This article has been subjected to double blind peer review

author: Eduardo Grillo (Università di Siena (IT))

The Utopia of Communication: cybernetics and informal art

language: italian

abstract: Philippe Breton’s appealing theory (L’utopie de la communication) places the birth of the communication society in the Forties of the last century, and recognises it as a post-traumatic value, come to light following the horrors of World War II. The cybernetic scientists, Breton’s book main characters, actually insisted on proposing a notion of information which is able to reduce the communication ambiguities. The model is the machine, indifferent towards the irrational tendencies of humans. The man itself needs to become transparent and fully communicating in order to guarantee the social self-regulation. Informal artists are motivated by the same concerns and by the same interest in communication, but through the expression of an alternative model: the conversation – actually an indefinite and informal form. The uncertain and vague artistic forms of the period can be seen as an invitation to an open dialogue. As long as the typical utopian season of the immediate post-war period lasted, communication has been inserted within the production process and put at the consumer culture disposal. Then the informal disappeared, replaced by Pop Art, which has put under the spotlight the new protagonists of history: the serial object and our relationship with it.

citation information: Eduardo Grillo, L’utopia della comunicazione: cibernetica e arte informale, "Ocula", vol.18, November 2017. DOI: 10.12977/ocula84

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