Dizziness - A Resource

When I came in I was confused, when I came out I was full of ideas. Eilean Hooper-Greenhills Dizziness arises locally, and situationally, and combines various elements. It can clear, cause a great stir, move heaven and earth; it agitates. Dizziness according to Plato is creating the constitution of all philosophical thought by destabilizing the basis of knowledge to a state of uncertainty. For the artistic research on DizzinessA Resource, artist duo Ruth Anderwald and Leonhard Grond and the multidisciplinary team of scientists will study dizziness, comprising its complementary areas of experience and reflection on dizziness. Based on artistic, art-historical, philosophical and natural scientific sources, they will address questions with respect to contemporary art (experimental film, video art) and to relevance for their own work. The artistic research shall present dizziness in relation to the viewpoints of the above disciplines, and illumine its impact on contemporary artistic practice, namely artists` takes on moving image. By investigating when, why and how dizziness occurs, considering the experience of dizziness on the one hand and the reflection on dizziness on the other, the artistic research shall present verification of the following assumptions: Dizziness can be seen as a paradigm, a power of innovation and transformation. Traces of dizziness are to be found within transformation processes. The result of a three-year working period shall establish a substantial and valuable body of artistic research material. The artistic film will employ a transdisciplinary methodology to provide insight into the research assumptions and will clarify open questions concerning the latent potential of dizziness as a creative source. Together with PhD candidate Kathrin Wojtowicz (film and media science, Academy of Fine Arts, Vienna) and expert consultants from the fields of philosophy, medical science, physics, creativity research, cultural studies and art history, Anderwald and Grond will define the latent potential of dizziness for transformation and innovation. The planned artistic e-publication and the artistic film shall present the project`s findings in a context that combines the perspectives of the various disciplines involved in order to cast light on dizziness as a source of transformation and innovation.

When I came in I was confused, when I came out I was full of ideas.Eilean Hooper-GreenhillDizzinessA Resource, initiated by artists Ruth Anderwald and Leonhard Grond, was a transnational, cross-disciplinary artistic-research project that explored the subject of Taumel (German for dizziness) in moving-image art and artistic practice, in philosophy, and through cultural and natural science sources. In contrast to dizziness, Taumel refers to a broader semantic field and can be used within positive, negative, or ambiguous connotations, pointing to disorienting complexity and divergence as well as enjoyable or frightening disorientation. The term dizziness was discussed throughout the projects trajectory, evaluating its implications, and exploring its functionality and appositeness. DizzinessA Resource established dizziness as an operational term for artistic research. The three-year project (March 2014 June 2017) established a substantial body of artistic-research material underlining the projects eponymous hypothesis. Resourceful and creative aspects were determined in dizziness processes and are documented in artworks, exhibitions, screenings as well as scientific publications (e.g. Anderwald and Gronds artistic experiments with 3D-printing, or in polyphonic writing and transdisciplinary research together with creativity researcher Mathias Benedek, curator Katrin Bucher Trantow, and philosopher Karoline Feyertag). Learning to navigate states of dizziness individually (cf. psycho-biologist Matitiahu Mintz) and in modes of togetherness (cf. addiction and risk educator Gerald Koller) needs development and training of individual and collective capabilities to cope with aporetic or liminal experiences. In conversations and workshops, artists (Henry Hills, Charlotte Hug, Joachim Koester, Catherine Yass) and philosophers (Karoline Feyertag, François Jullien, Alice Pechriggl, Marcus Steinweg) have deliberated the possible influences of dizziness on their respective working processes. DizzinessA Resource has shown that the ability to use states of dizziness creatively is influenced by individual personality traits and training (cf. Benedek at al., Mintz, and Maya Shmailov), but also requires compossible spaces of togetherness (cf. Jullien, and Anderwald, Feyertag, and Grond). In this sense, the project served to widen and strengthen the network of artists, philosophers, scientists, and practitioners working in dizziness-related fields. Through their cooperation, the participating artists conceived an artistic-research methodology based on the findings of DizzinessA Resource. During the whole research trajectory, DizzinessA Resource not only stimulated new artistic, curatorial, and scientific work, but also initiated cross-disciplinary debate on dizziness as a field of research in its own right.