#selections from truisms

[archiveofaffinities]

Jenny Holzer, Selections from Truisms, Spectacolor Board, 20' x 40', Installation, Public Art Fund Inc., Times Square, New York, New York, 1982

[milksockets]

selections from 'truisms,' 1986 in jenny holzer - diane waldman (1989)

[luckyacid]

Jenny Holzer Untitled (Selections from Truisms, Inflammatory Essays, The Living Series, The Survival Series, Under a Rock, Laments, and Child Text), 1989 Tricolor L.E.D. electronic-display signboard Dimensions variable

[probablyasocialecologist]

Palestinian liberation is a feminist issue. While this truism should need no elaboration, it has, as with so much that relates to Palestine, necessitated discussions, clarifications, analysis and documentation, again and again. Palestine rights activists have long been familiar with the all too common phenomenon known as PEP: Progressive Except for Palestine. Less known, but no less common in feminist circles is FEP, the Feminist Except for Palestine phenomenon. Books such as Evelyn Shakir’s 1997 Bint Arab recount incidents of FEP going back to the ’60s, with many Arab feminists being shunned by their American friends over their support for Palestinian liberation. FEP had one of its early expressions on a global stage at the 1985 United Nations World Conference on Women in Nairobi, Kenya, when Betty Friedan, an icon of second‑wave western feminism, with its slogan ‘the personal is political’, tried to censor the late Egyptian feminist Nawal el‑Saadawi as she was about to walk up to the stage to deliver her address. ‘Please do not bring up Palestine in your speech,’ Friedan told el‑Saadawi. ‘This is a women’s conference, not a political conference.’ Sadly, little has changed in global north feminism’s rejection of the very humanity of the Palestinian people, as evidenced in their continued exclusion from national and global discussions of women’s issues. White feminism has continued to align itself with orientalist imperialist militarism; Ms Magazine cheered the Bush Administration’s US war on Afghanistan in 2001, calling it a ‘coalition of hope’, and suggesting that invasion and occupation could, indeed would, liberate Afghan women. The white feminists in the Feminist Majority Foundation, which bought Ms Magazine in December 2001, never consulted with Afghan feminist organisations such as the Revolutionary Association of the Women of Afghanistan, who denounced both religious fundamentalism and western intervention in Afghanistan, and who opposed the US attacks on their country. More recently, hegemonic feminism’s desire to exempt Israel from criticism led to the fragmentation of the Women’s March, the coalition of women’s and feminist groups that came together to denounce the election of Donald Trump to the presidency of the US. The co‑chair of the 2017 Women’s March was Brooklyn‑born Palestinian American Linda Sarsour, a grassroots organiser who had long championed Palestinian rights. When journalist Emily Shire asked in the New York Times ‘Does Feminism Have Room for Zionists?’, Sarsour responded with a resounding ‘No’. Many felt threatened by her outspokenness and visibility. Another Palestinian feminist, Mariam Barghouti, also asserted in a 2017 article that ‘No, You Can’t Be a Feminist and a Zionist’, and explained that: ‘When I hear anyone championing Zionism while also identifying as a feminist, my mind turns to images of night raids, to the torture of children and to the bulldozing of homes.’ In the wake of Israel’s latest war on Gaza, white feminists are denouncing the unsubstantiated accusations of sexual violence against Israeli women, without addressing the Israeli state’s amply documented gendered violence against Palestinian women, children, and men. ‘Feminism cannot be selective. Its framework comes from true and absolute liberation not just of women, but of all peoples,’ Barghouti continues, building on bell hooks’ analysis of feminism as a complete liberatory movement. ‘A feminist who is not also anti‑colonial, anti‑racist and in opposition to the various forms of injustice is selectively and oppressively serving the interests of a single segment of the global community.’ Simply, ‘feminism’ that aligns with regimes that engage in racial and ethnic oppression is gendered supremacy; no ideology that hinges on supremacy and discrimination is reconcilable with feminism.

[cosmicanger]

selections from 'truisms,' 1985 in jenny holzer - diane waldman (1989)

[orthodoxydaily]

SAINTS&READING: FRIDAY, DECEMBER 20, 2024

december 7_december 20

St. AMBROSE BISHOP OF MILAN (397)

This is the world into which St. Ambrose was born in Trier (Treves) about 339-40, not long after the first ecumenical council of Nicaea in 325. His father, Ambrose, a civil servant, was Gaul's praetorian prefect (governor). His command included Spain, the Netherlands, and Britain. Ambrose had one brother, Satyrus, and a sister, Marcellina, who became a nun in 353, though she continued to live as a religious at home (there were few regular convents). Ambrose was not baptized as a child because Christians still regarded any sin after baptism with such horror that the sacrament was postponed as long as possible. There was. However, a service of exhortation and benediction Witchsalt and the Sign of the Cross was employed to claim the child for God and to withdraw him from the dominance of the powers of evil. All we have of Ambrose’s childhood is a legendary tale that a swarm of bees settled on his mouth as a prophecy that he would be gifted with eloquence. Upon his father's death, while Ambrose was still young, the family moved back to Rome. The brothers were tutored by a Roman priest named Simplician, whom the boys loved (he later succeeded Ambrose as bishop of Milan). Their education ended in the study of law.

The two brothers began practicing law in the court of the prefect of Italy. Their oratory and learning attracted the notice of Ancius Probus, the prefect of Italy. Ambrose was particularly marked for the fast track. When Ambrose was little more than 30 (c. 372), Emperor Valentinian appointed him ‘consular’ or governor of Aemilia and Liguria, whose capital was Milan, the administrative center of the imperial government in the West since the beginning of the 4th century. He filled this position with great ability and justice.

The Arian Bishop Auxentius of Milan, who banned Catholic congregations from worshipping in the diocese’s churches, died in 374, and the Arians and Catholics fought over the vacant position, which exercised a metropolitan’s jurisdiction over the whole of northern Italy. Ambrose had only been in Milan for three years at the bishop’s death and expected trouble selecting his successor. So, Ambrose, a Catholic in name but still a catechumen, went to the cathedral to try to calm the rival parties. During his speech exhorting the people to concord and tranquility, a child is said to have cried, “Ambrose for bishop!” Both sides took up the cry, neither of which was anxious to decide the issue between them. The local bishops had asked Emperor Valentinian to make the appointment, but he returned the dubious honor to the bishops. Now, the matter was out of their hands. Ambrose was unanimously elected bishop by all parties. The election of Ambrose, the one in charge of the local police, heightens our awareness of a truism: all clergy are recruited from the laity. It is better to choose an irreproachable person esteemed by all, than a savant who sows discord. Ambrose's choice was bold, but it surprised no one but us. What did Ambrose think of this call? At first, he protested (just like the prophets), saying he was not even baptized and fled rather than yield to the tumult. St. Paulinus of Nola wrote of the incident: “Ambrose left the church and had his tribunal prepared. . . . Contrary to his custom, he ordered people submitted to torture. When this was done, the people did not acclaim him any the less [saying]: ‘May his sin fall on us!’ Knowing that Ambrose had not been baptized, the people of Milan sincerely promised him a remission of all his sins by the grace of baptism. “Troubled, Ambrose returned to his house. . . . Openly, he had prostitutes come in for the sole purpose, of course, that once the people saw that, they would go back on their decision. But the crowd only cried all the louder: ‘May your sin fall on us'” (Paulinus, Life of Ambrose, 7). The people, however, continually pursued him and insisted that he take the see. The emperor confirmed the nomination, and Ambrose capitulated. Beginning on November 24, 373, Ambrose was taken through baptism and the various orders to be consecrated as bishop on December 1 or 7–one or two weeks later.

Quite consciously, Ambrose set out to be an exemplary bishop despite the daunting divisions within his see, his own delicate constitution, and his lack of preparation. He was a slight figure with a beard and mustache but with the natural grace of one who had been born in a palace and who could handle authority. (An early 5th-century portrait in a church he founded shows him as a short man with a long face, long nose, high forehead, brown hair, thick lips, and a left eyebrow higher than his right.) His natural dignity was ignited by enthusiasm to correct wrongs (such as high taxation, corrupt officials, venality in the law courts, and Arians in the imperial court). On his election, he dedicated himself to an austere life and the in-depth study of the Church Fathers and Scriptures under the direction of his former tutor, Father Simplician–essentially doing his seminary work after his consecration. Following his election, his life was one of poverty and humility. He gave away all his acquired property. He gave his inherited possessions into the charge of his brother Satyrus, who had resigned from his own governorship. Ambrose was a man of charity.

Sold church property to buy back captives taken in wars. He distinguished himself in defense of the oppressed, and there is a strikingly modern note in his objection to capital punishment. This left Ambrose free to follow the life he considered appropriate to the clergy: prayer seven times daily and regular fasts (although the Church of Milan followed the Eastern rule about Saturday and did not, as the Romans did, keep it as a fast), and no food until dinner. He gave daily audiences to any who wished to consult him, then occupied himself with reading and writing. His favorite writers were Philo, Origen, and Basil. He was a Greek scholar and read most of the Greek Fathers (but seems unfamiliar with the Latin Fathers such as Tertullian and Justin Martyr). He also read heretical works to refute them. As bishop, Ambrose felt he was primarily responsible for the instruction of catechumens and would himself hear confessions before he actually administered Baptism. Ambrose always washed their feet whenever he baptized new Christians, even though he knew this was not the usual Roman custom. As a metropolitan, Ambrose had to occasionally summon councils to deal with appeals from the various dioceses and set the date for the observance of Easter. He also had to preside at the election and consecration of bishops. Episcopal duties at this time are well summed up by Chateaubriand, “There could be nothing more complete or better filled than a life of the prelates of the fourth and fifth centuries. A bishop baptized, absolved, preached, arranged private and public penances, hurled anathemas or raised excommunications, visited the sick, attended the dying, buried the dead, redeemed captives, nourished the poor, widows, and orphans, founded almshouses and hospitals, ministered to the needs of his clergy, pronounced as a civil judge in individual cases, and acted as arbitrator in differences between cities. He published at the same time treatises on morals, on discipline, on theology. He wrote against heresiarchs and against philosophers, busied himself with science and history, directed letters to individuals who consulted him in one or other of the rival religions; corresponded with churches and bishops, monks, and hermits; sat at councils and synods; was summoned to the audience of Emperors, was charged with negotiations, and was sent as ambassador to usurpers or to Barbarian princes to disarm them or keep them within bounds. The three powers, religious, political, and philosophical were all concentrated in the bishop...” Continue reading @ St Ambrose (source).

VENERABLE NILUS, MONK, OF STOLBEN LAKE (1554)

Saint Nilus of Stolobnoye was born into a peasant family in a small village of the Novgorod diocese. In the year 1505 he was tonsured at the monastery of Saint Savva of Krypetsk (August 28) near Pskov. After ten years in ascetic life at the monastery he set out to the River Sereml, on the side of the city of Ostashkova; here for thirteen years he led a strict ascetic life in incessant struggle against the snares of the devil, who took on the appearance of reptiles and wild beasts. Many of the inhabitants of the surrounding area started coming to the monk for instruction, but this became burdensome for him and he prayed God to show him a place for deeds of quietude. Once, after long prayer he heard a voice saying, “Nilus! Go to Lake Seliger. There upon the island of Stolobnoye you can be saved!” Saint Nilus learned the location of this island from people who visited him. When he arrived there, he was astonished by its beauty.

The island, in the middle of the lake, was covered over by dense forest. Saint Nilus found a small hill and dug out a cave, and after a while he built a hut, in which he lived for twenty-six years. To his exploits of strict fasting and stillness [ie. hesychia] he added another—he never lay down to sleep, but permitted himself only a light nap, leaning on a prop set into the wall of the cell.

The pious life of the monk frequently roused the envy of the Enemy of mankind, which evidenced itself through the spiteful action of the local inhabitants. One time someone set fire to the woods on the island where stood the saint’s hut, but the flames went out in miraculous manner upon reaching the hill. Another time robbers forced their way into the hut. The monk said to them: “All my treasure is in the corner of the cell.” In this corner stood an icon of the Mother of God, but the robbers began to search there for money and became blinded. Then with tears of repentance they begged for forgiveness.

Saint Nilus performed many other miracles. He would refuse gifts if the conscience of the one offering it to him was impure, or if they were in bodily impurity.

Aware of his approaching end, Saint Nilus prepared a grave for himself. At the time of his death, an igumen from one of the nearby monasteries came to the island and communed him with the Holy Mysteries. Before the igumen’s departure, Saint Nilus prayed for the last time, censing around the holy icons and the cell, and surrendered his soul to the Lord on December 7, 1554. The translation of his holy relics (now venerated at the church of the Icon of the Mother of God “Of the Sign” in the city of Ostashkova) took place in the year 1667, with feast days established both on the day of his death and on May 27.

Source: Orthodox Church in America_OCA

1 Timothy 3:1-13

1 This is a faithful saying: If a man desires the position of a bishop, he desires a good work. 2 A bishop then must be blameless, the husband of one wife, temperate, sober-minded, of good behavior, hospitable, able to teach; 3 not given to wine, not violent, not greedy for money, but gentle, not quarrelsome, not covetous; 4 one who rules his own house well, having his children in submission with all reverence 5 (for if a man does not know how to rule his own house, how will he take care of the church of God?); 6 not a novice, lest being puffed up with pride he fall into the same condemnation as the devil. 7 Moreover he must have a good testimony among those who are outside, lest he fall into reproach and the snare of the devil. 8 Likewise deacons must be reverent, not double-tongued, not given to much wine, not greedy for money, 9 holding the mystery of the faith with a pure conscience. 10 But let these also first be tested; then let them serve as deacons, being found blameless. 11 Likewise, their wives must be reverent, not slanderers, temperate, faithful in all things. 12 Let deacons be the husbands of one wife, ruling their children and their own houses well. 13 For those who have served well as deacons obtain for themselves a good standing and great boldness in the faith which is in Christ Jesus.

Luke 21:28-33

28 Now when these things begin to happen, look up and lift up your heads, because your redemption draws near. 29 Then He spoke to them a parable: "Look at the fig tree, and all the trees. 30 When they are already budding, you see and know for yourselves that summer is now near. 31 So you also, when you see these things happening, know that the kingdom of God is near. 32 Assuredly, I say to you, this generation will by no means pass away till all things take place. 33 Heaven and earth will pass away, but My words will by no means pass away.

[maytheoddshq]

Neptune Akoya (she/her). District 4 Tribute. 58. Michelle Yeoh.

There was a misunderstanding throughout all of Panem about District Four Tributes. Most people didn’t understand how they were Careers - trained killers - when the people who entered the Arena tended to be so mellow, down-to-earth, and humble. The image of a District Four Tribute did not align with those from One and Two, who sought glory, violence, and fame. The highly trained and focused Tributes from Four did not seem coherent with the District’s otherwise rebel-leaning sentiment, where they opposed much of what the Capitol did and stood for while sending Volunteer after trained Volunteer into the Games.

It came down to one word: community.

Community was everything in Four, and to Neptune Akoya. A deep distrust of government was instilled in her early, and a commitment to her District was similarly taught. After all - when the government eventually fell, District Four would have to take care of District Four. No one else would, and no one else could. This truism permeated through Neptune’s entire life. Whether that meant sharing her daily catch with a neighbor who didn’t fare as well, leaning on her family when she was injured on the boats, or training from birth to enter the Hunger Games, Neptune was solely focused on bettering the place she called home.

Yes, the Hunger Games were an integral part of District Four culture. Where Districts One and Two saw fame and glory, and many of the outer Districts saw tyrannical punishment, District Four saw them as a golden opportunity. Anytime Four brought home a Victor, that meant abundant food and resources for the District for a full six months. That was six months of time that could be spent shoring up for the next famine, or spent rebuilding walls and roads, or delving into the vibrant arts that District Four could create when taken care of. It meant that every citizen of Four was fed - not just those who could feed themselves. In short, winning the Games was the ultimate way to care for your community. And that wasn’t all; even entering the Games allowed for anyone in your District to take tessarae without fear and without shame. By Volunteering, you told the entire District, “I have your back. I support you.” 

And so, Neptune trained. She entered the Academy at a young age, fully prepared to lay down her life for the betterment of her community. After all, everyone died. If not of old age, then of the violence of the state. If not by the violence of the state, then the chaos of the ocean. If not the chaos of the ocean, then something else altogether - so what better way to let her community know they were loved than by offering herself to bring them the resources they needed? She felt comfortable killing; after all, the fish gave its life for her to feed her. The seaweed dried out in the sun made her fabrics. And every Victor that Four brought home came with it a District partner who had laid their life down for the community. All beings ceased eventually, so if it was by her hand, so be it. She could thank them for their aid, since every Tribute that died meant she was closer to enriching her entire District. What was 23 lives compared to the thousands back home?

Neptune trained for all of her youth in the Academy, perfecting weapons, staying fit, and maintaining her commitment to Four. However, it was simply never meant to be for her. Each cycle, a different pair was selected by the committee to represent the fishing District. And that was okay. That was part of all of it - serve her role as best she could until she was needed elsewhere. And at age 25, she graduated from the Academy and moved on to a different type of career. She returned to the coast to support her family - all fishermen. Her strength served her well on the boats out in the deep ocean, where the Akoyas fought big game like tuna and marlin.

Neptune found the love of her life on those boats: a fishmonger named Tetra. She was bookish and small, but gruff and hardheaded - the perfect balance to Neptune’s measured patience and grace. They met as Neptune brought fish to the market where Tetra was buying. She was the first person Neptune ever argued with, and from that moment she knew there was no one else who could rile her up that way. (At least, that’s the story Neptune told. Her family would disagree about the arguments).

For fifteen years, Neptune and Tetra built a life together. Hosting neighbors, attending to the home, keeping each other sharp and comfortable. Over the years, they did what they could to resist the Capitol, by shorting fish shipments, adjusting books to hide money away, by storing weapons on their fishing boat. But all beings came to an end. If not by old age, then by violence of the state. If not by the state, then by the chaos of the ocean. And sometimes, those lines were blurred.

Tetra had joined Neptune on a fishing voyage, as she often had over the years. A storm picked up, as it often did. And the boat capsized, as it sometimes does. What was odd, however, was the small explosion in the hull - where there was nothing that could explode. What was odd was the way neighbors seemed unable to reach them, even with their vessels designed for rescue. What was odd was Tetra, who could swim like the best of them, being too close to the blast when it happened. No one would be able to prove foul play, given the noise of the storm and the fact that the boat was now at the bottom of the ocean. But when Neptune was finally pulled onto a rescue craft, exhausted from trying to find Tetra, she knew in her heart that something was not right. Tetra’s body was never recovered.

All beings came to an end, as Neptune knew. But this event only spurred her on further, organizing and supporting the rebel cause. And then the announcement was made: the age restriction was to be lifted - and Neptune knew in her heart what she needed to do. There were young ones who felt prepared to go into the Arena, but that was not their fate. There would be other times for them. Neptune knew this was her chance to fully commit to the cause. Get in, win the Games, and bring back six months of prosperity to the District. After all, she had trained her entire life for this moment.

And all beings came to an end, anyway.

Trained, motivated, dedicated to the cause

Mellow, calculated, emotionally walled

Token: Tetra’s wedding ring

PENNED BY: M

[blankinterstices]

.... we’re all fucked up to some degree because it’s impossible to reconcile the ideals of academe with its reality.  The only happy people are the abusers, the bullies, and the sexual predators, and they’re all inherently miserable.  Many of us enter the field with dreams of a meaningful existence, of making a difference, and are then systematically ground down by the social and economic hardships of the profession. In these conditions, the ideological cliquishness within the profession begins to make sense.  It’s helped along by a power structure that rightly sees the self-professed scholar-activist as unthreatening.  Certain truisms and devotions prevail because they arise from an insidious pressure to conform.  If every professor you know seems to have the same take on Venezuela or Ukraine or China—the take that just so happens to align with State Department boilerplate—then it’s not a funny coincidence.  Those professors auditioned and were consequently selected for the task, just as they now select the younger generation to maintain a uniformity of thought that suits their class interests. I had no idea how ideologically stunted I was until leaving the profession.  Everything I took to be common wisdom was in fact a painstaking ritual of complaisance.  How eager I was to discourse about faraway places, about the proper way to run a government, about how the natives should conduct an insurrection.  A lot of academics are filled with unacknowledged messianism that looks grotesque once you learn to recognize it.  They won’t support any old revolution, any slapdash movement for Indigenous sovereignty, any third-rate anti-imperialist in the Global South.  They have standards.  And whose interests do those reverent standards end up serving?  Why, that’s entirely the wrong question. 

Steve Salaita has a memoir out!

[fierceawakening]

A friend of mine recently mentioned to me that someone has chastised them for being upset with someone who has a personality disorder for saying something hurtful to them. I don’t know the specifics and wouldn’t describe them if I did anyway, but a conversation followed about whether mentally ill people are responsible for their actions or not.

And leaving aside what everyone ELSE said about this, I’m realizing my answer is I’m not always sure.

It’s a tumblr truism that if a mentally ill person does a mean thing, they were “choosing to be an asshole,” and therefore are responsible. It’s described as if the illness stirs up a reaction in you, maybe an intense one, but you get a dialogue prompt in the game of Being You, where you get to choose to act on it or not. And if you did, you knew.

I’ve said before that I suspect the women in my family have narcissistic traits. My mom, my aunt, most notably my grandmother. I loved and still love my grandmother dearly, so this is not meant as “narcissists are unlovable and inhuman.” (Also, I’m AFAB and genetically related to these people. If I’m right that they have enough narcissistic traits to be an issue, then so, most likely, do I.) She was very smart, never let anything get in her way, and fiercely protective of me and others she loved. I don’t say this to claim she was devoid of love or completely horrible.

But! The woman was OBSESSED with how people saw her, how everything anyone said and did reflected on the family. She curled and dyed her hair well into her 90’s. It was the consistency, and the color, of straw. When she finally succumbed to dementia, one of the earliest signs was her going to a hair appointment… at 3am… and, finding the place closed, banging on the doors and screaming about how important her appointment was and how they simply had to attend her immediately until she was led away.

“It hurts to be beautiful” was her favorite saying. Any suggestion that beauty might be discardable, even temporarily, because one does not wish to be hurt, was written off as obviously foolish, maybe even crazy.

As her dementia advanced and her brain to mouth filter disintegrated, she began to comment incessantly on people around her who were ugly or fat. She went up to someone and berated him for choosing visible hearing aids rather than the subtle flesh toned kind.

My mom and aunt inherited her obsession with how things look, whether because personality is in part genetic or because she shamed it into them or both. Both have very aggressively shamed me over similar stuff, a lot. This is bad, and I don’t deserve it and neither did they from Grandma.

So the question of responsibility becomes, at least for me: what about that dialog box?

When my mom sees that I dress butch and is disgusted because I’m MEANT to be beautiful, or feels she’s failed at teaching me anything about adulthood because my floor isn’t swept, does she get that little break, that little pause, in the horror that is the thought someone will see my floor, and explicitly select “be an asshole?”

I find myself thinking not.

[blistexenthusiast]

Jenny Holzer, Selection from Truisms

[drownmeinbeauty]

WORDY

The Guggenheim Museum is a notoriously difficult space for art. The most successful installations assert themselves sculpturally against the brazen and seductive forms of the architecture. An artist can't simply underestimate or obscure the Frank Lloyd Wright building.

Jenny Holzer's new exhibit Light Line updates her famous 1989 installation Untitled (Selections from Truisms, Inflammatory Essays, The Living Series, The Survival Series, Under a Rock, Laments, and Child Text), hanging scrolling electronic panels on the inner rotunda walls. The cool, dazzling text graphics with her iconic high-art "haiku" spiral upwards, pulsing like a stock ticker or electrocardiograph, speeded just enough to complicate legibility.

Some of Holzer's physical works are displayed in the small galleries along the ramp. There are marble benches, plaques, and shards engraved with original text. There are canvases laminated with gold foil and FBI diagrams plotting military attacks. There are reproductions of papers from the January 6 hearings. And there are metal panels stamped with Donald Trump's presidential tweets. These pieces are swallowed by the spiraling, sloping architecture; they can't hold their own, they feel small and lusterless. And, curiously, about half the galleries are left empty. The museum has never felt so desolate.

The electronic text settles right into the building. Compare this to the chyron on cable news, that might present facts at odds with the program, or address an altogether different subject. At the Guggenheim there's nothing of substance for Holzer's words to rub up against. More substantial artworks, visible in the galleries beyond the scroll, would have offered contrast.

Holzer's writings in the 80's and 90's carried a twinge of menace and subversion. BE CAREFUL WHAT YOU WISH FOR. YOUR OLDEST FEARS ARE THE WORST ONES. They were platitudes and also the awful truth, not messaging one expected from fine art. Today they no longer surprise. One museum guest wore a tank top with ABUSE OF POWER COMES AS NO SURPRISE printed across the front, like a sports team logo.

Occasionally a line reaches a loopy kind of poetry. IN A DREAM YOU SAW A WAY TO SURVIVE AND YOU WERE FULL OF JOY. Others are as dull-witted as the platitudes they were intended to dislodge. RAISE BOYS AND GIRLS THE SAME WAY. TORTURE IS BARBARIC. But here Holzer's writings, especially the most recent, just don't resonate; they feel jumbled, aphasic, as if the electronics controlling the monitors are generating the sentences. They observe laws of syntax but resist logic. I WILL THINK MORE BEFORE I CANNOT. IF YOU BEHAVED NICELY THE COMMUNISTS WOULDN'T EXIST.

As we're bombarded by text via messaging and media, words have lost some primal explain, arouse, and denote. This exhibit makes that spectacularly apparent.

Jenny Holzer, Light Line, 2024. Photo courtesy of the Guggenheim Museum.

[archiveofaffinities]

Jenny Holzer, Selections from Truisms, Spectacolor Board, 20' x 40', Installation, Public Art Fund Inc., Times Square, New York, New York, 1982

[milksockets]

selections from 'truisms' + 'the survival series' in jenny holzer - diane waldman (1989)

[worldsandemanations]

selections from ‘truisms,’ 1985 in jenny holzer - diane waldman (1989)

[cosmicanger]

selections from 'truisms' + 'the survival series,' 1986 in jenny holzer - diane waldman (1989)

[nostalgebraist-autoresponder]

From the introduction to Evelion:

On August 8th 1883, a group of three prominent German philosophers (Feuerbach, Schopenhauer, and Herbart) published an essay entitled "The nature of evil dismissed as a truism in the modern age." It was not a particularly remarkable document. It argued that because morality is human, its precepts must, by necessity, be contingent -- they are human conventions. And since human conventions come about through evolutionary processes involving the selection of individuals better suited to be successful -- that is, better able to survive and prosper -- those processes result in the development of morality and morality's prescriptions. The "truism" is then that whatever evils arise out of evolutionary processes are contingent evils, they may in principle be overcome by evolutionary processes in the future. Feuerbach's example was that, although it is certainly true that evil acts are generally more enjoyable than good ones, it is nonetheless impossible to tell whether any given act will be good or evil before it has occurred -- i.e., it cannot be determined ahead of time whether the act will be ultimately for the best. He thus concluded that "even the principle of evil itself would only appear to be evil if we assume to know what God has done and what he would do in the future."

He then goes on to make a similar argument against teleology in biology: teleology is human, so it would be incorrect to claim that "teleology is the explanation of the fact that things are the way they are."