Disturbing spaces: a metaphor for the challenge of structures and a symptom of spatial difference when operating within set frames. The manipulation of the space of activity, of the 2-D page, of the 3-D room, the juxtaposition of words, pictures, objects, bodies; the spatial and temporal configuration of things, their distance. But also, the metaphorical space of reflection, of ordering and classification, of orthodoxy and the canon; the domain of methodologies and typographies, of linguistic orders, of visual structures, of cognitive processes.

How does one, as a philosopher, a writer, an artist move in-between spaces, from the mental space of the formulation of ideas and rhetorical operations to the embodied space of physical impact and back again? And how does one act on the metaphysical space of theory from within the space of experience? This issue of parallax wishes to invite a discussion on strategies that by disturbing the spatio-temporal configuration of experienced space open up the space for critical reflection, or confront the canon with a premise that nourishes the possibility of doubt. What demands does the frame (of reference, of regulations, of limitations) make on the structure of the physical object? What are the frame/object’s internal and external limits and how can one invent and sustain alternative conditions of meaning and intelligibility?

Disturbing spaces entails knowledge of the object’s physical location and therefore depends on the context of its experience and the conditions of its exposure. Thus, one may arrive at a disjointed critical stand by way of upsetting the order of things, yet this disruption of the frame of reference will also cause one to fall back to a provisional starting point. Is it, then, possible to retain this experience and to use it in order to reflect on and repeat such a performance? Where would one locate strategies that disturb the embodied/mental space and that tease out their distance? Would a self-reflective operation create a new space, reconfigure the same space anew or remain in a conceptual space? Questioning the notion of impossibility and of impossible strategies, not as a prohibition but as a tangent, this issue of parallax allows its own space to become a meta-space of dialogue across philosophy, literary and art criticism, semantics and discourse analysis.

Submission Deadline: 1 April 2009

Potential contributors are encouraged to contact:

Eve Kalyva
parallax
Centre for Cultural Studies
School of Fine Art, History of Art and Cultural Studies
Old Mining Building
University of Leeds
Leeds LS2 9JT
UK

Email: parallax@leeds.ac.uk