My propositions serve as elucidations in the following way: anyone who understands me eventually recognizes them as nonsensical, when he has used them—as steps—to climb beyond them. (He must, so to speak, throw away the ladder after he has climbed up it.)
He must transcend these propositions, and then he will see the world aright.
Meine Sätze erläutern dadurch, dass sie der, welcher mich versteht, am Ende als unsinnig erkennt, wenn er durch sie – auf ihnen – über sie hinausgestiegen ist. (Er muss sozusagen die Leiter wegwerfen, nachdem er auf ihr hinaufgestiegen ist.)
Er muss diese Sätze überwinden, dann sieht er die Welt richtig.
Ludwig Wittgenstein, Tractatus Logico-Philosophicus 6.54,
english translation by Pears/McGuinness
reposition was founded in 2022 to present diverse research approaches at the University of Applied Arts Vienna. The journal is open to all topics and disciplines at the Angewandte, and to researchers of all levels. We seek to shed light on a research environment that is diverse, personal, and critical. We also want to facilitate dialogues between existing theoretical and methodological positions in order to enable a challenging and dynamic research discourse. We are utilizing the Angewandte’s environment to stimulate connections, discover new positions, repositions and personal encounters. We seek to further develop peer culture and enable research.
Repetition is the key… is it, though? The second issue of reposition already deviates from repetition – it introduces a repositioning. We use the act of repositioning to convey ideas in motion rather than looking for certainties and quality assurance (keyword: peer review). Through this exercise, we discover promises for potential rather than keeping promises. Imagining new potentials offers new opportunities. We believe that a certain connection in sense and sensing, in emotion and reasoning helps to recognize exciting and promising new paths. Endless possibilities are on offer. Yet choosing the one that will make a difference allows us to formulate truly new positions, such that pull the future into the present. After all, it is not infinite offers that create solutions, but specific ones.
In total, readers will encounter eight positions in this issue. Allow yourself to be moved and transformed by these positions. Thomas Ballhausen (author and philosopher) and Elena Peytchinska (Institute of Fine Arts & Media Art – Stage and Film Design) contribute the first few pages of reposition with Herbarium of Words: Literary Style at the Scale of a Street. The essay artistically explores the interrelations of space, language, and literature and takes us on a walk through Vienna’s streets. The herbarium serves as a point of departure for historical observations, which is seen as a form of subjective and personal archiving of urban experiences by means of linguization. Their performative approach combines film stills, poetry, and theoretical backgrounds to transform the boundaries of text and bibliographic formats.
This is followed by Pamela Breda’s (Digital Arts) contribution Notes On Artificial Intelligence And The Rise Of New Images. She explores how hyper-realistic computer-generated images (CGI) reshape our perception of reality and its implications for human creativity. Her considerations stem from an ongoing interdisciplinary artistic research project that combines positions from visual cultural studies, cognitive psychology, and perceptual theory with historical perspectives. Breda’s contribution reflects on the historical background of CGI, its influence on various domains of individual and collective life, and its philosophical implications. While Ballhausen and Peytchinska take us on a walk around boundaries, Breda provides current viewpoints on the position of AI and its past implications.
Leo Hosp (Center Research Focus) widens our perspective through her contribution I Can See Queerly Now. Queer Perspectives On Project Work, which is a reflection on queer working practices. Hosp intertwines her own experiences of queerness with insights from collaborative project work within the Action for Sustainable Future (ASF) hub. Hosp’s contribution refrains from defining queer research. Instead, it explores different aspects and approaches to deal with an inherently fluid term to propose a queer project work manifesto. Presented as a momentary insight into Hosp’s research, it is not to be understood as a finalized outcome but an open invitation.
Gabriela Krist (Institute of Conservation) and Marie-Christine Pachler (Institute of Conservation) provide solutions for challenges in seemingly obvious everyday situations in their contribution on Sustainable Behavior with Cultural Heritage: Study on Visitor Awareness. This text provides insights and findings from a study of awareness-raising measures conducted at Schönbrunn palace. This site is particularly popular with tourists and must deal with the wear and damage of displayed objects. As conservators, the authors draw attention to the damage that visitors can cause, and examine different educational measures to improve awareness among tourists and staff members.
In his contribution Post-Digital Angst – The Direct Experience, Mong-Sum Joseph Leung (Center Research Focus, PhD candidate PhD in Art) explores anxiety in the post-digital age, examining it as a basic anthropological condition in relation to concepts such as hollowness, nullity, and the unknown. Leung intertwines personal experiences from daily life with his artistic practice and ontological reflections on the human condition, working with Heidegger’s notions of Sorge and Angst, to reflect on affective experiences in a digitalized world.
Conny Zenk (Center Research Focus, PhD candidate PhD in Art), Bianca Ludewig (researcher and journalist) and Magdalena Scheicher (researcher) are interested in taking not only unusual paths but also using vehicles in different ways. In their contribution A Collective Cycling Body Of Sound, they reflect on the bicycle as a medium for art and sound and present activist strategies of collective cycling to open up queer-feminist, solidarity-based perspectives on the city. In doing so, they explore the possibilities of public space as a sound space and discuss insights from Zenk’s activist practice. Inviting Ludewig and Scheicher for interviews, Zenk discusses bikefeminism and counterpublics, and approaches soundrides as a form of empowerment.
Continuing with the topic of sound, Sophie Luger (Institute of Architecture) and Lenia Mascha (Institute of Architecture) address the increasingly important issue of urban noise pollution. SoundCape. Combating Environmental Noise in Urban Areas explores how sound and noise prevention can be incorporated into architectural design. To develop building structures for noise control in urban environments, the authors examine contradictory historical approaches from architecture and acoustics to learn about the relation of sound and material. Their approach focuses on geometry; experiments with Chladni patterns show that geometrical and material properties of architectural façades have an impact on spatial acoustics and result in the design of ornamental elements that can reduce unwanted noise in cities.
Taking repositioning literally, we finally return to action and its suspension, or better put, to Withdrawing the Performer. Facilitating Participatory Sense-Making, by Imani Rameses (Center Research Focus, PhD candidate PhD in Art), Charlotta Ruth (Angewandte Performance Lab), and Jasmin Schaitl (Angewandte Performance Lab). They combine their approaches from visual arts, choreography, and cognitive neuroscience to examine participatory modalities in immersive performative settings through the lens of social cognition. They focus on the role of the facilitator, a nearly invisible and overlooked, but highly important part of any performative situation. Working with facilitator experts in a practice-based peer-to-peer exchange, the authors seek to understand different methods for reducing thresholds and modulating participatory situations.
We are grateful to all researchers who provided insights into their work processes, to everyone involved in the production of this volume – from the graphic design to the editing – and, above all, to our extensive scientific advisory board, without whom this journal would not be possible. Once again, we gathered international experts from a wide range of fields to review submissions for this issue. They enriched the contributions by providing insightful and concise comments. Without this level of collegial, critical, and ever-curious feedback, reposition would be unthinkable. Our interdisciplinary approach and the ways in which artistic research challenges the traditional peer review system make this task not an easy one. We would like to thank all those who engaged in this experiment with curiosity and great commitment.
We continue our mission to understand research differently. To this end, we proudly present these eight positions, which are endeavors of curious repositioning. We hope to have made a difference.
Alexander Damianisch
Project Lead & Editorial
Contributions of this issue
Alexander Damianisch (Project Lead and Editorial): Foreword
Thomas Ballhausen (author and philosopher) and Elena Peytchinska (Institute of Fine Arts & Media Art – Stage and Film Design): Herbarium of Words: Literary Style at the Scale of a Street
Pamela Breda (Digital Arts): Notes on Artificial Intelligence and the Rise of New Images
Leo Hosp (Center Research Focus): I Can See Queerly Now. Queer Perspectives On Project Work
Gabriela Krist (Institute of Conservation) and Marie-Christine Pachler (Institute of Conservation): Sustainable Behavior with Cultural Heritage: Study on Visitor Awareness
Mong-Sum Joseph Leung (Center Research Focus, PhD candidate PhD in Art): Post-Digital Angst – The Direct Experience
Bianca Ludewig (researcher and journalist), Magdalena Scheicher (researcher) and Conny Zenk (Center Research Focus, PhD candidate PhD in Art): A Collective Cycling Body Of Sound
Sophie Luger (Institute of Architecture) and Lenia Mascha (Institute of Architecture): SoundCape. Combating Environmental Noise in Urban Areas
Imani Rameses (Center Research Focus, PhD candidate PhD in Art), Charlotta Ruth (Angewandte Performance Lab) and Jasmin Schaitl (Angewandte Performance Lab): Withdrawing the Performer. Facilitating Participatory Sense-Making
Scientific board of this issue:
Dr. Lotte Arndt, Dipl.-Ing. Dr. Jamilla Balint, Dr. Tino Buchholz, Univ.-Prof. Dr. Renate Buschmann, Prof. Dr. Tiziana Caianiello, Dr. Giovanna Caruso, Dr. Jakub Ceglarz, Dr. Adam Czirak, Dr. Laura Demeter, Dr. Robert Dörre, Dr. Nihad El-Kayed, PD Dr.in Silke Felber, Prof. Dr. Andrea Funck, Dr. Natascha Frankenberg, Prof. Dr. Ursula Frohne, Prof. Dr. Sabine Gebhardt Fink, Prof. Dr. Rolf Großmann, Dr. Timo Hagen, Dr. Kurt Heutschi, Dr. Regine Hess, Dr. Daniel Irrgang, Dr. Simone Jung, Dr. Michael Kliën, Prof. Dr. Andrea Kretschmann, Dr. Isabella Pasqualini, Dr. Nils Plath, Ass. Prof. Dr. Brahma Prakash, Dr. Michael Räber, Prof. Dr. Christine Reeh-Peters, PD Dr. Robin Rehm, Prof. Ben Santo, PD. Dr. phil. habil. Sabrina Schenk, Prof.in Sara Schwienbacher, Prof. Dr. Jan Söffner, Dr. Björn Sonnenberg-Schrank, Dr. Johanna Steindorf, Dr. Sarah Straßmann, Dr. Ulrike Töchterle, Dr. Alexandra Vinzenz, Dr. Stephanie Weiss, Dr. Anna Laura Wieczorek, Dr. Ulrike Wörner von Faßmann
Imprint
reposition Journal of reflective Positions in Art and Research
Support project for research documentation at the University of Applied Arts Vienna
alexander.damianisch@uni-ak.ac.at
wera.hippesroither@uni-ak.ac.at
Publisher:
Universität für angewandte Kunst Wien
University of Applied Arts Vienna
Oskar-Kokoschka-Platz 2
1010 Vienna
Project Lead and Editorial: Alexander Damianisch
Project Management and Editorial Assistance: Wera Hippesroither
Translation and Copy Editing: Melanie Sindelar, melaniesindelar.com
Graphic Design: HammerAlbrecht, hammeralbrecht.design, in cooperation with Paul Jochum, pauljochum.com
Print: Bösmüller Print Management GesmbH & Co KG, Stockerau
ISSN: 2960-4354 (Print) 2960-4362 (Online)
ISBN: 978-3-9505090-8-3
doi.org/10.22501/repos
© 2024. This work is licensed under CC BY-NC-ND 4.0.
© 2024. This work by Alexander Damianisch is licensed under CC BY-NC-ND 4.0.
reposition ISSN: 2960-4354 (Print) 2960-4362 (Online), ISBN: 978-3-9505090-8-3, doi.org/10.22501/repos