Brian Conley Pierogi Leipzig Decipherment of Linear X 1 May - 28 June, 2008 Accompanying book available: scroll down to see details Click on thumbnails to view larger images   Decipherment of Linear X is a mix of art installation and scientific display which concerns (with both seriousness and humor) questions of animal consciousness, the nature of language and the disposition of humans to project hierarchies of intelligence on both animals as well as other goups of people. This project centers around several dozen wooden sticks unearthed in Upstate New York between 1998-2000. These sticks are covered with elaborate incisions or marks. They have quite a striking calligraphic quality, and are often in a variant of a X formation. At first sight I thought these sticks were American Indian artifacts, covered with pictographs or symbols of some kind. I later found that these sticks had been carved by a species of beetle, the Scolytidae. Outside of this surprising fact, the markings look much like a script or proto-language. In fact the marks are similar to some of the earliest written languages, such as Minoan Linear A and B which was in use in Crete between 1600 and 1100 BC. This exhibition presents these incisions as intentional marks which constitute an unknown proto-language (Linear X) worthy of investigation and translation.   Linear X symbol detail   Linear X symbol detail   Decipherment of Linear X accompanying journal features the following authors/articles: Jean Luis Borges – The Library of Babel Anne Carson – Detail From the Tomb of the Diver (Paestrum 500 – 453 BC) Second Detail Charles Darwin – The Power of Movement of Plants Alexander Marshack – The Meander as a System: Iconographic Units in Upper Paleolithic Compositions Thomas Palaima – On Michael Ventris and Linear B Frances Richard – The Tongue Not Made For Speech: Paradise Lost and Alternative Consciousness Michael Ryan – The Ambrosia Beetle David Serlin – Etymology Recapitulates Entomology Luc Steels – The Origins of Intelligence Marina Warner – Conversation on Darwin's Power of Movement in Plants   to view other Brian Conley works: Fragments of a Future Science Fiction Movie, art 33 Basel (2002) Statements Pseudanuran Gigantica, Art 33 Basel (2002) Unlimited, (an ArtPace Commission) Crocodylus/Salmo
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