Σωφροσύνη/Discretion: Early pictorial knowledge in Greece and its Afterlife
Two-faced gold-plated bronze sheet depicting Athena 530 B.C., Acropolis Museum Athens.
My work at eikones examines Greek notions of form and image and their afterlife in modern thought (be it poetical or of a more philosophical or scientific nature). The Greek evidence is analytic and heuristic in nature. I am especially interested in the emergence of formal methods and their contexts: in what circumstances does the reliance on "form" become a question of sheer necessity? For this purpose form is firstly investigated in a Greek setting (roughly up to and including Tragedy) in the sense of a technical means of representation and account-giving, and can thus encompass poetical form as well as formal means of reasoning.
Representation by formal means can be a form of coping, especially so in religious or ritual settings: it is the art of remaining true under various circumstances. These forms however outlive the context of their emergence, they persist, poorly understood but sanctified by use. A modern name could be form as a form of rationality. A less charged notion would be discretion: my work at eikones is concerned with cultures of discretion (σωφροσύνη) and their modern, often cloaked counterparts. Discretion is the mindset of man facing boundlessness; it is required in uncertain, diffuse situations. By its means conditions can be confronted for which the lack of any inherent or humanely recognizable measure is characteristic, the account of which can then neither be simple telling nor outright concealing.
Of central importance in this investigation is the poetic and philosophical work of Friedrich Hölderlin: as a subject matter, but even more so as a detector of what to look for. Hölderlin is a major archaeologist of form. According to his example then, the notion of rhythm, one of the oldest notions of form in western thought, remains key to my research at eikones.
Representation by formal means can be a form of coping, especially so in religious or ritual settings: it is the art of remaining true under various circumstances. These forms however outlive the context of their emergence, they persist, poorly understood but sanctified by use. A modern name could be form as a form of rationality. A less charged notion would be discretion: my work at eikones is concerned with cultures of discretion (σωφροσύνη) and their modern, often cloaked counterparts. Discretion is the mindset of man facing boundlessness; it is required in uncertain, diffuse situations. By its means conditions can be confronted for which the lack of any inherent or humanely recognizable measure is characteristic, the account of which can then neither be simple telling nor outright concealing.
Of central importance in this investigation is the poetic and philosophical work of Friedrich Hölderlin: as a subject matter, but even more so as a detector of what to look for. Hölderlin is a major archaeologist of form. According to his example then, the notion of rhythm, one of the oldest notions of form in western thought, remains key to my research at eikones.