Emergent Value(s) of Giving Through Object Matter

As an artist and writer, I am interested in “object matter,” a term I use to signify how objects are mediated through visual and textual languages. In my thesis, I explore used, everyday objects, things no longer wanted or needed by their owners, by examining ways people give them away to strangers. In particular, I have chosen to the study the use of everyday language by people who give away their used goods through the online network Craigslist Vancouver “Free Stuff.” The three central question of my exploration are: How do people give to strangers? What kinds of value(s), if not monetary value, could these objects have in their being given away? What is at stake in these free offerings? I approach these questions through language, suggesting that what is offered is not only the objects themselves but their “object matter,” articulated through the written and spoken gestures of giving towards the other. I study how people describe their used goods and how they position their offerings both online and offline. These gestures reveal emergent values that may imply an obligation to use or receive these objects in certain ways, forming temporary yet sustaining bonds between strangers. Various visual components produced out of the research will be discussed along with an exploration of the central ideas of tactics, emergent value(s) and object matter. The collected objects and some of the components of the visual documentation culminate into a two-part installation that is part documentation and part participatory event. Methodologically, the research borrows from sociological examinations of the gift economy and Michel de Certeau's ideas of “tactics” as everyday practices of singular forms of production. The conceptual poetics of Marcel Duchamp who significantly introduced language into the visual arts through the readymade is discussed. Furthermore, language as “indirect discourse” informs how I interpret the ways of speaking and writing that poignantly illustrate how people in Craigslist “Free Stuff” value and give away their used things.