“Untitled New York:”
Speculations on the Expanded Field of Writing

Date: Saturday, 31 January 2009, 1:30–10 pm
Location: Cabinet, 300 Nevins Street, Brooklyn (map and directions here)
FREE. No RSVP necessary
Organized by Matias Viegener and Christine Wertheim

“Untitled New York” is a day-long conversation about writing which in some manner exceeds the printed page. It assembles a notable group of experimental writers to discuss the currently expanded and still-expanding field of writing that challenges assumptions about the nature of writing and the potentials of text. While we are familiar with visual artworks constituted as a set of instructions, secrets written by visitors in a book, or one artist erasing of another artist’s work, what would be their equivalents in the literary world? “Untitled New York” is composed of 2 day-time panels and an evening reading where participants perform their work.

The program is as follows:

1:30 pm Introduction

2:00 pm “Appropriation and Citation” – This panel looks at the many practices of appropriation so popular in the literary world in the last several years, asking questions about whose work and what material gets appropriated, cited or resurrected, who owns texts, and if there is a difference between appropriation and citation. Panel participants include Vanessa Place, Steven McCaffrey, Kenneth Goldsmith, and Julie Patton.

4:00 pm “Litterality” examines how writers use what we normally consider non-linguistic elements, such as symb­ols, diagrams, maps, or scores placed in the context of writing.  We will also look at invented writing systems, and what it might mean to think about the book as an object rather than as a collection of words or sentences. Panel participants include Christine Wertheim, Latasha Diggs, Rob Fitterman, and Shanxing Wang.

8:30 pm Reading with all participants.

“Untitled New York” is a reprise of “Untitled: Speculations on the Expanded Field of Writing,” held in October 2008 at REDCAT in Los Angeles, organized by Matias Viegener and Christine Wertheim of the Writing Program at CalArts, and funded by the Annenberg Foundation.