Artistic Research Does #7 - 'Tactics for Not Knowing' by Emma Cocker

This research exposition is conceived in conjunction with the publication, Artistic Research Does #7 (2023), which presents a translation of Emma Cocker’s essay ‘Tactics for Not Knowing: Preparing for the Unexpected’, originally published in Elizabeth Fisher and Rebecca Fortnum, (eds.) On Not Knowing: How Artists Think, (Black Dog Publishing, 2013). See https://i2ads.up.pt/publicacoes/artistic-research-does-7/ In addition to the translation and re-publication of the original text, the revised version of ‘Tactics for Not Knowing’ in Artistic Research Does #7 offers two further interventions in the form of annotations. In one column of margin notes, Cocker shares additional reflections, referring to some of her more recent artistic research projects and collaborations that continue to resonate with the concerns of the original text. In parallel, a second column of margin notes comprises the titles of additional pieces of contiguous writing drawn from two collections of Cocker’s writing, The Yes of the No (2016) and How Do You Do? (2023). Within this online version these margin notes include hyperlinks that enable the reader to access these different thought-fragments of writing. Artistic Research Does is edited by Catarina Almeida, André Alves. Artistic Research Does is published by i2ADS – Institute of Research in Art, Design and Society is a R&D unit based at the Faculty of Fine Arts of the University of Porto (FBAUP), financed by the Portuguese agency Fundação para a Ciência e a Tecnologia (FCT).

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WHAT THE BODY CAN STORE

Exercise a range of mind and muscle movements to prevent the self from stiffening into stable form. Identified, the body is all too easily fixed, immobilised within a nameable mould. Without flexibility, the body loses its resilience, becomes easy to break (down). The resistance of the body must not be too rigorous then, not too rigid in its stance. Practise litheness, lightness of touch. Make nimble moves. Be quick to grasp, swift to remain ungraspable. Proprioceptive heightening — increased capacity to grasp the position of one’s body in relation to itself, the strength of effort employed in the activation of one’s moves. The agile body conceals its effort well, movements initiated from places least expected. Attend to the affective micro-gestures of the dissident body, its insurgent energy events. Renew one’s confidence in what the body can store. Abandon hard drives, their data all too easily corruptible or lost. Embody one’s knowledge through muscle memory recalled in action, a knowing known only in its practise.

From Emma Cocker, How Do You Do? (Nottingham: Beam Editions, 2023)

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