Notes on the Deleuzian concepts underpinning the Surface, Series, Signs exhibition title

2. Series

A series is something that has the potential for an infinite sequence of additions. The Infinite regress of language, from which all paradoxes are derived, has a serial form. When we speak, each name, by which we denote something, has a sense, this sense must, in turn, be denoted by a name, which also has a sense, which is denoted by a name, and so on. This is the means by which the infinite regress is formed as a series, one name is added to another; in this manner the series can never come to an end, it is infinite. In this instance, the terms that make up the series are all the same, i.e. they are all names, therefore the series created is homogeneous.

If, instead of considering each term as a name, we consider what each name does, we discover two heterogeneous, i.e. two different, series; hidden under the homogeneous series. The names denote a state of affairs, whereas they also express a sense, in this way two series appear, a series of denotations and a series of sense.

Therefore each homogeneous series includes within it two heterogeneous series. This leads Deleuze to say that “the serial form is necessarily realised in the simultaneity of at least two series;” (LS 39) the minimum condition for the formation of a series is two series in communication. These series are marked by their heterogeneity, (series of names, series of sense), yet it also appears that the two series can be homogeneous, i.e. two series of things, two series of events, two series of senses. Yet this homogeneity is only apparent, one of the homogeneous series is always the signifier, and the other the signified. Therefore the essential feature of a series is not their sameness but their difference. It is this difference that enables the series to communicate, otherwise they would stare blankly at one another.

In order to develop our understanding of this idea, Deleuze examines two series identified by Jacques Lacan in a short story by Edgar Allen Poe, “The Purloined Letter,” a story of the search for an incriminating letter that is hidden in the open.

First series: the king who does not see the compromising letter received by his wife; the queen who is relieved to have hidden it so cleverly by leaving it out in the open; the minister who sees everything and takes possession of the letter.

Second series: the police who find nothing at the minister’s hotel; the minister who thought of leaving the letter in the open in order better to hide it; Dupin [the ace detective] who sees everything and takes possession of the letter.

These series can be notated in this way:

Series 1. King - Queen - Minister

Series 2. Police - Minister - Dupin

From this example Deleuze identifies three characteristics which enables series to communicate on the basis of their difference.

First characteristic. The terms of each series are in a “perpetual relative displacement in relation to the others.” For example the Minister occupies two different places in the series. Deleuze calls this displacement the “primary variation,” through which the relation between each series is put into a state of “perpetual disequilibrium.”

Second characteristic. The disequilibrium between series must be “oriented” in favour of one or the other. This means one presents an “excess” over the other, i.e. one must have something that the other does not have. This is the series that is determined as the signifier. Deleuze says that there is always a “blurred excess of signifier.” The signifier always has more than the signified, what it has in excess is not immediately apparent; it is blurred.

Third characteristic. In each series there is what Deleuze calls a “paradoxical entity” that circulates endlessly between both, putting them into communication. It is this paradoxical entity that puts the two series into communication at the same moment. In the example quoted, it is the letter, which is common to both series, but which always appears as missing. This third characteristic is the most important, in that it enables the first two characteristics, without allowing us to point to their cause in any of the terms in the series.

The paradoxical entity is two-sided, and has the characteristics of both series, it is name and sense, a word and thing. The terms of the series, as we saw in the first characteristic, are displaced in relation to each other, but they have an “absolute place” in relation to the paradoxical entity. Therefore its distance is relative to the series but never to itself. As we saw in the second characteristic, the two series are “simultaneous without being equal,” they are, at the same moment, but they are not the same. One series has an excess over the other, this excess is the paradoxical entity, which forms an excess in the series it constitutes as signifying, and a lack in the series that it constitutes as signified.

Derek Hampson

Notes on Deleuze’s concept of Surface