The Mark and the Word: Derrida’s Tâche as a Form of Language
Tâche. AI image Introduction In 1990, Jacques Derrida was invited by the Louvre to curate an exhibition as part of its Parti pris series, an initiative that paired thinkers from other fields with the museum’s vast archives. Derrida’s contribution, Mémoires d’aveugle: L’autoportrait et autres ruines ( Memoirs of the Blind: The Self-Portrait and Other Ruins ), explored themes of sight, self-portraiture, and blindness. The accompanying text, printed on the gallery walls, transformed the exhibition into a hybrid space where word and image intertwined. The project was neither purely philosophical nor strictly artistic, but rather a meditation on how the visible and the legible overlap and complicate one another. Among its many reflections, Derrida dwelled on the notion of tâche —the artist’s mark or touch. This simple gesture, the trace left by the hand, opens a deep reflection on creation, interpretation, and the production of meaning. Seen through a broader lens, the tâche can be r...