New forms from old works

The work of Mar Arza

Mar Arza says that if language forms thought then freeing the limits of language can increase the scope of thought. One thing is for certain, her work makes you think in a more lateral manner.

In some work she explores a ‘submerged’ language that arises from the interlines (a blank space between text). She sees an absence of text as a powerful tool for examining the meaning of ‘voids’ and the cavities of language. It is all very subjective but I see it as perhaps linking text and space to the relationship between matter and antimatter. A musical comparison is probably more apt and although I cannot find the quote now, I remember once reading ambient musician Steve Roach expressing something very similar about the relationship between sounds and silence. A kind of dancing, balancing act that allows more dialogue.

Perhaps  the musical comparison is apt because these new forms seem to take on the quality of a musical score. Arza has experimented further by creating an alphabet out of these remaining letter forms which is an interesting idea and why not? All language both written and spoken has been borrowed and modified from earlier language. Imagine if all language was modified in the manner that Arza has here and a future civilisation found it? How much would they be able to accurately translate without the missing parts? It’s an interesting thought.

Tom Phillips’ A Humument

In 1966 Tom Phillips found a cheap secondhand book called A Human Document by W.H. Mallock and began transforming it by painting, collage and cut-up techniques until he had his own Humument which was first printed in 1973. Since then he has continued to revise and transform this book.

 

This must be quite a liberating exercise. To take something and give it new meaning by adding and subtracting. With the foundations of a book we can create myriad different meanings; the only limit here is the choice of words on a page but that still yields countless possibilities.

Jonathan Safran Foer’s Tree of Codes

Jonathan Safran Foer decided to actively engage with his favourite book, Street of Crocodiles by Bruno Schulz. The end result is a cut up version that is renamed Tree of Codes.

This form takes on a sculptural and more tactile quality. One problem that may be apparent is the issue of words from other pages bleeding into one and creating distraction as you can see in the picture above. However, creating a new narrative out of an old one is an interesting idea. I prefer Tom Phillips approach to this though personally.

References

mar arza. 2009. EL SUEÑO ARQUITECTÓNICO DE IMAGINAR EN VOZ ALTA. [ONLINE] Available at: http://www.mararza.com/index.php?/2009/statement-series/. [Accessed 6 June 2020].

Tom Phillips. 2020. A Humument. [ONLINE] Available at: http://www.tomphillips.co.uk/humument. [Accessed 6 June 2020].

The Guardian. 2010. Tree of Codes by Jonathan Safran Foer – review. [ONLINE] Available at: https://www.theguardian.com/books/2010/dec/18/tree-codes-safran-foer-review. [Accessed 6 June 2020].