Author(s):
\nAbraham Avnisan<\/p>\n
Collocations is a work of experimental writing that explores the disruptive implications of
\nquantum mechanics for science, philosophy and literature. Designed for tablet computers,
\nCollocations employs strategies of erasure, visual poetry, and algorithmically defined
\nsystems to produce a work of innumerable poetic texts. Interaction with the work transforms
\nthe user into an experimenter, whose observation and physical manipulation of the device
\ndetermines the materialization of unique textual configurations in a dynamic, non-linear and
\nkinesthetic reading experience.
\nCollocations appropriates two key texts from Niels Bohr and Albert Einstein\u2019s historic
\ndebates about the complementary relationship between position and momentum on the one
\nhand, and determinacy and indeterminacy on the other. In quantum mechanics, that
\nrelationship is mediated by an experimental apparatus through which the experimenter
\nobserves the phenomenon in question; in Collocations, the tablet computer is that
\nexperimental apparatus, and the user\u2019s choice to manipulate either its position or momentum
\nallows certain poetic texts to become determinate at the expense of others. As the user
\nmanipulates the device in space, certain words from within Bohr and Einstein\u2019s original texts
\nbegin to vibrate, becoming highlighted and forming poetic subtexts. Striking a delicate
\nbalance between completely predetermined and randomly generated texts, these poems
\nembody the fundamental indeterminacy of matter without sacrificing poetic agency. At the
\nintersection of science, art, language and code, Collocations posits a new quantum poetics
\nthat disrupts classical notions of textuality and offers new possibilities for reading.<\/p>\n
Modality of presentation: iPad<\/p>\n