With the 'what if' having delivered some kind of comprehendible concept as always comes more and more 'what ifs' and the big question 'where to now'? There is one certainty and that is that it is highly unlikely that there will be universal agreement. This is especially so if the course chosen is deemed to be the way forward in a TOPdown scenario. The BOTTOMup scenario is likewise blighted.
So too is 'the proper way' which as often as not that straight and narrow pathway from wherever you are to some point over the horizon where mediocrity is on offer everywhere and all the time. The 'search' for perfection is contentious and contestable as well but nonetheless rich territory for a 'muse'.
In plotting a way forward we might look for metaphors to hang meanings on for a 'collection' that is an all embracing conglomerate of cultural treasures – objects, ideas, specimens, records, etc imagined as COLLECTIONlutruwita. For instance we might imagine such a conglomeration of riches and richness as being a 'fruit cake' jammed packed as the best of them are with all kinds of fruits, nuts, spices and more still. It is a celebration preservable for a long time and its 'richness' carries many stories.
Alternatively, we might think of a cuisine, one that belongs to and in a place, where there is oneness, a cultural oneness, that has evolved over millennia, that is replete with stories, that exhibits a completeness and more still. Conceptually, the metaphors for 'perfection' can be much more illusive.
Perfection is enticing idea and many make the claim of being able to define and divine it. Teachers are often called upon describe perfection and sometimes even measure it. A renowned German cultural producer and teacher, Prof. Junger, grappled with the task of illuminating 'perfection by metaphore'. He offered a ball bearing as an exemplar of 'perfektion in German' as being measurably 'perfect' as he put it an adopted/imposed Napoleonic idea –360º in the 3rd Dimension. Then he put forward a quail's egg as an exemplar of 'vollkommenheit in German' meaning a kind of perfection that exceeded 'perfektion' in that it was immeasurable somewhat like the universe, in total balance or in the vernacular 'totally OK'.
Then we might consider 'vollkommenheit' relative to the Japanese aesthetics around 'wabi-sabi' a world view centered on the acceptance of transience and imperfection ...the appreciation of the beauty that is "imperfect, impermanent, and incomplete" – yet somehow perfect in its imperfection. In the quest for meaning we might also ponder Einstein's theory of relativity. Here he illuminated the universe and in ways that allude to measurability yet somehow existing beyond measure.
With such metaphores in mind we might understand an amalgamated conglomerate and somewhat disparate collection of cultural material as somewhat 'vollkommenheitish cum wabi-sabiish'. Ideally perfect in its imperfection!
Somehow it seems more than possible to imagine this 'conglomerate collection' as existing in 'communal trust cum ownership' outside Tasmanian musingplaces' 'operations'. Also, it seems more than possible to DEsilo the contents and continually configure and reconfigure them in accord with transient imaginings, evolving perceptions and changing circumstances. There is no need for 'properness', no absolute 'truth' invested, no compelling requirement for 'authenticity' – no fixed narratives either.
Somehow it seems feasible to think about lutruwitaTASMANIA as a musingplace, the musingplace if you like, rather than imagine lutruwitaTASMANIA as an island/place endowed with musingplaces – albeit interfacing musingplaces working collaboratively and cooperatively – that had access to and engagements an entity such as COLLECTIONlutruwita
Somehow Tom Arthur's 1984 installation 'THE ENTIRE CONTENTS OF A GENTLEMAN'S ROOM' seems to embody such a conglomeration of ideas, things, smells, resonances, invocations, narratives and emotions. It makes no effort to be permanent or in any way 'be concrete' yet if you had experienced it then in so many ways it exists unfadingly and especially so for the fragrances.
In its time, this exhibit cum installation was 'marker' for 'time-based-cultural production' presented outside the 'theatre'. In many ways it is useful to think of this 'work' in the way one might imagine an 'operatic performance' – say 'Tosca'. It might be 'produced' again but not by necessity with these same elements albeit that the 'author' might well employ in another quite different 'work'. This might be similar to how elements in a COLLECTIONlutruwita 'cultural larder' might find themselves in various productions – installation, films, etc. etc.
To be able to assemble 'a collection' like COLLECTIONlutruwita that achieved such things seems like a laudable cultural enterprise. It may well be politically incomprehensible and bureaucratically repugnant but whatever, that is ever likely to be the case.
The possibility or transforming Tasmania's 'cultural estate' and allowing it to evolve into a 21st C 'cultural manifestation' – a COLLECTIONlutruwita – of the kind discussed here, no longer seems to be beyond reach. However, it seems that the 'political class' choose to locate themselves, for whatever reason, in a lifeboat just that little bit out of reach. It is a delusion but it seems that it is natural human condition. But why? Quite possibly the truth is too painful. Nevertheless, transformation and evolution must be a possibility no matter how audacious it might seem to be for some.
In Tasmania we already have a reference point for 'audacity' in an unprecedented 'musingplace' known as MONA.
CONTEXT … CLICK HERE
THE WHAT IF FACTOR … CLICK HERE
21st CENTURY MUSING IN lutruwitaTASMANIA … CLICK HERE
SO WHAT NOW? … CLICK HERE
BY WHAT MEASURE SUSTAINABILITY … CLICK HERE
A STRUCTURE FOR COLLECTIONlutruwita … CLICK HERE
HOW MIGHT A COLLECTIONlutruwita COME TO BE … CLICK HERE
No comments:
Post a Comment