I am a traveller who observes the kaleidoscopic fragment that is art- Like many others, I travel; like many others, I don't move, but even so, I experience displacements that I measure by the emotions they leave- I search, like many others, for a space to be free-My reality is a set of texts, images and stories-In the western democratic world, we give ourselves a margin of thought and action, so that we can take apart and put together again fragments of reality and express our own language- But in this same, neoliberal, world, democracy has been assimilated to produce a situation in which citizens are reduced to consumers, and the margin is constantly getting narrower-The corner of the world in which I live is eurocentric: The enormous, heterogeneous mass of other, non-western, non-North American, realities have no place in the official culture, and when they do, it is in the category of the exotic- At a certain level of political, economic, and cultural reflection, things are really very complex- This is not the place to develop this line of thinking, which needs its own space - but the pre-text of these pages is to participate in this catalogue, to write in tune with the Mostra and the spirit that guides it- And this spirit is in constant dialogue with politics, art, culture and the world- Following are some scattered fragments : I am the traveller who enters the territory of which this catalogue is a map-My mood synthesises two feelings and transcends them: I am pessimistic about intelligence, but I am an optimist by will- Antonio Gramsci, letter to Giulia, Turi de Bari jail, December 30th, 1929-The society of the spectacle analysed by Guy Debord has been substituted by the information society- The bitter victory of bits- Even so, the spectacular continues to be spread from the mass media to our consciousness, glamorising the products of the information age- In his films, Guy Debord took the process of atomising the image to the limit, the black image, the black screen, the end- Perhaps we will have to resort to black in order to free ourselves from the weight of numeric data- Mourning, deletion of imposed data- The theory of the spectacle is the theory of commodity-information fetishism- The detournemet of the situationists is a form of radical protest against the information system, in the age of the digital which makes meaningless any differences between original and copy, the aura of Benjamin- To practice detournemet is to act upon the circuits of information circulation taken to a momentary critical block-Creation is found at a place within strange zones of senses and experimentation, where subjectivity is inscribed as a real force of unique and inimitable life in individual forms of writing- A place of subjectivity in all its forms, delirious, psychotic, obsessive, full of poetry, free to form groups, like-minded communities, and to participate in the creation of a collective identity and citizenship beyond political, cultural and economic borders-Warning: Practice subjectivity, not individualism- Be another and speak and write like a foreigner in your own tongue-An artistic project is political to the extent that it proposes as one of its fundamental aims to contribute to creating a democracy that resists the ultra and neoliberal global project, fights against the destruction of identities and differences, denounces precariousness, violence, racism, fanaticism, neo-colonialism, the new technology-information colonialism, hunger, war, sickness, sadness and desperation-PARASITAGES / DETOURNEMENTS / INFILTRATIONSencourage disturbances within languages- The grain of sand in the cogs-Found footage film and video-The essay-collage as critical practice, reusing heterogeneous elements extracted from media archaeology- The philosophy of plagiarism, in all its different manifestations, against the essentialist theory of the text - a given form does not have single and universal meaning, it is a structured set of fragments, materials that can be re-taken and re-shaped-Hakim Bey, the strategies of subversive pleasure- Odes to chaos- The meaningful force behind creation is desire, what Charles Fourier called passion- Only desire generates values, which is why the values of societies are based on the negation of desire- The multimedia pornography industry is the most efficient mechanism to direct and channel the erotic and sexual energies of millions of people-It is not about extracting constants from variables, but putting the same variables in a state of constant variation-To think of carrying out a project as an act of love- To write, make films, videos or other things---multiple personal writings- To set, for example, mass media against the personal-medium of videographic writing- Every thought is a tribe, the opposite of a state said Gilles Deleuze-Pas une image juste, juste une image, Jean-Luc Godard-Farewell to the image? Dismantled, put together again, disturbed, processed---Is it the end of the fetish-object of the economy of symbolic exchange and simulacra?-Karl Marx had already spoken of the separation between work and life-An artist who is made to believe that creation only happens in isolation, far from everything and every one, that it is necessary to lose oneself - though there is nothing wrong with losing oneself , even without quite knowing in what - this is where it goes wrong- There is nothing more dangerous and catastrophic than to consider oneself a self-sufficient world, and to make creating into a programmed activity-The ideology of a separation between life and art makes us think that artists live isolated from society- And in this way, their essential and perhaps subversive force is taken, absorbed and devalued-The philosophy of Gilles Deleuze - the encounter, the becoming, the rhizome, nomadism, joy, concepts, art- Thought as a war machine-Michel Foucault, a system of thought about archives- Archives born from a process of conceptualising the critical subjectivity that observes and exploits its own affirmations and its own oppositions- Exploration of the media landscape and awareness of the power inherent in having a structure and consistency- Archives as instruments for thought and action, the Mostra de Video Independent & Fen?mens Interactius- A node in a network of international connections-TECHNOMADOLOGIE-Living with the other, the foreigner, we confront the possibility of being other, or not- Not only in our capacity - in humanist terms - to accept the other, but to put ourselves in the place of the other, think ourselves other, become other, different from ourselves- Rimbaud's phrase Je est un autre was more than a confession of the psychotic phantom that possesses poetry- The words announced exile, the possibility or necessity of being a foreigner and living in a foreign country, announced the art of living in a modern age- Alienation from myself, although painful, creates a distance that allows perverse pleasure to take shape, and the possibility to imagine and to think the impulse of my culture- Split identity, a kaleidoscope of identities - can we be a roman-fleuve for ourselves without appearing mad or insincere? Without dying of hatred for the foreigner, of being hated by the foreigner?-Just do it- Do it yourself-Video- An exercise in deconstructing phrases, putting them together again- An exercise in creating the third image, which lies between two images- To invent mechanisms for seeing, losing point of view, harmony, clarity, in order to give body to the body- Become alienated from one's own identity, release attachments- Look in art for what can be found in thought and practice - a critique of the imposed way of living according to representations and the standardised production of images, the dulling of reason, politics based solely on economic interests,a specialised aesthetic locked within its own tautology- For and with the men and women who fight to live, to talk, to act, to create expansion, anywhere- To circulate ideas, thoughts, writing in any media- Video art festivals have lost the subversive nature they had at the beginning, in the 80s- The information society and the society of the spectacle have absorbed many of those more concerned about how to survive and how to make themselves known- Others - more fortunate and cautious - have looked towards a more general reflection on creation in the digital age, and its philosophical and critical consequences- What is unacceptable is the competitive nature of many of the festivals, with their judges and institutional commissions and prizes- There is a need for initiatives that seek to insert artistic creation in the larger fabric of communities and culture, taking care not to become part of the cultural industry- Initiatives that encourage research and promote the work of the authors, that come together to create international networks to support certain d?marches and to disseminate completed works- I only know of two in Europe: The MVI&FI in Barcelona, and InVideo-Mostra del Video d'arte e di ricerca, in Milan- To create an open structure centred on investigation and the public, with access to the video archives- Extend the event aspect of an initiative, so that it becomes a cultural operation-Which dream are you from?-Simonetta Cargioli- Marseille, June 2001
