1. “Enlightenment stands in the same relationship to things as the dictator to human beings. He knows them to the extent that he can manipulate them.”

2. “Enlightenment stands in the same relationship to things as the dictator to human beings. He knows them to the extent that he can manipulate them.”
If enlightenment follows the logic of self-preservation through knowledge and if our path to self-preservation is in manipulation of and power over the objects of knowledge (e.g., nature, the human mind) then we are in big trouble. 

3. “Enlightenment stands in the same relationship to things as the dictator to human beings. He knows them to the extent that he can manipulate them.”
If enlightenment follows the logic of self-preservation through knowledge and if our path to self-preservation is in manipulation of and power over the objects of knowledge (e.g., nature, the human mind) then we are in big trouble. 
Rationality is linked to tyranny.

4. Art and Memory (DE 25) art treats the past as something living
(rather than as dead material which can be manipulated
for further rational/technological progress).

5. Perhaps art can show us a way out of this.
Art and Memory
Perhaps art can show us a way out of this.
(DE 25) art treats the past as something living
(rather than as dead material which can be manipulated
for further rational/technological progress).

6. Perhaps art can show us a way out of this.
Art and Memory
Perhaps art can show us a way out of this.
“The urge to rescue the past as something living, instead of using it as the dead material of progress, has been satisfied only in art, in which even history, as a representation of past life, is included.”

old art vs. old scientific theories
old technology as obsolete
old technology as vintage (i.e., aesthetic)
(DE 25) art treats the past as something living
(rather than as dead material which can be manipulated
for further rational/technological progress).
"The past is never dead. It's not even past."
Faulkner – requiem for a nun

7. Perhaps art can show us a way out of this.
Art and Memory
Perhaps art can show us a way out of this.
BUT : Art has also been colonized by rationality
Art can be used as a tool of domination

11. “You are an individual, and individuals like product X”
AD copy: “You are an individual, and individuals like product X”
Identity as a function of consumption patterns
“You are an individual, and individuals like product X”

12. From Autonomy to The Total System of Art

13. Potentially worrisome elements in the concept of autonomous art
Autonomous from what?
Social function?
External meaning / structure?
Human ears / minds?

14. Autonomy -> Unity -> Systematization -> loss of subjective autonomy
in a totally unified, systemized serial piece
performative expressivity / nuance becomes systematized
[e.g., timbre, articulation, tempo/timing, etc.]
the composer loses the ability to insert spontaneous bursts of intuition that are outside of the system. 

15. Unity -> Purity
To say that everything in a piece is unified is to say that it is purified of anything that does not fit in the system / that resists unification.

16. System absorbs composer's subjective choice / responsibility
In a systematic composition the composer creates a system that ‘spits out’ the actual musical events of the piece
Once the system is set up, the composer and performers do not have to make musical or expressive choices, the system does it for them.

17. Eichmann in Jerusalem: a Report on the Banality of Evil
Hannah Arendt,
Eichmann in Jerusalem: a Report on the Banality of Evil

18. Against Autonomous Art

19. Avant Garde
close ties to modernism but with more social emphasis
usually political (Marxist, proto-Fascist)
Eisenstein, Brecht, Eisler, Weill, Italian Futurists
Dada / Surrealism / Absurdity
against the institution of art (i.e., anti-art),
exchange value vs. aesthetic value in art,
emphasizes non-logic / aesthetics of everyday life, life as art
Satie, Poulenc, Duchamp
Reality fragments: film, recorded sound, collage, etc.
Eugène Ionesco:
[man is] “lost in the world, all his actions become senseless, absurd, useless."

21. Noise

22. from A Futurist Manifesto (1908)
Italian Futurism
F. Marinetti
from A Futurist Manifesto (1908)
We affirm that the world’s magnificence has been enriched by a new beauty: the beauty of speed. A racing car whose hood is adorned with great pipes, like serpents of explosive breath—a roaring car that seems to ride on grapeshot is more beautiful than the Victory of Samothrace.

23. from A Futurist Manifesto (1908)
Italian Futurism
F. Marinetti
from A Futurist Manifesto (1908)
We affirm that the world’s magnificence has been enriched by a new beauty: the beauty of speed. A racing car whose hood is adorned with great pipes, like serpents of explosive breath—a roaring car that seems to ride on grapeshot is more beautiful than the Victory of Samothrace.
We will glorify war—the world’s only hygiene—militarism, patriotism, the destructive gesture of freedom-bringers, beautiful ideas worth dying for.

24. from A Futurist Manifesto (1908)
Italian Futurism
F. Marinetti
from A Futurist Manifesto (1908)
We affirm that the world’s magnificence has been enriched by a new beauty: the beauty of speed. A racing car whose hood is adorned with great pipes, like serpents of explosive breath—a roaring car that seems to ride on grapeshot is more beautiful than the Victory of Samothrace.
We will glorify war—the world’s only hygiene—militarism, patriotism, the destructive gesture of freedom-bringers, beautiful ideas worth dying for.
Luigi Russolo, The Art of Noises (1913): six families of noise
Roars, Thunderings, Explosions, Bangs, Booms
Whistling, Hissing, Puffing
Whispers, Murmurs, Mumbling, Muttering, Gurgling
Screeching, Creaking, Rustling, Buzzing, Crackling, Scraping
Noises obtained by beating on metals, woods, skins, stones, pottery, etc.
Voices of animals and people, Shouts, Screams, Shrieks, Wails, Hoots, Howls, Death rattles, Sobs
Luigi Russolo: six families of noise

25. Luigi Russolo with his
Intonarumori

27. Dada

28. Hugo Ball
Dada Manifesto (1916)
An International word. Just a word, and the word a movement. Very easy to understand. Quite terribly simple…Dada Tzara, dada Huelsenbeck, dada m'dada, dada m'dada dada mhm, dada dera dada, dada Hue, dada Tza.
How does one achieve eternal bliss? By saying dada. How does one become famous? By saying dada. With a noble gesture and delicate propriety. Till one goes crazy. Till one loses consciousness.

29. Fountaine (1917)
Marcel Duchamp
Rrose Sèlavy

31. Funeral March for the Obsequies of a Deaf Man (1897)
Alphonse Allais
Funeral March for the Obsequies of a Deaf Man (1897)

32. Erwin Schulhoff
In futurum (1918)

33. Silence

34. John Cage — A Composer's Confessions (1947)
I wish to compose a piece of uninterrupted silence and sell it to the Muzak Corporation. It will be three or four-and-a-half minutes long—those being the standard lengths of "canned" music and its title will be Silent Prayer. It will open with a single idea which I will attempt to make as seductive as the color and shape and fragrance of a flower. The ending will approach imperceptibility.

35. 1951 — Anechoic Chamber
"Until I die there will be sounds. And they will continue following my death.
One need not fear about the future of music."

36. 0’00”
(4′33″ No. 2)
1962
"In a situation provided with maximum amplification, perform a disciplined action."
One3 = 4′33″ (0′00″) +
1989

37. White Painting — Seven Panel (1951)
Robert Rauschenberg
White Painting — Seven Panel (1951)

38. Suprematist Composition: White on White (1918)
Kazimir Malevich
Suprematist Composition: White on White (1918)