高清福利片

By Dr Killian Quigley, Postdoctoral Research Fellow, Sydney Environment Institute

Poetics and aesthetics are, among other things, theories and practices of attention. As an artist pays heed, they not only reveal the scope of their own regard鈥攚hat gets noticed and imagined, and in what manner鈥攂ut orient and compose their audiences鈥� views. Arts configure worlds, and modify the contours of cognisance and care. In the context of bewilderingly rapid planetary change, these potencies acquire specific urgency. A responsive and integral 鈥渆copoetics,鈥� write Angela Hume and Samia Rahimtoola, aims at nothing less than the 鈥渕aking of a new home,鈥� through 鈥渨ork of cultural and poetic invention that creates a more sustaining social and ecological context鈥�.¹聽If it鈥檚 true that by sensing, forming, and representing, artists may literally produce novel ways of 鈥淸dwelling] with the earth,鈥� and even of 鈥渂eing human,鈥澛爐hen this is potent labour indeed.^{2 3}

It bears noting, however, that opinions on these matters are neither homogeneous nor united. Some are a long way from sanguine. In a聽聽on climate fiction, or cli-fi, Katy Waldman posits a key, and possibly intransigent, problem for Anthropocene poetics. Literature, she writes, is essentially 鈥渉umanist.鈥� No matter their style or subject, writers are bound to create art that redounds, however circuitously, upon homo sapiens. Put simply, human writing is categorically incapable of addressing anything other than human preoccupations. Waldman鈥檚 point, then, is not that writers are themselves to blame for these shortcomings. The issue is too basic for that: languages, and the things languages make possible, can only ever express an asymptotic relation to the 鈥渁utonomous鈥� meanings of 鈥渘on-hominal鈥� entities, of environments 鈥渙n their own terms鈥�.⁴聽Under these lights, the limits to literature鈥檚 鈥渃apacity to imagine not only a different who, but a different where and when鈥� appear soberingly stark.⁵

Nonetheless, the figure of the asymptote鈥攁 line that approaches another, following closely but never converging鈥攊ntrigues. What if it鈥檚 more than an emblem of art鈥檚 insufficiencies? What if the asymptote represents a sort of space, and an ethic, for making? A kind of dynamic and unsteady ground for observing, interpreting, and inventing? The poet A. R. Ammons has written that to think ecologically is to occupy 鈥渁 firmless country鈥�.⁶聽Maybe the asymptote, by constantly moving and searching and never fully finding, is a theory and a practice聽蹿辞谤听ecopoetic and ecoaesthetic work, as well as a humbling reminder of that work鈥檚 fundamental contingency.

What practices and possibilities does asymptosy encourage, if it is deliberately and rigorously inhabited? It鈥檚 a question that recalls me to the work of the anthropologist Eduardo Kohn, whose聽聽I鈥檝e been fortunate to read alongside some of my聽Multispecies Justice colleagues. In that text, Kohn explores interactions among organisms鈥攈omo sapiens and otherwise鈥攊n and around 脕vila, in western Ecuador.聽 Learning with jaguars, dogs, leafcutter ants, humans, trees, and others, Kohn rejects the assumption that thought, interpretation, representation, and selfhood are exclusively hominal affairs. This inclines Kohn toward what he calls 鈥渁 perspectival aesthetic,鈥� whereby selves relate to other selves by making 鈥減rovisional guesses鈥� about the thoughts and experiences of those others. Sure, assents Kohn, those guesses are 鈥渕ediated, provisional, fallible, and tenuous鈥�.⁷聽But that is, in a sense, beside the point, which is that all selves are guessing, about other selves and about their very own, all the time, and so framing asymptosy as a uniquely human, or human-linguistic, constraint misses the bigger, richer picture.

Can I become a better guesser? I鈥檇 like to think so, and I鈥檇 like to think that that鈥檚 the perplexing, animating challenge that Kohn鈥檚 work poses for poetic and aesthetic practice. At the same time, I can鈥檛 help wondering how guessing operates in environments that simply聽补谤别听鈥減rofoundly non-human,鈥� such as the undersea.⁸聽In surroundings where anthropic sensation, interpretation, and indeed聽濒颈蹿别听are exceptionally precarious, the asymptotic line may have a hard time swimming, let alone coming anywhere near the selves it seeks.

Last month, I聽聽the painter Lily Simonson and the biologist Peter Girguis discuss their collaborative efforts to sense, interpret, and represent life in the deep ocean. I also spent time with Simonson鈥檚聽, an exhibition of large paintings of abyssal spaces and abyssal selves, including hairy-limbed yeti crabs and some memorably sensuous giant tube worms. The pictures were composed, in part, from luminescent pigments, which make their colours and textures humanly accessible only when displayed under black light. As well as orienting her audiences聽迟辞飞补谤诲听deep-sea habitats, Simonson鈥檚 paintings continuously enact the mediated and uncertain nature聽辞蹿听that very orientation. This is something different from triumphally expanding the human sensorium to incorporate yetis and giant worms. It鈥檚 something more serpentine, a bringing to view that is at the same time a sign of hominal incapacity. If this is home-building, it obeys a multifarious architecture, one whose chambers may be mutually dependent, but whose dimensions are never fully mine to make.

Killian Quigley聽is a Postdoctoral Fellow at SEI.聽Killian researches the poetic, aesthetic, and broader cultural histories of environments and ecosystems. He is focused, especially, on marine 鈥� and above all submarine 鈥� contexts. With Margaret Cohen, of Stanford University, he is co-editor 辞蹿听, forthcoming late 2018 from Routledge Environmental Humanities.

Header image: fan worm via Shutterstock, ID: 327636769.