θεωρητικό έργο >> άρθρα και ανακοινώσεις


Topos and Empathy

     Tragedies occur in a place and time. The place and time are not the actual site and time when the event has occurred. They are, rather, conceptual underpinnings that define the context where the event has occurred. That frame is needed because it is there where the victim and the predator get involved as dialectical forces that initiate the plot. In "Antigoni" Theba and the Mycenean era do not contribute the documentation of an event, but they function as spatial and time frames that support the development of the plot (1).
    Whenever a tragic event is detached from the context of space and time, it is transformed into an abstracted incident - a timeless incident that exists without any site specificity. These two parameters, time and space, are initiating the memory of the tragic event. Memory functions as an endless transfer of consciousness from the one individual to the other. It is the persistence of memory that prevents tragedies from being repeated. From         a moral point of view whoever tries to abolish that memory is committing an act equivalent to that of the perpetrator.
    In Goya and Darger's work the place and time are well defined. They are present and they allow the viewer to participate in the collective memory that their work sparks. The explicit way in which they develop  spatial and temporal underpinnings allow us to clearly distinguish the two dialectic opposites of the event; the victim from the perpetrator. Looking at the "Desastres de la Guerra" or at Darger's work one can recall Pasoloni's " Salo, 120 days in Sodom" where, beginning from the title space and time are well-defined (2).
    The decision of the Chapmans to place their works next to those of Goya and Darger has made evident how absent space and time are from their work. The figures are situated in a place where neither time nor space or memory is present. The only element present in their work is a depiction of atrocities. That depiction however, without being situated in a broader context becomes a cynical representation. From the moment that such an event is approached with indifference to the where, when and how an act of cynicism has been committed. The image becomes more cynical when the Chapmans refer to their attempt as an effort to examine violence within a dialectical model. For a dialectical model to exist two opposites are needed. From the moment that all the space and time parameters have been obliterated, the work ceases to work within a dialectical process.
    The Chapmans assert in their interview that " It is only a condition of good citizenship that the mediation of violence proliferates everywhere." Anyone who wants to become didactic using such a tragic event is not acknowledging that only the memory of the event can prevent its repetition. None from Goya, Darger, Pasolini or Picasso wanted to educate the good citizens of the future. They had all experienced tragic events and their empathy inspired the artwork. The persistence of memory, of their memory, is what continues to make their work valuable.
  Place, time, memory, tragedy and cynicism are notions that the Chapmans have successfully hidden in their process. We live in an era when we all, directly or indirectly, keep experiencing events equivalent to those the Chapmans tried to represent. If, in the place of cynicism, they had the courage - because it does take courage - to situate empathy then their work would have been more memorable. But they didn't have the courage.
   The main problem of the "Disasters of War " show was not that three of Goya's 83 etchings were missing. One of Goya's etchings, even in a xerox representation would have been enough. The question is whether there is a conceptual subtext in the exhibition other than the cynicism of image and form. The only creative reading of the show would be to interpret it as a dialectical model of empathy (Goya, Darger) versus cynicism (Chapmans). And it would have been ideal if the show had simply proclaimed that we've had it with detachment. The cynicism would have expired at the threshold of PS1.
        If cynicism survives, however, we would have to see Pasolini's film again in order to understand how an artist with empathy, and maybe not such a good citizen, was able to transform atrocity not in snapshots from a slaughterhouse, but into a perpetual tragedy where all the elements are sharply defined.

 

Yannis Ziogas
March 2001

(1) In Greek language the words for victim - predator are θύμα-θύτης. Both Greek words derive from the word θυσία (sacrifice). The sacrifice becomes the content within which the victim and the predator meet.

(2) In order to pay homage to the 18,000 plus that were executed the phrase " Hell refers to an episode of WW II during which the German Army killed over 18.000 Russian soldiers in a single execution " should be rewritten " Hell refers to the episode of WW II during which the German army executed 18,000 Soviet soldiers, prisoners of war"

 

(2) In order to pay homage to the 18,000 plus that were executed the phrase " Hell refers to an episode of WW II during which the German Army killed over 18.000 Russian soldiers in a single execution " should be rewritten " Hell refers to the episode of WW II during which the German army executed 18,000 Soviet soldiers, prisoners of war"