Agrippa (A Book of the Dead) is an art project collaboratively created by the cyberpunk author William Gibson, the artist Dennis Ashbaugh, and the publisher Kevin Begos, Jr. To answer this week's question, begin by reading the following web page: http://agrippa.english.ucsb.edu
Be sure to click on "more" so you can read the whole description.
Click on the "simulation" link and play the representation of Ashbaugh's idea for fading ink (an idea that proved too difficult to implement). Then, read Gibson's poem, available here: http://www.williamgibsonbooks.com/source/agrippa.asp
OK. This is question #1:
What meaning can you make out of Ashbaugh's original idea for disappearing images (keeping in mind Gibson's poem)? Use at least 1 quote from the poem in order to make your argument.
Here's question #2:
Read Bazin's "The Ontology of the Photographic Image" (1945), included in the course reader. What is the "mummy complex"? Although Bazin wrote this article decades before the Internet was invented, do you think he would say that the Internet satisfies the mummy complex? Why or why not?
76 comments:
Elizabeth,
Ashbaugh’s original idea for disappearing images was a book called Agrippa which is a book of the dead and in that book there was a simulation of intended “fading images” and what they might’ve looked like. In Gibson’s poem he says, “They must have asked me something at the border I was admitted somehow and behind me swung the stamped tin shutter across the very sky and I went free to find myself.”
To me that particular line is telling me that Gibson used this book to write down the names of loved ones that he lost. He may be reminiscing of what one loved one asked him to do who is now gone. I’m not entirely sure, but this is how I see it. The “mummy complex” is the process that might reveal that at that of the origin of paintings and sculptures. I think that the internet still satisfies the mummy complex. Throughout the internet you can still find out the origin(s) of paintings, sculptures and much more. Even though we don’t call it the mummy complex anymore I still believe that it still exists; only we may call the mummy complex the internet instead.
Elizabeth Miller
T.A. Kate Brandt
Disappearing ink would have changed the course of history. If disappearing ink actually did exist then it can be assumed that there is an entire world history under wraps that the developed world has no knowledge of. Because of this factor, disappearing ink is made into an extremely interesting topic. It leaves room for your imagination, and we love that. This makes for a huge hype. For example, William Gibson’s 305-line poem:
just as I myself discovered
one other summer in an attic trunk,
and beneath that every boy's best treasure
of tarnished actual ammunition
real little bits of war
but also
the mechanism
itself.
He describes the alleged technology as “every boy’s best treasure.” This is probably the only reason this topic has any significance. It blurs reality with every little boy’s fantasy.
At the same time, however, an artistic twist on reality often has a way of bringing actual issues to light. Janine Bazin talks of the “mummy complex” which I feel hinges on this truth. She parallels ancient Egyptians religious tradition of mummifying their dead with the motivation behind art. I feel like this was a fairly strong parallel to make because the reason they used to mummify their dead was to in essence “cheat death.” They believed that as long as the body was in tact the person lived on. Art has a way of doing the same. When someone makes a work of art, it lives on past them.
I think that the Bazin would carry the Mummy Complex over to the Internet because when something is posted on the internet, it can stay there forever. I always snicker when someone posts a YouTube video with the word “New” in the title. “New Kanye West Music Video” for example, will become deceiving in 3 months when he comes out with another music video. This has a way of mummifying the original work.
Danny D'Acquisto
TA- Steve Wetzel
I think that Ashbaugh’s idea of fading ink was to change the way we see images. We tend to record things by either writing down a fleeting thought or drawing something from our imagination before it’s gone or taking a picture of a moment we don’t want to forget to make what we’re recording seem more permanent. Like what Gibson says in his poem, with:
The mechanism: stamped black tin,
Leatherette over cardboard, bits of boxwood,
A lens
The shutter falls
Forever
Dividing that from this. (2.1-6)
It sounds to me that he’s describing the act of taking a picture and making whatever image is captured last ‘forever’. At the same time, Ashbaugh wants to make the images as impermanent as the original thing that they’re representing.
According to Bazin, the ‘mummy complex’ is the need to preserve oneself, like through having one’s portrait done. I think that the Internet both does and doesn’t satisfy the ‘mummy complex’. You can post your thoughts and pictures online, and those will stay there unless you get rid of them, which does satisfy the ‘mummy complex’. But technology can go wrong and information can get lost without a trace in cyberspace, which makes it impermanent and always changing, which doesn’t satisfy the ‘mummy complex’.
Katrina Schwarz
TA: Kate Brandt
I think Ashbaugh's intention was to create a new medium that would give as a different way to look at images and text. Something that would make us delve deeper and look harder into something before we could see what it actually is. I think he's trying to tell us to look past the surface material and obtain a deeper meaning from the material. Gibson wrote something that really speaks about this:
The mechanism: stamped black tin,
Leatherette over cardboard, bits of boxwood,
A lens
The shutter falls
Forever
Dividing that from this.
I found this to reinforce my idea that there is something more that we can't always see right away. He speaks about "dividing that from this," and I think what's divided is the surface material with the deeper meaning Ashbaugh was trying to reveal.
The "mummy complex" is a state of mind in which people feel the need to keep something of themselves that people will recognize them by. For instance, a lot modern of modern people use the internet to post information about themselves, which other people can view, and the person who does this then fulfills their "mummy complex" so that they feel like they won't be forgotten if they were to die.
Travis Torok
TA:Steve Wetzel
Ashbaugh and Gibson seemed to be making a clear representation about the characteristics of the human memory with their Aggripa projoct. The fading words and disappearing images in the book allude to the tenuous nature of memory. For instance, Ashbaugh’s images were supposed to initially appear clear and distinct and then fade away slowly, blurring the bulk of the image with only a slight outline still remaining. Overtime, our memories become skewed and merely shadows of the original event as our cognition adds to and takes away the clarity of the visual. The poem also reflects this as Gibson “reminisces” about images he describes to the reader. Initially, his descriptions seem concise, but towards the end his memory becomes more fragile, “There must have been a true last time I saw the station, but I don't remember. I remember the stiff black horsehide coat gift in Tucson of a kid named Natkin. I remember the cold.” Gibson also goes on to remember slight details, but cannot truly recall the last moment he witnessed the station. The way the passage is structured leads the reader to believe he’s struggling to remember the details, so instead lists what he can. This shows the fragility of memory and correlates to the artistic goal of vanishing images that Ashbaugh wished to achieve.
The mummy complex is the idea in photographic art of keeping alive an image or instance that becomes “dead” after the moment passes. Like the ancient Egyptian mummification process, Bazin says that photographs have the same preserving power. Throughout the article Bazin discusses the realism of paintings in comparison to photographs and states that through photos we have the ability to freeze lives in a certain space and time. In Bazin’s words, “Those grey or sepia shadows, phantomlike and almost undecipherable, are no longer traditional family portraits but rather the disturbing presence of lives halted at a set moment in their duration.” Personally, I think the Internet fulfills the mummy complex in its ability to capture and hold works of art that would normally be lost to old age and negligence. For instance, our look into sponsored films proves this, especially with web pages like The Prelinger Archives. However, too much of the Internet can be adjusted and fabricated and we cannot fully except a realistic life being preserved after a “moment’s death.” Some instances that may claim to be “authentic” and true may in fact be entirely falce. An objective look at what the Internet holds can show mummy complex ideas but must always be challenged by the viewer to determine the artistic validity.
Mitchell Keller
TA: Laura Bennett
I believe Asbaugh’s idea of disappearing images was meant to convey the duality of images: temporality and immortality. While images, like the advertisements featured in the Aggripa, more often than not fade into obscurity, they can never be truly forgotten. They are set apart in an alternate world of the photographic. Gibson described this phenomenon when he said, “A lens/The shutter falls/Forever/Dividing that from this.” It is though Gibson is saying that the camera is capable of creating two separate realities, the physical world and the photographic world. While the images found in the Agrippa may only be temporary in the physical world, they exist forever in the photographic world. One could go so far to say that the Agrippa is a means for such images to pass from the living, physical world into the photographic afterlife.
Bazin’s “mummy complex” refers to the Egyptian practice of preserving dead bodies via mummification as it applies to the psychology behind painting, sculpture, and film. I think Bazin would say the internet is perhaps the ultimate expression of the mummy complex. While a painting, sculpture, or film can only be viewed by a limited number of people at any one time, as soon as an image is uploaded onto the internet, it can be accessed by any person connected to it in a matter of seconds.
Joseph Otterson
TA: Laura Bennett
Ashbaugh’s idea for disappearing images stems from the age old philosophy of mortality and the omnipresent passage of time. Since images are merely captured moments of time, their fading would be representational of how, eventually, everything fades from existence. Gibson’s Poem represents the concepts of time and mortality very well. The entirety of the poem seems to be a compilation of old memories and reflections on events of the past. However, the poem is interspersed with references to “the mechanism”. This mechanism seems to be a metaphor for the continuum of time. “One of them came back at me-off a round of river rock-clipping walnut twigs from a branch-two feet above my head.--So that I remembered the mechanism.” This passage undoubtedly alludes to the constant reminder of mortality connected to his near death experience. He adds to this effect with, “looking down from high narrow windows-on the melting snow-of the city undreamed-and on the revealed grace
of the mechanism,-no round trip.” He further implies with this passage that the passage of time has allotted many graces, but like the melting snow the inevitable mortality caused by time is irreversible.
A picture is an immortal copy of a moment in time. The photograph is in essence a re-creation of reality through “the transference of reality from the object to its reproduction.” Today, where an image can be captured, digitized, reproduced, and uploaded/downloaded adnauseum, an image can “live” forever in the endless stream of data transfer that is the internet. Bazin’s discussion of the “mummy complex” that deals with the reproduction and preservation of moments of time (primarily considering images) would most likely believe the internet a form of eternal preservation. He refers to the “mummy complex” as a human drive for immortality and preservation as seen with the Egyptians’ mummification of the dead. Although an image, movie, sound file, etc represents a preserved moment in space and time, the internet provides a medium where data can be endlessly duplicated to the point where it will survive eternity in the endless expanses of Its web. Thus, fulfilling the human drive to live forever.
[Garrett Katerzynske]
[David Witzling]
In relation to Ashbaugh’s idea towards disappearing ink, I believe his meaning and inspiration behind it was to have the viewer go beyond what they see. What may seem to be lost forever “dividing that from this” can be found right beneath our very noses, just like “something [inscribed] in soft granite, now lost.” Sometimes the obvious may be right under our own noses, but with a little time and effort, the hidden meanings can literally reappear before our very own eyes. The viewers must delve into the deeper meaning of the work as a whole, and with the “missing link” of the disappearing text, a new meaning and deeper meaning is presented. All we have to do is take time and view the little inconspicuous things of everyday life.
As for the Bazin’s mummy complex, it can be seen as a way to capture and preserve the essence of a human, as well as the different forms of art. With the preservation of the body, its essence, and its soul, “by providing a defense against the passage of time it satisf[ies] a basic psychological need in man, for death is but the victory of time.” No matter if something is dead or forgotten, the need to preserve it is the top priority. I definitely think that Bazin would consider the internet satisfying the mummy complex because it can forever preserve anything and everything in our world. Whether it is a movie, image, or a first-hand written account of an event in history, it is preserved, and much as the Egyptian mummies, can stand the test of time and be revered and referenced to in the later years to come.
Dan Gorchynsky
TA: DAvid Witzling
The main meaning derived from Ashbaugh’s disappearing image ideas was to create a reproduction as fleeting as the original object an image has attempted to make last for eternity. The thought of ink vanishing, possibly reappearing simply to vanish again is very interesting. It is almost like creating a memory within an object. The old feelings and moments rising up temporarily to remind of a past time. Though it is not crystal clear, it is more like memory; small details combined to create an overall picture.
Gibson says in his poem, “
Inside the cover he inscribed something in soft graphite
Now lost
Then his name
W.F. Gibson Jr.
and something, comma,
1924”
Gibson has described this idea perfectly in this verse; a piece of history preserved with some of its parts lost. The idea seems to perfect in this way. An album to look inside and recall the past, but the album itself is a reflection of the imperfection of memory itself. The documentation of history has become more human in this way, simply because it is as unclear as the human mind.
In Bazin’s article “The Ontology of Photographic Image” the idea of a “mummy-complex” is discussed as being the urge and desire for human beings to survive beyond death in some way. Through this Bazin theorizes that “at the origin of painting and sculpture there lies a mummy complex.” The strong need to preserve one’s legacy (if not their body) is what created the culture of resemblance. It carries on today, in the use of the internet. Social Networking sites, streaming home made video, and blogs are all designed in this mimicry of real life. Photographs are posted, thoughts are written, and videos are sent across the world through a digital, cyber network. In a way, the internet satisfies and complicates the idea of the mummy complex by creating a temporary space to place one’s image with no true guarantee it will survive over time.
The idea presented by Ashbaugh regarding towards disappearing ink and the playing with of memory can be applied to the internet in many ways. Just as the mummy complex requires a sense of preserving one’ own image, time and the imperfect traditions and trends of human culture cause parts to be lost with little to no trace. No ink is present on a cyber web page, and therefore capable of disappearing without concrete evidence, just as Ashbaugh attempted. So, the mummies of the internet, since they too are not concrete, can vanish, thus defeating the purpose of preserving one’s thoughts and images within the cyber world.
Time has proven that there is no true method for a legacy to survive the weathered torment of time, and so too the internet is but another stepping stone in the advancement of technology and art but it as well is derived from man and cannot solidify history for eternity.
Robert Francis Curtis
TA: Stephen Wetzel
I believe Ashbaugh’s idea of disappearing ink was to show us how our memory works. At first there is a clear and precise image or “thought”, but as time passes, so does the ink or memory. In the beginning of Gibson’s Poem, “AGRIPPA” he has very clear and descriptive memories of the past,
“Next the spaniel Moko "
Moko 1919"
Poses on small bench or table
Before a backyard tree
His coat is lustrous
The grass needs cutting
Beyond the tree,”
But throughout the poem, he seems to be more forgetful of his memories and they fade, just as the disappearing ink fades.
“They must have asked me something
at the border
I was admitted
somehow”
As for the “mummy complex” I believe it is the way people find ways to keep a person “alive”. With photos and mummification, there is still a presence of a person when they pass away. It’s a way to keep memories of people, so that down the line, things won’t become blurry or fade away as our memory goes. Bazin could have gone either way with the internet. It can hold all of your pictures, movies and thoughts, keeping “yourself” available to the future, but also the internet can go bad and lose all of your stuff.
Carly Rieder
TA: David Witzling
Ashbaugh’s original idea for disappearing images is uniquely interesting because a disappearing ink would represent how finite everything is. Fading ink would symbolize a captured image or idea that doesn’t last, similar to “[inscribing] something in soft granite, now lost” (Gibson). Every thing passes away eventually, including granite. A disappearing image would represent this concrete idea, illustrating how all things fade away. To go beyond this idea, I think that the idea of disappearing images is also to make us strive to find true meaning in everything. It would be so easy to look at an old document—for example, the one in the simulation—and think it has nothing to offer but black smudges of ink. But to dive deeper and to find what disappeared from that document is interesting, and creates a sense of mystery and excitement. This is true in all aspects, which I think may be what Ashbaugh is inferring—there is always something that we overlook. Perhaps he is simply telling us to look closely at everything, because even something seemingly unimportant may turn out to be a hidden story.
The “mummy complex” that Bazin writes of is a person’s need to “preserve” himself or herself, as a mummy is preserved. A person may feel the need to be preserved with a photograph, or in the past, perhaps a painted portrait. Sometimes a written account of one’s life will be enough preservation. I do not think the internet satisfies the mummy complex; but I do not think that the mummy complex can TRULY be satisfied. Technology is ever-changing, and posting pictures or written accounts online to preserve a memory could fail simply because internet may not be around forever. We cannot fathom not having internet in our current day, but even now there are underlying problems going on, such as large internet companies (Comcast, Roadrunner, etc), are trying to give fast connection to only those companies or corporations that can pay more money. This means that “less important” (less well-known) companies will be stuck with slower internet (you can learn about this on savetheinternet.com). Anyhow, if the large internet companies gain this power, it will get increasingly harder to post pictures and stories onto personal web pages. I also do not think the mummy complex can truly be satisfied, simply because everything passes away (as Gibson wrote in his poem).
Bryn Unger
TA Laura Bennett
I believe that Dennis Ashbaugh’s idea of disappearing images roots in the idea of memory, and the idea that over time, memories can change the color of a house, have someone say something they didn’t, or just all together fade away. William Gibson’s poem, “Agrippa”, presents the idea that memory is an unreliable thing that changes with time. The fading image of the gun on the page represents how meanings can fade with memory over time. A line from Gibson’s poem states,
Inside the cover he inscribed something in soft graphite
Now lost
Then his name
W.F. Gibson Jr.
and something, comma,
1924
This line shows how, over time, things (such as the graphite) can fade, like memory. The disappearing image in Ashbaugh’s idea fades away, just like the meaning behind the image of the gun and the memory which created it in the first place.
The “mummy complex” is the idea that in order to survive eternally, there must be a continued physical presence. This is why ancient Egyptians mummified bodies; in order make the dead eternally survive. I believe that André Bazin would believe that the Internet satisfies the ‘mummy complex’, because of its constant presence and availability. Although the original creators of a website may no longer be present or even alive, their reputation and existence continues due to the 24-hour availability and access to the Internet. There are representations of life all over the web (such as youtube) which means that there is constantly a preservation of whoever’s life is being presented on the Internet.
Mark Scholbrock
TA: Kate Brandt
Ashbaugh’s idea of disappearing ink has to do with the idea of memories fading and reappearing. Everything deteriorates over time and with that deterioration, the memory of how it was exactly is lost. Some recollection of how it was can be obtained through reading, story-telling, pictures, etc. but the idea of the object or subject itself will never be there completely just as the physical aspect of that object will never be the same as it once was. One portion of his poem struck a chord with me in realizing this idea:
The mechanism: stamped black tin,
Leatherette over cardboard, bits of boxwood,
A lens
The shutter falls
Forever
Dividing that from this.
This portion to me, relates to the idea of a camera and taking a photo. When you’re taking a picture, your capturing the moment when something was positioned a certain way, the quality it was in that split second, and the emotion or energy that it embodied. After that shutter closes and opens, exposing the film with that print, the subject is already slowly deteriorating from what is displayed on the negative, it’s already moved out of that pose.
The “mummy complex” as explained in Bazin’s article, was the idea of preserving something over time in it living on forever. For the Egyptians, this was the act of embalming ones deceased body to preserve it, mentally reversing death, preserving life and the physical form so that it would live on forever and be remembered. “To preserve, artificially, his bodily appearance is to snatch it from the flow of time, to stow it away neatly in the hold of life.”
With this definition in mind, I would think that the internet satisfies this idea of preserving life or any object over time so as for it to be read, viewed through pictures or video, or heard at a later date. Unless this information is completely deleted from the internet, which is near impossible these days as someone has copied, downloaded, and uploaded this same information elsewhere, it will stand as a story of an object or person’s memory as it was in that place in time.
Corey Otto
TA: Steve Wetzel
The main idea is that disappearing ink would be a way to represent how things are in real life. every second an action is happening. It may be subtle and tiny, but something has happened and now it's gone. The photographic reality has the ability to capture a second and hold onto it for as long as another object does not destroy it. The lines:
Leatherette over cardboard, bits of boxwood,
A lens
The shutter falls
Forever
Dividing that from this.
To me means Gibson is making a photo album or possibly the book itself. "The shutter Falls, Forever, dividing that from this" is like putting pictures in a photo book under the plastic covering (The shutter) and having it fall forever (closing the picture in it's casing). He is describing the photographic reality we've developed in this universe. When Ashbaugh talks about disappearing ink he wanted to create a simulation of what happens every second of our lives.
The "mummy complex" however is what some consider to be this day and ages way of "preserving the past". We preserve our past via photographs just as the renaissance preserved with paintings and the Egyptians preserved with mummys and symbolic statues. Is the internet a way of preserving the past? In theory it has surpassed the photograph because people put their entire lives on a web page these days. What was only shown to a select few with photgraphs, is shown to the world now with the internet. Some could argue the internet is not a permanent way of preserving the past but then again, photographs could easily be burnt or statues over time cold erode, so nothing is ever technically permanent. But for now, the internet I feel is actually the next step and I feel Bazin would agree considering his article was written in 1945.
TA Laura Bennet
Andrew Megow
There are a couple of different ways that we could interpret Ashbaugh's disappearing images in his "Book of the Dead". In one sense, I believe that he explores the idea that the book itself is actually alive. Or if not alive, it at least mimics the memory banks of the human mind. The fading images are like memories that fade over the passing of time. Like any typical book, words and images will deteriorate but will last much longer than our own memories will serve us. Books also can be reproduced, their contents forever and infinitely replicated. Books are our means of creating a permanent record of a moment in time or a series of events. Images especially have the unique ability to freeze time, like the line in Gibson's poem "The mechanism: stamped black tin,/ Leatherette over cardboard, bits of boxwood,/ A lens/ The shutter falls/ Forever/ Dividing that from this." The mechanism of permanence is the camera. The instant the shutter falls marks the instant that time froze. It marks a particular moment in its purest form, leaving time to deteriorate the image's subjects from that instant on into oblivion.
Another way to interpret the 'fading images' could be to simply address the idea of a general impermanence in nature. Memories will fade, but so will mountains. Nothing is beyond the wasting of time. "Agrippa" is itself not exempt from this deterioration, and the fading images act as a sort of 'time lapse'. This concept is not unlike the typical short films of bowls of rotting fruit. The fading images in "Agrippa" gives the reader a unique opportunity to witness the mercilessness of time, manipulated for proper viewing and consumption.
Bazin's "mummy complex" is quite straightforward. The fear of death, the terror that grips all of us, has seen many attempts at being thwarted throughout history. Bazin believes that the first sign of this attempt at immortality came from the mummies of ancient Egypt. The same as a human body is preserved in a petrified state, a photograph, a painting, a song, or a book act as preservations of moments in time, memories, and the intangible. These are our means of grasping at a rather faint sort of immortality.
I would agree that Bazin would consider the Internet as a satisfactory medium for his mummy complex. Not only does the Internet proliferate a wide range of media outlets, but it has the ability to act as a true extension of an individual's profile. Especially with sites like MySpace and Facebook, users are consistently creating and updating their digital persona counterparts. And for the most part, the digital renderings always seem a lot more interesting than the actual people themselves.
-Nick Westfahl
-TA Steve Wetzel
The “fading images” technique that Ashbaugh and Gibson tried to use in Agrippa is a vey interesting one, one that is definitely open to critiquing and interpretation. My take on it is that it is meant to be a comment on how all things eventually fade from memory. In the simulation of the “fading images,” the figure very slowly weakens and eventually becomes nothing. This is the same thing that happens to memories. They are at first strong and full of details, but eventually time takes its toll and they become weaker and weaker until they are eventually all but gone. Parts of the poem reflect this. For instance, towards the end Gibson is describing a memory: “There must have been a true last time/I saw the station but I don't remember/I remember the stiff black horsehide coat/gift in Tucson of a kid named Natkin.” The way he describes it, it seems as if he is having trouble remembering everything (as he says, “but I don’t remember) but he does recall certain details.
The “mummy complex,” as Bazin describes it, is the idea of “preserving” yourself forever, such as through photography or a portrait. I would say that the internet definitely satisfies the mummy complex. It contains millions and millions of images, videos, and text files, all easily reproducible and easy to preserve.
Gus Ingebretsen
(David Witzling)
When I was reading the poem, I could not remove the concept of memory. Memory fades as you grow old and move on. Over time change is the constant and artifacts fade away with time as well. The ink of the poem is fading away with time just as the article mentioned, "contains the 305-line text of Gibson's memory poem about his father and his own youth (captured for reflection by the "mechanism" of a camera and a 1920 Kodak "Agrippa" brand photo album), scrolls its text up the screen once before an encryption program makes it seem to vanish, locking it up irretrievably in a kind of zen code (actually, RSA-based code) for nothingness." another quote from the article, "his distinctive copperplate aquatint etchings alluding to DNA gels or stains were also intended to vanish (though in the end there was no way technically to implement the idea)." The book of the dead relates to how things are disappearing or fading away over the time. The poem refers to the general idea of storing photographs with texts in a photo album. The poem explains how parts of the picture cannot be explained because there may not be anyone that remembers the event anymore, the memory of the details are fading away. We are only reminded of events through artifacts like photographs and the texts they come with. They are never meant to last forever but are there for another generation in a different century to see. The point being made is that the DNA as well as other things is fading away with the book. The meaning of the poem is fading away with the book too. "inside the cover he inscribed something in soft graphite/Now lost/Then his name/W.F. Gibson Jr./and something, comma,/1924" (from Gibson's Poem). The written information in the book is fading along with the memory. No one knows who Gibson is now; his life is fading away with the book. The book gives us some evidence about Gibson but he is still fading away with the book. The memory of the photos, books, poem, and the man named Gibson, all are fading away over the time.
Bazin discussed about the mummy complex and refers to art (painting to photography and cinema). In his words, "To preserve, artificially, his bodily appearance is to snatch it from the flow of time, to stow it away neatly, so to speak, in the hold of life" (p.9). He used the word "mummy" to describe the progress we evolved through and live with; memories being stored away neatly like photo albums and films. He also mentioned paintings as well because that came before photography. Preserving memories is crucial to everyone, even today. "No one believes any longer in the ontological identity of model and image, but all agree that images helps us to remember the subject and to preserve him from a second spiritual death"(p.10). This refers back to the Agrippa book and how memories are fading over time and how people are trying our best to preserves them. The Egyptians preserved their dead for the future to remind us about theirs and our history, hence the mummy complex.
I would say that the internet can be part of the mummy complex possibly but not entirely to satisfy the idea of mummy. The internet is another way of carrying memories of people over time but at the same time, it is distorted and no one can tell which is real and which is not. The more time into this new cyber age, the more memories become distorted. The perspective of memories can be altered and completely distorted from its originality. "No matter how fuzzy, distorted, or discolored, no matter how lacking in documentary value the image may be, it shares, by virtue of the very process of its becoming, the begin of the model of which it is the reproduction; it is the model" (p.14). Model, itself, is the memory of the subject. The memory is being distorted or changed over the time and how it is completely fading away with time like the Agrippa book. Internet is part of fading time/memory but in a newer form of media/medium. However, it may not completely satisfy the mummy complex idea because of how nothing can satisfy one hundred percent. Photography and cinema have come close but still not completely satisfying. Internet is a very new technological media, and it still does not satisfy.
Catie Eller
TA Steve Wetzel
The meaning which can be derived from Dennis Ashbaugh's original idea for disappearing images is that the narrator in William Gibson's "Agrippa" is longing for things of the past. He desires things which no longer exist, that have faded away just as a disappearing image. The narrator says, "He made it to the age of torqueflite radio
but not much past that, and never in that town.
That was mine to know, Main Street lined with
Rocket Eighty-eights,
the dimestore floored with wooden planks
pies under plastic in the Soda Shop,
and the mystery untold, the other thing,
sensed in the creaking of a sign after midnight
when nobody else was there." The words used in this passage evoke the idea of disappearing. He describes how the man in this passage did not make it much past the 1950's and "never in that town". This elicits the idea of the man fading away. He is disappearing. The last portion of this passage indicates the conception that there is a ghost and the man who did not live long past the 1950's could be that ghost. The narrator describes this as a "mystery untold" as the sign was creaking after midnight when "nobody else was there". The narrator describes this incident implying the idea of disappearing, something that is not present. He depicts the notion that there is no explanation behind this happening. It is a mystery, just as disappearing is of a mysterious nature.
In Andre Bazin's "The Ontology of the Photographic Image", the mummy complex is when the continued existence of the body is the means for survival. Bazin conveys preserving a body is to seize it from time, to store it away in the "hold of life", as Bazin would proclaim. The mummy complex is preserving life by representing life. I believe that Bazin would say that the internet satisfies the mummy complex. The internet is timeless, so to speak. It is a network always in support of people's needs. Furthermore, the internet is an entity which will most likely exist for a very long time. The internet represents life and contains information pertaining to life.
Rachel Marten
TA: Steve Wetzel
Ashbaugh attempted to develop a breakthrough media in which images would be written and fade into nothing, exemplifying the nothingness that consumes all things in the end, thus taking the name of H.P Lovecrafts Book of the Dead. It's interesting to me how Gibson's poem revolves to an extent around lost records, and in a passage on fossils he writes
In the banks and courthouse, a fossil time
prevailed, limestone centuries.
Illustrating the carbon that is left behind after social events, things that remain yet seem to disappear, and leave behind only hints at meaning. As time passes, all things fade.
Bazin defines the mummy complex as a focus on the survival of a corporeal body. He discusses the way in which painting and photography attempt to document and engage in a "purely psychological duplication of the world outside"
This duplication is an inherent part of the internet today. We attempt to create and transfer reality into the realm of cyberspace in which it is duplicated and reproduced again and again, until it becomes part of immortal cyber and hyperreality. I believe Bazin would see the internet as a new realm possessing a diegesis that directly represents all things that have passed within our own reality. The internet satisfies the mummy comples, a need for the senses to exist post death.
Andrew Tolstedt
TA: David Wetzling
Sometimes people like to change things even if they have been around for a while, because change isn’t always bad. In fact it may be something that people really enjoy and had no idea. Ashbaugh not necessarily changed anything but developed a new medium so that the people could look at an image of something or words and have a different appeal to it, or a different way of looking or listening to things. It’s not a bad change that people hate, but I think his intentions were to make people believe something different, make people see things different. When reading Ashbaugh’s reading I considered reading it again to try and understand what his message is. I had a hard time with this so I asked some classmates what he was talking about because I had my ideas but I wasn’t sure. I came up with the idea that he wants us to look deeper in his readings and see what is missing. It may not be that same for everyone but for me this is how I felt about it. In his message he mentions the quote “dividing that from this” and to me this means that the meaning of his passage and the material that we read are divided and we need to figure out why.
The "mummy complex" is a state of mind in which people feel the need to keep something of themselves that people will recognize them by. It’s self explanatory in the way that you write a letter about your life or what you want to be remembered by. Then once you have gone and been excepted in the after life will it be read by others and that’s what you’re mummy complex is.
T.J. Waite
Steve Wetzel
Chris Schasse
TA Laura Bennett
Ashbaugh’s original idea for disappearing ink was to have a page in the book Agrippa where the text and a picture slowly disappeared as it was exposed to light.
The concept of disappearing ink is written on the minds of humans. We see it in dreams, as the memory fades like a puff of air. We see it as time slowly takes our memories away, like this excerpt from Agrippa (A Book of The Dead),
“Inside the cover he inscribed something in soft graphite
Now lost” (Gibson)
We see it in day-to-day things, in hallucinations, when we have to look twice to see if we really saw something. It’s written on the part of our mind that believes this world is not just about numbers and mathematical equations, that there is something mysterious and unexplainable about reality.
The concept of disappearing ink is not something Ashbaugh failed to implement. He merely failed to implement it in a way that people can perceive with their eyes. The reality is that all ink disappears. All pages of all books will someday turn to dust. All cities will fall into ruins. All civilizations will eventually die.
Humans have been trying to fight the concept of disappearing ink since civilization began. In Bazin’s The Ontology of the Photographic Image he writes,
“The religion of ancient Egypt, aimed against death, saw survival as depending on the continued existence of the corporeal body.” (Bazin, 9)
The ancient Egyptian’s, after going through all the rigorous rituals in order to properly wrap and preserve the dead body, would then build an entire pyramid over it, protecting it from invaders as well as from the elements. The Egyptians were utterly obsessed with this idea of preservation, and were scared to death with the concept of “disappearing ink;” that someday they may simply cease to exist like everything else. Time was their worst enemy, worse than any drought or famine, worse than any attack or pillage, worse than their own corruption. They knew that time could bring down mountains.
Bazin talks about how Louis XIV did not have himself embalmed because he was content with a portrait painted of him. Bazin argues that people do the same thing with photographs, protecting family albums as if the dead members were buried within them.
The Internet does not in any way satisfy the mummy complex. Yes, there are sites dedicated to archiving videos (like sponsored and independent films), but those videos are backed up somewhere else, on film reels in a warehouse. And the data from the online videos are also backed up on multiple external hard drives in an uncompressed format. The Internet is here today, gone tomorrow. It is a method of communication, and it is not treated as sacred like family albums are. No one uploads their videos onto YouTube, then deletes them because they are “backed up” or “preserved.” YouTube gives you reason not to care about your videos, because you see how many more there are out there. It does exactly the opposite of the mummy complex, making us apathetic to whether we are preserved or not, because we know there are millions of others out there just like us.
Ashbaugh’s original idea for disappearing images, I believe, is the notion of the disappearing ink being like what actual life is. An event in time is something that only happens for that point then continues moving forward. Images are able to stop that time and make it forever frozen there.
“Leatherette over cardboard, bits of boxwood,
A lens
The shutter falls
Forever
Dividing that from this.”
Forever dividing that from this is saying that there is this reality and photographic reality. The shutter falling is dividing the two realities. Ashbaugh wanted to imitate the actual reality by having ink disappear.
The mummy complex is the desire or need to conserve oneself, like to conserve oneself in time by making a piece of art that will “live” on passed your days. So I believe that the internet does fulfill the mummy complex in the sense that you can post anything on the web and it should be there forever, but then again if technology has taught us anything it’s that technology can fail so in another sense it doesn’t really fulfill the mummy complex.
Doug Mellon
TA: Steve Wetzel
Ashbaugh's idea for the disappearing images seems to be a statement on the frailty of the human memory and its relation with an original instance in time. These instances cannot be truly captured by photography or writing and be replayed with the vividness of the original instance. Therefore the metaphor created by the images and text fading from the page is that throughout time the memories we hold will slowly wash away leaving nothing but an outline of what they once were. William Gibson remarks on this same principle in terms of photography in his poem when he says:
A lens
The shutter falls
Forever
Dividing that from this.
These four lines supports Ashbaugh's statement. The instant a photograph is captured it effects the originality of the moment. There are then two separate memories of the instance. The real instance lived in begins to slowly fade from the memory while the photograph remains, it does not deteriorate, but holds less resemblance to the originality than the memory itself.
The “mummy complex” is the idea that humans feel the need to record their existence in life in order to remain the world when they die. Bazin used the example of paintings of oneself as a form of preserving one's existence. At first I wasn't quite convinced that the Internet was a good example as well because of it's intangibility and it's uncertain future. However I do believe Bazin would classify the Internet as satisfying the “mummy complex”. This is mainly because Bazin addressed two goals of paintings to be expressive and psychological. This can be said about the Internet as well. People post on forums because they have opinions which coincides with the expression of painting. Along with the expression of ideas they hope that others read their posts and acknowledge their opinions. This satisfies the “mummy complex” in that the writer wishes his opinions be read in a time other than that of which he posts them.
Nathaniel Winter
TA: Laura Bennet
This was a very interesting reading but I enjoyed the change in pace. Ashbaugh’s original idea for disappearing images focused on the fading memories of the past. The flashes of fading ink are like the memory process using faint details of the past to put together an image or memory. The simulation of the fading ink was very neat, I could not help but watch it several times to try and read what it said. After the fact I realized it was a lot like trying to remember something from the past and only remembering a split second of the memory, but trying over and over to remember. Reading William Gibson’s poem was a great help in understanding this idea. In his poem we ourselves can try and visualize the book and the process of piecing all of the images together.
The mechanism: stamped black tin,
Leatherette over cardboard, bits of boxwood,
A lens
The shutter falls
Forever
Dividing that from this.
This section of the poem really defined the connection between the images of the past in the book and the images of the past in our minds. Our mind acts like a camera “The shutter falls/ Forever/ Dividing that from this” is our mind taking a memory.
Bazin’s article The Ontology of the Photographic Image brings forth the idea of the ‘mummy complex’. Bazin attributes “the origin of painting and sculpture there lies a mummy complex” the main purpose of mummification was to preserve the human body which in turn preserves the persons life. Does this idea of mummification translate to the Internet? Yes, if the idea of human mummification is to preserve ones life and achievements the Internet can achieve the same thing. Through blogs, videos, websites, and everything else you can put almost every thought or idea on the Internet, but like mummification, who knows if it will last forever. There is no way to tell if the Internet will get wiped out or modified and we have to start over, so I think that Bazin would totally agree that the Internet satisfies the mummy complex.
Kirk McCamish
T.A. Steve Wetzel
I believe that Ashbaugh’s intention was to discover a new way of advertising and presenting ideas to the public he wanted to capture the feeling people gets when things disappear right in front of them. Using the disappearing ink with the images creates a mysterious spectacle for the art and in Gibson’s poem there’s a similar spectacle of mystery as well, “Inside the cover he inscribed something in soft graphite
Now lost Then his name W.F. Gibson Jr. and something, comma, 1924” This line comments on the age of the piece ‘now lost’ and ‘something, comma’ specifically comments on the fact that this book is so old that the text is barely legible in some parts.
Bazin’s idea of the mummy complex is a process that preserves the origin of a painting, sculpture, or body which in a way cheats death or time; because the object may no longer exists but the image, sculpture or statue still does. The prolonged existence of these figures has a bigger impact on time because although the original is gone the copied version could be seen as evidence of its life span. I think Bazin would include the internet as an example of the mummy complex because the internet preserves millions of people, articles, songs, and several other substances. Web pages such as Facebook can be viewed as records of its member’s lives and if the person were to die today their FB page would still exist. Lyrics from songs that were made decades ago can be found on the internet and are presented as if they’ve just been discovered or as an artifact, but either way its preserved in a since, and prepared for display.
Venise Watson
David Witzling
The Agrippa (A Book of the Dead), created by Dennis Ashbaugh is a collection of a series of photographic images that would seem to “disappear” if exposed to light. The Agrippa Files is a website displaying some of the images from the book simulated to show how they would have faded. Additionally, the website also contains the poem “Agrippa” by William Gibson which was also featured in the book. Ironically, the original Agrippa has said to have disappeared because most professors and scholars view the images and poem on the website over the actual book. Ashbaugh’s idea of “fading images” relates to the idea that old technology is often shadowed by newer, improved technology – much like how his book is shadowed underneath the internet website. Gibson examples this theory in his poem: “A lens/The shutter falls/Forever/Dividing that from this. /Now in high-ceiling bedrooms,/unoccupied, unvisited.” The photograph spoken of in Gibson’s poem will always be there, but it is untouched and forgotten. In the same matter, the book will always be there, yet, it is somewhat forgotten.
The “mummy complex” is preserving a person or thing in order to make a representation of it. In many ways the internet provides information describing old ideas in order for people in the future to learn the history of the ideas. However, Bazin would probably disagree that the internet as a whole is similar to the “mummy complex” because the majority of the information on the internet is not meant to be preserved. The internet is ever-changing and much of the information forgotten not glorified.
Alison Korth
T.A. Laura Bennett
Dennis Ashbaugh’s notion of disappearing images comes from the idea of the omnipresent passage of time. Images are captured moments of time. When pictures fade it resembles death. The poem talks about the concepts of time and mortality. The poem is about memories and experiences from the past. The poem is also filled with references to the idea of “the mechanism”. The mechanism is a metaphor for time. He implies that the passage of time has good qualities, but in the end leads to death. The idea of a digital picture allows us to understand the mummy complex. The ancient egyptian idea of immortality. With a digital picture we are able to save it forever and it does not fade away. The internet is an extremely useful toll for this, as we transfer things all the time. Information is saved on the internet all the time. This information becomes "immortal" unless there is a chance of "destroying the internet". Still, it is the information that becomes "immortal" and not the individual itself.
^ Kyle Arpke
TA: Bennett
Ashbaugh Had a very interesting idea with the vanishing images. Which also would lend itself to the Agrippa Files. This concept of a certain type of digital distribution has always caught my attention. "Today, Agrippa is in danger of being erased by its own legend. Early on, Gibson’s poem was leaked onto the Internet to flourish in innumerable ghostly copies." This quote shows us how the internet at this point is still something that is not fully understood, and its purpose isn't really clear yet. I related this quote to one in the poem. "When the colored restroomwas no longer requiredthey knocked open the cinderblockand extended themagazine rackto new dimensions, a cool fluorescent cave of dreams
smelling faintly and forever of disinfectant,perhaps as well of the travelled fears of those dark uncounted others who, moving as though contours of hot iron, were made thus to danceor not to danceas the law saw fit." This quote made me think about the changing mediums of technology and entertainment, relating back to the other quote its shows that we are always changing how we distribute entertainment. The entire idea behind the fading ink is to change what we already know, much like the internet, or other digital creations changed many other art forms.
In the Mummy complex, the author presents the idea of having a photo preserve moments in history. Almost like the image keeps it alive. Going by this idea the internet most certainly supports the mummy complex and what it says about images. Realistic life can never fully be preserved but we the internet displays these "moments" in time and some of them can be exaggerated or manipulated. For that reason the Mummy complex would support the internet.
Nick Aldrich
TV Steve
Ashbaugh’s idea for disappearing ink was meant as part of a larger project devoted to the concept of fleeting memory and reminiscence. In reading about this project, I was struck not with Ashbaugh’s ideas, but rather with the presentation of Gibson’s poem on a self-destructing floppy disk. Ashbaugh contributes to the memory by designing illustrations that with time become nothing more than memory. This, coupled with the small number of released copies of the book, led to large speculation and discussion and few people who had experienced this project at all. This is the large ideal behind the project, especially the poem; which speaks of the difference between a memory and a recreation. To that end, the poem was created to only exist as a memory, and ironically was preserved as a dead recreation. The only enduring record of this piece (that will survive more than one viewing) is on the internet. The video recording of the initial “transmission” along with the transcription of the poem.
“The mechanism: stamped black tin,
Leatherette over cardboard, bits of boxwood,
A lens
The shutter falls
Forever
Dividing that from this”
This section of the poem most literally speaks of the division between a memory and, in this case, a photograph. The recreation of this poem is the only way many of us will ever experience it, and in a strange way, answers the second part of this question. The Mummy Complex, as defined by Bazin, is the desire to live on after death. Originally conceptualized physically, in the age of “plastic art” the term took on a more psychological meaning. However, the internet provides a living mausoleum even more easily than a photograph. A photograph or a film clip documents a real person as they exist physically in the world around them. However, with the internet, we have the power to write our own “virtual epitaph.” The world of Facebook, or MySpace is one where every person has a place to document themselves and their existence and be ensured not only preservation, but observation. In an infamous example, school shooter Jeffery Weise’s LiveJournal acount is still active and viewable.
(http://weise.livejournal.com/)Suffice it to say, the internet has become the Social Embalming for the next generation.
I think Ashbaughs intentions with disappearing ink was to create a new way in recording, or even a new type of medium through which we see things. This disappearing ink goes past normal ways of recording things and there is a noticeable difference he wants us to see. Normally, people will just read what is on the paper, but this type of ink makes us dig deeper into the context and search for more meaning. I think he is also trying to get at the idea of mortality, and that nothing lasts forever, not even his recordings.
“A lens
The shutter falls
Forever
Dividing that from this.”
I think this quote helps define the difference between regular recording, and Ashbaughs ideas. There is a division between the two just like a lens open and closing. And I also believe this quote is creating a metaphor to disappearing ink in the sense that the lens closing makes things go black or disappear.
The “Mummy Complex” deals in general with the idea of preservation. Just like the ancient Egyptians would preserve the dead through this process, people today are doing other forms of preservation. This biggest form of preservation in modern history is the photograph which Bazin himself says it has the same preservation power as mummies. These new forms of preservations are how people of modern history leave behind their own legacies and memories long after they are gone. I think the Internet satisfies the Mummy Complex because the Internet is simply a result of newer, better, technology. Turning to this digital age, almost everything can be posted digitally onto the Internet and thus lengthening the preservation of things. People can now post their photos, videos, writings, etc. into a digital world that will outlive their original sources and the people who have posted them.
Kyle Probst
Laura Bennett
In Gibson’s poem, memory is meant to be seen as failing to hold images of complete truth. Like disappearing ink on a page, it will maintain pieces of the original text, but through time, fades. We have to put the pieces together.
They must have asked me something
at the border
I was admitted
somehow
and behind me swung the stamped tin shutter
across the very sky
and I went free
This passage expresses the knowledge that there is more to the memory that can be grasped. The author knows there’s more to story, they don’t remember exactly how they got through, but the important part of the memory was the details of the shutter and the feelings this action evoked. Trying to remember something, especially an event long ago, can only be accurate about the things we felt were important at the time. For some reason, noticing the sky at that moment was more important than the whole picture of what actually happened.
Bazin’s article discusses the “mummy complex” of preserving one’s mark on the world. It must exist through the work, ideas, and published thoughts, as a mummy is preserved in lasting form. The Internet touches on this idea by making it possible for anyone to put themselves out there at any moment, but it may not fulfill the greatness that Bazin was focusing on.
Cassie Hutzler
TA Steve Wetzel
When Ashbaugh implies the original idea of what disappearing images are, memory is what I think he is talking about. The memory is a complex thing that not a lot can understand. How can we only remember some stuff? and why does some of the stuff are bad things? and that’s what I think Ashbaugh is talking about. Ashbaugh disappearing images, images that appear and disappear, just like memories, they appear and disappear at random. The challenge for us is keeping memories, watching a sun set or watching a car drive away. A week later, are we able to remember those moments in time? and if we are how long time we remember them? All of these are disappearing images (memories), if are unable to remember them, it just reinforces the idea of what Ashbaugh’s thoughts of memory being the disappearing images. “Just as I myself discovered one other summer in an attic trunk, and beneath that every boy’s best treasure of tarnished actual ammunition real little bits of war but also the mechanism itself,” (Gibson part 2). This is just a good example of what memories (disappearing images) are able to do. Finding something you have seen for a long time, and by feeling it and seeing it, it brings back memories that long forgotten.
Andre Bazin’s mummy complex, could be another way for capturing and preserving things. Referring back to the article Bazin told us, “The religion of ancient Egypt, aimed against death, saw survival as depending of the continued existence of the corporeal body,” (Bazin 9) By doing that they used mummification. “To preserve, artificially, his bodily appearance is to snatch it form the flow of time, to stow it away neatly, so to speak, in the hold of life,” (Bazin 9). When reading this article it reminded me of Walter Benjamin’s article “The Work of Art in the Age of Mechanical Reproduction.” Both Bazin and Benjamin seem to have the same views on the aura and capturing and preserving the original object(s). “No one believes any longer in the ontological identity of model and image, but all are agreed that the image helps us to remember the subject and to preserve him from a second spititual death,” (Bazin 10) that quote is what I think Bazin would think of the internet. It would help us remember the person (or thing), but capturing [and or preserving] the original person [or thing] is better.
TA: K. Brandt
From what I gather from the Book of the Dead seems to be a reverse Mummy complex. I got this impression from the line “A Kodak album of time Burned” from the poem. The Kodak album symbolizing the extension of a single moment of time (mummy complex), and the destroying or “burning” represents the disappearing images within the Book of the Dead. The Mummy complex, which is summarized by Bazin, is the immortalizing of an individual through preservation of ones image/body/identity. The Book of the Dead reverses this mummy complex in much of the same way that the Portrait of Dorian Grey by Oscar Wilde does. Within Dorian Grey a man (Dorian Grey) receives a most peculiar portrait of himself from an artist of the name of Basil. Much from the idea from Louis XIV who felt he was content to survive by portrait instead of embalming, a much queer reverse affect happened to Mr. Grey in where his portrait aged in a dusty old attic where Mr. Grey stayed young and puerile. But, unlike the reverse effect of Dorian Grey and his portrait, the Book of the Dead’s reverse effect is associated more with the mechanical art of the photograph.
The mummy complex associated with the internet I find to be somewhat of an interesting idea. Unlike the photograph preserving a moment of time, and cinema preserving a duration. The internet has the ability to preserve a thinking process to later be interacted with. Just like how the surrealists viewed photographs as hallucinations to be later transcribed to film as a trip. The internet serves as your own drug you create to be later used by someone else.
Nicholas Lawrence
Laura
Ashbaugh’s original idea for disappearing ink was such an ambitious one that it still has not some true. The idea of printing something with the intention that it won’t last is somewhat a foreign idea for human’s who have been trying to leave a permanent record of themselves since the beginning of time evident from the early etchings of cavemen on their walls. Ultimately, I think Ashbaugh’s book was supposed to illustrate how everything fades and disappears over time either through death or decomposition. The interesting part is the etchings that are left behind which I interpret as the idea that all matter is neither created nor destroyed. So even when something fades or is destroyed or dies from its recognizable state, it is still out there somewhere, just in a different form. Gibson’s poem “AGRIPPA” has this very same idea within it as well which made it a perfect accompaniment to Ashbaugh’s book. Gibson’s poem references ‘the mechanism’ throughout his poem, which seems to allude to the unavoidable process of life and death and the affect of time on everything. Gibson explores these ideas by talking about his experience looking through an old photo album of his family and revisiting his old hometown. When Gibson tells the story of a ricocheting bullet coming two feet from his head he comments “So that I remember the mechanism”, showing that when he was young he didn’t understand the mechanism and needed reminding of it. The quote also shows that his attitude toward the process of life and death was fearful compared to at the end of the poem when he is “laughing, in the mechanism.” So now he understands that everything must end, like Ashbaugh’s fading images, and has accepted it as a natural process of life.
In his article “The Ontology of the Photographic Image”, Bazin describes what he calls the ‘mummy complex’, which is the basic human instinct of trying to outlive death in some form or another. The Egyptians tried to do this by mummifying their dead to prevent death; although people know now that death is inevitable and unstoppable, we still have images created of ourselves and our loved ones to help us “remember the subject and to preserve him from a second spiritual death.” Originally, this was done by painting but this method was surpassed by film and photography which “satisfy…our obsession with realism”. The photograph also allows the subject to be “freed from the conditions of time and space” thus preserving the subject for us like mummification used to. There is even a newer technology that allows images of people as well as their ideas to live on past their natural life, the internet. I think Bazin would consider the internet to fit in with the ‘mummy complex’ because it provides a almost everlasting imprint of the person out there to view. Take Facebook for instance, which allows you to create and personalize a page about yourself in order to interact with others. Well if an unfortunate accident happened and this page was not deleted before the person died, the page will go on living in the cyber world seemingly forever.
Lanae Smith
TA: DAvid Witzling
Ashbaugh’s idea for fading ink in Gibson’s poem adds to the overall theme of the poem. There are numerous references to forgetfulness and a sense of feeling lost within the poem. One of those references is here, “Then his name, W.F. Gibson Jr. and something, comma, 1924.” The narrator of the poem seems to be reading something that is difficult to understand and is considerably faded. Ashbaugh directly connects with this sense of difficulty understanding the words, by presenting the poem in this exact manner. By having the poem fade away, it reinforces the ideas that Gibson puts forth.
The “mummy” complex is the desire to cheat death by creating “mummies” that supposedly live on forever. It relies on the fascination to be dead, but also to be recognized after they are dead. I think that the internet does satisfy the “mummy complex”. The internet allows the information to be stored forever and be accessed by a wide variety of people. For example, if someone dies, their youtube videos do not die with them, they live on as long as no one else takes them down. The internet allows for a part of the dead person to live on within the system.
Charlie Ripple
T.A. Kate Brandt
1. I think one meaning of Ashbaugh's original disappearing images would be that he was trying to remember family or friends. For instance in this line, "'Papa's mill 1919', my grandfather most regal amid a wrack of cut lumber, might as easily be the record of some later demolition..." Gibson is talking about his grandfather and how he had some type of a lumber mill. Gibson goes on to say that his grandfather was very "regal" despite working a very simply and blue collar job. Gibson finishes this line by explaining how the mill might as well just be a date of its demolition. Gibson is clearly remembering and honoring those that have passed before him.
2. The "mummy complex" is essentially the comparison between ancient Egyptians ritual of mummifying or preserving their dead, and the inspiration or motivation behind artwork. Based on the idea of the "mummy complex" and how it continually revolves around the need to preserve oneself I believe that the internet does satisfy it. The main reason being that today anything and everything that you may want find or learn about is on the internet. For instance some news blooper from five years ago is on Youtube and it will be there forever. Both the horrific events of The Holocaust and the euphoric events of The Fourth of July are sealed into the the internet forever. Also, based on the fact that any individual can make themselves known forever on the internet through Facebook or blogging, I believe that it does satisfy the ideas behind the "mummy complex".
Connor Murray
TA: Katherine Brandt
Ashbaugh’s original idea for disappearing images is that it ties in personal memories and history and how throughout time, both start to fade and seem unclear because the exact details aren’t clear anymore. With the invisible/disappearing ink, the text in the Agrippa book fades away and is no longer visible to people. It’s like Alzheimer’s in a way.
(metaphor.) In Gibson’s poem, he says
"Steamboat on Ohio River",
its smoke foul and dark,
its year unknown,
beyond it the far bank
overgrown with factories.
With the photograph that is being described here, the year is not known to the viewer, but the person who took the picture was present for the event so that moment in history is not lost entirely, just lost in someone’s memory.
In lieu to Bazin’s article, the mummy complex is to preserve people but through portraits, and not bodies. With the Internet, the mummy complex is present because the websites that people create are a part of their personal history, even if the viewer doesn’t know who they are. Also, there are thousands of pictures on the Internet of random people doing random things and that “mummifies” them in space and time forever on the World Wide Web.
Kaitlyn Murray
TA Kate Brandt
Agrippa’s (A book of the dead) fading ink seems to be a direct representation of human memory. How when something happens, you can remember it clearly, but after a while it begins to fade out (unless it’s a really important memory). Eventually the memory will fade completely away, just like the ink blots.
“The mechanism: stamped black tin,
Leatherette over cardboard, bits of boxwood,
A lens
The shutter falls
Forever
Dividing that from this”
In this quote from Gibson’s poem, he seems to be hinting at making something last forever. The lens part makes me think that its directed towards pictures taken by cameras.
The “Mommy Complex” is the idea of one wanting to immortalize themselves. People want to be remembered in some way or form, such as a portrait or a biography. Just like how pharaohs immortalized their dead bodies through the mummification process. The internet sort of satisfies the Mommy effect. You could make a face book or a website with your name and face on it witch would immortalize you. Unfortunately the internet is always changing, so a certain website may be deleted in a few years, but then again it might not. So it does fallow the “Mommy complex” for now.
Ashbaugh’s original idea of the fading images is to visually represent the fading of human memory. In the majority of arts, the ability to have a permanent representation of the subject matter allows for accurate recall of the past. Painting, writing, and sculpture all have the potential to be a permanent representation of what had existed before the present time. Without these records, our past could be lost forever because the human memory is not reliable or objective. The fading of the images visually shows us what we all have experienced, forgetting. If we try to recall an event from our past, the memories we have retained are not clear and detailed. There are only a few details we can recall. But those few details can unlock more details by association. This part of the poem seems to talk about associations in memory.
A flat-roofed shack
Against a mountain ridge
In the foreground are tumbled boards and offcuts
He must have smelled the pitch,
In August
The sweet hot reek
Of the electric saw
Biting into decades
In this section we find a description of a sawmill brought about by the associations of; a shack, tumbled boards and offcuts, the smell of pitch, and an electric saw. Each of these images are related to each other in that all can be found in a sawmill. But instead of an elaborately detailed account of the items at the sawmill in question, Ashbaugh give us a few seemingly random details that can bring about a more details recollection of the sawmill.
The “mummy complex” is the desire to avoid oblivion by leaving behind a permanent representation of a person or historic account. The Internet satisfies the “mummy complex” only if the Internet itself can survive the test of time. Just like historical documents, statues, paintings, and burial grounds, if the evidence of a person/event ceases to exist then the person/event ceases to exist.
Nathan Irish
TA Kate Brandt
After reading the article on Gibson's idea of fading ink, I feel as if Ashbaugh was trying to revolutionize art. For example, he wanted to create a new way in which we perceive art and how those images appear to us. I believe he wanted to us to ask why he would do such a thing, which brings up my next point. I feel as if he wanted to create a way to hide his works so they could not be reproduced or stolen. Gibson describes this idea when he states in his poem, "Inside the cover he inscribed something in graphite, now lost." In addition, he talks about how his grandfather was "prone to modern materials." I think this refers to how he used the invisible ink as a tool to hide written works and he too was "prone to modern materials."
When Basin talks about the "mummy complex, she is referring to the idea that works of art are, at times, preserved. Just like a mummy, works of art, whether they are paintings or sculptures, are preserved to last centuries and to keep their original beauty. I think that she would say that the Internet satisfies the mummy complex. The Internet is used to preserve documents, while shown to the mass public. These documents will be preserved for centuries for everyone to see.
Erik Wagner
T.A. Steve Wetzel
Ashbaugh’s idea of disappearing images can be seen as a representation of the importance put in recollection or memory of what is seen and not simply taken for granted. The disappearing images would only be remembered if the image was not only looked at but taken into deep consideration or analysis in order to figure out its importance. In keeping in mind Gibson’s poem, the idea of disappearing images also comes across in it. Gibson describes various images that he has seen and has, perhaps, hard copies of. He describes other images that seem to come from his memory and these are reminiscent of the decrease of his memory over time. These more vague memories are like the disappearing images. What can be remembered is only what is truly unique or substantially significant in experience. Gibson's memory, as a kind of disappearing image, is clearly selective in the following passage.
"They must have asked me something
at the border
I was admitted
somehow
and behind me swung the stamped tin shutter
across the very sky
and I went free
to find myself"
The "mummy complex", according to Bazin, is the notion of preserving one's existence (through painting, photography, sculpture, or in some other art form) so it can be a representation of our life. "It is no longer a question of survival after death, but of a larger concept, the creation of an ideal world in the likeness of the real, with its own temporal destiny" (10). Even though Bazin wrote this article much time before the idea of the internet was even invented, it can be said that the internet does satisfies the mummy complex. The internet allows for photographs and films to be stored without an expiration date. The internet allows for a "preservation" of someone's life in a way that it can be accessible to basically anyone with a connection to the web, at any time, without temporal expiration.
Marisela Rodriguez Gutierrez
TA: Steve Wetzel
I think Ashbaugh’s fading ink was meant to emphasize that everything material is ephemeral. Eventually, it all fades away to nothing, and all we have are our memories of it (similar to the memories shown by the photographs in the poem). This is shown in the poem at the beginning, when the author finds the Agrippa album. The author says, “The string he tied/Has been unravelled by years/and the dry weather of trunks/Like a lady's shoestring from the First World War/Its metal ferrules eaten by oxygen/Until they resemble cigarette-ash.” In the poem, the string holding the book together is crumbling away to dust, eaten by time. If Ashbaugh had succeeded with his vanishing ink, he would have given us a brief glimpse of past objects. The images of those objects would have soon faded away, however, and we would have been left with only memories.
The mummy complex is the desire to create a legacy, an eternally-lasting memory of yourself that will live on long after you are dead. This could be achieved through preserving your corporeal body in paintings, photographs, etc., like the kings and queens who insisted on having their portraits done. It could also be achieved through the things you did during your life, like a book you wrote or a humanitarian project you did. I think the internet both does and does not meet that need. Yes, you can put pieces of yourself on the web for the world to see (presumably for eternity). However, the internet is so incredibly huge that those pieces of yourself can easily be lost and never seen by anyone (also possibly for eternity).
Bethany Davey
TA: Kate Brandt
#1. For the impatient among you- skip about three minutes into this clip.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=el4eUKmLujg
You only need to watch for a minute, though I'd encourage anyone to watch the rest (it is however, a major spoiler for those who intend to watch the show.)
This is an excerpt from the series finale of the HBO program "Six Feet Under," Claire attempts to take a picture of her family on the front porch before getting in her car to start a new life. Her brother, Nate, (deceased) appears in a ghostly form and reminds her, "You can't take a picture of this, it's already gone."
That line seems so poignant and relevant to Agrippa. Photographs are an element of documentation but their tangible nature- the ability of the photograph to suspend time is misleading. Yes, in the poem we can read a vivid description of a photograph- but we cannot re-experience the moments.
""Papa's mill 1919", my grandfather most regal amid a wrack of
cut lumber,
might as easily be the record
of some later demolition, and
His cotton sleeves are rolled
to but not past the elbow,
striped, with a white neckband
for the attachment of a collar.
Behind him stands a cone of sawdust some thirty feet in height.
(How that feels to tumble down,
or smells when it is wet)"
This stanza opens with a detailed recounting of what the speaker sees before him, and ends with longing. The smell and the feeling is gone. The sense of loss and longing resonates so heavily here, as it well should- for who among us hasn't longed for a moment of which a photograph is a pale reminder?
Agrippa through the (proposed) use of disappearing ink and the included encrypted disk articulate the relationship between artifact and memory.
#2. The ‘Mummy Complex’ refers to mans desire to cheat death. Whence applied to art Bazin writes, “…Photography does not create eternity…it embalms time, rescuing it simply from it’s proper corruption.” In the same way that ancient Egyptians preserved bodies in the effort to preserve life, digital reproduction and the internet sustain- and make accessible- works of art that may otherwise fall by the wayside.
Meghan Strobel
TA- Steve Wetzel
I feel that Agrippa's A book of the dead is a good representation of memory. When you first learn something or see something its very prominent in your memory. Just as in the book you are seeing the image clearly but slowly it fades away. Just as your memory does if you do not constantly revisit the material. A quote below from Gibson's poem states:
"The mechanism: stamped black tin,
Leatherette over cardboard, bits of boxwood,
A lens
The shutter falls
Forever
Dividing that from this."
I believe that this quote is describing the mechanism which is the camera. The camera can take a photograph that can last forever.
The "Mummy Complex" is simply the idea of preserving humans. Making someone or something in some cases last forever. Giving others the sense that they may still be "alive", by still giving them a presence in life. In the sense of the internet, even after your gone your "stuff"(videos, pictures, blogs, etc.) will still be floating around. However if your "stuff" is not being viewed or read, how alive is it? So even though you are available to the future you might not actually be viewed and thats where the internet doesn't really keep someone alive.
Amber Blanchard
T.A. David Witzling
When Gibson said
"Like a lady's shoestring from the First World War
Its metal ferrules eaten by oxygen
Until they resemble cigarette-ash"
in his poem, I feel this reflects the idea of the fading images because it shows how we only see something, or think something for a fleeting moment and then its gone, and there is no way of capturing it.
The "Mummy Complex" is the idea that we need to have a way in art to save these thoughts, and things we see that will never last. The internet is a good modern example of that because not only can we store these things to an almost unlimited capacity, we can share them almost instantly with one another. But negatively everything you have ever said online, or done, is also able to be stored, and many other things people may never want to have preserved.
TA: Kate
Marco Cannestra
I think that the idea behind Ashbaugh's use of invisible ink had to do with things fading away in time. As time passes, things decay, crumble, and disappear. Once smooth, gold, and reflective, Eqypt's pyramids are now uneven and jagged. I think this relates with Gibson's statement:
"A Kodak album of time-burned
black construction paper"
The album can't last forever, and neither does disappearing ink. It's there, and over time, it fades away, only distilled in one's memory of how it used to be.
Bazin discusses people's want to be remembered in life, namely, their physical body or some form of look-alike, such as a painting, statue, or photograph. He speaks of the 'mummy complex' as "the preservation of life by a representation of life." I think that although we no longer mummify people (in America, at least) we still have ways to preserve ourselves. One recent way is by making our own webpages, full of pictures of ourselves, listing our interests, and stating our opinions. Perhaps the most popular way to do this, is by creating a Myspace. Even after you die, the page still exists, and this has even become a popular phenomenon, people preserving dead people's myspaces. http://mydeathspace.com/article-list.aspx
This website archives people's myspaces that have died, and anyone can browse through them. I had a friend a couple years ago who committed suicide, and she had a page. After she died, all of her family and friends would still leave her comments and send messages of love and how they missed her and what they were doing, as if she could really read them. It's almost like she was preserved through her page, and people were still able to 'contact' her. I think Bazin would agree that by people making their own Myspace page, they are imprinting themselves and 'mummifying' themselves on the internet.
Dawn Borchardt
TA: Steve Wetzel
After reading about the “Agrippa,” I believe what Ashbaugh was trying to do was through his idea of “disappearing images,” make a new medium in which art and other things are captured. I also think that another reason he was doing this was to say that things don't last forever. They could be there one minute and gone the next so make the the most of what time you have. The idea of something disappearing when exposed to a certain object such as oxygen, or as William Gibson puts it “eaten by oxygen.” Makes a new way to display your work or ideas.
The “mummy complex,” is an idea that is derived from the practices of the ancient Egyptians. The Egyptians would preserve their dead so that they would be remembered. This idea can be done in other ways too such as a painting, or other forms of reproducing something so it will be remembered after it is deceased.
As i stated before the “mummy Complex,” is the act of preserving something. I believe that the internet does a very good job at doing this. Some examples portraying this idea are things such as fan sites for bands that are no more. It is a place where people can talk and remember what used to be. There can also be websites designated to people who are deceased and there is a place online where people can go and pay their respects and have something to remember the person by.
Brad Schiefelbein
T.A. Laura Bennett
The meaning behind the fading images, in my opinion, is to replicate the tendency of the human memory to fade. This goes along with the poem where, in the beginning we have detailed descriptions of the images that are very in depth and, towards the end, the recollections become more and more vague. It is obvious that some of the details have been forgotten.
"They must have asked me something
at the border
I was admitted
somehow"
This quote shows the uncertainty our author has to the details. towards the end.
The "Mummy Complex" is the urge for humans to preserve their bodily appearance, in one way or another, so it can live on long after they are gone. This representation could be anything from a statue, to a painting, or a photograph.
I believe that the internet does satisfy the "mummy complex" because it can preserve peoples' images for a potentially infinite amount of time via pictures, movies, and other forms.
Forrest Falconer
TA: Steve Wetzel
The meaning of Ashbaugh’s original idea of disappearing images is mainly a metaphor for time and how most things disappear over the course of it. The ink was thought by many people to have a certain ingredient that made it disappear when exposed to light. This quote from the poem sounds like it has to do with the disappearing ink:
"I hesitated
before untying the bow
that bound this book together."
He was on edge and scared to open the book for fear that he would in somehow damage the material inside, even if he hadn’t known about the ink. Like many historical books, pages usually fade over time anyway. The disappearing ink seems to just be a mock of it.
The “mummy complex” can basically be summarized as another way for preserving things. Such as how a mummy’s body is preserved and can last for decades, certain other materials can always be kept in tact. This “mummy complex” having more or less the opposite effect of the Book of the Dead as it preserves whereas the Book of the Dead deteriorates. I believe that Bazin would say that internet satisfies the “mummy complex” due to the fact that it can save and/or preserve documents and files and many other things forever.
Derek Reilly
TA: Laura Bennett
I think Ashbaguh’s original idea of disappearing images represents memory. In one moment the picture is right in front of you and you can see it clearly and when it starts to fade away you can no longer see it. Memories work in much the same way. When you first witness something you can remember it closely and detailed. As time passes the memory starts to fade and you remember less and less, until finally you can recall no more. In Gibson’s poem he says, “there must have been a true last time I saw the station but I don’t remember, I remember the stiff black horsehide coat, gift in Tucson of a kid named Natkin, I remember the cold….” He vaguely recalls being in the station before but can’t remember specifically as time has passed, just little details here and there.
The mummy complex is the way in which people preserve their lives over time, like through paintings or photography. I belive the Internet satisfies the mummy complex. There are many ways the Internet allows people to preserve parts of their lives through things like blogs and photo sharing websites. Their thoughts or images of their daily lives can still be seen online long after they’ve passed.
Tanisha Richter
TA: David Witzling
What I came across when reading about Ashbaugh's idea for disappearing images and in Gibson's poem, I thought of memories. Gibson seems to be recalling events that happened in the past. Gibson is looking at pictures and remembering past events. With disappearing images, someone could record their past without letting anyone else see it. They would know it was there but no one else would be aware of it. Its like the name that once was on the front cover of the book. On the front cover there was “inscribed something in soft graphite now lost”. The person who inscribed the 'something' knew what it was but no one else does now.
The Mummy Complex is all about preservation. Paintings and photographs are all ways of preserving loved ones who have passed on. With all these things its almost as if they aren't really gone. I think the internet allows this to happen today although not always in a good way. The internet immortalizes things, if it hits the web, it will always be there. Sometimes things are put on the internet that weren't meant to be immortalized but forever will be online. The internet in a way allows the dead to stay alive.
Sara Nesbitt
TA Kate Brandt
Kevin Witkowski
TA David Witzling
I think the purpose of disappearing images is to give new meaning of an image. When we first see the image, it is clear and easy to see. We are able to put meaning in the image. When the image disappears, we must depend on our memory to keep meaning on the image we just saw. Since our memory is not perfect, the meaning can change. There fore, the meaning of the image we first see is different from the meaning that we get after the image disappears. In the poem, it reads, “Dividing this from that”. The disappearing image divides the meaning that we get from first seeing the image from the meaning we get later when the image only exists in our head.
The mummy complex is the idea of keeping an image’s meaning alive even though the image itself is dead, gone, not existent any more. I think Bazin would think the internet is a form of the mummy complex. One of the internets purposes is to serve as an archive to old forms of media. The old forms of media, such as pictures or videos, can be accessed by anyone at anytime keeping that media alive, even when its original aura is gone. The original may be gone, but its meaning lives on through the internet.
Kevin Witkowski
TA David Witzling
When Ashbaugh’s idea of disappearing images is shown in the simulation, I understood a new concept that I did not get from reading the description. After seeing the image literally fade away and then reading Gibson’s poem, I got a meaning of memory being important, even with it maybe not always being correct. As the image disappears, and as the article states, doubts of the existence of the book come about, we only have memories to continue the existence of it. While these memories can be some proof that the book exists, they may be slightly distorted and therefore not completely accurate. The poem has the same idea when talking about the mechanisms. “Bored, tried shooting down into a distant stream but
one of them came back at me off a round of river rock clipping walnut twigs from a branch two feet above my head. So that I remembered the mechanism.” In this line about the 9mm we see the idea of the memory being so strong it would not be forgotten.
In discussing the mummy complex concept brought up by Bazin, I am reminded of the term aura, which is similar to the idea behind it. Mummy complex looks to keep work authentic, described through the process of mummification. As for the internet, I see ways that Bazin could realize that mummy complex is upheld through media being saved for all to see on the internet, but at the same time many images and videos can be untrue on the internet which is against the mummy complex off preserving the truth and authenticity of an original.
Matt Prekop
TA: Kate Brandt
I think that Ashbaughs original idea for disappearing images was an attempt to create a historical document like pictures or text that, contrary to most books and photographs, did not last forever. In Gibson's poem he often refers to a "mechanism". The way he describes the "mechanism" and the way the poem is structured as though the writer was looking through a photo album, leads me to believe that this mechanism is a camera. In fact, while describing the mechanism in his poem Agrippa, Gibson writes, "A lens, The shutter falls, Forever Dividing that from this." In other words, a picture forever divides the past from the present. It can also be concluded that in a broader sense, this "mechanism" could be anything which divides the past from present, such as old war ammunitions. The idea that this "mechanism" lasts forever is the concept Ashbaugh was questioning with his idea for disappearing ink. If the ink disappeared, then the picture or text would in fact not last forever.
The "mummy complex" describes the way people tend to want to create something which represents themselves and will be around long past their death. The Egyptians did it with mummification and later people did it by painting portraits. At the time the article was written, the most popular way to satisfy the "mummy complex" was to take a photograph. In this day and age, I believe Bazin would describe the internet as a way of satisfying the "mummy complex". Not only does it store data, such as pictures and text, for a seemingly infinite amount of time, it also gives users the ability to post their own pictures and videos of themselves. It satisfies the "mummy complex" because it lets people "live on" through pictures, videos, and text.
Dennis Ashbaugh's idea of disappearing images corresponds to the attributes of memory. Things that happen at one point in time will be forgotten, or (if not forgotten) diminished in one's memory to a mere faded image. In his poem, Ashbaugh uses numerous metaphors to paint a picture of the fading away of past events. One of these was especially striking to me:
Now in high-ceiling bedrooms,
unoccupied, unvisited,
in the bottom drawers of veneered bureaus
in cool chemical darkness curl commemorative
montages of the country's World War dead
In this stanza, Ashbaugh seems to be exploring those things that are nostalgic and almost completely forgotten. But his words don't just relate to memories. There is a link between the loss of ideas and artifacts, and ephemeral film. Ephemeral films are essentially the faded memories of a past, imprinted onto celluloid. Interestingly, and corresponding to Ashbaugh's artistic vision, ephemeral films are doomed to be erased, since the physical pieces of film (like memories) are impermanent.
The "mummy complex," described in Bazin's article, is the desire to keep the moments and objects of the present intact, so that we can look back on them later. It began as a desire to conquer time, but it evolved into a desire to specifically preserve art. According to Bazin, we are not so much concerned with the preservation of our bodies (the literal meaning of the 'mummy complex') as we are the preservation of our art - of our creations. Bazin would have certainly thought that the internet satisfies the 'mummy complex.' After all, many of the aspects of the internet are continuations of the ideas of photography and film - two media that Bazin points out in particular as satisfying the 'mummy complex.'
Eric Grycan.
TA: David Witzling.
The disappearing images represent the disappearing moment in life. When it was seen, it was seen as unique. Seeing it was special, just "Like the first time you put your mouth on a woman." Then the fact that it disappeared represents the fleeting of these moments of life. The text disappeared just as our lives disappear a little at a time.
The Mummy Complex is defined says that ancient Egyptians wanted the body’s of the dead to stay intact. They believed that in order to lead a happy after life, the body of the diseased must stay in tact. This relates to the Internet because the Internet is a way to preserve "life". The Egyptians would make statues and monuments in order to keep the dead alive. We do similar with the Internet. Long after someone is gone, we can see pictures of him or her, or see that person's work on the Internet. So the Internet diffidently satisfies the mummy complex.
Ta:
Kate
Matthew P. Curley
Ashbaugh's idea of a disappearing image is the fact that you can create a sense of temorary and a sense of forever or "immortality". Even though these images seem to disappear they can never be truly gone. They will forever be remembered in our minds and never "die". And these two can be kept through the camera... “A lens/The shutter falls/Forever/Dividing that from this.”He says that the camera can create these two realities or worlds through the way you use the camera. The images in the Agrippa are not bound there but forever in photograph.
The essence of a mummy is the artwork of capture the true meaning of human and what a human is. It preserves the "essence" of a human and what it is. It captures the difference between the temporary of life and the immortality of capturing a human life in the form of life and capturing what life is perceived as by the Egyptians. I would say that the internet a pretty good thing that is similar to the mummy complex because it captures an image but is able to be brought up by anyone and by as many people in the world.
David Witzling
The Agrippa book was originally an art project that was made to hold memories. The book wanted to realistically portray these memories and memories don’t last forever. The makers of the book wanted to use disappearing ink to portray the temporary nature of these memories. In his poem, William Gibson describes various photos and memories that go along with them. He talks about the camera capturing his memories and refers to it as “the mechanism.” “The mechanism: stamped black tin,/Leatherette over cardboard, bits of boxwood,/A lens/The shutter falls/Forever/Dividing that from this.” He describes how the camera is freezing a moment in time and that moment is now separated from the present moment.
The “mummy complex” that Renoir describes is the human need to preserve an image in order to cheat death. The Ancient Egyptians preserved the bodies of their dead because they thought that if the person still looked alive then they would live on, albeit in the afterlife. Renoir specifically focuses on photography as the current form of art to satisfy our “mummy complex,” or our need for absolute realism in our preservation of life. He states, “The photograph as such and the object in itself share a common being, after the fashion of a fingerprint.” He’s describing how closely a photograph resembles reality, so much so that it is that reality.
I think that the internet is a great example of the “mummy complex.” It has been used to chronicle every part of our lives since it was created. History lives on in the internet. You can find information about any day, photos from any place, and blog accounts of any person. The best way to preserve your life is through the internet and you can share it with the whole world.
Megan Linner
TA: Laura Bennett
Ashbaugh’s took the idea of a disappearing images and used it to symbolize a captured image or idea that doesn’t last, “(inscribing) something in soft granite, now lost” (Gibson). This represents the idea that nothing is permeant that everything eventually fades away, including something like granite. Using an images that disappears reflects this idea. I also think that the idea of disappearing ink expands the idea of how much our imagination can go. With the idea of using our imagination it also us to think beyond the normal when analysis a document, the thoughts that don’t exist in written form but are there in the authors intention is like the disappearing ink. If we look into the deeper meaning of this we are less likely to over look things.
The “mummy complex” that Bazin write about is a person’s need to “preserve” himself or herself, as a mummy would be preserved. A person can preserve themselves i different ways, in a photographic image, self portrait or even in an abstract for of art. “Those grey or sepia shadows, phantom like and almost undecipherable, are no longer traditional family portraits but rather the disturbing presence of lives halted at a set moment in their duration.” (Bazin) Meaning that the family portraits are away to preserve the family at that moment and time. They are beyond themselves locked in place, unchanging. I don’t believe that Bazin would carry the Mummy Complex over to the Internet because the internet hasn’t been around long enough for it to truly be able to give the idea of preservation. There is the idea that it could preserve but the internet has came along way since it started and original websites have been over thrown by the new. Its possible that internet will be able to accomplish this one day.
Zachery Holder
TA: Laura Bennett
The idea of "fading images" is pretty interesting. In a way, it can be related to life very much so. We live our lives, eventually forming an identity and a legacy, and once we die, or "fade away", we are physically gone and cannot be seen, but our legacy lives on. For better or for worse, we somehow left our mark on the world. A caption of Gibson's poem led my thoughts in this particular direction.
Inside the cover he inscribed something in soft graphite
Now lost
Then his name
W.F. Gibson Jr.
and something, comma,
1924
When I visualize this stanza, I picture W.F. Gibson Jr. disappearing after he wrote the date, leaving nothing but his written documents.
The mummy complex deals with this same type of idea. Back in the day, people were mummified, which is a process that prevents the body of a human from decaying, and essentially leaves the empty body as a representation as to who that person used to be. It is almost like a reverse fossil with the same root of preservation. I definitely believe the Internet would be considered a form of the mummy complex. It will never die, so therefore is an everlasting representation of some ones life, though all the bodies of work they have posted on the internet though their life, whether it be articles they may submit to a research organization, or home videos they post on youtube.
Dennis Ashbaugh had the idea to make images on paper disappear when they were exposed to air. He was going to put these images in an art project known as Agrippa (A Book of the Dead). I believe the theme that Ashbaugh was going for was to show a deterioration process in real time right before the viewers eyes. This could represent how memory is fleeting, or perhaps how everything eventually ends and goes away. In William Gibson’s poem Agrippa, he makes reference to how time erodes memory as well as objects.
“Inside the cover he inscribed something in soft graphite
Now lost
Then his name
W.F. Gibson Jr.
and something, comma,
1924”
The “mummy complex” eludes to the Egyptians practice of mummifcation and their belief in life after death. A photograph for example keeps an image alive after the moment is gone or “dead”. The internet takes the Mummy Complex to the next step by instead of just capturing the moment, it can be altered and be given a completely new life. I suppose this could be called Re-animation, it truly gives life to these pieces of work.
Nelson Schneider
TA: Kate Brandt
I believe that the lines "The string he tied; Has been unravelled by years; and the dry weather of trunks; Like a lady's shoestring from the First World War; Its metal ferrules eaten by oxygen; Until they resemble cigarette-ash" best describes my understanding of the poem. The pictures that the poet talks about in the work won't last forever, like how the disappearing image doesn't last in the book. I also agree with what others said about how the pictures represent memories, which fade over time, like the image of the gun.
The Mummy Complex seemed to be a way that art changed through time, to keep up with what technology is currently supplying us. I would say that the internet does this, as it is changing everyday.
Mallory Davidson
T.A.: Kate
I believe Ashbaugh's idea of disappearing images, is that they are timeless in a sense that you can always reminisce about an significant event, without adequate amount of visual proof or evidence. The simulation of the book on the Agrippa website serves an example of a "Kodak album of time-burned". When clicking the play button an image of a gun flashes. In order to get a better look of the image one will have to click repeatedly on the play button.Experiencing this online simulation is similar to seeing time pass and reoccurring as something to treasure in the topic of contemporary art.
2) Bazin defines the mummy complex as a object,person,story or idea in the past which is referred back to as something "embalmed" in the real world. His ideas of bringing something back to life is mentioned in his essay. If Bazin was alive I believe he would agree, that the internet somewhat satisfies the mummy complex. The internet can be utilized in ways to conceal world history and current events. If one was interested in viewing people that are no longer living, one could access a picture and read a autobiography. Art works that are ancient in time (photograph, painting,sculpture, etc.) continue to remain relevant to todays teachings and conversations of stylistic choices made by an artist.
Dominitric Griffin
TA: David Wetzling
The idea of Agrippa is a work of art that provoked a deep train of thought for me. The concept of the fading image being consumed by a code relates to the viewer being locked into the mechanism that is consumer culture and advertisement; the digital . The book of the dead is a reflection of the idea that the internet and modern technology has consumed our souls and will lock us into a matrix of surrealism that distorts our interpretation of reality and the world in order to further push us into mindless consumer indulgence. We will all be subject to the curiosity and mystery of reality provided for us by the producers of commercial advertisement and entertainment. The only way for us to redeem ourselves will be to submit to the will of the production monster. We will in turn, turn to the production monster to make our own mark on society. This is what is referred to as the mummy complex in which we seek to preserve ourselves in the world by making our mark on humanity usually via the internet. Bazin would say that the internet would satisfy the mummy complex because it provides us a medium to immortalize ourselves among trillions of units of data.
Jack Kirby
TA Laura Bennet
Kurt Raether
Steve Wetzel
Ashbaugh's disappearing images technique was meant, by the artist, to simulate how memory fades, how events change meaning and significance with time.
The string he tied
Has been unravelled by years...
This entire book, the entire idea of a "Book of the Dead" shows us that death is the only thing that is really concrete, by creating something that is not concrete at all: it fades and withers in time, just like any human being.
His memory gets better in the middle of the poem, as more details are remembered:
His cotton sleeves are rolled
to but not past the elbow,
striped, with a white neckband
for the attachment of a collar.
But then near the end of the poem he reverts back to abstractions and short phrases:
The fine rain horizontal
umbrella everted in the storm's Pacific breath
tonight red lanterns are battered.
The "Mummy Complex" is a want or need for preservation, and I think the internet satisfies that... think about all the websites, weblogs, social networking profiles... all these things we leave as bits of ourselves.
I think Ashbaugh’s idea to have diappearing images, directly correlates with the nostalgia of the Gibson’s poem. In order to capture the essence of an experience that has passed, it is of course, most efficient to visually display the passing of the design. Gibson describes, “Behind him stands a cone of sawdust some thirty feet in height.
(How that feels to tumble down, or smells when it is wet)”. The reader did not witness the cone of sawdust that stands so tall. The reader is not even witnessing the picture. But the part in parenthesis is the part that really captures attention, through Gibson’s sensual reminder. He prompts the reader to think about the picture in a physical sense and directs an imaginative connection to the Gibson’s description.
According to Bazin, the “mummy complex” is this urgency to capture and preserve life through artwork. The culture of 1945 had a certain obsession with legacy. Portraits and other artworks were an attempt to capture that legacy, perhaps before it’s too late. Bazin believed that the photograph was the first time this legacy could really be captured in a realistic fashion. I think, today, he would argue that the Internet and internet archives are the most valuable of mummified material, because of it’s ability to preserve in a intangible, non-spatial way. The material, in itself, is even intangible, and therefore is indestructible… forever preserved in cyberspace.
T.A. David
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