Upon Fleeing One Island For Another

METAL

"impression of a grotesque mausoleum raised in the memory of companions petrified in terminal postures as insignificant in their solemnity as they were in their ordinariness" - Georges Perec

"I never told a joke in my life" - Andy Kaufman

"Why Go On Feeding Germs?" -Thomas More

"I'd never seen the heart of the country. I figured it all for corporate parks and sick prairie grass. Apparently there were also some malls." - Sam Lipsyte

"The gallery and the art museum are small fish; who cares about them? Showing in them is hardly any different than showing at the mall." - Mike Kelley

Words Keep Slipping

LIKE (Hungry, Hungry, Hippo)

This is a poem I like.
This is a song I like.
This is an exhibition I like.
This is a building I like.
This is a movie I like.
This is a book I like.

Are there other things I should like right now?

Life Is Mostly Like This

"There's a Little Bit of ..."

Baby's On Fire

Black Triangles

Hello, You're the 150+ Visitor Today Looking for Pictures of Pocahontas. While you're here, enjoy this:

Social Skills

TO  DEVELOP

1. Clear (read for: quick & painless & not slighting) answer when asked: 'Why are you in Berlin?'
2. Clear (read for: quick & painless & not slighting) answer when asked: 'Why did you come to Berlin?'
3. Clear (read for: quick & painless & not slighting) answer when asked: 'How long are you staying?' [check!  Answer: 'I've stopped asking myself this question, and since then I'm a lot less anxious / happier.']
4. Clear (read for: quick & painless & not slighting) answer when asked: 'Why did you come to Germany?'
5. Clear (read for: quick & painless & not slighting) answer when asked: 'Why did you learn German?'


REASON FOR DEVELOPMENT:

These are questions, typical questions, for which I have no real answer, for which any answer (at a party for instance) would, in some way, be incomplete or inaccurate or a fudge.  Conversations often get 'hung up' here (especially with Germans, when speaking the German language) and perhaps block the way for more interesting (read for: enriching?) dialogue.

POSSIBLE TACTIC:

Ask more questions.  Hide like the Wizard in the Wizard of OZ.

OE

Last night I went to the Berlin Biennale opening, which was a lot of fun, despite the art being mostly meh.  I have a real problem with quasi-documentary/wannabepolitical/realityTVemulating art.  Not only is it dreadfully boring (cheap jokes / home movies that were torture to watch at home and are much less enjoyable in a crowded gallery, dripping with sweat), but it's also deathly.  So much time is wasted in these art forms trying to do things that lie outside of their powers.  Is any policy going to change because of these videos?  Does anyone have any clear examples of outright political work having any effect on politics?  That isn't to say that work that has political content can't be interesting; but it seems to me one has to be playful, thoughtful and modest.  Almost everything at the BB felt juvenile and coffee shop intellectual aware; which is to say, not really aware.  As far as art is concerned, I'm more on the side of Olafur Eliasson, whose exhibition at the Martin Gropius Bau is amazing.


Olafur Eliasson | Martin Gropius Bau : Water Pendulum, 2010 from MADE Blog on Vimeo.


In an interview I read between OE and Hans-Ulrich Obrist, OE suggests that art is affective and his art in particular is trying to make people more aware of their own sensory apparatus.  Though this is rather abstract, I find this to be more politically effective than a political poster.  For, if you're more aware of yourself, then you're more aware of your surroundings and, potentially, of the structures that shape your surroundings.  I think in some cases OE really achieves this, especially if you allow yourself a good chunk of time in the fog room at the exhibition.

Rant, rant, rant.

I actually had another plan for this entry.  Only means another entry of writing.  God forbid.

"Seeing Machines"

Something's in the Way

That is All

I made a mixtape.  

I'm in love with WHITE RING.  

"There no longer remains, in their place, anything but excess, strangeness, and death"

What I've Been Doing While I've Been Sleeping

Hip Hip Hooray

IRAS

Today I have a piece up at everyday genius.  it's from the big manuscript.  i've been working on lots of small stuff lately, stuff that feels just right, even if it sits on the fence and refuses to be defined by a genre.  good for it!

i just finished reading 'die gelehrtenrepublik' which is absolutely phenomenal.  i'm going to buy all the arno schmidt this world has to give.  and then i might go visit his foundation, i bet it's marvelous and decrepit and a little sad.

speaking of foundations, i went to the scelsi foundation in rome and saw luciano chessa perform there.  it was freaking amazing.  the concert was a perfect mixture of luciano's music and music that's inspired him.  and the setting, my god, the setting.  afterwards we had drinks on scelsi's terrace, overlooking the forum.  man was cold hard pimpin' in his day.


i'm still waiting for my copy of chris higgs book and i don't know how much longer i can wait.  i think i might have to buy another copy.  i just reread his e-chapbook at publishing genius and me mouth began to water.


no pictures today, but please see the 4 entries yesterday, and click on all the videos in the entries at the same time.  it's a lot of fun.

This Is Only A Test

Looking for a way out

Something Has Been Lost

A Flash