions, which he almost exclusively expressed in the form of statements and value judgments. What I had originally found difficult became clear to me towards the end of the transcription. The artist is someone who constantly makes decisions during the work process. I have bundled his statements into eight sections according to subject and quoted the references in footnotes with guidance from the artist.

It is right, as Buren says, that it paints.1 It is right, as Lehnerer writes, that in my work I, the artists consciousness, am only one factor among others.2 It is right that in their individualism and autonomy the material, the devices, and the machines that I use to create my work go beyond what I know, what I can, and what I want. It is right that the success of a work depends on to what extent I allow these instruments to develop their own life. It makes sense to say that competences are embodied in the concrete, material conditions of artistic work that are no different than in scientific experimental arrangements where, according to Rheinberger, knowledge takes the shape of instruments, devices, and equipment.3 It is right, as Gertrude Stein writes, that things we know flow down our arm and that before we write them we do not really know that we know them.4 It is right, as Newman states, that exhaustive research in the field of art requires the most modern, highly developed technologyjust like research in other fields.5 It is right that as an artist I can certainly create favorable conditions for the success of a work, but that the actual success of a work cannot be predetermined. It is right, as Lyotard says, that it happens.6 It is right, as Rheinberger says, that experimental systems are extremely tricky set-ups for the production of unanticipatable occurrences.7

1 Daniel Buren, It Rains, It Snows, It Paints, Arts Magazine 44, no. 6 (April 1970), p. 43. 2 Thomas Lehnerer, Methode der Kunst (Wrzburg, 1994), p. 105 [trans. S.G.]. 3 Hans-Jrg Rheinberger, On the Art of Exploring the Unknown, in Say It Isnt So: Art Trains Its Sights on the Natural Sciences, ed. Peter Friese, Guido Boulboulle, and Susanne Witzgall (Heidelberg, 2007), pp. 8290. 4 Gertrude Stein, Four in America (New Haven, 1947), p. xi. 5 Barnett Newman, Interview with Thomas Hart Benton [1938], in Selected Writings and Interviews (New York, 1990), pp. 1418. 6 Jean-Franois Lyotard, The Sublime and the Avant-Garde, Art Forum 22, no. 8 (1982), pp. 3643. 7 Rheinberger, On the Art of Exploring (see note 3).

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It is right to say that my studio is like a scientific laboratory, which represents a sometimes more and sometimes less complex material environment for experimental arrangements. It is right: to the same degree it is also the intellectual catchment areaan expression from Gerhard Merz, if Im not mistakenthat forms the basis of my work. And it is right to say that in artistic work making and thinking mutually determine one another, interrelate, and work together. It is wrong to think that artistic work has no concept simply because it is not charged with theory or because it does not explicitly demonstrate its intellectual aspects. It is right, as Musil says, that the writer, the artist, applies the same kind and capacity of rationality and does not make less use of the intellect than the scientist.8 It is right, as Paul Valry does, to summarize this thinking as literature behind the scenes of production, whether it is put down on paper or not.9 It is right that the majority of my artistic work consists of a dialogue with myself, a dialogue about the work in the process of creation, the already created, and the not yet created. It is right that thinking in art demonstrates various forms and a different character, and that the literature of artistic production has different functions. It makes sense to distinguish between the artists knowledge10 and art knowledge,11 between the artists theories12 and art theory, and between philosophy and theory.13
8 Robert Musil, Sketch of What the Writer Knows [1918], in Precision and Soul: Essays and Addresses (Chicago, 1994), pp. 6165. 9 Paul Valry, About Corot [1932], in Collected Works, vol. 12, Degas Manet Marisot (Princeton, 1989), pp. 13454: 135. 10 Tom Holert, Knstlerwissen: Studien zur Semantik knstlerischer Kompetenz im Frankreich des 18. und frhen 19. Jahrhunderts (Munich, 1997). 11 Gernot Bhme, Kunst als Wissensform [1980], in Fr eine kologische Natursthetik (Frankfurt am Main, 1989), pp. 14165. 12 Michael Lingner, Reflections on/as Artists Theories, in Bekanntmachungen: 20 Jahre Studiengang Bildende Kunst der Hochschule fr Gestaltung und Kunst Zrich, ed. Studienbereich Bildende Kunst and Kunsthalle Zrich (Zurich, 2006), pp. 23138.

It is wrong that art and intellectualityaccording to the terribly simplifying vieware two separate spheres. It is true that artists have to continually struggle for the status of men of thought and to fight against the accusation of inferior thinking as Newman has already said.14 It is wrong to believethe whole history of art speaks against it that it is university researchembraced by the term theorythat brings thinking into art. It is right, as Newman said, that art itself is an expression of thought and is itself a realm of thought.15 *** It is wrong to think that it is only the university context that forms the basis and framework for artistic research. But it is right to distinguish between artistic research at art universities and that outside universities. It is right to say that one of the differences between university and non-university artistic research is how the research process and its results are reflected upon and legitimized. But it is wrong to assume that the forms of division of work and collaboration would not be more efficient outside the university context. It is certainly right to hope that the contribution of universities to artistic research consists of accelerating the conceptual development of art and that, through this, the preferences of market-orientated research and development are corrected. It is right to say that there is no significant difference between artistic work and artistic research. This is right if we want to understand art as exclusively successful art. For it is right to ask what makes art into research, i.e., what makes good art and what makes great art with far-reaching consequences.

13 See Jean-Franois Lyotard, interview by Bernard Blistne, A Conversation with Jean-Franois Lyotard, Flash Art 121 (March 1985), pp. 3239. 14 Barnett Newman, The Painting of Tamayo and Gottlieb [1945], in Selected Writings and Interviews (see note 5), pp. 7177. 15 Barnett Newman, On Modern Art: Inquiry and Confirmation [1944], in Selected Writings and Interviews (see note 5), pp. 6671.

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In the context of research it is right to make a distinction in art between correct and, as Wittgenstein said, tremendous things16 ; or, as Hirschhorn says, between quality and energy17 partly comparable to the distinction between normal and extraordinary science, pointed out by Kuhn.18 It is right that an enormous requirement is thereby demanded of us artists. It is not wrong to say that art as an activity can also be art research, similar to science studies and philosophy of science, as an investigation and interpretation of a specific style of thinking and its contexts; but it would be wrong to say that it is exclusively art research. It is therefore right to make a distinction between artistic research and art research. In artistic research it is right if we mainly orient ourselves on art and artists outside of universities. **** It is wrong to believe that there is something extra added on to art practice, that it is advanced investigation or subsequent reflection that makes art into research. It is wrong to think that it is proximity to science or a connection with theorybased on it, derived from it, or saturated by it, referring to or including itthat makes art into research. But it is right, as Merz says, that the artist must also be aware of what is known outside art.19 It is utterly wrong to think that we artists would not carry out studies and subject our work to a thorough critique, and that we would not absorb everything that is necessary for our work, and furthermore also not think about the consequences that the work can have in various contexts of art and life.
16 Ludwig Wittgenstein, Lecture on Aesthetics [1938], in Lectures and Conversations on Aesthetics, Psychology and Religious Belief, ed. Cyril Barrett (Oxford, 1966), pp. 140. 17 Thomas Hirschhorn, during a seminar with art students at the Zrcher Hochschule der Knste (ZHdK), December 3, 2008 [trans. S.G.]. 18 Thomas S. Kuhn, Logic of Discovery or Psychology of Research, in Criticism and the Growth of Knowledge, ed. I. Lakatos and A. Musgrave (London, 1970), pp. 123. 19 Gerhard Merz, Interview, in Binationale: Deutsche und amerikanische Kunst der spten 80er Jahre, ed. Jrgen Harten, et al. (Cologne, 1988), pp. 22628.

It is right that understanding art as research does not require another type of artistic practice but a different perspectivewhich, however, is not newtowards this practice. It is right that it is this change of perspective that draws attention to the work process and its preconditions and effects, and which has the consequence that artistic work is now micrologically observed, analyzed, and evaluated, which enables artistic practice to be understood as a process of research. It is right to ask precisely what status the artifact has in this context. It would be wrong to regard the artifact only as a work, as the result or product of a process, or as a precipitate or representation of experience and knowledge. It is right and important to understand the artifact as a tool, as an instrument for the production and experience of insight and intensity. It is right, as Newman writes, that the goal is not the voluptuous quality in the tools but rather what they do.20 And it is right, as Whitehead saysalthough today we would express ourselves differentlythat we do not find ourselves on a higher level of imagination because our imaginations have become finer, but rather because we have better instruments.21 ***** It is right that as an artist I do not primarily allow myself to be guided by an interest in productsbe they works or theories. It is right, as Nauman says, that the concept of art is more attached to the activity than the product, and that the product is of no importance for the self-awareness of the artist.22 It is right, as Rheinberger said in conversation, that scienceand, we should add, art as wellis not to be understood from the structure of its products but from the practices of its making and production.23
20 Barnett Newman, The Plasmic Image [1945], in Selected Writings and Interviews (see note 5), pp. 13855. 21 Alfred North Whitehead, Science and the Modern World (New York 1970 [1925]), p. 114. 22 Bruce Nauman, interviewed by Ian Wallace and Russell Keziere, Bruce Nauman Interviewed [October 9, 1978], Vanguard 8, no. 1 (February 1979), pp. 1518. 23 Hans-Jrg Rheinberger, at a research seminar at the Institute for Contemporary Arts Research at the Zrcher Hochschule der Knste on January 19, 2007.

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For it is true that as an artist I am essentially interested in the development of material structures, the development of those moments that make it possible for unpredictable occurrences to happen, that show the previously unseen, and lend a voice to the speechless. It is right, to say once more with Rheinberger, that it is the production of epistemicand aestheticthings, that it is the making available of phenomena, that it is this space of creation that constitutes the core of scientific experimentation as well as artistic exploration.24 It is right when Wittgenstein inquires how a work is made, when he wants to understand why the artist has done something in a certain way.25 And it is right, as Valry says, that every artwork desires to be answered, that the primary cause of any work is the wish to be spoken about.26 ****** It is not wrong, when inquiring into the singular characteristics of research in art, to look for differences between artistic research, scientific research, and philosophical work, as well as for points of comparison and similarities. It is wrong to think that scientific paradigms would thereby be adopted or that a scientific concept of research would be transferred to art. It is right, as Busch writes, that research and knowledge should not be hastily abridged and equated with scientific methods.27 It is right that it is often not easy to separate what belongs inalienably to the internal conditions and precepts of the research process, and what is external to research. It is right that, in relation to the pragmatics of research, the two systems, of art and of science, are not essentially different. It is wrong to think that the art world does not also have a differentiated peer review system that serves to define the internal and

external framework conditions of research, to check research findings in accordance with their axioms and precepts, and to control access to the research community. It is right that a great many criteria important to the sciences are also important to the art system: the paradigm, the state-of-the-art, a diversity of skills, the relevancy of the problems, the criterion for relevance, the new, verifiability, and so forth. It would be wrong to say that the art world and the art market have been left behind in this respect, and that science and the universities should therefore be given preference. It is right that the decision about norms and power structures in one field or another is tantamount to a decision in favor of a belief system. ******* It is right that basically we artists do not have at our disposal a number of standardized methods that are accepted by everyone and generally practiced and which are comparable in function and status with methods in the system of science. And it would be wrong to cite the experimentwhich has its beginnings in physicsfor the specific characterization of artistic research.28 It is right that in the traditional arts, such as painting, tools are used which are applied exclusively in the field of art and which here also constitute the specific instruments of research. But it is right as well that art is also increasingly using means that are not only also used in other contexts of life but are part of the research equipment of the sciences too. It is not wrong to say with Musil that the realm of values and valuations, the realm of ethical and aesthetic relationships, constitutes the core area of art.29 But it is wrong to say that this area is the exclusive preserve of art, and it is right that there is hardly a field of knowledge with which art is not also concerned.

24 Ibid. 25 Wittgenstein, Lecture on Aesthetics (see note 16). 26 Valry, About Corot (see note 9). 27 Kathrin Busch, Artistic Research and the Poetics of Knowledge, in A Portrait of the Artist as a Researcher: The Academy and the Bologna Process, ed. idem and Dieter Lesage, AS Mediatijdschrift, no. 179 (2007), pp. 3645.

28 Gunhild Berg, Zur Konjunktur des Begriffs Experiment in den Natur-, Sozial- und Geisteswissenschaften, in Wissenschaftsgeschichte als Begriffsgeschichte: Terminologische Umbrche im Entstehungsprozess der modernen Wissenschaften, ed. Michael Eggers and Matthias Rothe (Bielefeld, 2009), pp. 5182. 29 Musil, Sketch of What the Writer Knows (see note 8).

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It is right to conclude that it is neither methods nor specific instruments, nor that it is a particular field of knowledge that characterizes artistic research as a particular type of research. It is right that research in art, as thought, creation, and action, does not only orient itself on the criterion of truth but also on the criteria of justice and happiness, correctness and efficiency. It is right that the knowledge of art, beyond epistemic competence, as Lyotard says, also includes good performances such as knowhow, knowing how to live, knowing how to speak, and knowing how to listen.30 It is right that this knowledge, again in Lyotards words, is to be understood as a tightly woven web of various competencies and that art is the form and producer of a condensed knowledge.31 It is right to say that it is this form of knowledge productionas it is customarily called todaywhich basically distinguishes artistic work from scientific research. It is right: art of this type is not an expository project like science and theory, it is principally a non-expository, an explorative, problematizing project. But it would be false to claim that this form of knowledge production was only inherent in art. ******** It is right that philosophy, as Hampe states, can be understood as a specific form of activity, as a practice of conceptual experimentation.32 It is right that philosophical activity is thus a creation and testing of other, new abilities to distinguish, because, as Ros says, in the understanding of pragmatism terms are habits of distinction.33 It is right that, as Hampe puts it, concepts can be rooted in percep -

tion and action without them also having to be shaped in verbal language.34 It is right that it is the experimentation with conceptswhether in the field of the senses or the intellectthat is the specific form of activity which art shares with philosophy. It is right to say that this activity is not research in a dogmatic, scientific sense, even though it is explorative experimentation and part of a long tradition of artistic problems. From a conservative point of view it is thus not wrong to say that, strictly speaking, artistic research does not exist, comparable to philosophy, which, according to Hampe, should also not be understood as research.35 It is right that in the context of art the term research in everyday use is more fruitful: as an investigation of a new field, as a development of a new perspective, and as an effort to want to understand something. It is right, as Filliou says, that research is not the prerogative of the knowledgeable but, on the contrary, the domain of the unknowledgeable, and that each time we direct our attention to a subject we do not know, we carry out research.36

30 Jean-Franois Lyotard, The Postmodern Condition: A Report on Knowledge (Minneapolis, 1984 [1979]), pp. 18, 21. 31 Ibid., pp. 20, 21. 32 Michael Hampe, Denken, Dichten, Machen und Handeln: Anmerkungen zum Verhltnis von Philosophie, Wissenschaft und Technik (2004), http:/ / www.phil.ethz.ch/fileadmin/phil/files/Antrittsvorlesung_Hampe.pdf (accessed 7/10/2009). 33 Arno Ros, Was ist Philosophie? (1997), http:/ /www.uni-magdeburg. de/iphi/ar/content/t97a.htm (accessed 7/10/2009).

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Hampe, Denken, Dichten, Machen und Handeln (see note 32). Ibid. Robert Filliou, Sans titreSans tte, video, color, sound, 17 min., 1983.