This essay is a discussion of Jacques Derridas’ concepts about the ‘traits’ of drawing. Jacques Derrida offers a detailed reading of a large collection of images, examining issues such as the faculties for sight, the lack of vision, the self-representation of the draftsman, and the relationship between these and the drawing and sketches of the draftsman. Derrida selected the works from the Louvre’s drawings and prints department. They depict blindness as it appears in the Bible, fiction, and history.
Derrida views drawing as a blinding act. It is an act of anticipation and remembrance. The sketches reinstate mediated as well as direct modes of seeing.
The reading becomes a question that must be answered. Assumptions need to deconstructed and deciphered. Derrida reduces writing processes to the most fundamental element, which is the “gramme” or “trace”. In Memoirs of the Blind the Trace is identified as the essential process of drawing. This is like the miner’s lamp. Artistically presented objects that are otherwise absent due to blinding darkness. “The trait has to proceed at night. It is not visible. “Not only is it not visible yet, but it also does not belong in the world of spectacle”. Derrida continues his description of the drawing process and its significance. Blindness can be used to refer to repeated processes, which go beyond the significance and measurement of success for artists or critics. Derrida is a conscious of the drawings. Derrida views self-portraits as a form of self reflection and expression. A drawing’s significance is influenced by the artist. Each self-portrait reflects a story, a history and reveals the past. Each drawing represents a ruin due to profound blindness. We look at the image of the piece and make an assumption about what it means based on what we’ve seen in the past. We relate gestural marks to visual representation. We describe the work to make it more meaningful. Derrida implies that when we’re faced with a particular question, our assumptions should be deconstructed. The content is then deduced from this. The mark is a sign of blindness. Art blinds our eyes to other things when we are looking at something. The linguistic features of the world and our preconceptions are what bind and restrict us. Derrida describes blind draftsmen as not being blind in their general vision but blinded by the act. “In the tracing power of the trait, as the point of contact of the hand moves towards the surface at that instant, the inscription on the inscribable cannot be seen.” The mark and object are separated by a space. Linework flattens an object’s shape when elements overlap. This is referred to as the first loss of power in the eyes. James Elkins agrees Derrida’s claim of first powerlessness of eye. He says that “every stroke of a brush, every pencil line, every smudge or eraser must have a purpose and function as sign.” Elkins comments, “Marks are those which “are what make us interpret a work. Elkins suggests that the works speak for themselves. Marks and gestures are crucial to the meaning that art can take on. When a static line is created, it loses its power. It must be reconnected to everything surrounding it. Derrida shows that once the limit has been reached, nothing is left to be seen, not black andwhite, not a figure/form, but only the line. As if the physicality of a line is not enough to hold our attention. We must verbalize them. Blindness to the blindness. It is not by chance that we use the language of narrative-theology to describe the trait. Derrida suggests that language is always present in order to decode the draftsman’s art. Elkins’ feelings towards the rhetorical trait are expressed in his argument that “the traced line can be considered a stable object for inquiry. Something about which we can say more then “it withers away,” “it ages itself,” it becomes invisible or it becomes writing.”
Escoubas focuses our attention on Derrida’s brother and the train of thought that follows. She says “Derrida’s brother was a talented artist, whose talent his family admired.” Derrida’s drawings were not well received by anyone. Derrida, as I call it in this case (compensation), denigrated drawing in order to focus on writing. Writing was not only a means to showcase his own talent; but it also appeared to him superior than drawing. Derrida’s reading seems emotionally distorted, as if he felt the need for him to denigrate his brother. Escoubas continues to discuss Derrida and brother: “What is the difference between writing and drawing? The hand always operates on a surface, whether it is a canvas or a sheet of paper. Do not writing and drawing then represent the same surgery? In this context, Derrida is the same as his brother. They can be substituted. Is there a justification for the rivalry of the line in drawing and the letter in writing? Escoubas is in complete agreement with Derrida. He says “I weave language nets, or more accurately, I weave using traits and lines about drawing.”
Derrida’s deconstruction method has been used to critique not only literary movements, but also philosophical ideas and political institutions. Derrida’s deconstruction is based around the principle of diffe?rance. The essay “Differance” is where Derrida first used the term Diffe rance. It means deferral and difference of meaning. Barbara A. Biesecker says that Derrida’s concept reading, specifically the “rhetorical component” of it, is in line with the argument. If we view audience as a result of diffe-?rance (and not a realization of identities), then our conceptions of rhetorical situations must include the potential for displacement and condensation. I recommend that rhetorical situations be rethought in terms of logics of articulation and not influence. As soon as we adopt the identity structure as an effect, we must read every ‘fixed identitiy’ as a provisional and practical result of a symbolically engaged between speaker-audience.
