"dark matter"

I just came across this quote on the Version 08 website- it's an interesting articulation of the idea....

“Like its astronomical cousin, creative dark matter also makes up the bulk of the artistic activity produced in our post-industrial society. However, this type of dark matter is invisible primarily to those who lay claim to the management and interpretation of culture - the critics, art historians, collectors, dealers, museums, curators and arts administrators. It includes informal practices such as home-crafts, makeshift memorials, amateur photography (and pornography), Sunday-painters, self-published newsletters and fan-zines, Internet art galleries -- all work made and circulated in the shadows of the formal art world. Yet, just as the physical universe is dependent on its dark matter and energy, so too is the art world dependent on its shadow creativity. It needs it in much the same way certain developing countries depend on their shadow or informal economies.” - Gregory Sholette (gregorysholette.com)

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This reminds me that I've been trying to locate my copy of Ralph Ellison's "Invisible Man" for a few weeks now. There is a beautiful passage in the book where he describes coming out of the subway and suddenly seeing Harlem- all the lives that happen on what he calls the "lower frequencies," that are left out of history and elided....