Inside Abstraction

Issue no. 38 of e-flux journal (October 2012) is dedicated to the subject of structural violence. It contains my essay "Inside Abstraction," which is part of a personal long-term research project that I hope to focus on — circumstances permitting — when the History in Motion book, which is now scheduled for early 2012, is out of the way.



www.e-flux.com/journals/

Ongoing

Dutch academia is in the process of being transformed into an edu-factory in which research has to suit the ideological agenda of the government or private and corporate sponsors, and either try to squeeze their research interests into whatever mega-programme is on offer or simply allow their agenda to be determine by those programmes. 

Meanwhile, there are fortunately some alternative and less market-Stalinist contexts in which scholarship and theory can survive — as forms of praxis that engage with those structures that attempt to make them obsolete.

If I Can't Dance has published an update on our project on Louise Lawler's A Movie Will Be Shown Without the Picture, which includes the introduction to (the rough draft of) my essay and an impression of the Amsterdam "screening" of A Picture by Anik Fournier. We are working on a publication, which will  contain my essay, a few shorter texts on specific aspects of the piece, and documentation.  

The Autonomy Project — an informal, under-funded and highly stimulating initiative by a number of art schools, art history departments and the Van Abbemuseum — is also continuing. The autonomy issue of Open contains a number of texts based on last year's Autonomy Symposium, and the recently published issue of the Autonomy Newspaper, which can be downloaded for free here, also reflects (on) this symposium. As usual with the Autonomy Newspaper, there are a number of contributions by students. We're now working on a reader with historical and recent source texts, to be published by Afterall. The Autonomy Project has also has an impact on into my upcoming book History in Motion.