THE INCANTATION

Medium: Corporeopsychogeography
Date: London (2009-05-08 onwards)

1.   ‘Incantation’ – from Latin ‘incantare’, meaning “to chant (a magical spell) upon,” from in- “into, upon” and cantare “to sing”.
2.    Incantations are the words spoken during a ritual, either a hymn or prayer invoking or praising a deity, or in magic, occultism and witchcraft with the intention of casting a spell or an object or a person.
3.    Use of magic words to… raise the dead/ protect the living/ delineate space (between the sacred and the profane, for example)

For further of the word definitions click here*

This project is in development and will continuously change. Whilst the formal structure of the project is clear, the conceptual aspect thereof is continuously in research development. This is reflected in the organic nature of the web-page, with some entries  expanding/ changing as the project continues, and others marked clearly with a star* hyperlinking to external web-pages (comprising user submitted, open source content including maps, dictionaries and personal websites). It is expected that the visual aspect of INCANTATION will be complete near the end of 2010 although the Phd research project of which it forms a part  will only be complete in 2011.

1. CONCEPT

INCANTATION is a large-scale land art work/ performance through which the artists body, its physical actions and corporeal extensions into space ,will become the conduit for the release and implementation of an alternative infrastructure within the urban geography of the contemporary city of London. In all this is the re-negotiation of the relationship between contemporary urban geography and the artist’s body through the re-connotation of language, action and the body.

These goals will be brought forward through a number of actions/ readings/ incantations throughout London, eventually forming a large 9 kilometer Pentagram (if taken as the circle – see Fig 1, yellow markers) over the urban landscape: a ‘corporeopsychogeography’. As a South African artist it is particularly interesting for me to work within the confines of the city of London. London remains a global center and on a more obvious level there is  a definite link to South Africa’s colonial history.

The Pentagram

The Pentagram is significant, based as it is on a hybrid mixture of scientific, mythical, spiritual and occultist origins* , most notably as regards its relation to our early astrological observations of the planet Venus. Throughout human history this symbol has been utilized in a number of religious/ spiritual and scientific systems/theories (from Christianity, Judaism, Paganism, Thelema, Taoism to the theory of the golden ratio and Pi). As a symbol it is thus simultaneously specific and general, inviting interpretation and further study even as it seems to exist within specific parameters of the commonplace.

When the pentagram is turned upside down, it is viewed as a malevolent symbol exactly because it signifies the credo of matter-over mind, carnality over spirituality.  In my interchangeable, self-replicating usage of the pentagram as graph the pentagram refers a non-dualist, corporeal understanding of the relationship between subjectivity, territory and art. Thus the pentagram also establishes a link between various marginalized forms of knowledge such as those of African spiritual tradition and western occult, and that which is beyond, the unseen or ‘other’ forms of knowledge. In this regard, even though the pentagram used in INCANTATION is aligned with the Greenwich Median  – with a single triangle pointing ‘upwards’ as a result – this remains a matter of custom and not of deeper value (put in another way, the location of the Greenwich Median is arbitrary). In this regard the pentagram may be multi-directionally oriented. See the small animation video below – must be watched in HQ (just press the HQ button on the Youtube player).

2. PROJECT DESCRIPTION

2.1 Formal Elements

In all there will be five main INCANTATIONS of 100 words each. Each word of the individual INCANTATION is engraved on an ordinary steel razorblade (1 word per blade). These words are ‘read’ aloud in order during the various INCANTATIONS. That is, each blade is physically handled as its is removed from the pack of blades, read aloud or perhaps rather ‘intoned’ in this context (decoded and understood by the brain), spoken (verbally re-encoded) and finally thrown to the floor, falling where it may. Thus each word becomes a compound term, denoting a set of interrelated actions, objects and meanings.

There is  tension between the act of reading, handling the sharp blades, and of intoning the words – reading and writing become corporeal activities as the distinction between the body and the mind, spirit and matter, is erased through the unifying act of INCANTATION. The blades may cut the skin, rupturing the body’s’ surface and dissolving the limit between inside and outside, the sacred and the profane. Here it is constructive to remember that the profane is always that which is ordinary/ commonplace or base, as in the desire of the flesh.

The bottom right corner of the pentagram (INCANTATION 5) is positioned exactly on the Prime Median at the Greenwich Royal Observatory* in London, the home of ‘world time’ and the global dividing line between East and West:

Five Lesser, twenty-word INCANTATIONS will be intoned at the sites where the lines forming the pentagram interconnect.

2.2 GEOGRAPHIC LOCATIONS

Below is a complete list of the various geographic locations where INCANTATIONS will take place. I have embedded two Interactive Google Maps (use the controls to zoom in and out to see exactly where INCANTATION will take place). If you do get lost on the interactive map just refresh the page and it will automatically reset to the original location.

The rest of the locations are all hyper-linked to Google Maps UK and will open on a new page if you click on them.

INCANTATIONS

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• 1. Studley Close/ Lyneham Walk*, Hackney, Greater London E5
• 2. Cnr. of East Surrey Grove and Commercial Way*, Southwark, London SE15 (see interactive map below)

View Larger Map

• 3. Cnr. New Barn Street and Esk Road*, Newham, London E13
• 4. Rutland Place*, Islington, London EC1
• 5. Prime Meridian*, Royal Observatory, Greenwich, Greater London SE10

LESSER INCANTATIONS:

• 6. North Colonnade, Churchill Place*, Tower Hamlets, London E14
• 7. Cantrell  Road Tower Hamlets, London E3 (see interactive map below)

View Larger Map

• 8.Coopers Close*, Tower Hamlets, London E1
• 9. Green Ban*, Tower Hamlets, London E1W
• 10. Pier on Greenland Dock*, Southwark, London SE16
  Get Directions

  
  

  * approximate times

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  Category:
  Unverified listing

2.3 LANGUAGE

Each INCANTATION is written in poetic free-verse form. The exact order of the words used to compile each INCANTATION will not be documented in any other manner than on the engraved razor blades (‘all other records, work-drafts  etc. will be destroyed). Thus once the INCANTATION has been recited/ intoned the written sequence of the words is destroyed and the INCANTATION is released into the urban landscape. Words are ‘crafted’ into form, given  a sequential, poetic logic and discharged into the environment through the final synthesis between the body, mind and spirit once they are ‘incanted’.

Each blade is ‘captured’/ lifted from the ground using a single stereo speaker, later to be compiled into a multi-speaker and multi-channel sound-installation for exhibition/ display purposes.

There are two forms of ‘documentation’ generally: The Internet presence via this site (1) and a Sound Installation (2).

As memory of the INCANTATION fades so will the order of the words, descending into a larger ‘cosmic chaos’. Nonetheless, the event is preserved in a number of interrelated, though self-sufficient, forms:

• The geographical site is called into life, activated through act of ‘INCANTATION’ as the casting of a spell; once the symbol is completed various energies are unleashed and bound to the site.
• The engraved blades are collected from the site with the magnet of an audio speaker.
• The clicking sound of the razorblades created as  the magnetic force of the speaker lifts them from the ground will be recorded. Also ambient sound recordings of the environment will also be made at each site directly after the INCANTATION. However these recordings will only feature the sounds of the environment and will not include any part of the INCANTATION. These recordings will be played back at the exhibition site through the 10 speakers (5 larger + 5 smaller; all still magnetically holding the individual blades from each site).
  The 10 speakers will be mounted facing the wall or positioned physically inside the architecture of the exhibition space (by breaking open the floor or hammering into the walls for example). The final installation will thus have 10 ambient soundtracks channeled directly into the architecture of the exhibition space.  The sound will be looped, creating an organic cacophony of ambient noises that symbolically unify the energy created through the actual INCANTATION, within the exhibition space. Thus it will be an organic machine linking the INCANTATION to
  -    the viewer,
  -    the exhibition space’s architecture
  -    and ultimately back to the geographic location(s) where the work originally took place.
• A single photograph of each site will be taken when I arrive there. This photograph will complement the rest of the documentation that include images and videos from Google Earth, sound-files and hyperlinks.