The Exchange Workshop
This workshop involved a creative drawing exchange exercise inspired by the ideas the participants' had about the definition of exchange. The instructions were as follows:
1) Draw a definition of exchange (a symbol / object / action etc.) using the black marker.
2) Pass piece of paper on to next person. Now take a different coloured pen. Redefine the exchange or change the original symbol in any way (adding / editing / cutting etc.).
3) Pass piece of paper on to next person. Now take a different coloured pen. Look at your new piece of paper and describe the exchange using (at least 3) descriptive keywords.
4) Return each piece of paper to its original artist. Now take a different coloured pen. Make a descriptive sentence including all of the keywords.
5) Each participant read out the descriptive sentence whilst showing the piece of paper to the group.
6) Group discussion. Can begin with connecting common redefinitions.
See the drawings co-produced by the participants in the images above. Below are some notes taken from the group discussion:
In relation to the first image
- win/win situation between two people - human
- but can be inter-'air'
- contexts
- exchange is a process - subject/object - subjective
- affect / affected
- causation / reaction
- unconscious reaction / conscious affected
- exchanging passively / actively
- see the stuff we want to see (cognitive) intentionally - already part of our being in the world.
- communication / exchanging information.
- Wittgenstein / Humboldt.
- what are we exchanging with the object, so that we come to know it?
In relation to the second (and third (the back of the previous)) image
- marking grid is a formula
- engage with literature - teacher engage with student engaging with literature.
- personality test
- extracting / extractions - mining and laying waste to the territory one is extracting from.
- exchange of death (respect) / compromise
- deconstructing the contexts - means one thing and another, allow for the non-sense to make sense of the situation.
- formulate: attach to structures to make sense. To not be so polarised. - rationality / thought.
- knowing the predefined exchange - disrupt the expectation of the exchange determined outcome with nonsense.
- research as self-reflectionality.
In relation to the fourth image
- what is said / what is objectively / how is it received - layers of exchange - intentionality - never really get what the other means (-Wittgenstein) - relationship.
-structures help us to understand, but limit creativity.
- 'cut' against the movement / can even be a creative movement - deterritorialisation.
- cut the dominant system.
- change it into something
- can you stop the inter?
- cut / separation could be exchange as relationship is disruptive / still connected.
In relation to the fifth (and sixth (the back of the previous image)) image
- think first of a dissymmetry
- relational without relation
- speaking from different places
- infinite communication, yet dissymmetrical. Always movement of in speech.
- "relations are external to their terms" (Deleuze, Essays Critical and Clinical 1997, 58.)
- dark nothingness / white nothingness
- ethical relation without relation, engage with relation without relation.
- narrative - one that presumes space of the inter (inter subject), one that does not (disconnect - asymmetry)
- always distance, proximity - close, never touches - approximation.
"LOVE is an approximation of the asymmetry of disconnection."
- never direct equal / sacrifice.
- hindsight to know the unevenness.
- tension of being yourself and not being yourself at the same time.
- undefinable.
- exchange is intended, love is not.
- passive exchange.
- always two elements to exchange.
- dictionary - ideologically laden!
*This blog post has been back-dated for continuity purposes. 'The Exchange Workshop' logo was originally designed on 12th November 2015 and the poster was created on 18th November 2015 by mysekf. The collaborative drawings were co-produced on 4th December 2015 as part of the workshop, and the notes were also written during the workshop on 4th December 2015 and are pasted here unedited.
