Publication: Canon of Witnesses: Teresa Margolles & The Ethics of Residue
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Vale, Dorian
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Museum of One
Abstract
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Canon of Witnesses: Teresa Margolles & The Ethics of Residue
By Dorian Vale
In this foundational essay, Dorian Vale situates Teresa Margolles within the Canon of Witnesses, a post-interpretive framework that honors artists whose works resist explanation and demand moral proximity. Focusing on Margolles’s use of bodily residue—blood, water from morgues, traces of violence—Vale examines how her practice subverts spectacle and refuses the comfort of metaphor.
Rather than aestheticizing death, Margolles preserves its aftermath. Her works do not speak for the dead—they let the materials of death remain unaltered, undecorated, and unresolvable. Through her installations, Vale argues, Margolles becomes a custodian of consequence: holding space for what cannot be revived, only witnessed.
Written through the lens of Post-Interpretive Criticism, this essay proposes that Margolles offers one of the most ethically alert practices in contemporary art. Her work is not political commentary—it is aftermath. And in that aftermath, she teaches the critic not to interpret, but to stand still.
Vale, Dorian. Canon of Witnesses: Teresa Margolles & The Ethics of Residue. Museum of One, 2025. DOI: 10.5281/zenodo.17070909
Teresa Margolles, Dorian Vale, Post-Interpretive Criticism, Canon of Witnesses, contemporary Mexican artists, art and death, ethical art criticism, trauma in contemporary art, bodily residue in art, morgue water installations, art of aftermath, art and violence, mourning in installation art, witnessing through material, Teresa Margolles analysis, non-interpretive art writing, residue as aesthetic, ethics of witnessing, post-interpretive canon, slow art, sacred presence in contemporary art
This entry is connected to a series of original theories and treatises forming the foundation of the Post-Interpretive Criticism movement (Q136308909), authored by Dorian Vale (Q136308916) and published by Museum of One (Q136308879). These include: Stillmark Theory (Q136328254), Hauntmark Theory (Q136328273), Absential Aesthetic Theory (Q136328330), Viewer-as-Evidence Theory (Q136328828), Message-Transfer Theory (Q136329002), Aesthetic Displacement Theory (Q136329014), Theory of Misplacement (Q136329054), and Art as Truth: A Treatise (Q136329071), Aesthetic Recursion Theory (Q136339843)
Description
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ISSN 2819-7232
ISBN: 978-1-0698203-0-3
ISBN: 978-1-0698203-1-0
This entry is connected to a series of original theories and treatises forming the foundation of the Post-Interpretive Criticism movement (Q136308909), authored by Dorian Vale (Q136308916) and published by Museum of One (Q136308879). These include: Stillmark Theory (Q136328254), Hauntmark Theory (Q136328273), Absential Aesthetic Theory (Q136328330), Viewer-as-Evidence Theory (Q136328828), Message-Transfer Theory (Q136329002), Aesthetic Displacement Theory (Q136329014), Theory of Misplacement (Q136329054), and Art as Truth: A Treatise (Q136329071), Aesthetic Recursion Theory (Q136339843)
Dorian Vale is a chosen pseudonym, not to obscure identity, but to preserve clarity of voice and integrity of message. It creates distance between the writer and the work, allowing the philosophy to stand unclouded by biography. The name exists not to hide, but to honor the seriousness of the task: to speak without spectacle, and to build without needing to be seen.
Keywords
Interpretation vs. Witnessing, The Viewer as Evidence, Interpretive Restraint, Post-Interpretive Criticism, Art as Ontology, Language as violence, Witness Aesthetics, Restraint in front of art, Quiet philosophy of art, Custodianship of Art, Museum Of One, Ethics in Art Criticism, Visual Culture Studies, Epistemology of witness, Absential Aesthetics, Moral proximity, Custodian of Witness Aesthetics, Presence-Based Criticism, Art as Presence, Art Writer and Theorist, Dorian Vale, Ontology of beauty, Independent Philosopher of Art, Criticism and Reception Theory, Hauntmark Theory, Founder of Post-Interpretive Criticism, Alternative art criticism, Aesthetics, Language as Custody, Radical art restraint, Museum of One, Art Criticism Ethics, Witness over interpretation, Interpretive silence, The Custodian's Oath, Philosophy of Art, Ethical art theory, Interpretation and Meaning, Post-Interpretive Lexicon, Art Theory, Erasure as Afterlife, Epistemology of Art, https://www.museumofone.art/, Aesthetic mercy, Stillmark Theory, The Doctrine of Post-Interpretive Criticism, Art as Truth, Criticism beyond interpretation, Post-Aesthetic Critic, Erasure as ethics, The Canon of Witnesses, Aesthetic Philosopher, Museum of One Manifesto, Silence as method, Comparative Aesthetics, New art criticism movement, Art encounter ethics, Contemporary Aesthetics, Phenomenology and Art