Corfu 2016

Spaces of intimacy: Transgressing Visual Simulation of Desire

Summary

Bataille writes that man lives in constant fear of himself; his erotic urges terrify him. Using this as my starting point, I want to question genesis of erotic desire through the concept of seduction (Baudrillard) and intimacy. Eroticism is not merely a biologic urge or melancholic longing; it is a desire of human being to be, if only for a moment, " the only one " to another human being, and not merely " one of the many ". Eroticism is thus unique experience of time and space through temporary unification with another human being, that though briefly violates the transient nature of life. The main question of this paper is how to define eroticism and transgression in the age of simulation and visual seduction of sign? Baudrillard shows that the turning point is now contained in the state of simulation, characterized by the seducing nature of repetitive Oneness. Instead of being one among many others, we are now faced with the challenge of being one among many that are, essentially, the same. This brings out the new aspect of erotic desire in relation to another human being, as man is never alone among those that are different, yet he is indeed alone among those that are the same. How is then possible to define seduction, as the prerequisite for seducing is the desire for the other, and not for the same? If desire is a source of inner life, then there can be no seduction without desire, and no eroticism without seduction. Transgression of a simulated desire is not possible if we confine eroticism to the inner life. This does not mean that eroticism does not derive from it; the problem is that the immanence of desire has become questionable under the proliferation of signs, so that the concept of " innerness " needs to be fundamentally questioned. I would like to open spaces of intimacy by reinterpreting the concept of seduction through transgression and eroticism in the context of the new understanding of intimacy. Seduction of the intimate, as opposed to the seduction of a sign, contains traces of fascination by another being. This fascination is not merely infatuation as it carries the connotation of temporal duration; it is encounter in time. Transgression thus becomes a quest for intimacy beyond the simulation of erotic desire. Instead of replicating itself, it appears as pure coincidence. 

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Zagreb 2015

Intimacy, Repetitivity and Seductiveness: Reading Knifer in Perspective of Sennet and Baudrillard (ENG)

Intimnost, repetitivnost i zavođenje: čitanje Knifera u perspektivi Senneta i Baudrillarda (HR)

Presentation originally presented and published in Croatian language