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the technological sublime
I've been thinking a lot about this quote by novelist James Flint:
"Our artists no longer try to put us in touch with God and the eternal, but with the infinity of our own archives."
I found this quote on the weblog Test, in this post about the "digital sublime," in which the author writes:
"The sublime is a vertiginous moment - the moment when an excess of visual pleasure leads to a kind of terror, or awe - usually interpreted as a humbling realisation of God's power. In a Godless world, the sublime is invoked by the achievements of science [and] technology."
I have some quibbles with both of these quotes: I think "the infinity of our own archives" is a form of "the eternal," and if one believes in God it is not necessary to make a distinction between God and "the achievements of science and technology"—that's a false dichotomy. It is possible to see the technological as another facet of God's multiplicity, or, if you are of a more pantheistic bent, to see it as another facet of the natural world.
(I have found that this mindset is more common in Eastern cultures. It is summed up nicely in Idoru, when Gibson has Mr. Kuwayama say "We [the Japanese] have never developed a sinister view of technology ... It is an aspect of the natural, of oneness.")
Minor complaints with the wording notwithstanding, I think Flint is right when he identifies an increased artistic interest in media archives, and I think the Test author is right when s/he identifies technology as a potential source of sublimity. I've been thinking of these points in relation to my own process music experiments (which are fundamentally technological but which also feel like an expression of my spiritual side) as well in relation to an album like Philip Jeck's Stoke, where turntables are used to create a rich elegiac carpet of sound from a million human fragments.
See also these astonishing visual interpretations of oscillator patterns by feedback artist David Lee Myers, aka Arcane Device.
"I do not make sounds or draw pictures, but allow latent or unseen forces and processes to present themselves via simple technologies. I select the methods, set the stage, and as the phenomena emerge I of course introduce my own aesthetic judgements to the mix. Therefore the sounds and visuals which are presented are neither completely random science nor the gesture of an artist's hand, but something between the two, and I believe this to be the most effective approach toward evoking meaningful impressions of unseen worlds."
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Wednesday, June 18, 2003
10:01 AM
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