Objects in Flux - RMIT Research Repository - RMIT University

ever chosen not to explore this path within the exegesis. The reason
for this stems from the field of study itself. Although practitioners
often describe their creative acts as art, their involvement within a
contemporary art community is generally quite limited. Rather than
bring a foreign voice to bear upon the practice I have attempted to
discuss practices of object modification in terms that remain attentive
to the concerns of those working within the practice. The field of art is
therefore largely ignored within the following text; instead the discussion
centres on individual agency, mechanisms of control and stories
of resistance.
1.5 Chapter outline
This research has resulted in both project outcomes, in the form of
material and textual artefacts, and an accompanying exegesis (this
document) that reflects on the projects and conceptualises them within
a broader theoretical framework. While the exegesis gives insight into
some of the projects undertaken it does not account for all project
activity, nor should it be regarded as a key through which knowledge
is extracted from the projects. The exegesis constructs its own knowledge
and its own ways of knowing. Likewise, the projects themselves
hold their own unique form of knowledge that exists independently of
this text. These two components, the projects and the exegesis, offer
two distinct paths by which the research may be known. To access the
projects it is necessary to visit the project website and engage with
the stories of modification presented there. 2 A project overview is also
given in the appendix of this document. To gain a comprehensive understanding
of the research, it is recommended that both the exegesis
and the project website be engaged.
2. Rethinking Objects
In this chapter the object is explored through a range of theoretical texts
that emphasise the socially constructed nature of object identity. From
this exploration the object emerges as a complex set of relations given
through personal and social narratives of use. Stable object identity is
achieved through the repeated articulation of these narratives, however
this repetition also brings the possibility of deviation. Caught in a perpetual
state of production, the object becomes a site of struggle where
disparate interests meet and negotiate shared meaning structures.
2/ http://www.openobject.org/
objectsinflux
Introduction
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