A reflection on the value of research in the career of an artist and of those who, on the level of practical, theoretical and creative reflection, deal with art. A historical-philosophical excursus on the nature of the words “research” and “researcher”, in order to contextualise their weight and meaning in an aesthetic framework, but above all in a political and institutional context. What research for the world of artistic training? To what extent and how do the Italian Academies of Fine Arts guarantee a path that is truly and profoundly oriented towards the development of thought and the innovation of languages? How long will it take to achieve the best possible outcome of the reform of the AFAM (Higher Education in Art, Music and Dance) sector, which has been awaited for 20 years, also establishing – among other things – the possibility of accessing grants and postgraduate research courses at the same university level?
This is the question posed by Angelica Speroni, President of the Council of the Academy of Fine Arts in Rome and national representative of the students of the Academies and ISIA, in a text published in the catalogue of the “Presenza” exhibition, which we publish here in full, courtesy of Manfredi Edizioni.
The exhibition, which is expected to open in Rome on 28 May at the prestigious headquarters of the National Institute of Archaeology and Art History, brings together the work of 13 students and recent graduates, including works of painting, sculpture, video, installation and photography, to mark a project promoted by the Conference of Student Presidents of the Academies of Fine Arts and ISIA, with the support of the Academy of Fine Arts in Rome. The first stage took place in Palermo, on 14 October, at the Cantieri Culturali alla Zisa: playing on the theme of “waiting”, the public was invited to engage with a scenic and symbolic “void”. A way to reflect on the twenty-year battle waged by the students that never reached a just conclusion: even today, governments and politicians are being asked to complete a reform process that brings the educational institutions chosen by those young people – and there are many of them, and their numbers are constantly increasing – who are determined to explore the world of the arts, through study, research and profession, up to international standards.
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We who are the future
by Angelica Speroni
“Plato identifies three modes, or degrees, of knowledge of the object: onoma, logos and eidolon, i.e. the name, the conceptual definition and the sensory image. These lead to true knowledge, which takes place in the soul, which is at once episteme (knowledge), nous alethes (evidence of the thing) and intuition. The first two correspond to the same degree but have a different nature, while intuition, which the philosopher himself defines as the closest to the fifth degree “by congeniality and similarity” (Letter VII, 342d), is the only possibility of understanding the truth. The thing itself, which cannot be entirely translated into the intelligible, remains on a different and detached level, the fifth.
Plato’s discourse and thinking, when he reaches the fifth degree, is not “a science like any other: it cannot be communicated in any way, but like a flame it is kindled by a leaping fire: it arises suddenly in the soul and then feeds on itself” (341c-d). It is an unspeakable knowledge, an intimate participation of the subject in the object, absolutely personal and incommunicable, which does not allow for sharing but is configured as a participation in the thing.
Therefore, knowledge, even if made possible only by intuition, cannot in any way dispense with a logical-intellectual process, which proceeds by degrees. These cannot induce or force understanding; they are not sufficient but all necessary, and their weakness is that of the human intellect, which proceeds through them and knows no other way. The intuitive leap is configured as a going beyond and therefore is not intelligible, but (wonderful aporia) must proceed through the intellect. It can be said that this last step means opening oneself up to research, or going beyond the known and grasping that which, once grasped, will (perhaps) become rationally investigable. And to do this, one must observe carefully and ask oneself that doubt (skepsis) which inevitably leads to research, which requires research, which compels movement.
Who does this? In our country, the word “researcher” transforms the verb skeptesthai into a role, and its synonym, although not yet commonly understood, is “artist“. If you ask us who does this, we will answer: the artist, who is a researcher. And their cradle, the institution in which they receive their education, is a place where not only intellectual research is carried out, but also operational research, a place that was created as an Academy in the sixteenth century precisely to accommodate research. Precisely because, even if today it seems that some have forgotten it, study, and therefore teaching, has always been associated with research. In addition to the paths of science and philosophy, man has seen another way to grasp the absolute, the truth, the thing itself or whatever you want to call it, that which, to paraphrase Agamben, remains unspoken in what is said. This is the path of art, which proceeds like all knowledge through the three degrees and then takes flight to the fifth, managing not to say what it captures – and it can do this because it is the same artistic language that proceeds through the unspoken – but at the same time to communicate it to those who allow themselves to be guided, managing to escape the canons of rational knowledge and recovering, thanks to the enjoyment of the work, that natural disposition to know which, unlike what Plato believed, perhaps lies dormant in all human beings.
Research, supported and accompanied by study, its conditio sine qua non, is precisely this: a journey in which one never stops, a journey that has no predetermined destination. It is that point of tension that is never reached and yet one must continue to strive for it; it is an asymptote. It is necessary because, as Plato writes, one cannot live otherwise; in fact, this is a necessity, like water, nourishment and breath, for the researcher, the philosopher, the scientist and the artist. And just as these figures share the same need, it is not certain that the different aspects and fields of research cannot coexist in one person. Research is what allows great men to anticipate time, to anticipate study, to reach an earlier future that will only become the present some time later, and the artist is the one who is able to emotionally engage man, to shake him from the banality of everyday life and to put him back in front of himself, forcing him to question himself, in every historical moment; he is able not to stop, but to always doubt, and therefore necessarily to adopt a sceptical attitude.
But what is artistic research, what is the difference between artistic research and artistic action, assuming that the research component is constitutive of art? If research is art itself, when art is expressed in a work – or in its very practice – does it then become the ‘product’ of research, the product of itself? Research, as a work on the borderline, is described by Henk Borgdorff in 2006. He discusses it in particular in the context of teaching, posing the problem of its necessary rigidification in order to fit into a possible evaluation and a sustainability plan. This then, in our opinion, is the difficult and urgent task of the State, which has so far been neglected despite being enshrined in the Constitution: to establish the criteria and organise its institutions in such a way as to guarantee the sustainability and recognition of research, as well as of teaching, especially within public institutions. What we students are waiting for and fighting for is this realisation of the reality. If the State continues to deny us the opportunity to do research in our country, it continues to send us into exile; by denying us the opportunity to study with dignity, it discriminates against us; by denying the quality, refusing to evaluate it and then recognise it, of what we do in our institutions, it continues to undermine the very reason for our being students.
The “Presenza” project, within the national representation of the students of the Academies of Fine Arts and ISIA, was created precisely to say all this, not because we want to take on a task that is not ours, but to share an awareness that does not seem to be understood. We students, who are the present, ask that the doors be opened to us for an education that is not only valid, as it is now, but that is regulated, supported by the State and finally recognised. We students, who are the future, ask this because, without dreams, without art, we are already dead. All of us, human beings”.
PRESENCE
A project of the Conference of Student Presidents of the Academies of Fine Arts and ISIA
Supported by the Academy of Fine Arts in Rome
Exhibition opening: 28 May 2019, 5:30 pm
Until 14 June 2019 (by appointment)
National Institute of Archaeology and Art History – Piazza San Marco 49, 2nd floor – Rome
Artists: Alessandro Bozzoli, Debora Cristina Cocchetti, Collettivo Mare Dentro, Tiziano Conte, Ola Czuba, Alessandra Draghi, Marco Eusepi, Elisa Garrafa, Manuel Ghidini, Eleonora Monguzzi, Mara Jvonne Raia, David Salge, Francesca Santarelli
Info: comitatoartistico.studenti@abaroma.it