Michael Linares
An Aleatory History of the Stick

After two years of research in close conversation with anthropologists and archaeologists, Michael Linares eventually enrolled in classes to study archeology—specifically the history of material artifacts. He became obsessed with the origin of metaphor, and the stick as the Ur (earliest) object used by humans that led to the formation of meaning itself. This video, which accompanies Museum of the Stick is part of major work surveying material culture collected and presented by the artist through a complex narrative of associations and anthropological research. Here “aleatory” means not just random but subject to the complex and organic forces of chance. As early as the Pliocene epoch, the stick as a specific, three-dimensional form has played a vital role in the technological, social, political, aesthetic, and religious development of humanity and some animal species. The chimpanzee’s tool that catches termites, the facial ornamentation of the Yanomami people, the Shulgi of Ur’s weaponry—as well as the toothpick, knitting needle, and vaulting-pole—all represent a minute slice of the myriad transfigurations that this form has undergone throughout history.