Excavation #01-06

Abstract

In this flyer-series, content is queried as a vectored relationship between image and writing. The reference framework is Samuel Beckett’s queries in the “novellas” Ill Seen Ill Said/Company/ Worstward Ho/Stirrings Still (FF—faber & faber).

The concept of excavation determines the hatching of content through a work of staging: the performed container. A ontological status is ascribed to such containers: they feature a category of dis/play which is neither an exhibit, nor a show.

The lineup (Germ. Ausstellung, Norw. Oppstilling) is discussed as a dis/play in which the nature of what is seen and said is yet undetermined, or uncertain. From this basis the notion that the Beckett estate clusters the signature, event and context—rather than being external to Beckett’s work—is suggested.

From this ground the possibility that Covid19 (pandemic and the lockdown as life-work) can fruitfully be considered an estate, is tentatively demonstrated and argued, from the vantage point of terrestrial estates, that may hatch and develop in the wake of Bruno Latour’s work, and Donna Haraway’s scheme of staying with the trouble.

Which is also why the geological time-frame (cf, anthropocene) is discussed. Hereby, the /Covid-19 estate/ is launched.