If a picture is worth a thousand words, what kind of speech is it producing? Does film recover what escapes the frame of a photograph? Or is it a matter of re-thinking what an image or a representation is, and how the making of an image, or a figure, or text, both captures and releases physical phenomena? From the early experiments on walking by Gilles de la Tourette to Jeff Tremaine’s “Jackass”, from Berthold Brecht to Catherine Breillat, from Martha Graham to Rubber Johnny, and from and the sequenced photographs of ordinary human activities by Edward Muybridge to Santiago Sierra’s labour performances, a shift in the way vision has been transformed by technologies of capture has had tangible effects on how we sense and understand the production of meaning as well as social and political relations.

This seminar will be centred on a close reading of “Notes on Gesture,” a short but rich text by Italian philosopher, Giorgio Agamben. Agamben is known for his poetic use of figures, images and historical accounts to illuminate his philosophy. “Notes on Gesture” focuses on how the use of such aesthetic and poetic means of representation reveals a potential for thinking about cinema, gesture, and media in relation to politics as the “sphere of pure means”. Further readings (including fiction, poetry, art criticism and philosophy) will be discussed in relationship to the first text, drawing out a critical thinking of art practice and the responsibilities it entails with regards to aesthetics, politics and ethics. The practice of “close reading” as the core activity of the seminar will provide a milieu for discussing the perception and dissemination of art. Regular video and film screenings, visiting lecturers, fieldtrips to exhibitions, and group activities will enrich our discussion of a “means without end” as the practice of a politics of gesture.

The seminar will include public lectures by Marc Camille Chaimowicz with Roger Cook, Diedrich Diederichsen, Anselm Franke and Lisa Robertson. Please see Public Programme for details.

A thematic project by Hadley+Maxwell (October 2008-January 2009)