Language (And Lack Thereof)

There is no event or thing in either animate or inanimate nature that does not in some way partake of language, for it is in the nature of each one to communicate its mental contents.

-Walter Benjamin, “On Language as Such and on the Language of Man”

Letter (Passage to India), 2020, Cement, turmeric,

and tea casts of wood blocks, wood (Photograph by

Julia Clouser)

Language plays a significant role in my body of work. Aesthetics seem to function as a language separate from what we identify as ‘language’ per se*, but in actuality, they operate identically. The lack of understanding of what an object is does not take away from the ability of that object to communicate itself through language (or the idea of language) that we recognize.

My piece ‘Letter (Passage to India)’ was associated with a cipher by several peers, faculty, and critics. These sculptural objects, when seen in another form of grouping (a pile, a grid, or strewn haphazardly on the studio floor) may generate questions regarding their contextual and cultural implications, but do not implore one to question their meaning in terms of linguistic legibility. The arrangement of the sculptures in this format immediately begs the question of its readability. The manner in which the shelves were installed, with an indentation and in the form of a paragraph (much like this one), the spaces between each smaller group of objects that mirror spaces between words in written language (much like these), and the intricacies in difference whilst maintaining a unified optical identity similar to the alphabet of various languages (much like these letters) allow the work to be viewed through the same lens as would a body of text. Upon reading it as such, and coming up short in understanding the work in a way one can read and digest written language, one may be forced to wonder “am I meant to read something?” or “is this a language that I do not understand”? In asking those questions the audience has stumbled upon the realm of censorship.

Censorship exists in many forms. It is the concealing and obscuring of things. It is the telling and retelling of falsehoods that become so widely accepted and embedded in historical documentation that the truth remains as nothing but shriveled refuse. The bowdlerization of the marginalized has reverberated through colonization into contemporary India. Is recorded history immutable in its transcription? Some would argue that it is. I’ve been thinking about this in my studio as I create. What are the ways in which we can begin to change the historical transcriptions of our current political moments? I do not pretend to have the answer to that question, as I believe the answer is embodied in existence itself, and is dependent on the transformation of time, objects, and persons.

* Here I am referring to Walter Benjamin’s philosophy that poses that all language is an expression of that which communicates itself, where “itself” is an entity independent of the language itself.

Source:

Benjamin, Walter, Marcus Paul Bullock, and Michael William. Jennings. Walter Benjamin: Selected Writings. Vol. 1. Cambridge, MA: Belknap, 2004.