INFRATHIN

DISCRETE LIFE OF INFRATHIN

INTERVIEWS

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Discrete life of Intrathin originated in thinking of interview as conversational encounter, a relationship whose nature lies in transformation, in openness to be changed by a particular kind of intimacy, lexical at core, born out of engagement with the other/another. The interview is here a performative act of collaboration between interviewer, interviewed and readers.

 

Each conversation is anchored in Infrathin, the undefinable separation in and of minuscule difference. A place where things, states or beings are in-between, in process of change, different and yet, not quite the same. Infrathin is a strange passage rite aimed against sharp numerical boundaries of modern science. Prompted by thinking on the nature of practice itself, this series of exchanges is intended to act as notes on ways of working, an expanding archive of practices and poetics, and a resource of knowledge gained over a pleasure of reading. Fluid, occupying nebulous spaces on the very boundaries, it exists in continuous movement, a state of transition, like an ever-becoming process of mapping. 

 

Invited practitioners work in varied disciplines and through different methodologies.. Interviews are acts of indexing the contemporary universe,  collection of voices, ideas, projects, assemblages and communities spreading across all* realms of existence, selves and minds. 

* regarding digital, offline, human and beyond, trans-species and cyborgs, brain-based intelligences, alien or collective minds, rational and enlightened, belonging to the world of spirits.

 

Set in tradition  of introductory, brief interview, a form frequently used  in newspaper columns, where these short pieces provide reflection on frequently changing, fluid contemporaneity and positioning of cultural and art criticism within the fabric of fragmented and immediate daily life, DLoI Interviews are a nod towards the “Funf Fragen”. The series first appeared on pages of Berlin’s local guide to cultural and social life of the city, “Zitty” in March 2005. The inaugural column featured responses to the five questions posed to the Fluxus artist Emmett Williams.  For each issue thereafter, those same five questions were answered by invited artists. 

  

Discrete life of Infrathin quotes this vey structure, but the project's architecture is different. Each question is merely an anchor, a topic, intended as a starting point of a thread of thought. They are not strict “Q and A”s, but more of a series of conversational exchanges, branching out and meandering, interwoven around a grid of 5 entry  points. Declaration of short formula is deceptive, with each conversation reaching its natural end at the length needed. DLoI refuses a specific focus, a final goal, a unified shape; all markings of modern success. Instead, it is simply a record of encounters, which, put in writing, tries to convey the pleasure of freely conversing with one another, of momentary connections happening during the act.

 

The interview itself is, fundamentally, a form of collaboration and a declaration of a joint authorship. Its framework was constructed together by the interviewer and respondent. Met over collaborative exchange, connection of minds, practices and selves, where both parties work jointly on the final text.

 

INFRATHIN

The name  refers to the notoriously elusive, refusing to be defined Duchampian term of the “Infrathin”. By the statement of Marcel Duchamp himself, possible to understand only through examples, Infrathin is the in-between, the liminal and the gap impossible to grasp, the immaterial and yet not without matter, neither an action, nor a state, not exactly process and not really a temporality. At the same time it is immediately recognisable on an intuitive level. Infrathin is a threshold, an act of paying attention to difference. It is a methodology of the unmeasurable investigation, a form of practice contesting scientific paradigm and proposing art as an experiment in place of number-lead inquiry. Occupying this desirable and in a way, uncanny place, the Infrathin feels the perfect term to describe interchanges which record is made available here.

 

Each conversation is neither intended as representative to the whole practice nor as strict presentation. It points to the liminal intention behind the interviews, trying to somehow convey an impossible pinpoint, but intuitively felt,very identity of each talk in the series. Published documents  are notations of this experience, attempts to capture elusive meaning of ways of working.