Reflexivity imagined as art practice

Abstract

A consideration of the relationship between conscious self-aware systems and art. I introduce my art practice and demonstrate the connections language has to self-conscious reflexivity. The document of research can be considered part of a creative practice that also uses language as a material. Being able to imagine re-duplications and proceed with reiterations using available materials including existing ideas is correlated with my art practice. This adaptive and emergent methodology uses a group of simple components and a flexible recursive process that can be modified to suit changing contexts. The research describes a circular two-way methodological framework that informs my art practice, where perceptions of the environment that surround me are repeatedly folded back into the process. Ideas about the origins of conscious self-awareness from Julian Jaynes and Humberto Maturana Romesín are introduced. The use of available materials, that includes working with pre-existing ideas, considerations of process and outcome based methodologies citing the artist Kim Jones and the anthropologist Claude Lévi-Strauss. The term ‘spiritual masochism’ used by the philosopher/anthropologist, Bruno Latour is compared and contrasted with the ‘Holy Fool’ from philosopher, artist, Michael Leunig in a discussion about the indirect search for antidotes and the subversion of human endeavor. Selected viewpoints from the cybernetician Norbert Wiener and artist Santiago Sierra elaborate the influences that have contributed to the strategic use of restriction and access as part of my art practice. The specialist use and subversive manipulation of information in science and art as practiced in the service of culture are discussed to show how this informed the creation of Access Restricted-Operational Reasons as a response to my environment.