How the diagram changes …

Just while we’re waiting excitedly for the final diagrams, another picture of the forest and lights in the site’s banner.

Primes, Cues

A response to Prime que align repeat.

We went across the road to the Stor Centre Nord (the big north shopping centre), which is conveniently across the road from the university. Jonas and Lone ended up captured by the number 5 as a cue, and afterwards we discussed ways of responding to eg commercial cues in a shopping centre without necessarily being captured by them at a micro level (that is, in continuation to purchase etc). This was followed by some interesting conversation about attention.

Meanwhile Jette and I tried to work out system of cues and primes .. relational cues that kept us in some kind of relation along with a second set of cues and primes that were to do with the environment. Flocking was also an inspiration (and by the way this is kind of interesting in these terms). This led to a strange kind of dance outside the Stor Centre Nord, between the nearest trees and stones, hopping with yellow, skipping backwards with red, etc. Very much an experiment.

I’m still hopeful for a relational cue’d dérive as as kind of dance that everyone could do, although here of course you’d have to watch out for bicycles as well as cars, and the Situationists have been doing this kind of thing for ages (as have others such as Kate).

And actually, a few weeks ago Anna Munster pointed me towards this great organization Spurse, who do some interesting work on diagramming (Time Drills). There’s so much of this around when you look for it.

Jette and I tried to diagram what happened. Here’s a blurry picture.

Diagram of a conversation between the more than (two giraffes) and its echo

Sponge Phone Echo #1

Tracking, Diagramming, “A Life”

In response to Lone’s previous post on iPads and tracking, here is a diagram of “a life” during the Generating the Impossible workshop that Senselab ran at Meekos in the Quebec countryside in July.

This is a photo of the surface of an iPad—you can see the roof of the log cabin reflected on the screen. In what sense is that a diagram? Is it just a tracking (a kind of wild or complete surveillance, although it speaks no language, despite being the record of interface, codes, writing)? It seems “abstract”, yet it’s about as concrete a recording as there could be—and it’s an asignifying semiotic if ever there was one. What is the relation of the tracking of a past and a diagramming directed toward the future? Or, when do maps or trackings become diagrams (when they become relational, not representational?). It’s certainly a recording of “a life” during a short period of this workshop. I guess now I’m “playing” this recording as part of a diagramming of the future—an asemiotic tracking coming into a diagramming of a concept (of “the diagram”).  In any case, this can be taken as my diagramming “a life” #2.

Synchronous Objects

For those engaging with Erin’s ‘Choreography as Mobile Architecture’ reading, it’s very well worth going to the Synchronous Objects site (you’ll certainly enjoy it—it’s really very interesting from all kinds of angles—great for data freaks and sceptics alike in a way). It’s also worth going to her own site, here, and clicking on both “textiles” and “Volumetrics”. These are the works she discusses towards the end of the chapter.

Diagrammer Friends

One of many nice things to happen so far is that we’ve been connecting up with others not involved with the workshop, but who are “Diagrammer Friends”. An interesting diagramming in itself.  Two of these are @naxos, from Spain, who fabulous blog Inmanencia seems one big web of diagrams in itself. Just then, Nicola Morton contacted us to link up to her diagramming of Capitalism including ‘an activity decoding and recoding a bicycle in the late capitalism machine‘—I haven’t had time to watch the videos as yet but they certainly look interesting. Nice to develop these “differential relations” with people in Spain and Indonesia.

And, thinking about these new connections after just finishing chapter three of Brian’s Semblance and Event for the workshop (I think for the third time), I’m realising how well it describes what’s happening in the workshop (well, ok it describes most things that happen pretty well actually). I’m thinking of lines, figures etc, of the swerve away from judgement and ideals (we hope, at least in part, at least their suspension for little durations). I’m also thinking of abstractions as the extracting of potentials and concrete as also always abstract in precisely this sense. Of the ongoing diagrammatic movements, non-relational relation/contrast between concrete and abstract. If you look at Naxos’ psychedelia or Nicola’s bicycle I hope you might see what I mean.

Diagramming—some ideas and openings to other ideas/practices

“We need benches not benchmarks”. (Sydney Molecule, 2009, The Society of Molecules)

Just wanted to update everyone on where things are with the Into the Diagram workshop. I thought I might post some thoughts on the kinds of things one could do generally (without saying that this is what we will do, necessarily). I also thought this might be useful for those not in Sydney or Aarhus. [there are some quick, “sketchy” suggestions down the page]

The Sydney and Aarhus workshops are pretty much organized (as much as they will be at this point in any case!). That is (and this is very likely to be varied) there will be morning conceptual speed dating around core readings, then discussion, lunch, then some more open generative work/fun in the afternoon.

Diagram Exchange

We’re also thinking about an international (or for that matter, with the person next to you) “diagram exchange”. What is this? Well of course we don’t exactly know yet, but I think it will involve a call to exchange diagrams that have been generated, and that are generative, so that they can be activated around the world.

It may indeed be that the diagram exchanges will occur at least twice formally (I suspect it’s already occurring informally, via the web site). So you might, say, send a diagram out into the world and have it returned transformed to be re-activated. In all cases, when you receive diagrams they should be activated if possible.

I think the periods for diagram exchange are likely to be the most obvious: December 13 to December 14 … and of course whenever online..

Other Activities/Blog

So that would mean that possible activities are the like of conceptual speed dating, open discussion, diagramming as technique of relation, diagram exchange, diagram activation.

The blog is a happening process, so thanks so much to everyone for that! I’ve really enjoyed it very much so far, and have had the same feedback from a lot of people. There are a lot of interesting posts and some discussion is beginning in the comments.

Suggestions for Exploring Diagramming as Technique of Relation

In terms of the exploring diagramming as technique of relation, I’m thinking of the following (notes follow that are certainly not compulsory reading! But you might find some of it stimulating):

General Propositions:

1. a diagram is at once a concept, a technique, a relation of forces between many things and across time
2. we can open up the sharing of techniques as kinds of diagrams for existence or events (and for the exploration of the “limited infinity” of diagrammatic events within any local or situation).
3. there are infinite diagrams and diagrammings possible. They mutate, and although they might take the form of paper and pencil (and there’s nothing wrong with that) they could be, for example, sounds, invisible, a matter of intuition, a collection of gestures, a reworking of relations, made from wool, a collection of points of inflection, contrasts, be only seen, heard or felt across time etc etc

Possible Tasks:

I’m thinking of two kinds of tasks (to use diagram terms): sketches and full diagrams (“sketch” here does not at all automatically mean pen and paper .. although it might), although in a sense these two kinds of tasks are interchangeable.

All these could be done anywhere (a room, a city, across the globe); or for that matter found anywhere.

These could be done with all kinds of materials (or even non-materially) that is, as above: they might take the form of paper and pencil (and there’s nothing wrong with that) they could be, for example, sounds, invisible, a matter of intuition, a collection of gestures, a reworking of relations, made from wool, a collection of points of inflection, contrasts, be only seen, heard or felt across time, in 2d, 3d or larger multi-dimensions,  etc etc

Sketches

(these are “emergent diagrams” .. although all diagrams are I guess emergent until they find their “satisfaction” and die .. sketches are exo-skeletal relational emergences, or landing sites, point of inflection creators/linkers … elements in on ongoing durational diagrammings. In short, sketches are little diagrams that are also diagrammatic fragments.)

• Diagram something impossible to map
• Gather diagrammatic materials
• Gather diagrammatic immaterials
• Conceptual Diagrammatics
• Engage in “automatic diagramming” (as per “automatic writing” but here the aim is not statements but an impossible yet unavoidable automaticity of ongoing [re]construction)
• Create diagrammatic fragments to work with and re-assemble (like a dynamic diagrammatic Lego)
• Produce a new thought, or, “make thought happen”
• Counter-instructions and micro-disruptions/counter-diagrammatics … seize the/a (and all diagrams are made from other diagrams) diagram and turn it (“The absolute necessity of preventing the diagram from proliferating” (Deleuze, Francis Bacon:109)
• The diagram as proposition
• Diagram contrasts, points of inflection, transductions, translations, relay, affect (powers to affect and be affected), emergence
• Diagram objects (or, turn “objects” into “objectiles”
• Diagram relations
• Diagram the relations between relations
• Diagram concepts (in general do some kind of conceptual diagrammatics) … diagram the real operation/process of concepts .. and interlinking (machinic assemblage) of concepts ..
• Or, better, don’t just diagram concepts, diagram-with concepts …
• Diagram things/processes/events that don’t fit ..
• Diagram data gaps and points of lapse etc .. (I’m thinking urban environment but could easily by in conceptual diagrammatics .. that is, diagram where things are falling apart or shifting out of phase)
• Diagram something not usually diagrammed with something that is not usually a
  diagram …
• Create a diagram you can feel but not see
• Re-assemble your “diagrammatic easel” …

Full Diagrammatics

• Produces a diagram that generates diagrams
• Breakup and re-assemble diagrammatic fragments
• Caffeinated Diagrammatics … diagram relations via caffeination (or other key urban events/processes)
• Diagram a machine that generates thought
• Diagram collectively, relationing, a “diagramming-with” .. both form/force of expression and form/force of content show be diagrammed relationally …
• Diagram the limited infinities of the city; between cities, of the planet as it moves through a city, between cities
• Diagram the universal diagram (as this constantly falls apart at the seams, its fractures, its potentials)
• Diagram interlinked propositions
• Diagram the secret pickup (or zapping) of affective powers
• Diagram by subtraction … subtract the given, rework.
• Or, subtract the given via addition (see Deleuze’s ‘Diagram’ chapter of Francis Bacon)
• Diagram duration (eg from the eighteenth century to now … diagram history in process)
• Diagram intensities, relations of intensification and the opposite
• Diagram the difference between these
• Diagram synchronicity … coincidence, quasi-cause
• Diagram everyone/everything’s own diagramming ..
• Diagram the subtraction of diagrams …
• Diagram the emergence/activity of the asignifying semiotic (‘forms of operation that manipulate elements in ways that do not involve signification or meaning’ Larval Subjects)
• ‘Give the eye another power’. Diagram (that is, enact via a diagram, the  destruction of ‘optical organization’, so that ‘an object will no longer be figurative’ (Deleuze, Francis Bacon: 102)
• Build a diagram that continues into a process, that is, one that begins and follows through with the act or event, and doesn’t just come before the act/event.
• “Unlock areas of sensation” (Francis Bacon: 102), Bring forth synesthetic “jitter and “flicker” (Massumi, Semblance and Event, chapter 3)
• Diagram the layering of the diagrams/power/forces/differential relations (eg from the eighteenth century disciplinary diagram(s) to the more recent biopolitical/control diagram(s))
• Cued Dérive. Base your dérive on cue and primes (see Manning, ‘Choreography as Mobile Architecture’). Two phases—diagrammatic assembly of cues and receptivity to primes, diagrammatic events of cueing and priming/being primed … these two should fold into each other. [higher degree of difficulty!]
• “Invoke the virtual” (Massumi, Semblance and Event:98)

Do all of this in your local environs, across Sydney-Aarhus-Montreal-Turku

—
very open to more/different ideas, either in comments or separate posts/links to elsewhere (but about to head off the internet for a couple of days myself! Have fun)
all the best, Andrew

Peirce’s Own Diagrams

Peirce’s own diagrams are pretty wild, and at least one of them kind of cute, to say the least. There’s two of them in this blog post at the Work without Dread blog. I really liked that the first of them seemed to end with a sheep, but a kind person pointed out it was a minotaur. The first of these, by the way, is I think called The Labyrinth of Signs (one for the semiological/semiotic among us).

Diagramming Guattari/Deleuze

You can say what you like about D and G (and these days people do), they certainly inspire diagramming. I thought it might be useful to bunch some of these together here. Not only are they often interesting diagrams, they often diagram diagramming. Of course, other workshoppers might consider the diagramming of other thinkers.

Here’s a diagram of Guattarian semiotics, from Gary Genosko’s Guattari Reader, via Janell Watson’s ‘Schizoanalysis as Metamodeling‘ in the exceedingly excellent Fibreculture Journal. It’s Guattari’s ‘Place of the signifier in the institution’ (from Félix Guattari, The Guattari Reader, edited by Gary Genosko: Oxford, UK: Blackwell, 1996, p. 149). Those who know me know I’m not an OOO’er but that doesn’t mean I don’t think this Larval Subject post on ‘Double Articulation: Notes Towards a Theory of the Genesis of Objects‘, which also includes the diagram below, isn’t interesting. It is!

Here’s a Brian Holmes’ diagram of Guattari’s thinking, also found in his ‘ESCAPE THE OVERCODE:  Guattari’s Schizoanalytic Cartographies, or the Pathic Core at the Heart of Cybernetics‘. This version is taken from a great post elsewhere by Anna Munster on ‘The image in the network’, ‘that attempts to work with the processual relations involved in the shaping of new subjectivities of collective enunciation’

Here is a discussion of the rhizome and architecture. It contains this rather nice rhizome illustration—a complex diagram from many perspectives.

Here’s a diagram from Laura U. Marks site, which ‘synthesizes a monist aesthetics from Henri Bergson, Deleuze’s work on the fold, the philosophy of Deleuze and Guattari, the triadic logic of C.S. Peirce, medieval Isma‘ili thought on latency and manifestation, and Ibn Sînâ and Deleuze on the univocity of being’. More information here!

Here’s Sean Smith’s diagram of the molar and the molecular from his fabulous SportsBabel blog. It’s actually a diagram ‘theorizing basketball, written after reading Deleuze and Guattari’s A Thousand Plateaus: Capitalism and Schizophrenia.’

Meanwhile there’s a rather blurry version of the score with which the ‘Rhizome’ chapter of A Thousand Plateaus begins here. The rest of this post looks kind of interesting (although I haven’t read it really) … there are quite a few more diagrams. In fact, they seem to be everywhere.

The next link is to the famous Deleuze “Diagramme de Foucault”, with the fold and all. There’s the more famous panopticon diagram down the page. This is from one of my favourite blogs, Pirates and Revolutionaries, a post on ‘Foucault and Deleuze in Nikolas Rose’s “Authority and the Genealogy of Subjectivity’.

Here’s a machinic assemblages from another of my favourite blogs, Fractal Ontology. It’s a post on spectral realism, titled simply ‘Spectral.’ Among other things, this post discusses ‘pure diagrammatic force.’

From the Anarchist without Content blog we get Foucault’s 17th and 18th century version of the ‘Order of Things’.

If you go to this page, Beth Metcalf’s ‘Hjelmslev’s Univocity’, she diagrams de Saussure’s semiology versus Hjelmslev’s ‘semiotic net’.

And it’s really worth going to Mark Ngui’s drawings of the first two chapters of A Thousand Plateaus. That’s from the fabuously excellent Inflexions journal. There’s more here.

Here’s a 2007 post by Brian Holmes, ‘The Potential Personality: Trans-Subjectivity in the Society of Control‘. This has a great diagram of ‘initial characteristics of an artistic resistance to the control society’. And it also discusses the diagram of the swarm.

Finally here’s a great diagram on a blog post by DAYglo Writing. It’s really quite beautiful and I encourage you to go to the large version here. It’s diagramming an ‘energy island’ in relation to Guattari’s Three Ecologies. The project proposes ‘a new layer of decentralized systems that attempt to instigate new subjectivities through open source interaction. It starts with an independent, yet non-linear energy network. This network converges at separate hubs that then will contain new typologies for open source living’

That seems a nice way to finish this post.