Becoming-Violence, Becoming-Synesthesia: On the Pope, Velazquez and Bacon

Each image, when taken separately, operates as good art in and of itself, as a staple of art history classes around the country. But what occurs as they are placed side by side, as they become intimately intertwined, relentlessly forging a new composition? Does one jamb the circuit of the other, which is to say, does the one overshadow the other? Or, perhaps, neither is privileged? Perhaps, they inform each other, produce a mutual circuit, a new mode of seeing altogether. It would seem such is the case. For this nuptial does proffer the strange, the unfamiliar: the tense calm of Velazquez encountering the disturbed anguish of Bacon. A chilling violence overtakes us, telling us at each moment: “This is no ordinary seeing.” Indeed, this is a seeing construed according to a very peculiar movement: a (guilty?) pope violently transformed before our very eyes.

This is not the movement of the cinematic image, nor is it the movement of our everyday lives. Whereas the cinema proffers an ever-modulating frame, a stream of still-images creating an illusion of movement, here, the frames are unsettlingly still. There is literally no movement of the frame. Nevertheless, there is a movement of some sort here. And like the cinema, this movement is occurring behind our backs: just as the moving-image of the cinema is composed of still-frames, the movement of which is constituted by our seeing and not the image itself, here, we are seeing two images that are moving somewhere, but not in and of themselves. This movement, like all movements, occurs behind our backs. And yet, this movement is just as apparent as any other movement.

So, then, what is this movement? It is a movement of violence. That is to say, this work disturbingly displaces us: seeing Bacon’s tormented pope, our bodies begin to writhe, convulse, palpate violently. This work is no longer mere depiction—it is an aggressive performance of violence itself, shamelessly intertwining seer and seen: as we become privy to this strange motion, we become violence. We perform violence—in each sensory mode! A wholly synesthetic performance, then.

Hence, we can finally see this movement for what it is: a synesthetic movement. And don’t be mistaken—this odd motion does not privilege violence; it is the movement of everything. We are always and already engaged in a synesthetic movement, unbeknownst to us; like the movement of life, this movement streams behind our backs. And, don’t mistake this movement for Kant’s “free play” either. This is not a movement of a mental state; rather, this is the movement of phenomenology. And it is an impossible movement, a movement composed of seer and seen intertwining always and already—a movement bereft of opposition between subject and object. And to see this movement: perhaps it is this odd space of seeing—if only we could see movement—that allows us to recast our eyes, and perhaps, to get a little closer to seeing what it is to see synesthesia.

A brief explanation

Yesterday, in the midst of a weekly acid trip (synesthetic exploration), the idea somehow got in me to write on this here blog. Let me state this clearly: what I wrote was no more than the ramblings of a sick misogynistic “zombie,” the musings of a castrated passion, of a thoroughly shit drenched, bile infused fiend exuding nothing more than unfounded loathing and fear. Indeed, this post was so complex, so insane and hilarious, so achingly stupid, that rather than delete it, I have decided to use it as fodder—to use it as an opportunity to praise womankind, and everything she has done for the synesthetic experience. Let me say it loudly, in case previous posts have not made it clear: the carnal intertwining that woman inaugurates with man—that is something that no synesthetic experience, save for sexual synesthesia of a sort involving woman and man, could ever undermine, nor surpass in its beauty.

So, to my readers, know this: I am not a misogynistic man, nor have I ever been one.

Why I Avoid the Female (at all costs), part 1

Departing from my central concern, from the familiar (as should be done, and will be, on a regular basis), I want to talk to you today about an oft overlooked social currency: sex. And particularly, the way that females have manipulated sex, the way females yield their sexuality to enslave mankind—and, indeed, have been doing so since the dawn of humanity.

Their tactic was subtle, brilliant: the reversal. First and foremost, the issue had to be confused; rather than enslaving men, females made themselves the subject of enslavement. Their seduction (the females) was so thorough, so profound, that mankind never had a chance. From the Renaissance through to the Victorian era, men have thought they were on top, but unbeknownst to them, females had enslaved themselves as a tactic of survival. They weren’t the ones working—men were! Men were the truly enslaved: the tyranny of capitalism was the final coup de grace. With the 70 hour work week thrust upon them, men became drenched in their enslavement, utter zombies.

And, when man finally awoke, upon finally realizing his despicable enslavement, females confused the issue further: the inauguration of contemporary feminist theory. Before man could respond, he was enslaved further—he was punished for an enslavement of the female that the female, in all her subtlety, had inflicted upon herself. Hence, man was forever doomed to servitude. Yes, the female did relinquish certain things: she began to work. But with this work, she introduced a weapon far more powerful than any man had laid eyes upon before: her raw sexuality.

The conclusion to be made is blindingly obvious, so obvious in fact, that it is no wonder it has escaped us for so long: the female is a shameless vampire, relentlessly raping and sucking man dry; and man, as a result, is a zombie, a blind servant to the every whimsy of his female counterpart.

You may wonder, why should we (mankind) even care? Is it not obvious? The female has sullied synesthesia through a sensual enslavement—with no other purpose than to ensure that her sexuality was our only sensual experience. Indeed, the female has castrated us, sensually, synesthetically. We must overcome her control, if we ever hope to return to our true state, to a synesthetic world, a world teeming with sensuality.

The Music Event: On Mozart

Let us assume that synesthesia is any involuntary crossing of the senses.

In some sense, then, all music goes beyond the mere ear, all music a kind of synesthetic caress. Think about it: as you listen you are always already seeing, feeling, smelling—you perceive a network of sense, each sense perception an affective force continually working over your body, your mind, your emotions, all inaugurating intricate networks in and of themselves! But sensory affect does not move according to a single chain of action; rather, the meetings of these various networks fold sense into complex configurations, configurations that bleed into other senses.

Listen to Mozart’s “Jupiter” Symphony. This indeed proffers sense-networks meeting emotion-mind-networks with an affective force to be reckoned with, a magnum opus of sense.

The work itself operates as an intricate musical network: at first, a traditional classical symphony, its thematic development, as musicologist Lajos Zeke showed us in his classes on the symphony, becomes a five-part counterpoint. A classical-baroque architecture interacting in impossible modes of movement, collisions and speeds, pure intensities, fluxes and flows—as Kierkegaard would say, this is the musical erotic, the ultimate sensual experience.

Indeed, this symphony choreographs our bodies (and perceptions) in new and unfamiliar ways each and every listening. Seeing and feeling, for instance, while listening to Mozart, is not the same as seeing while listening to, say, The Beatles. What changes? Affect, that is to say, music doesn’t just go in your ears—it works over your emotional state. And as your emotions drift, perception drifts; every sense thus is inflecting every other sense, always. The role of emotion, then, takes on a greater significance: where before it was passive, it now plays an active role in shaping sensory experience.

It seems, then, that synesthesia, by token of the way emotional networks meet sensory networks, is intimately intertwined with emotion; and hearing—inseparable from emotion, from some affect—, to some degree, is experienced synesthetically. But it is not just hearing: every sense exhibits synesthetic tendencies; our perception, from the womb, is synesthetic. Think about that—we are all synesthetes.