martes, enero 01, 2008

dear jurgen doc

Dear Jurgen (sorry about the uncomplete “u”, this keyboard’s crazy):



How are you doing, man?
I bet you are so buisy as a turtle eating spaguetty with chopsticks.

Well, you know, this nice south african cheap cabernet sauvignon and me, just wanted to say hello...
Hello!
Need to go see the rice...it’s donne!.
.............I just took a photo of a plant thinking about you.
This plant inhabits the kitchen (another one’s in the living), center of known Universe. She is a solo performer, in one of the most astonishing things I’ve ever seen. She dances, man!, I‘m not kidding, a really slow, butoh like, on going posture (could even say gesture) movement. Her shows are more intense during the night –which is the most of the time, now. And no, I’ve only drunk one and a half glass, the previous glass I did clumsily spilt it all over the place, which stain resulted (by the way impossible to take out, once the walls seem to have been painted with whiff) pretty enough.
Anna came back. Care and proper atention brake.
It wasn’t the plant that remind me of you, was the background:
.............Behind the plant there are two offset photo posters that I’ve glued together. One (the upper image) is a person in gabardine and glasses replacing a sett of the street paving for a flower plant , neat, eh? Czek artist’s performance of the 70’s or 80’s –not sure right now. The image below is upside down and it’s also from a performance: Spani na strome, Sleeping in a tree (the “i” should have an acute accent tilde. As well, the “e” should go with an inverted portugueesse circumflex look like tilde on top) by Petr Stembera (the “s” in the surname should have another of those portugueesse inverted on top), occured in April 1975 in Praha –here the date it’s of more interest, I imagine for a sec this act-in-winter: “frozen artistis is found on top of a tree, after three days missing... “After three days and nights without sleep I spent the fourth night in a tree” says in the part of the poster I’ve cuted out. Finaly, out of the photo range *like the expression*, dodging an electric cable and making a 90 degrees between the door frame and the skirting board on wich alights surrounded by “train stones” (dark grey bluish and white granite), there is a woman lying completely streched on the curb of a road.
.............Interesting group of gymnastic weridos...
.............I wonder where does this “sett” word come from?. I would like to point that in the dicctionary (Langesnscheidt, modern dictionary, Spanish-English, English-Spanish by Santillana –my God, what a mix!) there wasn’t the english version of “adoquin” wich is “sett”. Anyway, I’ve checked out this gap between the words “set” and “settback” (funny thing), so before the last definition of “set” it is an expression use in farming, meaning “to transplant”. Just in case I’ve looked for the spanish version of “transplant” and in one of the figurative meanings says “emigrate”.
.............That’s a way of going outrooted!
... Fresh bread coming out the oven!, an integral barley and rye bread (couldn’t make it only from rye, with comercial yeast it wouldn’t grow, you know?). I am on time if you think it is half past six in the morning.
.............Okay, now let’s take our picture-performance-pic story back, profitting the bread boost –which reminds I have some workshop/activity proposal for Maumaus’ new kitchen department...
Of course by this time you are thinking, probably in German, “but where do those interesting images come from?” and perhaps also “is it dear max always cooking?”.
.............My sweetheart and I went to this museum/gallery, named easy forgot, to see the performance we were told was going to happen. It Resulted that a contest “who-is-best-artist-like?” was being held, as if an edp prize thing for czek artists –the new day’s lighten blue tints the sky such in a violet and petroleum tones...- and that day a dernisage, as this nice participant guy said, was going on and they were going to reveal to the whole wide big world who deserved best all those crowns and the first quality trip to New York –I wonder “would I talk (would it be possible or would it be fair?) like this if I had the first place in edp’s?...
.............But first must say that in my way I remembered Jimmie Durham’s advice, he encourage me to cook; so I was having an affarir (or was it just a flirt?) with these thoughts when I got to the exhibition. In the beggining (was the rythm) saw a barrel with fire in front of the building, thought it was nice moove, contrasting. Then I was admired by how many people where there, specially gypsies. And finally understood that somebody was cooking, nothing too fancy merely popular nutritive food: sausages and other roastable stuff over the barrel, and a delicious chilly cous-cous in the entrance hall. They were properly set up for the task with a gas stove (over a washing machine) pans and pots and all imaginable items; also visually looked very nice, somewhere between a students’ cantine and a quick fix street stand. They made a pretty nice knocking tea with rum... Can you imagine this scenario with the fire and the gypsies and the food and drinks in Serralve’s garden, ja ja aja would it be super!!!.
.............It is day, I can turn off the lights.
.............Those of the cooking collective *could be the name for a group* were from Praha and they didn’t even enter the exhibition spaces, instead they send gypsy children with spray cans to paint in the walls... I know, sounds crazy. So, “crazy” should have sound in the minds of the judges who gave the prize. And –finally we’re getting to the core- the girl artist who won and was happy and smiling and probably not trying to remember if she had left the heating on– saw her being riddled by the photographers- was the one of the posters.
.............She reflects. She picks five performative artists of the 70’s and 80’s (dead or alive). She talks to them (even the gonne ones). She reflects. Then she decides to mimic the performances, chosing video documentation instead of photo. She does the zhing. She reflects once again. She exhibits everything (tv monitors, headphones) and, laying aside in the floor, the posters with the original (this piece could work as an intro for discussing benji’s text) photo, underneath you can read the name of the artist, title, date and a brief description of the work. On the posters she stamps (quite horrible, idea and outcome) REPLACED. She wins.
.............While crossing the big puddle, she stops reading her “how to eat the apple pocket dictionary or manual for prize winning artist’s trip”, she looks out through the litle window, she can see the wing sharpely contrasted against the depthless bleu du ciel (sound like cheese). The white mass of clouds floating lower down... she reflects “I came off well”.
.............Because I know you would like to know: the actions were nice (although they were copies, in the literal not pushed forward or emancipated –here you are, with your own, many times used, words- sense) the videos where done okay, she ad english subtitles with deep fried thoughts (come on, now you’re being naughty). I liked it, it was simple, eficient, she did it, she was lying there, on the ground, while people just passed by not wanting to know (with the actions, she was generating some thinking, maybe), and specially I wondered how she managed the tree thing and, most of all, how she managed not to sleep for four days. Anyhow I still have the feeling that the first performances involved a more political and defiant fresh statement. The only real but(t) was that everything was prety bad installed. Not honest care about space, not care about viewer’s view details.
.............Well... I realy enjoyed the cooking part, the crafty gypsy children bruised faces and the freeness of entrance and wine.


Meanwhile the tea got coldhearted.
This is another day, long ago,
Another night ’n’ dawn
Together : Miles
Me and U
...
Too
D A Y
Feels
Like lost sense
Of humor and sour
Cream eyelids, just be
Cause I wanted:
To meet Him,
To let go
of ev e r y t h i n g
of
the
very
word
hands
Off !
and
Be
One
with
The
.............V
................E
...................L
.....................O




Now it’s time to plug in the headphones , shift from never played to before sunarise, and drink my cold tea looking at the wonderfull spectacle in sky.


Hoje escrevi um poema para o gonzalo, branco.

.............Ainda hoje, ao ver acontecendo um novo evento na galeria (acho que e chamada “A Casa da Arte”) onde foi do premio, infiltramo-nos la para dentro, e qual foi a nossa surpressa ao descubrir que o espazo todo estava a ser utilizado para a festa da empressa butterfly uma dessas modernas e livres empresas onde o patrao e os empregados aparecem todos, casualmente vestidos (?), e sao retratados em coloridas fotografias no hall de entrada, e e todo superluminoso, quase ate a cegueira, como se essa luz pudesse trespassar o peito das pessoas...
.............Havia um cattering e claro, com fonte de chocolate incluida, e cocteis. Tudo uma merda, e digo isto porque experienciamos e experimentamos. Nem vou falar do trio de entertainers (o que e que esta gente fara no seu tempo livre?, nao consigo imaginar) a cantar a capela o “if i saw you in heaven” do eric clapton, o da megaprojeccao de fotos de bebes. O mais horripilante foi asistir a tentativa de algumas pessoas de conjuntar pezas de roupa que nao deviam era mesmo existir, num estilo post-saloio-chique (o que e que uma pessoa pode fazer senao rir dos fatos de 600 euros com meias dos ciganos), ou as que pareciam ter ido ao evento em camisa de noite (la fora 4 graus), no estilo denominado quase-puta-mas-sem-skills. Nem de carnaval tinha a reuniao ar.
.............Isto e que duvido que acontecese mesmo em serralves, pelo menos a fonte de chocolate seria maior, e nao estaria tao separada da mesa, que uma pessoa quase que cai ao por nela a bolacha... Em fim, uma triste dor de alma de se ver, num santuario da arte.





Espero que nao te importes de eu por este texto no meu blog.


Gostei destes momentos.

E hora de ir.

ate breve

abrazo

max