|
|
||||||||
|
|
Present Past Subjects Projects Misc
|
NOVEMBER 2002
Just before dawn I dreamt I met an artist. This made me happy. We were standing together outside. He was wearing an amazing coat with lots of pockets. The more he talked the more he reminded me of another friend, also an artist, also a dreamer. Together we threw floating objects into the pond below us. We laughed and pointed. "Look, it's a garden." he said. Looking up as I walked past the building I noticed a weathered opening in its facade through which I could see a rough concrete ceiling. After a moment I realised that this was the end of an open veranda overlooking an inner courtyard and a pool. It was winter. A hotel with a pool always looks bleaker in winter. To get in I had to enter through someone's room. Each time I did this I felt very apprehensive. Wouldn't the occupant be inside? Wouldn't he cry out, surprised, if he saw me enter, a stranger? What if I found him sleeping? It was a relief that the room was empty. I quickly crossed it but the door through which I usually passed was covered with drawn curtains and the beds (which I noticed had been made up) had been pushed back against the worn fabric.
(Anniversary) Thinking of proper names and their various aspects or types of synonym: anonyms, pseudonyms, allonyms and necronyms... I've been particularly fascinated by the allonym (usually defined as 'the name of another person assumed by a writer') ever since I read the following passage by Jalal Toufic (which, I should add, he qualified last November, by stating that only objects possessing both consciousness AND a proper name, thus only objects that are conscious of their own death, are in a position to self-liberate).
Thinking of such action, one (already) imagines the world as considerably larger when one witnesses or observes the presence of one's own allonym. In my case the allonym being the Paul Perry that I am paying to type this (or the person, also named Paul Perry, who's paying me). Note the 'paying' part is important. For allonyms to be allonyms they must invest -- 'more or less' heavily -- in each other. Researching 'strange wills' I've come across these two reports:
... this wonderful 19th c. essay written by Sabine Baring-Gould, and the titles of two books:
Escaped: one white plastic barrel containing mysterious objects of a biological origin. Last seen rolling down a series of steep streets (with me in hot pursuit). Possibly lost in nearby gully. Don't you wish more 'post contemporary art exhibition' websites were as simple as this one? (Update: Shit... It seems the designer has gone and added a trendy purple logo. This, in my opinion, completely ruins the effect.)
(Köln) The Last Will and Testament of Henri Bergson
There is solace in the recognition of a return, in the recognition of a pattern, in the arrival at a previous point of departure. Today I've returned to May 28th's entry on backward causality. Today (and Monday) I'm back at the Rijksakademie. Al-Ghazali's critique of cause and effect:
Heard yesterday at the Rijksakademie: "I respect my first idea." A page covering Pierre Klossowski's biography, writing and art. The Space of Untimeliness Untimeliness. Impatience. The moment arrives when one can no longer continue in the same vein. Rupture. One forces (or is forced to make) a break. Untimeliness nestles in the center of the Zeitgeist just as impatience nestles in the heart of the patient. Is not impatience inevitable? Can anything (can any event) ever really be 'untimely'? In 1848 an Alamut-like rupture occurred in the Gardens of Badasht: The Unveiling of the Babi Poetess Qurrat al-`Ayn Tahirih in the Gardens of Badasht
Babism (a precursor to the Baha'i faith) references:
Super interesting Nietzsche: The Four Great Errors from 'Twilight of the Idols'.
Untimely Life Two days ago I wondered: "Can anything (can any event) ever really be 'untimely'?" and just now I've thought of something: Nietzsche's 'Posthumous Man' ("Some are born posthumously.") and Al-Ghazali's corpse which sits up "and writes learned volumes in a well-ordered script." Untimely are the living dead. (Nietzsche's 'Untimely Meditations': written by a dead man.) One's last will and testament is the perfect expression of untimeliness. Testamentum omne morte consummatur. (Every will is perfected by death. A will speaks from the (un)time of death only.) Typically it is in one's last will and testament that one speaks with the greatest power and authority:
Nietzsche: "Posthumous men--I for example--are understood worse than timely ones, but heard better. More precisely: we are never understood--hence our authority."
Zinda Laash (The Living Corpse) 1967. The Hotspot. I was taken to Hotspot for icecream on one of my last evenings in Islamabad without realising that they had such a cool web presence -- or even crazier given the extent of my film research while in Islamabad -- without realising that they put enormous energy into collecting, reviewing and screening bollywood and lollywood cult films. Aaargh. How on earth could I have missed this? Hotspot reviews of 5 films I'm interested in...
(More Indian vampires: 29 August 2002 and 8 September 2002.) Speaking of 'untimeliness' I saw Nicolas Roeg's 'Bad Timing: A Sensual Obsession' when it first came out and was showing in the theatres in Canada (1980 or 1981). At the time I thought it was a very disturbing film. It appears that others thought so too. The film has been been buried by its distributor ever since. From Rick Trembles' Motion Picture Purgatory (comic-art reviews of films for the Montreal Mirror) comes a review of Last Year at Marienbad. (Happily anticipating my new Powerbook G4 1ghz (superdrive) currently en route from Taiwan I've just ordered the DVD of Last Year at Marienbad from Amazon.) Film-Philosophy.com Online Writings N. and I watched Julio Medem's Tierra. Found the concept and bits of the dialogue interesting but overall were left disappointed. Maybe need to see more of his work?
ALAMUT.COM is artist owned and operated.
|
|
||||||
