Virtual Virilio:
Speed, Politics, Potentiality

Instructor: Jason Adams Date & Time: Sundays June 25, July 2, July 9, July 16, July 23, July 30, August 6, August 13, 2017 4:30 – 7:00pm EST

DESCRIPTION
Along with acceleration, the concept of “speed” has become an increasingly central thematic in 21st century technological, cultural, and political theory. First invoking and deploying the term as far back as the 1970s, Paul Virilio, the French “critic of the art of technology,” is perhaps the most-invoked figure associated with the thematic of speed. However, his work has largely been misunderstood as a wholesale rejection of technology and acceleration, even while Virilio himself affirms both at least as rigorously as an art lover or art critic would affirm art – by proceeding critically and selectively. In this two-module seminar, we will read and discuss Virilio’s works as well as secondary texts upon them, through the lens of selective affirmation, emphasizing those in which he suggests not simply a negation of technology and acceleration, but rather a rigorous engagement with the actual and material in the service of the virtual and potential.

Image: The Strength of the Curve, Tullio Crali, Oil on canvas, 1930