Gesamtkunstwerk 0.1: Having a Signature is more Important than Having Admirers

Presenting yourself to an audience is not an easily manageable task. Ironically, nobody is a stranger to daily performances, our existence as humans is in itself an ongoing show where we choose the spectators who attend it.

The challenge in performance comes with self-awareness, when I am aware that I am playing a role, I am then pressured to deliver the best I have, whether somebody is looking or not. It is the Pygmalion Effect of being. The more aware I am of my performance, the more I am attentive to other people’s, which results in me playing along.

Choosing to put on a show is not manipulative but it can become self-destructive if I am not capable of taking breaks behind the stage when necessary. Performance can become a self-inflicted burden when all I do is respond to what is happening around me. Ultimately, self-aware presentation is not for everybody.

Finding a Signature

After learning the methods and acquiring the skills, what do I have left ?

Trends, movements and identities are often admired but also transitory. Who I am now will change tomorrow, and what is engaging to the general public now will eventually become boring. This is when it becomes essential to have a signature.

Unfortunately, many people confuse signature and identity. In contrary to the identity, a signature is universally understood but does not seek to be approved. Identities require approval and alignment with whoever I am speaking to, it is interchangeable and adaptable. My signature does not require approval or adaptability because it is something bigger than me, bigger than us.

This is where the difficulty resurges, because admiration is more appreciated and crucial to many, signature loses its meaning and it becomes a clutch to my identities. In creating and evolving through my identities, I am able to engage and connect. It is perfectly understandable, humans navigate life through opposition; we do things through love or the absence of love, I am an I in search of a You, I seek happiness from a fear of sadness, etc.

And when I present myself through identities, I present myself in the Light, I do not want to be in the Darkness, my admiration does not belong in the Shadow. Everybody runs from the Shadow. In avoiding the opposition, I risk becoming the Double. Simple as it, if I do not accept the two dimensions, I will be stuck in one role for my entire life.

If I create a signature, I am able to touch to reach both the Light and the Shadow, I do not have to always be Seen, I accept navigating between performing and watching. The signature becomes this penumbra of who I am, although neither completely in the Light nor in the Shadow, it can reach more people because of its ability to be diffused.

Nobody Knows Who I Am because I Am Everybody // Everybody Knows Who I am because I Am Nobody

Photo: Peter Lorre in Crime and Punishment (1935)

There is a contemporary conundrum we are facing and it is the obsession with individuality. The more I obsess with individuality, the more I find myself resembling the ones I am running away from.

All in all, the fixation on an identity makes the signature impossible to thrive. It is not listening to other people’s tips and advice, or scrolling through Tiktok trends that will help you achieve the signature you seek. Being open to creating a signature meaning being open to your Shadow-Self. Open yourself to vulnerability, face your fears and be honest with yourself. How can you validate yourself in a way that will make all identities you cling so very trivial that you will no longer need them. Finally, understand that the signature you apply to your performance will be universal in a way where people perceive it as ‘Something Bigger Than […]’ without being understood through words or a materialization of existence. It may be universal for the subconscious but not the ego.

You have to be okay with thinking without the who, what, or where in my mind. You will need to use your cognition toward what is and always been rather than what could be. In the end, the ‘Is’ sits between what isn’t and and what could be, meaning it is never for or against an opposition.

Until next time,

With more tangible examples surrounding the Gesamtkunstwerk series.

-Floesie

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Reading suggestions:

• The Theater and its Double by Antonin Artaud.

• The Self by C. G. Jung and R. F. C. Hull.

• The Presentation of Self in Everyday Life by Erving Goffman.