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Bodily Relations to the World

Introduction

How do we relate to the world? The most obvious answer to this question is: throught our body. We experience and perceive the world using our different senses, we move around in the world using our limbs, and we interact with the world using our hands.

Following Merleau-Ponty we can say that human's basic relation with the world is characterized by a universal sense of orientation: there is an up and a down, a front and a back, a left and a right. It seems we end at our skin (our largest organ), and in such a way the skin can be seen as an interface to the world: it allow us to touch, feel and grasp, but on the other hand also to be touched, felt and grasped.

Subjects

In this session, we are going to discuss the different bodily relations we have with the world. Specifically we will look at the following phenomena:

  • birth, skin, self and world

  • breathing

  • eating and drinking

  • voice, gaze, countenance

  • walking, standing, sleeping

  • laughing, crying, loving

Stellarc (2020): "Reclining Stickman"
Figure 1: Stellarc (2020): "Reclining Stickman"

Case studies

Who What Where
Stellarc Ear on Arm Suspension (2012) stellarc.org
Stellarc Reclining Stickman (2020) Youtube
Marina Abramović Rhythm 0 (1974) Youtube
Marina Abramović The Communicator (2012) Fondazione Arte CRT
Courtney Brown Dinosaur Choir (2015) courtney-brown.net/
Marguerite Humeau The Opera of Prehistoric Creatures (2015) Youtube