The New Post-literate: A Gallery Of Asemic Writing: June 2016

Wednesday, June 8, 2016

Asemic Ceramics & Sculptures from Mojgan Habibi

http://mojganhabibi.com.au/

Ps: This is my abstract:

Asemic writing and illegible calligraphy delivers meaning not through the text itself, but through other means. Hidden meaning in asemic writing can be utilised subversively in order to articulate political, religious or social ideas.

It is in this context that I am combining my studio work with scholarly research and a parallel reading of related political and conceptual contemporary art work.

An understanding of written text is influenced by the individual reader’s ability to read the words as well as by the ability to identify ‘other messages’ contained in the writing. Some of the ‘other messages’ may be understood on a subliminal level without the reader’s awareness, while most of the ‘other messages’ are encoded and can be decoded by those who know the code.

The letters are just symbols to those who are not able to read, or become meaningless if written in an intelligible alphabet or an unknown language.

Because every culture always refers to its own visual heritage when writing, all writing necessarily contains several exclusive elements of meaning. An interpretation of work from another culture becomes influenced by the reader’s understanding of that culture. The reader who knows the writing. But not the culture will be excluded from understanding some meaning. Written language is therefore only useful to those who can read that written language. Writing is expressed through script and calligraphy and symbols and signs. The initial content of the writing is the meaning contained in the words, what is contained in the graphics and what can be understood literally

Traditional writing is intelligible if written in a comprehensible language. The written words can become meaningless symbols to those who are not able to read the writing. Even if one is able to read, writing cannot always be immediately understood, particularly if it is written in an incomprehensible alphabet or in a foreign language.

It is of interest that humans who are able to read will recognise written letters or components of their own language, even where there are none. Even when we know that a text is composed of writing, which does not represent any letters of our language or another, we will still try to read that text. The desire to attempt to read, even if there is nothing to read, is common to all who can read, regardless of language. This desire is a human quality. Our ability to read our own language may provide us with an understanding of others who read in a different language.

It is in this context that I am investigating to what extent texts in visual art can contain meaning in addition to the display of aesthetic qualities and in the absence of any literal meaning.