Jill Townsley –Research Student-University of Chester
Repetition and Process in Art Production - A Practitioners Account
Stream: Repetition and Endurance

Research into repetition developed from a particular personal journey through what may now be called Textile Art (though when studying Embroidery at Manchester Polytechnic in the 1980’s it was as yet undefined), moving to fine art sculpture, studied at the Royal College of Art. Without going into anecdotal details (of which there are many) I became acutely aware that this cultural shift raised many problems. The relationship between fine and applied art being rather difficult at its perimeters.

Through reflection on the work I was producing before, during and after this re-positioning, I observed a strong adherence to repetition. Whether early or late work, repetition remained integral, not in a Worholian presentation of the repeated image but embedded within the process of art production.

The academic Kate Armstrong in her book ‘Crisis and Repetition- essays on art and culture’ (1) argues that there are essentially two types of repetition in art production: 1, ‘apathetic reiteration’ which artists such as Andy Warhol employ to act as a functional distancing and 2, ‘the project of abstraction’ which severs links with representation and finds through repetition a closeness with the ‘unrepresentable’ other. (P37). The second definition is most relevant to the work I consider during this presentation.

Initially I found it impossible to understand repetition without first thinking about singularity. They are ‘after all’ either side of the same coin. Plato and Aristotle understood singularity as having a strong relation to repetition through the word Mimesis.  The encyclopaedia Britannica describes it as the:

‘basic theoretical principle in the creation of art. Plato and Aristotle spoke of mimesisas the re-presentation of nature. According to Plato, all artistic creation is a form of imitation or false repetition’ (2)

So it could be said that the repetition brought about through Mimesis is the problem that leads Plato to the banishment of artists from the republic. His Divided Line as ‘simplified’ for us in the Socratic Dialogue ‘The Allegory of the Cave’ (3) highlights the problem of repetition deviating from the single truth and immediately brings about the first crisis of repetition in that if the repetition is a re-presentation it is different from the original and not a true repetition at all.

While contemplating these ‘shadows on the wall’ I became curious about addressing ‘practically’ the role of repetition in the process of art production. In simple terms by applying some type of physical repetition to a material to formally address repetition found at the source of the making process. For this, the relation of singularity to repetition became important as it lead me in an evidence-based manner to an important related word – MULTIPLICITY.
Something that embodies:
1. a considerable number
2. the state of being multiple

What multiplicity offered was a guide to a range of materials that could be categorised as multiple and could be easily appropriated. Material multiplicity allowed opportunities to use predetermined systems of repetitive process. The considerable number of objects (multiples) already repeated in form act in a singular manner, when an action is applied and then repeated.

Studio Experiments
Jill Townsley 2005

This image shows experiments in building structure and form, with a systematic,
repetitive action - the action being simply gluing polystyrene beads together. I used different gluing methods, some with tweezers, where I literally picked up a bead dipped it in the glue and fixed it to the previous bead. The other process I developed was by mixing glue with the beads to form what I
nick-named a primordial paste (rather like a sloppy cake mix). I found I could then build with this mixture.

Building the structures over weeks, this primitive and playful ‘mud pie’ process had interesting results. It formed stalagmite type towers whose function follows directly the form of the making action. Each incremental layer was balanced on the previous one and replicated its footprint, though each layer had a smaller and smaller base on which to settle. Gravity and the glue binder combined with the careful and repeated hand placing, organised the bead components towards a similar end-state.

In-Formation, Installation
Jill Townsley 2005

The resulting organic structures reached finality when it was impossible to balance any more beads on the top without changing the process. Isomorphic structures are the result; in so far as no matter how many times the action is repeated the result is always a stalagmite type organic form. The repetition exposes within the work a natural internal structure unexpected in outcome.

This confers with Kate Armstrong’s second category of repetition in art production - ‘the project of abstraction’ She states;

‘Some artists Barnet Newman, Ad Reinhart, Kasimir Malevich et al employ repetition in the creative activity ‘to explore the limit at the edge of human experience in order to glimpse at that which is the condition of existence.’ (4).

What I was interested in here is the use of the word limit; the structures reached their own limit in the process of production, and through the continued repetition of that process the invisible becomes visible.

At This Very Moment in this work where am I?
Jill Townsley 2006

The studio work named “At this very moment in this work where am I” (a pun on the Derrida essay) considers further the idea that failure at the edge of human activity (limit) can be creative or at least generative. I devised work that would push a repetitive action through a specific system to hopefully visualise failure.
The system I chose was devised by Sol LeWitt, taking the queue from his  'Five
Modular Structures (sequential Permutations on the number 5)' 1972.
 
The intent was framed within a research paradigm, specific, repeatable and
transferable. What these objects aim to explore, in a simple and pragmatic way, is the power/role of process within construction, through the repetition of the exact structural organisation found in Sol LeWitt's 'Modular Structures' but combined with a change in process brought about by a shift of material.

LeWitt’s original objects have clear, systematic and logical foundations. They are
modular constructions with mathematic number systems at their source.  LeWitt is aware that there are limits to the purity of this logic. The first of his statements on conceptual art declares,

‘Conceptual artists are mystics rather than rationalists. They leap to conclusions that logic cannot reach.’ (5)

In this statement he questions the hierarchy of art next to logic. The structures
embody logic at their source yet express a creative objectivity beyond that logic.
Something Rosalind Krauss commented on when observing the work,

‘The experience of the work goes on exactly counter to 'the look of thought,'
particularly if thought is understood as classical expression of logic.’ (6)

In-fact that very ‘expression of logic’ was tested right from the start. Knowing that the structures depended on a logical mathematical system meant that discovering the key to their whole shape was rather like doing a puzzle. There was a definite answer that was arrived at through observation (drawing) and logic. This distinguishes the work outside of an expressionistic tradition, where gesture or the 'hand of the artist', results in forms whose repetition is fundamentally impossible to reproduce, making this work perfect for replication.

LeWitt says,

‘If an artist uses the same form in a group of works, and changes the material, one would assume the artist's concept involved the material.’ (7)

So endorsing that a material change has conceptual value. All that I essentially did in the reproduction of this work is to change the material. The form and mathematic system remain the same. However, the new material insists on a change in the mode of production or process. In turn, the process dictates a different scale and object stability, a stability relating to the structures physical properties, not strength of object.

To do this particular determinations were required:
1. To follow the logic of the original work, each section of the cubic module should consist of 10 polystyrene beads.
2. The beads must be pinned with wire when joining. The overall physical strength of the structure requires this.

So the determinate change of material has conceptual value, leading inevitably to an enquiry into the resulting process. The link between material and process may not be relevant in all cases; it is relatively irrelevant in LeWitts constructions.
However the relentless nature of repetitive action needed to construct ‘this’ work
in this unlikely material, is hard to overlook, and conceptually pertinent to the
structural and perceptual outcome.

The shift in process results in a crumpled version of the original. By reintroducing repetitive action through process the clarity of the object is compromised. The structural stability is altered from a clean and clear description of logical space, into organic, unstable structures that further question the mathematical logic at their source.

The possibility of reading 'expression' into the object is only created because of 'leakage' within the process. The minute inaccuracies of each repeated action, measured over time, leak or record failure; a failure of the human hand over action. So the logical integrity of each structure is eroded, resulting in inaccurate forms. The 'wonky' structures highlight an ergonomic reality/intelligence that records a broader human experience through the repetition of action. Failure becomes expressive, in that it differs from the clear lines of logic. The repetition betrays the accuracy of each action, revealing difference, and leakage through difference inevitably alters the resulting object.

What is still held back is the opportunity for the full expression of the authorial 'self'. The artist is not opened to exposure; the process reveals leakage but only due to the imposable repetition of an act, resulting in difference. The person of the artist is not revealed, and the 'ego' is not exercised conferring further with LeWitts statement number 7.

‘The artist's will is secondary to the process he initiates from idea to completion. His willfulness may only be ego.’ (8)
 
As you will have gathered I am clear to state that this project deals with repetition that resides in the making or process rather than the presentation of a repeated image.

With the next piece of work I intended to consider further observations carried from the last piece that the repetition worked in two ways;
1- in its process
2- through time (in the changing context).
In this slide the repetition is manifest by simply tying together 3 plastic spoons with an elastic band to form a unit

2,000 of those units - 6,000 spoons are then assembled to form a predetermined
structure in this case a regular solid which acts as the logical conclusion of the
sequence.

Spoons
Jill Townsley 2006

The repetitive action within the process is then reversed or undone, through the general and random decay of the materials (rubber bands) within each individual unit.

Click here to view

Spoons decay Movie
Jill Townsley 2006

This structure reveals not only the infinite chain of shifting context, but also each action within time. Each repeated action exists in a different 'moment' from the last. Each individual unit logs another moment that is no longer present. In this way, repetition and process are adding philosophical context to the object, while still defying signification due to the nature of that context. The actual 'moment' of process can never exist retrospectively; it leaves only a 'trace' of its action. That trace is then mirrored in the time-lapse record - like the hall of mirrors trick the repetition is infinite. The process itself has no presence, yet the resulting structure is a record of its 'trace’ (in Derridian terms). Each trace records the difference of each moment.

Authorship, in this framework is lost to the repetition of the action or 'moment' and deferred through 'trace' to the 'Other'. Derrida's philosophy endorses this standpoint, in that through authorial responsibility, he outwardly accepts the shift in form brought about through repetition, changing concepts in time. He writes:

I interrupt for an instant: "in the present work"  the unpresentable has therefore presented itself, a relation with the Other (Autre) that defeats any gathering  into presence, to the point where no "work" can be rebounded or shut in upon its presence, nor plotted or enchained in order to form a book. The present work makes a present of what can only be given outside the book. And even outside the framework. (9)

So you are now implicated through your observation of this record of the decay (the time-lapse movie) which itself logs the random decay of the repeated action originally applied. This is repetition working in a physical, intellectual and time based manner. Itself claiming authorship without possession and shifting context through trace.
 
CONCLUSION

For me the idea is now forming that repetition can be a material in itself, to be moulded, formed and presented and is a compelling and a unifying force behind this work. I think one of the most important outcomes, is the exposure (through repetition) of the point at which a system breaks down. The point of breakdown being the interface of the art to the system, no matter how embedded the system is in the work itself.

The hard logic of our wider systemic conventions, when obliged to operate within specific repetitive art based process, are exposed to the absurdity of the logic within the system itself.   

We are then catapulted into an atmosphere of uncertainty. When through repetition the systems that we work to are revealed as absurd, merely convention and without absolute truth, we have to look towards another explanation of reality. Mel Bochner writes;

‘Measurement is one of our means of believing that the world can be reduced to a function of human understanding. Yet, when forced to surrender its transparency, measurement reveals an essential nothing-ness. The yardstick does not say that the thing we are measuring is one yard long. Something must be added to the yardstick in order to assert anything about the length of the object. This something is a purely mental act … “an assumption”.’ (10)

The idea of appropriating repetition in order to test and reveal a systems limit cannot be understated as an incentive or reason to work in this way. Repetition though at first glance a simple concept works to confuse, reveal difference through limit, which in turn confirms a divergence from logic.

 

However if we put the deconstructive approach to repetition thus far outlined aside for a moment, we may still see the self determined obliteration, brought about through the logical conclusion of a repeated system, stands to warn us of the power of repetition when taken to the limit of its action. As Eva Hess stated:

‘If something is meaningful, maybe it’s more meaningful said ten times. It’s not just an aesthetic choice. If something is  absurd, it’s much more greatly exaggerated, absurd, if it is repeated.’ (11)

Scribble Movie

Bibliography

1. Armstrong, K. (January 1, 2002). Crisis and Repetition: Essays on Art and Culture / Kate Armstrong. Michigan State University Press. Pp15&37.

2. The Encyclopaedia Britannica

3. Plato. Socratic Dialogue The Allegory of the Cave. A Guided Tour of Five Works by Plato: Euthyphro, Apology, Crito, Phaedo (Death Scene), Allegory of the Cave. Biffle, C, Plato (2000) Mayfield Pub. Co.

4. Armstrong, K. (January 1, 2002). Crisis and Repetition: Essays on Art and Culture / Kate  Armstrong. Michigan State University Press. Pp37.

5. LeWitt, S. (1969). Sentences on Conceptual Art. Art-Language vol. 1, statement   no. 1

6. Krauss, R. (1993). The LeWitt Matrix. Sol LeWitt structures 1962-1993, Museum of Modern Art, Oxford. C. Illes, Museum of Modern Art Oxford.

7. LeWitt, S. (1969). Sentences on Conceptual Art. Art-Language vol. 1, statement no. 31

8.  LeWitt, S. (1969). Sentences on Conceptual Art. Art-Language vol. 1, statement no. 7

9.  Derrida, J. (1991). At This Very Moment In This Work Here I Am. Re-reading Levinas, Bloomington: Indiana  University Press., p. 31

10. Mel Bochner, Quoted in Anne Rorimer, New Art in the 60s and 70s: Redefining Reality,  London 2001, p129

11. Hesse, Eva – Nemser, C. A conversation with Eva Hesse in. Nixon, M., Ed. (2002). Eva Hesse - October Files, MIT Press. (p11).