Manifesto Of Nomadism

FOREWORD

From the standpoint of practical knowledge, also, we might expect in advance that the more an empirical
science approximates to the “rational” stage, the stage of “exact” monological science, i.e., the greater the
extent to which its’ structure is ordered on the basis of well-developed eidetic disciplines, and to its’ own
advantage draws upon them for the grounding of its’ own propositions, the greater will be the increase in
scope and power of those practical services which are the fruits of knowledge.
Edmund Husserl.​1

Nomadism is also a lifestyle adapted to infertile regions such as steppe, tundra, or ice and sand, where
mobility is the most efficient strategy for exploiting scarce resources​.
Wikipedia.

The Manifesto of Nomadism was originally conceived in Newcastle Upon Tyne, UK, in 2010, as a
working document - of course incomplete and structured for progression - for exploring and making
contemporary art. As such I had imagined it could be be used as a template or source of inspiration by
myself and others.

Manifestos are by definition not extensive theses, but a call to swift and sure action. Given the
status of Art in contemporary societies and its’ well-defined links to Capitalism and Class for instance,
and theories of cultural and individual expression, there is an urgent need within pakistan to engage in
the theoretical aspects of Art. One is reminded of Jacques Lacan: Nothing created appears without
urgency; nothing in urgency fails to surpass itself in speech​1​. Thus, this manifesto is both reaction and
response to a need, and it perhaps functions particularly as an attempt to create a myriad of linkages
between theoretical concepts.

The art of writing about Art is not the making of art, it remains Writing. In order to develop
Critical Frameworks that can be applied to Art, Architecture and Design, one might take the advice of
Edmund Husserl​2​ and delve deeper into “rational” disciplines, so as to arrive at standpoints of objective
criticism and contextualization, processes vital to artistic, architectural and design practice in terms of
development and innovation. As is well-known, in order to analyze and synthesize theoretical
frameworks, then, there is no substitute to engagement with the thinking process and to begin
discovering the relations to creativity ; in my case, building on my academic history, there are
opportunities offered to me by Psychoanalytic Theory, Sociology and Linguistics as well as Contemporary
Philosophy, and however difficult and introrse these connections may seem, I am compelled to
investigate these leads, if it can be put as such. Indeed, speaking for myself, this involvement began with
an interest in Literary criticism in 1987 with Marinetti, Marcuse et al., and by 2003, after having acquired
professional training in Electronic Media, I was able to begin transposing my interest in Semiotics to an
artistic practice ( See ‘The King”). There are surprising revelations to be had: one might begin to
understand, for instance, that the Deleuzian concept, per se, of nomadism as War Machine, is somewhat
mistaken in its’ poetical enthusiasm - it cannot in reality be an anti-State force, but is instead the
appropriation of territories in order for the horde to survive as nomads; its’ disruptive intention, if at all
it wishes to be so, is a purpose bound to fail because the State reacts in order to defend itself with the
full force of it’s not inconsiderable resources. If in older times, nomads were freer to cross geographical
 Manifesto Of Nomadism

boundaries, this is just not the case in our times. To remain free of the State and yet be entirely
dependent on it is the real conundrum of societies. The illusion of freedom, as it turns out, is in fact
encouraged by purveyors of new technologies.

The Manifesto of Nomadism is frankly an esoteric document. It is addressed to professionals and

academics, no doubt, but certainly not inaccessible to those who are aware of the imbrication, to use a
biological term, that forms artistic practice and theory in our times; for the moment I can only indicate
the reasons why it is intentionally a ‘dense’ document, rife with statements and injunctions, a heated
free play of associations within critical theory as written out by Derrida, Deleuze and Guattari, among
others, and a bit fearsomely, this structuralist poetics appears already dated. Nevertheless, I have
wished, even in the recent addition of a third sector, to anchor this document firmly in the present
latitude.

Given the quiet success of the first Artists Of The Manifesto Of Nomadism exhibition in 2016,
and in keeping with the goal of experimentation and innovation primarily aimed at contemporary usage
of new materials (with its’ clearly stated caveat to avoid gimmickry ) and amidst the prevalent confusion
in certain quarters between constructing the Social on the one hand and Pure Aesthetics on the other, it
seems we were not so far off the mark in our intention of staying close to the home-grounds of artistic
endeavour.

We are not unconscious of the sheer range of territory that need to be taken account - on the
contrary. We are well beyond the post-modernism that underpins, in the case of Manizhe Ali and
myself, our oeuvres, negatively: we have discovered, along with The Poet, that the road we took is not
the one we should have taken. Ali Khan, for his part, is The New Optimist.

This observation allows for a more precise understanding of the situation we find ourselves in
and presumably can be stated as follows: while I have discovered means and methods to appropriate
and assimilate, for instance, theories of modern mathematics and am learning to transpose these into
the gallery, Manizhe Ali has retrieved a fascinating and no doubt enduring Jungian synchronicity visibly
operative in her art ( she has stories to tell), and Ali Khan continues to draw on the challenges of holding
to an artistic practice and producing viable Design in a city that remains notorious for being an immense
third-world conurbation. Making Art in Pakistan is now (perhaps it has always been and we are now
confronted with an even greater magnitude of the emics and etics involved ) analogically akin to a
deranged waltz across a topography variously described in turn as schizoid and insane, wonderful and
fascinating. Be that as it may, we hope to have learned from the writings of Edward Said and Fanon and
are in a position to establish that we are not merely passing through.

Paul-Mehdi Rizvi

September 2018

1. 241: Ecrits. Lacan, J. 1966​. Translated by Bruce Fink.

2. IDEAS. General Introduction to Pure Phenomenology: Edmund Husserl​. Translated by W. R. Boyce Gibson.1962
Edition. Page 58. COLLIER BOOKS. Macmillan Publishing Company ISBN 0-02-065910-5
 Manifesto Of Nomadism

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<title>&abouthome.pageTitle;</title> ​Nomadism Manifesto

direct usage of structuralist terms and conditions in art history and art criticism;

equivalence of art and design;

exchange of operational concepts on exploratory bases, a free flow from one territory to the other;

OR

blockage

Nomadic manifesto (String)= new manifesto(NOMADISM);

trace manifestoName ; // Nomadism

(T​HE SURREALIST ENDEAVOUR: AN AUDACIOUS PROJECT THAT, WITH URINALS AND LOBSTERS, CHALLENGED
IMPERIAL ART, GIVING RISE TO DIVERSE LINES OF FLIGHT ALONG WITH A MULTIPLICITY OF FLOWS AND FORCES.
YET, ONCE AGAIN, ANOTHER IMPERIALISM: MARKETING, HERE WITH ITS VAST FINANCIAL MEANS AND POLITICAL
PUISSANCE. PSYCHOLOGY IN SERVITUDE, PSYCHIATRY RELEGATED TO THE ORGANIC STRATIFICATION. MAN IS BORN
FREE, AND EVERYWHERE HE IS ENSLAVED TO RETAIL. AN OPPORTUNITY ARISES, NEVERTHELESS - ONE THAT MUST
BE GRASPED WITH OPEN EYES, ONE THAT HAS LESS AND LESS TO DO WITH SOLELY IDENTIFYING CONTRADICTORY
ELEMENTS BY MEANS OF ELABORATION, A WEAK ENUMERATION AT BEST )
 Manifesto Of Nomadism

Class A : nomadism = ​( ​Is the site of arrival or departure more important at this time, than asking, who
arrives and who departs? An event*ual concatenation of arrivals and departures within a temporal
framework allows us to make up an array, and then to namespace appellations of nomadism and
migration. It would be a mistake, though, to take no notice of this fabulous act of bracketisation, to
assume that technology has decreased the vicissitudes of nomadism, or eased its’ ruptures in any
significant way, by supplying many more vectors of flight. Agreed, concrete theory points to initialisation of
a weltenshauung, but its’ very existence may be little else than a successful macrophagy by Capital, if
you will. And, cyberspace, we believe, whilst declaring and demarcating, fairly successfully, an attractive
and seemingly imperative topographical mass, essentially, in itself does not nullify self-constructs in as
forced migrancy does, and therefore, cannot produce the revolutionary affect that an authentic challenge
would. To be sure, the bore-holes in plain sight remain qualitatively the same: it is the horizons and
vertizons that have changed somewhat; but we must deny this complex*ity an overriding privilege of pure
plurality and real-politik assures us we are not misguided in this refusal. True nomadism remains a
burden for humanity, still, and migrancy, a forced displacement; If somehow, for the fortunate among us, it
is a case of shamanic capture, there on the borders of divinity, then of course we seek to delineate a
people, a coterie of saints, as it were, but we must remember to not feel any guilt at all if we fail to create
any such thing as a tribe of Seers and the universe continues to be indifferent to the endeavour. When we
are offered a choice of levitation or collapse, we might choose either or both, knowing it is always a
problem of plotting trajectories between and through a multidimensional set of strata, milieus, polyvocities
as well as monocultures, and geo*metric possibilities; Regrettably, it has to be said, we can no longer
reify the megalopolis as destination, or even as settlement, and it should be sufficient to see it for what it
really is: an over-heated compendium of signs and significations. Therefore, we cannot afford to be
charmed by the intensity of these flows and stoppages, unless, of course, we completely understand that
we ourselves may be injured by the same forces. Moreover, it could be a matter of being deaf to
architecture’s Post-Modern symphony, knowing how it is that we have been more interested in raising
many a marvelous structure, but then not knowing what to do when a particular edifice begins to fall; An
intellectual may well aspire to the same behaviour evinced by points that generate spatial forms, but then
evaporate. To be even more precise, it should be possible to appropriate an influential dimension of
invisibility. We embrace the suggestion, a proposition that has a frisson all its’ own, that an intellectual
possibly might employ powers far removed from conventional forms, and since all such matters belong
still to the socius, this puissance moves along influential lines running parallel to basic given forms; We
must perforce ask, are nomads better at gauging exchange values than most, and are they any better at
re*forming the rates of exchange than the average citizen? Whatever the case may be, let us be a people
of many words and as many actions, understanding that there will always be societies, that some
societies will display sterility and fecundity according to the nurturing qualities of the strata they wish to
inhabit. Societies differ only in degrees of ingenuity when taking up a continuum. We accept that migrant
mankind will cart along the habits of being nomadic and sedentary to the stars, and so, infect the
universe. For the moment, however, here in one corner of the earth, as nomads, we have an opportunity
to reinstate our navigational skills. We must seek a new methodology that frankly appropriates abstracts
as though they were, as all materials are bound to be, at hand. We therefore explicitly accept the
challenge of creating an imperium based on the detection of fresh territory. Let us not squander time
merely wondering, and instead closely consider the possibilities of ​art and design around which a sincere
neo-structuralist silence gathers;)
 Manifesto Of Nomadism

FUNCTION (nomadicMaterials.axiomatics): new FUNCTION = ( An enunciation is in order, an

enunciation in favour of a multi*plexed flow of pre-procedural and pre-processual materials resulting in
perhaps an outward dominance of chaos, but instead is essentially a masterful tolerance of disruptive
forces. Here, we must clearly mention thresholds and limits from which destruction steps back and in truth
reconstitutes itself as life-saving schizophrenia; Moreover, as a prescribed condition, amongst other
requirements, of nomadism, it is necessary to consider a temporal framework, a system of kinship and
agreed alliances, however pregnant with tension, of materials in their usage. Our foundational notion of
nomadism therefore, cannot be anything else but one that, structurally speaking, involves the earth and
those things originally of the earth, which traverse its’ face and body: wind, fire, water and of course, the
skin of the earth itself as clay, sand, ore, deserts, seas and forests. And it cannot be argued forcefully
enough, we must also fit into place that which delivers to us, if not truth, at least contextual fabrication, in
fact a content that is both inner lining and epidermal stratum - in short, our power of abstraction, being a
directive of the intellect and indeed intellect itself, both of which are no less things of the earth; This is not
to mean deterioration into recidivism, another form of nostalgia or even shamanism. That would be far too
literary, one could say. What we mean to say is that we must be mistrustful of a hysterical disorientation
within ourselves. Restlessness not content with calm assurances, a fine suspicion of the reification of
shining texts over and above slippery grammar…these we must admit. Lest this matter be misconstrued,
it is not a question of abandoning the emotions as a source of intentional force. In the words of a
sympathiser, there is a world of failed ideas and shattered dreams. All this notwithstanding, we do not
imagine this situation to be a good enough reason to forego this innovation, this form of transcendental
ratiocination, and undoubtedly, we must bring out our alembics and lay them out well, all the better to
savour without any real regard to predicted results, our moments of entelechy;)

( Class B: manifesto, section 3 [201802]: {(nomadicVertex): ​Deeper investigations, paying greater attention
to the construction of maps and going off on ever more-exotic incursions as well as the traversing of other
territories have enabled us to announce the fall of The Unrepresentable Absolute under a mindful onslaught of
Hyperprecision. Elsewhere, Husserlian teachings have taken root and created the most humane paths for us to
travel along, and now, per esempio, we have the means to expose consumerism's strategy of appropriating just
one half of the Bakhtinian sphere in order to define and enforce it's own puerile authority, and in fact evade the
challenge of a better recognition of incompleteness. Beyond The Carnevalesque (we know it well, having
celebrated its teachings in our youth), we will let the siren call of Russian Formalism help us navigate toward
what may seem uncharted lands that yet will be, sensa dubio, a consequential lyricism that does not make the
mistake of taking technological signs as wonders. Therefore, to reiterate, our building up from and to a
point-by-point calculus of means which in other words could be a matheses that deploys surjections and
injections, must continue to present a challenge to the vicious disruption of the locutionary of the Self. Thus, we
knowingly develop a set of disjoints and isomorphs, all the better to indulge in our stellar capacity to be efficient
macrophages and perhaps lend substance to this most lyrical aphorism: De Nobis, Fabula Narratur }

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