Gesture

Stefan Wojnecki, HiperphotographyHiperfotografia, Galeria BWA, Poznań 1978

In 1991, Vilém Flusser called for a "general theory of gesture." This group starts from the experimental premise that gesture is the primary medium of learning and goes from there. Addressing streaming video chat’s emphasis on the frontal of faces and voice, this group first formed as an experiment in form. After much wrangling, we were able to point our webcams down at our hands and books.

We proceeded to read several excerpts on gesture in this manner:

• Giorgio Agamben, Means Without End, “Notes on Gestures”

• Vilém Flusser, Gestures, conclusion

• Manning, The Minor Gesture, intro and chapter one 

Possible next readings

• Leroi-Gourhan, A. 1993. Gesture and speech. MIT Press.

• Maddalena, G. 2015. The Philosophy of Gesture: Completing Pragmatists’ Incomplete Revolution. McGill-Queen’s Press.

• Châtelet, G. (2010). Figuring Space: Philosophy, Mathematics and Physics. Springer Netherlands.

It is clear why classical rationalism doesn't much like to rub against the 'mystery' of these practices and these ways of seeing: the latter are applied on precisely the sensitive, but blind, points of the Understanding, at the hinge-horizons where inchoate systems begin to unfold, in all those places where orientation can't be had for free and where the true is not synonymous with the verifiable. . . Gestures and problems mark an epoch and unknown to geometers and philosophers guide the eye and hand.”

Gilles Châtelet

Figuring Space: Philosophy, Mathematics and Physics