{"title":"Past Conditional Subjectivities: Enacting Relationships with the Non-Human in the Work of Ana Mendieta","authors":"Matthew Harrison Tedford","doi":"10.18778/2083-2931.12.16","DOIUrl":null,"url":null,"abstract":"Inspired by what literary scholar Lisa Lowe calls “the past conditional temporality”—or the “what could have been”—this paper examines how the work of 20th-century Cuban American performance artist Ana Mendieta challenges modernist ontologies that separate the human from the non-human, simultaneously calling on older ways of being and demonstrating that they never disappeared. Many argue that the ecological crises of the Anthropocene are in large part due to the proliferation of modernist worldviews that set humans apart from the non-human world. The rise of European rationalist philosophies in the early modern period played a central role in the proliferation of instrumentalist relationships between humans and the non-human world.\nThis paper explores how Mendieta’s Silueta and Rupestrian Sculptures series (from the 1970s and 1980s) resist the logic of European capitalism and colonialism, revealing that the relationships that rationalism sought to subdue have always existed, will continue to exist, and can proliferate. Symbolic communication is a key means of mediating and actualizing relationships between subjects, and so, if a non-instrumental relationship is possible between the human and non-human, visual art ought to be a possible means of enactment. Through Mendieta’s work, this paper considers the mechanisms by which this is possible. By considering meaning-making as a basis for life, the co-constitution of human/non-human subjectivities, and the inherent permeability of the category of the individual, this paper highlights counter-modernist visual art practices that are of special urgency in the age of the Anthropocene.","PeriodicalId":41165,"journal":{"name":"Text Matters-A Journal of Literature Theory and Culture","volume":null,"pages":null},"PeriodicalIF":0.2000,"publicationDate":"2022-11-24","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":"0","resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":null,"PeriodicalName":"Text Matters-A Journal of Literature Theory and Culture","FirstCategoryId":"1085","ListUrlMain":"https://doi.org/10.18778/2083-2931.12.16","RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":null,"ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":null,"EPubDate":"","PubModel":"","JCR":"0","JCRName":"LITERARY THEORY & CRITICISM","Score":null,"Total":0}
引用次数: 0
Abstract
Inspired by what literary scholar Lisa Lowe calls “the past conditional temporality”—or the “what could have been”—this paper examines how the work of 20th-century Cuban American performance artist Ana Mendieta challenges modernist ontologies that separate the human from the non-human, simultaneously calling on older ways of being and demonstrating that they never disappeared. Many argue that the ecological crises of the Anthropocene are in large part due to the proliferation of modernist worldviews that set humans apart from the non-human world. The rise of European rationalist philosophies in the early modern period played a central role in the proliferation of instrumentalist relationships between humans and the non-human world.
This paper explores how Mendieta’s Silueta and Rupestrian Sculptures series (from the 1970s and 1980s) resist the logic of European capitalism and colonialism, revealing that the relationships that rationalism sought to subdue have always existed, will continue to exist, and can proliferate. Symbolic communication is a key means of mediating and actualizing relationships between subjects, and so, if a non-instrumental relationship is possible between the human and non-human, visual art ought to be a possible means of enactment. Through Mendieta’s work, this paper considers the mechanisms by which this is possible. By considering meaning-making as a basis for life, the co-constitution of human/non-human subjectivities, and the inherent permeability of the category of the individual, this paper highlights counter-modernist visual art practices that are of special urgency in the age of the Anthropocene.
期刊介绍:
Text Matters: A Journal of Literature, Theory and Culture, based at the University of Łódź, is an international and interdisciplinary journal, which seeks to engage in contemporary debates in the humanities by inviting contributions from literary and cultural studies intersecting with literary theory, gender studies, history, philosophy, and religion. The journal focuses on textual realities, but contributions related to art, music, film and media studies addressing the text are also invited. Submissions in English should relate to the key issues delineated in calls for articles which will be placed on the website in advance. The journal also features reviews of recently published books, and interviews with writers and scholars eminent in the areas addressed in Text Matters. Responses to the articles are more than welcome so as to make the journal a forum of lively academic debate. Though Text Matters derives its identity from a particular region, central Poland in its geographic position between western and eastern Europe, its intercontinental advisory board of associate editors and internationally renowned scholars makes it possible to connect diverse interpretative perspectives stemming from culturally specific locations. Text Matters: A Journal of Literature, Theory and Culture is prepared by academics from the Institute of English Studies with considerable assistance from the Institute of Polish Studies and German Philology at the University of Łódź. The journal is printed by Łódź University Press with financial support from the Head of the Institute of English Studies. It is distributed electronically by Sciendo. Its digital version published by Sciendo is the version of record. Contributions to Text Matters are peer reviewed (double-blind review).