Myth - Gift and Exchange

tinyurl.com/aiemythgift

Session 6: the sacred, Profane and HETEROGENEOUS

Arts, Myth &Imagination

Aims & Objectives:

Aims: To understand notions of the sacred & Profane and symbolic exchange Objectives:

• Identify the role and function of the sacred & profane
• Explore the relationship between the sacred & profane and art
• Recognise the role of symbolic exchange.

What do you think are the characteristics of carnivals and festivals? What do you think is their role in society? Can you think of examples.

Starter

George Bataille (1897-1962) was a French intellectual whose work traversed various fields including literature, anthropology, sociology, and philosophy. He is known for his provocative and often transgressive exploration of themes such as eroticism, symbolic exchange, death, excess, the sacred and profane and the gift economy.

George Bataille

The Profane The profane refers to the mundane, ordinary aspects of life - the world of the everyday. The profane is characterized by familiarity, utility, and rationality, devoid of the awe-inspiring qualities of the sacred.

Sacred and Profane

Ecstasy of Saint Teresa,Gian Lorenzo Bernini, 1647–52

The Sacred In contrast, Bataille defines the sacred as that which is imbued with a sense of mystery, awe, and transcendence. The sacred transcends the realm of ordinary experience and is often associated with religious, spiritual, or erotic phenomena.

Sacred and Profane

In what ways is this Sufi dance an example of a sacred ritual?

The Sacred: encompasses experiences and objects that evoke feelings of eroticism, fascination, ecstasy and fear. It includes religious rituals, sacred spaces, and erotic experiences. The sacred is often associated with taboos, mysteries, and rituals that transcend rational understanding. The Profane: The profane, on the other hand, pertains to the ordinary, routine aspects of existence. It includes mundane, rational and functional activities, objects of utility, and social interactions that lack the transcendent qualities of the sacred.

Sacred and Profane: Characteristics

What aspects of life are ordered, rational and useful? What aspects of life are excessive, irrational and useless?

Homogeneous and Heterogeneous

The Homogeneous: Order, Rationality, and Utility The homogeneous refers to the structured, ordered, and productive aspects of society: • It is the domain of utility, rationality, and exchange, where everything has a function and contributes to the smooth operation of the social system. • It includes the economic system, bureaucratic institutions, and scientific rationality—everything that maintains stability. • Homogeneity absorbs differences, making elements conform to a unified, regulated system. • This aligns with a restricted economy, where everything operates within a framework of scarcity, accumulation, and controlled expenditure.

Homogeneous and Heterogeneous

The heterogeneous: everything that escapes, disrupts, or threatens the homogeneous order: • It includes waste, destruction, excess, and all that is non-productive. • It manifests in the sacred, the erotic, laughter, sacrifice, crime, poetry, mysticism, and the grotesque—all things that resist assimilation into rational order. • Unlike the homogeneous, which seeks equivalence and stability, the heterogeneous is marked by intensity, difference, and rupture. • This corresponds to the general economy, where excess energy must be expended rather than accumulated.

Homogeneous and Heterogeneous

The Heterogeneous and the Sacred Bataille associates the heterogeneous with the sacred, but in its impure form—linked to violence, sacrifice, and transgression. Religious traditions often contain both homogeneous (institutional, rule-based religion) and heterogeneous (ecstatic mysticism, sacrifice, and martyrdom) elements. The sacred is not about maintaining order but about shattering boundaries, dissolving identity, and confronting death.

Homogeneous and Heterogeneous

Social Exclusion and the Heterogeneous Societies maintain themselves by excluding heterogeneous elements, treating them as taboo or dangerous. Examples of this exclusion include:

• Madness and insanity (as opposed to rational thought)
• Excrement and decay (as opposed to hygiene and purity)
• Sexuality, especially in excessive or perverse forms (as opposed to reproductive, controlled sexuality)
• Violence and sacrifice (as opposed to legal, institutionalized power)

Homogeneous and Heterogeneous

The Role of Transgression • While the homogeneous excludes the heterogeneous, it also depends on it. The act of transgression (breaking a taboo) allows a temporary rupture into the heterogeneous realm. • This is why moments of sacred violence (sacrifice, war, erotic excess) exist—they allow for a temporary release from the constraints of order before returning to stability.

Homogeneous and Heterogeneous

The heterogeneous: everything that escapes, disrupts, or threatens the homogeneous order: • It includes waste, eroticism, destruction, excess, and all that is non-productive. • It manifests in the sacred, the erotic, laughter, sacrifice, crime, poetry, mysticism, and the grotesque—all things that resist assimilation into rational order. • Unlike the homogeneous, which seeks equivalence and stability, the heterogeneous is marked by intensity, difference, and rupture. • This corresponds to the general economy, where excess energy must be expended rather than accumulated.

Homogeneous and Heterogeneous

The restricted economy refers to the conventional economic system (Capitalism) based on: • Scarcity: Resources are perceived as limited, requiring careful management. • Utility and Production: The economy prioritizes work, efficiency, and the maximization of useful goods. • Accumulation and Growth: Wealth is saved, reinvested, and expanded in a cycle of productivity. • Rationality and Control: This economy operates within clear, measurable limits, reflecting the logic of capitalism, labour, and profit.

Restricted Economy: The Logic of Utility

The general economy is concerned with excess energy and how it must be spent rather than accumulated. It is based on: • Abundance, Not Scarcity: Nature (e.g., the sun) provides an overflow of energy that must be dissipated. • Expenditure (Dépense): Surplus energy must be used in non-productive ways, such as:

• Sacrifice (e.g., religious rituals, offerings)
• War and destruction (e.g., large-scale conflicts, imperialism)
• Luxury and waste (e.g., art, festivals, eroticism)
• Laughter and transgression (e.g., acts that defy social norms)

• The Accursed Share: The excess that cannot be reintegrated into productive systems must be wasted or destroyed.

General Economy: The Logic of Excess

Both Bataille and Mauss were interested in understanding economic systems beyond the realm of market exchange. Mauss' work, The Gift: Forms and Functions of Exchange in Archaic Societies, laid the groundwork for studying gift-giving practices in non-capitalist societies. Mauss proposed that gifts are not simply transactions but embody social relationships, obligations, and expectations. Gifts create bonds of reciprocity that extend beyond individual transactions, fostering social cohesion and solidarity. Bataille builds upon Mauss's by emphasizing the symbolic dimensions of gift exchange. Gifts are not just economic transactions but convey meanings, values, and emotions that transcend their material form.

Gift Economy

Carnivals and festivals, in both religious and folk traditions, are moments where normal social rules are suspended: • Hierarchies are inverted (e.g., fools become kings, commoners mock the elite). • Excess and waste replace productivity (feasting, drinking, destruction). • The body, rather than the mind, becomes central (grotesque imagery, eroticism, laughter). • The rational order of the homogeneous world (work, discipline, morality) is replaced by a heterogeneous world of excess, transgression, and irrationality. Aligns with Bataille’s general economy, where moments of excess must be ritually "spent" to release society’s pent-up energy.

Heterogeneous Carnival and Festival

Heterogeneous Carnival and Festival

Transgression in Carnival: Between the Profane and the Sacred • Carnival and festival do not just oppose the structured world—they momentarily dissolve it. • This is a transgressive act, similar to what Bataille describes in Erotism—a crossing of boundaries that generates intensity and rupture. • The transgression is not permanent; it is cyclical—society allows for an explosion of excess before returning to normal order. • Festivals and carnivals always end. The homogeneous order returns. • But the temporary release of the heterogeneous allows society to maintain stability—without it, repression would build to dangerous levels.

Heterogeneous Carnival and Festival

Laughter, the Grotesque, and the Base • Following Bakhtin, carnival is often associated with laughter and the grotesque body. • Laughter is a moment when control collapses, and the body’s irrationality takes over. • The grotesque body (exaggerated, overflowing, excessive) is an informe (formless) body—spilling out of the neat categories imposed by the homogeneous world. • The obsession with excrement, eroticism, food, and violence in carnival aligns with Bataille’s "base materialism", where the lowest aspects of life (filth, bodily fluids, death) reveal deeper truths about existence.

Heterogeneous Carnival and Festival

Religious Festivals and the Sacred • Many festivals originate from sacred rituals involving sacrifice. • Bataille’s theory of the sacred (eroticism, excess) helps explain how festivals are often spaces where the dangerous and disruptive aspects of the sacred are temporarily unleashed. • These events allow for ritualized expenditure (general economy) —just as sacrifice was a way of offering something uselessly to the gods, carnival is a way of "wasting" time, food, and resources in a sacred manner.

“Blood and Semen II” (1990)

Piss Christ, 1989

Aesthetics and Art: In what ways are Andres Serrano's photographs subversive? How do they break down order and oppositions?

The Informe

Unlike traditional philosophical concepts that seek clarity and definition, the informe is anti-conceptual; it resists form, structure, and intellectual containment. The informe is about collapsing distinctions, rejecting hierarchy, and embracing the grotesque, the base, and the excessive. It is linked to materials or substances that refuse categorization—like mud, excrement, rot, or bodily fluids—things that disturb the boundaries between high and low, inside and outside, subject and object.

The Informe

Jacques-André BOIFFARD, Big Toe (1929)

The informe disrupts the binary of sacred vs. profane by acting as a force that dissolves both: • Against the Profane (Order and Utility): The informe resists the structured world of the profane, which is based on categorization, productivity, and meaning. It introduces chaos, waste, and excess—elements that profane society seeks to suppress. • Against the Sacred (Hierarchy and Transcendence): Rejects traditional sacred hierarchies that elevate the divine as something above and beyond. The informe grounds the sacred in the base, the erotic, the disgusting, and the abject, pulling transcendence downward rather than upward.

The Informe

Jacques Boiffard, Mouth, 1929

Ambiguity and Ambivalence: The informe embodies a sense of ambiguity and ambivalence that defies straightforward interpretation. It represents a paradoxical state where opposites converge and distinctions dissolve.

The Informe

Eroticism, Excess and Waste: The informe is associated with eroticism, excess and waste, suggesting that it represents the surplus or overflow that lies beyond the limits of rationality and utility. In the realm of the sacred, the informe manifests as the excess that transcends human comprehension. In the profane sphere, it appears as the excess, waste and decay that disrupts the order and stability of everyday life.

The Informe

Key Examples of the Informe in Bataille’s Thought • The Base Materialism of the Body: Bataille often fixates on bodily fluids (blood, sweat, excrement, semen) as examples of how the informe disrupts purity. These materials defy clear boundaries—neither fully inside nor outside, neither useful nor completely discarded. • Laughter and the Grotesque: Laughter, especially uncontrolled laughter, is an informe moment—it dissolves rationality and composure, making the human figure grotesque and irrational.

The Informe

Key Examples of the Informe in Bataille’s Thought • Eroticism and Death: Sexuality, particularly in its excessive, orgasmic or violent forms, is informe because it undoes identity and rational control. Similarly, death is informe because it reduces the structured body to decay and indistinction. • Sacrifice: The act of sacrifice in many religious traditions embodies informe logic—it is sacred, yet it is also destruction, waste, and chaos.

The Informe

The Informe as a Method of Transgression • The informe operates as a weapon against hierarchy and idealism, breaking down both scientific objectivity and religious transcendence. • It functions as a method of thought rather than a fixed idea—Bataille uses it to attack traditional categories of art, knowledge, and philosophy. • Rosalind Krauss and Yve-Alain Bois, applied the informe to anti-formalism in art, seeing it as a critique of rigid artistic and philosophical systems.

The Informe

Aesthetics and Art: The informe represents a form of aesthetic experience that challenges conventional notions of form, beauty and harmony. In art, the informe can take the form of abstraction, fragmentation, or deformation, disrupting representational norms and inviting viewers to confront the limits of their perception and understanding.

The Informe

Nature Study 1994

Louise Bourgeois, The Couple 2009

Louise Bourgeois, Cumul I, 1969

Aesthetics and Art: How does Louise Bourgeois' work deform and disrupt representational norms? How do they relate to the notion of Informe?

The Informe

Monster: Pink,1998

Untitled (Cravings White) 1988

Aesthetics and Art: What does South Korean artist Lee Bul's work have in common with Louise Bourgeois? How does it relate to the informe?

Sacred and Profane: The Informe

Full Fathom Five, 1947

Autumn Rhythm, 1950

Aesthetics and Art: How does the paintings of Jackson Pollock relate to notions of the informe? Consider the form and content.

The Informe

Peer Review:

You were asked to develop and initial plan for your your presentation - peer review this with your peers and tutor (see the next slide). Highlight any targets for improvement and development.

Presentation: Checklist

• Have you selected a chosen topic?
• Are you able to justify the ways in which you chosen topic relates to notions and theories of myth and imagination?
• Have you chosen the form of your creative myth and imagination intervention (writing, poetry, artwork, music, dance, theatre, ritual or multimedia)?
• Are there opportunities for audience participation?

• How does your intervention approach relate to arts education and human wellbeing in general?

• Have you identified relevant literature to support your intervention?.

• What might be the conclusion to your presentation?

Directed Task:

• Develop your presentation based upon your identified targets.

References:

• Bataille, Georges. Erotism: Death and Sensuality. City Lights Publishers, 1986.
• Bataille, Georges. The Accursed Share: An Essay on General Economy. Zone Books, 1991.

• Bataille, Georges. Visions of Excess: Selected Writings, 1927-1939. U of Minnesota Press, 1985.

• Bataille, Georges. Theory of Religion. Zone Books, 1989.
• Bataille, Georges. Erotism: Death and Sensuality. City Lights Publishers, 1986.
• Hollier, Denis. Against Architecture: The Writings of Georges Bataille. MIT Press, 1992.
• Stoekl, Allan. Bataille's Peak: Energy, Religion, and Postsustainability. U of Minnesota Press, 2007.
• Mauss, Marcel. The Gift: Forms and Functions of Exchange in Archaic Societies. Routledge, 2002.