Use of Deleuze’s process ontology

Abstract

ABSTRACT This paper aims to explore the clinical use of Gilles Deleuze’s philosophical concepts such as repetition, virtuality, multiplicity, and difference of intensity, which together comprise his process ontology. I argue that Deleuze’s process ontology forms the basis of his transcendental aesthetics of sensation, specifically by focusing on his earlier work prior to his collaboration with Félix Guattari. This investigation uses the concepts of Agencement machinic as a method to study Deleuze’s aesthetics which is based on his establishment of nondiscursive art and nonverbal semiotics. This paper also argues that the displacement of Plato’s Idea by Deleuze’s intensive multiplicity endows a work of art with the highest ontological status in Deleuze’s transcendental empiricism. Throughout this paper, Deleuze’s process ontology is understood, used, and reinvented through the Documentation Art project, which creates experimental video art pieces from the digital documentation of the processes of Korean Bunche paintings, while not reducing a work of art to an expression of certain concepts. As a result, this paper shows how Documentation Art rejects the notion of representation stemming from Kant’s transcendental aesthetic, by making the invisible painting process visible, and explores unseen experimental capacities in Korean painting practices through the artistic singularization processes.