Incomplete thoughts 

with garnished evidence of the Kali Yuga

 

 

June 10, 2002

    40 million imbeciles choose one to strip them bare.     Borges (defining democracy)

I may not be fair to use a political quote for an author whose subject matter, for the most part, concentrated on artistic inquiry. Yet today my mind is on the political and it stems from a question that has cropped up in my mind:  is art subversive?  It's hard for me to think of subversive without thinking politics, as you can see the denotation always includes government ,revolution, overthrow,  but I think politics and "government" can be brought down to ones individual sovereignty even down to a conscious/subconscious level. Because our society is a reflection of our psyche. 

The art I enjoy most wakes me up from the slumber that is my day to day.  David Hickey says it a different way, when he feels that art should expose "quotidian" as beautiful.  Revealing the possibilities, the choices which are available to us , that surround us all over.  How rare it occurs to me now, that feeling of newness all over. Is it because my sleep is deep, or I stray away from art that lends me its possibilities?  The protective armor goes up, and the depth of that armor is a reflection of how easy my life has become.  That ease kills art, and feeds imbeciles.

June 17, 2002  3.am.

    No one is ever convinced by an argument. Emerson

What an argument.   Art needs to be subversive in order for it not to be combative. Once the sides are taken, eyes close up, and brain narrows.  

In line with that, criticism for the most part should start at a personal level, it should include the critic as part of the process,  otherwise everything becomes objective, and that comes off as fake. I would call it a holier than thou type of stance. 

There's a sanskrit word that comes to mind upaya, and I guess it translates as a skillful means, I've heard Alan Watts speak of it as a trick, a pedagogy.  How about , a means of convincing without an argument?   Is subversion a upaya? Should art convince? 

Next week awaits to answer those deep questions, I am so excited!

June 24, 2002 

 the worst art is art that means something Alan Watts

So I end my last entry with a bit of irony.  Why not, I'll drag David Hickey in again.  I'm ever so relieved of the obscurity of this page, so that he, and others I may falsely paraphrase, do not learn what is being associated to their names.  Nonetheless, in the now defunct Art Issues, Jan-Feb 1999, Mr. Hickey writes, "To employ the full expressive figure of irony, one must assert something in a manner that insists upon its meaning something else entirely -- that suggests by some sign an altogether antagonistic meaning."  Irony holds in it the adolescent cruelty of an inside joke hence the "antagonistic meaning". Comically it's the nudge nudge, is that any better? I think subversion is in the same category. That sly "sub" prefix that makes its seem underground and sneaky. An so in the same article, he continues, "Those who fear 'death from above' who dwell in bureaucratic, clerical, or academic cultures where speech is regulated, relationships are permanent, and there is no free expression must resort to irony". He goes on to call it a "wanker's ploy" and  I agree. Why not just come out and say what you mean, especially when you have nothing to lose. What do I have to lose,  I, who constantly employ my protective ironic tone....  as if pride were something not to lose.   I'd just rather call my irony subversive, it's more punk rock that way.

Have I even touched upon those questions of yesterday?  Who cares? Sure,  art can convince, but actually it is  critics that  should convince, and art should lay there on her back,  with her legs....    

 July 1, 2002 

If you're bored wake me up.  The stardust memories have arrived, enough theory they say, we want your older funnier stuff. Well I'm headed to Seattle, slew heads, for a week of  hunting ducks in a barrel, so for ammo I plan to pack my pad and pen, and we'll see what falls from the sky.  

Book bag inventory: The posthumous publication of Borges keeps coming out, so it's more of the same.

Speaking of the same I saw Bergman's Persona and I'm not sure whether or not to read some criticism on it, for it may spoil it for me,  it seems like one of those movies that you which and you think , did I get any of that? 

Let me go out on a limb though. There isn't two women it's really just one and the movie is the inner conflict between the mask (persona) and the soul (alma), and in the end mask dies, in fact the mask is on it's way out at the beginning. I may have read it wrong because of my Spanish.  The nurses name is means soul in Spanish, but I'm fucked cause it means nurture in Latin, and unless alma means something interesting in Swedish my theory is shot. I know, Bergman was probably sleeping with a spanish poetess on the sly at the time. With that stickiness aside, my theory holds,  we know the patient who refuses to speak is an actress, and  there are plenty of scenes in the movie that show the melding of the two women into one. 

Ok, I should research and have someone tell me what this movie means, I can't just lie awake without knowing.  I'd be sleepless in...., and Meg Ryan would show up and and and....MEGGGGYYYYYY.

 July 21, 2002 

Ruben and I used to theorize of a letter that was all preamble and no letter.  A preamble meant to explain two things:   Why I was writing, and why the writing was so bad.  The content, good or bad,  was never written.  That preambilic writing is what is found in the stacks of paper in my closet right now.  Stacks of super self conscious writing, that is for the birds, and all of which should be torched.

    My liners are her liner on my liner.

It has occurred to me that I will never write any better.  My language education was over years ago, and all that can improve now, is my approach to that language and the result of that is this website, which gives me the facade of an audience, and that helps, otherwise my audience is the bird liner.

Just back from a trip through the Northwest and some pictures of the new Whippet puppy that we got are going up soon.

Happy birthday Doug Misterly.  There are peoples birthdays you never forget, no matter how annoying that may seem.  

 Aug 13, 2002  Martes 13

Don't get married.    Today.    

If you don't know by now, you should, the crux of this site is found on the boat pages.  yankee30 etc.  If you want to know what I am doing on my weekends, just look there.  If you want to know what I do during my days Activisions_Wakeboarding.  The point is, the web is a great resource and it has helped me tremendously, and I want to give my little part.  I would like at some day  if someone were to search  "sailboat deck repair" for my site to come up. I would have liked to have found my site before I started.  If you are curious on how to get you site listed, via keywords: email me or look it up on the web.

Aug 19, 2002

What occurs is you drift away and time, like water, just fills the gaps.  I'm going to wake up dead one day soon.  Amen.

I was listening to a public radio station yesterday, and heard this guy Richard Grossman http://www.progressive.org/March%202002/intv0302.html

the website of his organization

http://www.poclad.org/

You can read that article but I ordered the tape of a talk he gave that was absolutely brilliant on the development of the corporate culture we live in, and the continual  fading of the sovereignty of the people in this country.  If you want me to send you a copy of the CD of this talk: e-mail me.  

Back to the writing: link