ABSTRACT
The influence of literary theory and cultural studies on visual art theory has situated the visual arts firmly as a discursive practice. According to this view, visual representation is conceived of a sign or complex of signs that convey social meanings. The material practice, the performative representative act, becomes of central concern in rethinking an aesthetics of visual practice. The material practice of art can be conceived, in Paul Carter's terms, as an 'act of concurrrent actual production', producing a representation that is both a materialization of matter and a sign. The materialization that occurs in a material practice is far more difficult to access or analyse than is language. The dialogical and emergent nature of methexis resonates with Edward Sampson's notion of the 'acting ensemble'. For him, the acting ensemble presents a dialogical construct that takes into account the emergent quality of creative practice.
