I am interested in exploring the cut-up
method through photographic means. Although the idea is often
attributed to William S. Burroughs, the Dadaists were the first to
use the cut-up method, which reorganizes text through the use of
physically cutting a page in order to create a new arrangement of
words from a closed set.
This procedure is something that has
interested in me from the standpoint of being a writer. Initially, I
started investigating the cut-up through the desire to mark a poem
that had been written for a particular meaning, but that over time,
was regarded as a piece of work generated from falsehood. For
example, what happens to the love poem under revision if the writer
falls out of love with the subject of the poem? I decided to remove
each stanza from the page, lay a piece of construction paper below
the open area, and to create a document of the space rather than
continue working on the poems themselves.
Marking and then physically cutting the
marker itself allow for further exploration of the demarcation of
specificity, and then a more generalized collection of remnants that
may highlight not only absence, but intention. The dichotomy that
comes from the manipulation of a source document carries a similar
weight to that of translation. It allows for the configuration of
something created in one language to exist within another, in this
case, a visual one.
Questions / Concerns
Rather than cutting up existing text,
what happens when a blank piece of paper is cut up and a gap is left?
Can it be assumed that this space should be filled with new language
or is physical absence the prominent and new focus of the work?
Who is the author of this work and
under what circumstances does the author take control of
meaning-making?
How can the notion of capturing a
single moment from multiple perspectives be applied to an exploration
of textual revision, and then rendered visually?
What is it to look through a piece of
writing from within and how can it be represented?
How can interruptions to the process
add to this exploration and what thematic possibilities are present
from the outset?
Is it important to use text or is the
process what best serves this exploration through visual
representation?
Are color and scale enough to create a
system of symbols through which an idea can be activated in the
project?
How can repetition enable a ritualistic
undertone to the work and why is this important?
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