A Perspective on Jenny Holzer's Truisms

Over the past two years, Jenny Holzer has become a more and more prominent figure in my life. From 1978-87, she produced her ‘Truisms’ - a collection of work compiling statements which I perceive to be talking points. Ever since I discovered these truisms, I have been fasciated by the works of Holzer, and have tried to incorporate her art and words into my conversations with others. Many of the truisms hold deeply political and philosophical messages, and even if they have not been able to sway my opinions, they have always offered me a critique to my own way thinking. I feel my blog would not be complete without at least dedicating once piece of writing to Holzer’s work. Here I will dispense to you some of the truisms which I find to be most provocative, and I will offer a brief discussion on my opinions of them - and I will try to keep it brief as there is a wealth of statements to follow. Of course, if there are any which I find need deeper discussion, perhaps they will be dedicated their own blog post in the future. Another point to add before I start is that although I am breaking down Holzer’s truisms into singular points, it is important to keep in mind that they are all part of a large collection, a bigger picture - so the message which the artists is trying to convey may be largely different to the examination I present of each smaller part of the whole collection.

“THE IDEA OF REVOLUTION IS AN ADOLESCENT FANTASY”

When I think of revolution, I think of Marx, I think of revolutionary socialism - something which is, in my opinion, a naive fantasy at the very least. The debate over whether reform or revolution is the

best means for change has been a long an inconclusive one, and one which would probably require more than the time I give it now. Of course I think protests and revolution can be unifying and I am not saying that they are ineffective, but I believe the most systemic and long lasting change can be found through reform of legislation. The thing is, as human beings we are prone to losing interest in things, we are apt to getting riled up over an issue over social media and then weeks later lose all care for the matter. I would also argue that the momentum for a cause can fluctuate massively when using a revolutionary method - if you can imagine a graph with dramatic spikes up and down, that is what I would imagine revolution would like like on paper. For this reason, I think that revolution is indeed a fantasy, as it is simply not possible to keep such high levels of energy for a cause (ie. someone backing a cause simply cannot go to protest every single weekend for years on end). Instead, imagine a more steady, less fluctuating graph of the same level of energy for a cause - this is what I imagine reform to look like. If a more realistic level of momentum can stay for a cause, then it can carry on for a much longer time and achieve the desired amount of change. And if a cause can be backed by the people for such a long time, then this is evidence that this a more long-term change, it is timeless and universally desired. So, unfortunately, and I do think that it is unfortunate, revolution is logistically impossible and if anything, less timeless and more of a ‘trend’.

“THE NEW IS NOTHING BUT A RESTATEMENT OF THE OLD”

You may have heard of one of the core beliefs of the conservative ideology - ‘change to conserve’. This means that in order to conserve the things we value the most in society, it must be changed. This has been evident throughout history, for example the church as we know it now has been modernised and is worlds away from what it would have been like hundreds of years ago, but it is still the church. That medieval church from centuries ago simply would not stand a chance in today’s society, change was necessary in its conservation - hence why it has been so successful as a global institution. We can apply the same logic to the family institution, which up until recently was only socially acceptable as heterosexual and nuclear. Nowadays we see single parent families, homosexual families, childless families, as well as many other variations of what was once thought to be the typical family. And the reason for this still stands by the conservative ethos of ‘change to conserve’ - we are in a time of extraordinary social and moral change where more people are being accepted than ever, so the church and family institution have been change in line with that in order to survive. I could take about this for pages and pages, and maybe I will dedicate a blog post to this particular belief of conservatism as I think it is owed more discussion time.

In the meantime, I invite you to watch this clip of the Canadian lecturer Jordan Peterson talking about conservation, and the danger of change and progression in todays society

I have only touched on two of Holzer's Truisms in this post, but I believe I have opened a can of worms for two topics which I believe are intrinsic to political philosophy and ideolog

y. Both topics need more time and discussion and I'm sure I will find time to dedicate it to them. I also believe that another post on Holzer would be beneficial, I have not done this collection justice in this short blog post.