Date: Sun, 18 Nov 2001 16:49:31 +0000
Subject: Re: irigaray & colour


Hi Simone

Good to hear from you - I know of those references in Irigaray's work 
- and look forward to the translation of Between East and West, due 
to be published soon. I was wondering if anyone has written on this 
strand in Irigaray's work - and would love to see a copy of your 
paper, if that would be possible. (maybe send it to my private email 
address, but continue the conversation on-list?).

  My own thesis was on the implications of Irigaray's work for 
contemporary feminist art practices and criticism. In begining to 
theorize the artwork as mediation between artist and audience, in an 
intersubjective relation (rather than, as is usual in art theory, 
reading the artwork as an object in subject-object relation to both 
artist and audience - or artwork as symptom) the work on buddhism was 
very useful. My partner is an artist and has practiced rinzai zen (an 
austere Japanese form) for over 30 years, so I used his extensive 
library to help me find readings of, for example, the passages where 
LI discusses buddha and the flower. However, I did feel a little 
isolated in this! it is an aspect of her work that commentators tend 
to skirt. I'm now working on turning my thesis into a book, and wish 
to re-address this material, particularly in the light of recent 
translations.

And of course her mentions of colour are totally apposite for any 
discussion of visual art - Flesh Colours is the main essay, though 
there are other mentions through the work. Again, it's not something 
that folk seem to have engaged with.
I'd love to know what your thoughts are - particularly on her 
discussions of Buddhism -

best,
Hilary

>Hillary,
>
>        Strange that I missed such a post. My work on Irigaray tends in these
>directions as well.  I don't know of anything of her's on color, but in Why
>Different, I Love to You, and especially in To Be Two there are references to
>yogic meditations.  There is nothing "on" meditation, as in directly
>discussing various traditions in any sustained way, but the influence is
>definately coming to the surface.  I've been working in my dissertation on
>some similar connections and influences, but in the direction of Tantric
>Buddhism as a system that represents being-two much more fully than most
>Western religious-symbolic systems, and parlaying that into a poetics.  I
>presented a paper called "Irigaray's Eastern Turn" at The Feminine Principle
>conference in Arlington, TX a few years ago.  I would be happy to share it
>with you if you like.  Since you are interested in these elements of her
>work, it might be good for both of us to exhange ideas from time to time. 
>What is it that you want to work on with color and Irigaray's work?  It's an
>interesting mixture.
>
>peace,
>Simone
>
>^*^*^*^*^*^*^*^*^*^*^*^*^*^*^*^*^*^*^*^*^*^*^*^*^*^*
>It is equally deadly for a mind to have
>a system or to have none.  Therefore
>it will have to decide to combine both.
>              ---  F. Schlegel
>
>Simone Roberts, Ph. D. Candidate, A.B.D.
>Humanities: Studies in Literature
>University of Texas-Dallas
>
>        "in Literature" means:
>(19th and 20th Century European
>and American Poetics and Literature,
>Literary Theory, and Feminist Philosophy,
>all with a "History of Ideas" flavor)
>
>email: douve1-AT-aol.com
>Instructor: Art Institute of Dallas
>
>
>      --- from list french-feminism-AT-lists.village.virginia.edu ---


-- 
_______________________________

Dr. Hilary Robinson
School of Art and Design
University of Ulster at Belfast
York Street
Belfast BT15 1ED
Northern Ireland
UK

<h.robinson-AT-ulst.ac.uk>
direct phone/fax: (+44) (0) 28 9026.7291)
________________________________

Darkness cannot drive out darkness; only light can do that. Hate 
cannot drive out hate; only love can do that. Hate multiplies hate, 
violence multiplies violence, and toughness multiplies toughness in a 
descending spiral of destruction....The chain reaction of evil--hate 
begetting hate, wars producing more wars--must be broken, or we shall 
be plunged into the dark abyss of annihilation.
 
-- Martin Luther King Jn.


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