Geometric, economic, real–social, elastic: Formatting Animation’s Sensorial Vocabularies

This presentation takes account of animation’s malleable character and its dedication to reproduction and lifelike-ness in an expanded knowledge space. Tracing the current state of art corrupted by the market, with modes of resistance being formed around representations of cultural difference (Chris Kraus), the paper’s trajectory passes from Osamu Tezuka’s 1963 ‘TV manga’ Tetsuwan Atomu—an early example where a work/image/animation, a serialised mode of production, and an investment of rationalisation merge into an indiscernible unity—into contemporary anime, via a vital moment of multi-layered cultural investment in 1960s Japan. Incorporating anime in these various creative endeavors, and making a claim for animation’s proliferating vocabularies and narratives rewriting history, the talk posits that this inherently reproductive force calls for experimental analytical models. In addition, the simultaneous refusal, necessity, and drive for these models produce an imaginary realm for such undertakings; Paolo Virno’s new places for intellect, where “special places” of discourse dissolve and are replaced by “common places,” speak to such undertakings.