The Onion Variations

Nikolaus Maack

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Jul 8, 1999, 3:00:00 AM7/8/99

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There is an onion sitting in a phone booth outside of the McDonald's in
Bells Corners, a suburb of Ottawa. It is a brown onion. It is big. The
phone booth has McDonald's arches all over it -- a McPhone Booth.

Above the onion is a sticker with arrows pointing down at the onion. The
sticker reads:

"Please Leave The Grapefruit Alone!"

(My girlfriend wrote the notice. She has better handwriting than I do.)

I have personally adopted this phone booth for my onion fetish. I would
like to suggest, humbly, that each of you adopt your own phone booth.
Place a vegetable of your choice -- or any object that normally does not
appear in a phone booth -- inside of it.

Stickers warning people to leave the object alone are entirely optional.
I personally enjoy the concept of a false authority warning people to stay
the heck away from my grapefruit. And who knows? (I do. I am the
authority.) Maybe the onion is a grapefruit trapped in an onion's body.

Once you have adopted a phone booth, keep an eye on your fetish object and
replace it when necessary. Post in alt.surrealism about joining in the
"onions for phonebooths" experiment, thus placing pressure on other
so-called surrealists to join in.

It is a small act, with untold consequences. What sort of political
agenda does it further? No one knows. Is it surreal? Sure, I guess.
Does it further the eventual destruction of society, and prepare us for an
anarchistic system? No.

When I went to place the onion, there was a woman in MY phone booth. My
girlfriend and I sat down near the phone booth and stared at her. We
tapped our feet, and we scowled. The woman inside the phone booth noticed
us and didn't realize we were joking. She waved to indicate that she
wouldn't be very long, and when she came out of the booth, she apologized
for taking so long.

She made me feel guilty. She felt the need to explain to us WHY she took
so long, and blathered half a story about getting "good news" and wanting
to tell her husband all about it. She didn't tell us what the good news
was.

Apparently she was unaware that five feet away were two more phone booths
that -- were we actually going to make a phone call instead of setting up
an onion -- would have suited us perfectly.

In any case, the onion is in place. Long live the grapefruit.

Nik

--
Who cares about the political consequences, so long as there are onions in
phone booths?

Leo Sgouros

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Jul 8, 1999, 3:00:00 AM7/8/99

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Nikolaus Maack <ac...@FreeNet.Carleton.CA> wrote in message
news:7m2tel$c...@freenet-news.carleton.ca...

Excellent.
I shall carry out this experiment here.
I wonder what kind of scientology tie in I can give to my onion.
Onions!The new tool to fight cultism!!
Fight a cult with a cult
YAY111!!!111!!!!11!

Michael DiCola

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Jul 8, 1999, 3:00:00 AM7/8/99

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Nikolaus Maack (ac...@FreeNet.Carleton.CA) writes:
> There is an onion sitting in a phone booth outside of the McDonald's in
> Bells Corners, a suburb of Ottawa. It is a brown onion. It is big. The
> phone booth has McDonald's arches all over it -- a McPhone Booth.
>
> Above the onion is a sticker with arrows pointing down at the onion. The
> sticker reads:
>
> "Please Leave The Grapefruit Alone!"

You see surrealism. I see someone stumbling into that McDonald's one morning
in the depressingly near future, and asking for one order of the McOnion
with Grapefruit he saw advertised in the phone booth outside.

Ars gratia artis. *ROAAAARRRRrrrr!*

--
Michael J
"My myopic view of life"
me and The Barras

Dale Houstman

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Jul 8, 1999, 3:00:00 AM7/8/99

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Nikolaus Maack wrote:

> thus placing pressure on other so-called surrealists to join in.

If we buckle under to this "pressure" and participate in this
less-than-productive and more-than-silly exercise in self-congratulatory
"oddness for oddness' sake" will we STILL be "so-called surrealists" or
(since we have done what YOU want us to do) can we join the club you
have established? In other words, are you (who are so against "the lead
cube" and the control of "false surrealists") actualy claiming that the
only path to true surrealism is through YOU? A mite restrictive for the
anti-lead cube brigade isn't it? I wonder at your dedication to freedom
when you start spouting control nonsense like this. I am more than
willing to listen to your urban adventures in detail, and even find them
amusing, but I am not willing to allow you the privelege of claiming
that all surrealism begins and ends with these tedious jokes.

> It is a small act, with untold consequences. What sort of political agenda does it further? No one knows. Is >it surreal? Sure, I guess.

Your certainty in the face of limpidity is awe-inspiring...

> Does it further the eventual destruction of society, and prepare us for an anarchistic system? No.
>
> When I went to place the onion, there was a woman in MY phone booth. My girlfriend and I sat down near the phone booth and stared at her. We tapped our feet, and we scowled. The woman inside the phone booth noticed us and didn't realize we were joking. She waved to indicate that she wouldn't be very long, and when she came out of the booth, she apologized for taking so long.
>
> She made me feel guilty. She felt the need to explain to us WHY she took so long, and blathered half a story about getting "good news" and wanting to tell her husband all about it.

Common civility seems to unnerve you to an uncommon degree. Your willed
rudeness has no point, and yet when the "victim" of your control has the
decency to apoligize to two rude strangers, you take it as a sign of -
what exactly? - stupidity? And I don't see why a stranger should share
her news (good or bad) with two such obvious egomaniancs. This project
to simply "disturb" random strangers strikes me as no less idiotic than
the conventional "Random Acts of Kindness" tripe we have been subject to
(to no apparent end) these last few years. It appears fundamentally
baseless.

This story reminds me of a fellow student in a writing class. He once
told us that he had stood at a bus stop and turned away from the
direction in which the bus would be coming from, in some vague protest
of the people who stared (ridiculously, he presumed) in that direction.
His superior attitude at the time belied any postive aspects of that
"project" and made him appear somewhat stupid. For those "idiots" he so
wished to aggravate were (1) At least looking in an "efficacious"
direction, and (2) recapitulating a rather marvelous modern grasp of
"sympathetic magic": they felt (quite beyond rationality) that directing
their gaze at a space the bus might inhabit would "invoke" the bus.

I find both aspects more marvelous and less dim than the silly game.

Blow up Hamburger U!

DMH

Andrea Chen

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Jul 8, 1999, 3:00:00 AM7/8/99

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Dale Houstman wrote:
>
> Nikolaus Maack wrote:
>
> > thus placing pressure on other so-called surrealists to join in.
>
> If we buckle under to this "pressure" and participate in this
> less-than-productive and more-than-silly exercise in self-congratulatory
> "oddness for oddness' sake" will we STILL be "so-called surrealists"

I somwhat agree with you in principle here. I would suggest that
surrealism does involve acts that force some questioning and shift
perspective. I'm not sure that Nik's do.

But then again neither do your silly little shifting of words to make
"poems."

or
> (since we have done what YOU want us to do) can we join the club you
> have established? In other words, are you (who are so against "the lead
> cube" and the control of "false surrealists")

Remember however you are the ones who established the idea of "false
surrealists." We simply reflected it back at you.

You have appealed to dogma such as Breton, yet completely ignored
points related to the historical Breton (prefering instead the one you
invented.)

I offer again the example of Freud, mentioned in several webpages
listed yesterday by Brandon and in the article on surrealism and
anarchy. You refused to educate yourself.

> wished to aggravate were (1) At least looking in an "efficacious"
> direction, and (2) recapitulating a rather marvelous modern grasp of
> "sympathetic magic": they felt (quite beyond rationality) that directing
> their gaze at a space the bus might inhabit would "invoke" the bus.
>
> I find both aspects more marvelous and less dim than the silly game.
>

"Sympathetic magic," once again religion creeps in.

Again you are arbitrary on what you will accept. Taoism is a religion,
but at it's core it's a form of thinking about things, you can find it
it Mao's concepts of gueruilla war (when the enemy advances, we retreat,
when...)

Or here is another bit from Taoist texts which seems in line with your
Rousseau. A traveller sees a farmer watering fields by bucket and
explains the draw well. The farmer replies:

"I have heard my teacher say that whoever uses machines does all his
work like machines. Whoever works like a machine grows a heart like a
machine and whoever has a heart like a machine loses simplicity.
Whoever loses simplicity becomes unsure. This uncertainty does not
agree with the way. It's not that I don't know of machines, I refuse to
use them."

Now certainly this point written millinium ago is of interest. It
certainly echoes some things you've recently said. There are points to
bicker over, but you rejected it without hearing it.

You practice a sympathetic magic trying to keep out all things you
don't know.

Brandon J. Freels

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Jul 8, 1999, 3:00:00 AM7/8/99

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Nikolaus Maack wrote
> What have YOU done for surrealism lately, besides your continual sucking
> upon the limp, dead, paper-bound, mummified prick of Andre Breton?

I find it rather humorous that no matter how far we* drift from Breton we
are still considered by those who oppose us to be "sucking upon the limp,
dead, paper-bound, mummified prick of Andre Breton."

*By "we" of course I am referring to the alt.surrealism regulars.

My definition of Surrealism is based on the definition provided by the
Declaration of January 27, 1925, which was originally mapped out by Artuad.

Nikolaus Maack

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Jul 9, 1999, 3:00:00 AM7/9/99

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Dale Houstman (dale.h...@gte.net) writes:
> If we buckle under to this "pressure" and participate in this
> less-than-productive and more-than-silly exercise in self-congratulatory
> "oddness for oddness' sake"

[blah blah blah]

What have YOU done for surrealism lately, besides your continual sucking

upon the limp, dead, paper-bound, mummified prick of Andre Breton? Have
another latte, you pompous, inactive, self-important sack of neuroses.

Don't like my game, make your own, Dale. Do something or continue to die
quietly.

g.v.w. iv

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Jul 9, 1999, 3:00:00 AM7/9/99

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Dale Houstman wrote:

> This story reminds me of a fellow student in a writing class.

Dale lies. No one who writes like Dale Houstman ever attended a writing class.

Or if he did, he should demand a refund. Or his instructor should be taken to the wall and shot.

> DMH

Dale Houstman assumes his new role, that of a maniac suburbanite. He shrieks at the children to stay off his lawn. He rockets about our newsgroup squeezed into the control-top pantyhose of his dull-witted didacticism. The veins on his forehead distend. His face swells blue with impotent rage.

Deprived of his newgroup, deprived of the comfort of his delusions, deprived of the comfort of his once slavish friends (they turned on him), he can only gibber glumly to himself. He scolds. He lectures. He pleads. He snivels. He shrieks. He complains. He issues a continuous stream of bitter dicta, only barely intelligible. In puffy sleeves and frilly apron he ricochets off the walls
of our newsgroup like a crazed house-wife on crystal-meth, mop and pail flailing, battling desperately the disorder of ordinary human discourse.

He trails behind him doilies, coasters, plastic-slipcovers.
--
gilbert vanburen wilkes iv
http://eserver.org/home/wilkes
<a href="http://www.2600.com/mindex.html">Free Kevin</a>

Revolutions are always verbose.
Leon Trotsky

Brandon J. Freels

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Jul 9, 1999, 3:00:00 AM7/9/99

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g.v.w. iv wrote

> Or if he did, he should demand a refund. Or his instructor should be taken
to the wall and shot.

You are implying that their is a type of instructor that should not be shot.
Please identify this type.

Dale Houstman

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Jul 9, 1999, 3:00:00 AM7/9/99

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Nikolaus Maack wrote:
>

>
> What have YOU done for surrealism lately, besides your continual sucking
> upon the limp, dead, paper-bound, mummified prick of Andre Breton? Have
> another latte, you pompous, inactive, self-important sack of neuroses.
>

Sorry, don't drink lattes. It's a question of what surrealism has done
for me. It has aided me in producing a magazine, in producing several
anti-coporate leaflets which were distributed with both a sense of play
and a sense of duty. It has prompted me into the composition of many
poems of late, and into participating in an international day of action.
It has bolstered me in my daily exercise of anarchistic humor to defuse
the seriousness of managerial control.

I do have to admit it has not led me to attempt to startle or confuse
the already-exploited minimum wage earners of my city. You have me
there.

Why don't you attempt to startle or confuse those in power, rather than
to ruin the day of a woman in a phone booth who (it seems evident) was
gracious to you despite your boorishness? That fact that you did not
appreciate her civility makes you a double boor. The fact that you
posted your dubious exercise with its self-congratulatory egoism makes
you a triple boor.

Onions are fine. Paint one so it resembles a bomb and toss it into a
passing stretch limo. Please do anything but go about creating "scenes"
that lack any sesne of investigation.

What's next: peeing into the lemonade of old people at a nursing home?
Disguising yourself as a city cop and arresting beggars? Pulling a gun
painted tomato red on your babysitter? What a hoot!

DMH

Dale Houstman

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Jul 9, 1999, 3:00:00 AM7/9/99

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"g.v.w. iv" wrote:
>

pointless and baseless trash, as usual.

DMH

g.v.w. iv

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Jul 9, 1999, 3:00:00 AM7/9/99

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Dale Houstman wrote:

> Nikolaus Maack wrote:
> >
>
> >
> > What have YOU done for surrealism lately, besides your continual sucking
> > upon the limp, dead, paper-bound, mummified prick of Andre Breton? Have
> > another latte, you pompous, inactive, self-important sack of neuroses.
> >
> Sorry, don't drink lattes.

Well, duh. So you could ''plug-in'' to Barrett's rectum, you had your
mouth-parts surgically re-configured to resemble an enema nozzle. But just
what *have* you done for Surrealism lately, you un-testicled little boy?

g.v.w. iv

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Jul 9, 1999, 3:00:00 AM7/9/99

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[i committed a formatting faux-pas last time: let me try this again]

> Dale Houstman wrote:
>
> > This story reminds me of a fellow student in a writing class.

Dale lies. No one who writes like Dale Houstman ever attended a writing class.

Or if he did, he should demand a refund. Or his instructor should be taken to the wall and shot.

> > DMH

>
> Revolutions are always verbose.
> Leon Trotsky

Dale Houstman assumes his new role, that of a maniac suburbanite. He shrieks at the children to stay off his lawn. He rockets about our newsgroup squeezed into the control-top pantyhose of his dull-witted didacticism. The veins on his forehead distend. His face swells blue with impotent rage.

Deprived of his newgroup, deprived of the comfort of his delusions, deprived of the comfort of his once slavish friends (they turned on him), he can only gibber glumly to himself. He scolds. He lectures. He pleads. He snivels. He shrieks. He complains. He issues a continuous stream of bitter dicta, only barely intelligible. In puffy sleeves and frilly apron he ricochets off the walls of
our newsgroup like a crazed house-wife on crystal-meth, mop and pail flailing, battling desperately the disorder of ordinary human discourse.

He trails behind him doilies, coasters, plastic-slipcovers.

--

g.v.w. iv

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Jul 9, 1999, 3:00:00 AM7/9/99

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Here comes little Dale Houstman in his empire-waisted
baby-doll dress, gibbering frantically. Dale's
control-top pantyhose of grim didacticism grip him to
near strangulation; but he would rather look good than
feel good. They also cause him to lose bladder control
at the least convenient moments. Like right now.

Dale Houstman loses bladder control:

> "g.v.w. iv" wrote:
> >
>
> pointless and baseless trash, as usual.

You sound bitter, Dale. Learn to get along with the
other children.

>
> DMH

Nikolaus Maack

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Jul 9, 1999, 3:00:00 AM7/9/99

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Dale Houstman (dale.h...@gte.net) writes:
> I do have to admit it has not led me to attempt to startle or confuse
> the already-exploited minimum wage earners of my city. You have me
> there.

The masses need magic more-so than the powers that be. The surreal isn't
just about disturbing people. Or, that is, disturbing people isn't just
about disturbing people.

Stumbling across something odd can be a very magical experience. It
leaves you feeling a sense of hope and wonder. For example, several years
ago I came across the homemade mould of an enormous dildo. Someone left
this on the MacKenzie King Bridge in downtown Ottawa. It was a very
strange object to come across at three in the morning -- two plaster
halves of a mould that, if placed together and filled with chocolate or
rubber, would form an enormous artificial cock.

I was delighted to find this. It startled and pleased me. It gave me
strength. It shocked me, it kicked me out of my ruts. I took it home and
kept it until a cat knocked it over and destroyed it.

Surrealism isn't just about confronting POWER. It's also a magic show.
It's about giving strength and dreams to people.

Have you seen the movie, "Life is Beautiful"? It's surprisingly yummy.
One of the things that happens in the film is the main character startles
his love with events that seem to be MAGIC. Keys fall out of the sky and
into his hand. Strangers walk up to him on the street and deliver
pronouncements of significance. The world seems to be utterly in synch
with his insanity. This makes the woman so incredibly happy and entranced
with his universe that she marries him.

A surreal act can shock and depress, but it can also fill a human
head with joy. The nazis are a game. Laugh at them. Sure, they'll kill
you, but it's important to have fun while you're alive.

> What's next: peeing into the lemonade of old people at a nursing home?

Actually, for the longest time now I've been thinking of volunteering at a
nursing home just so I can have access to the wrinkled faces and paint
portraits of them. It would be a much more pleasing, and surreal act, to
say, "I find the elderly beautiful. Can I paint your wrinkled face?"

> Pulling a gun
> painted tomato red on your babysitter? What a hoot!

I had a strange vision last night while drifting off to sleep -- a
man painted red from head to toe. Shoes, pants, shirt, a top hat, face
and hands, all the same brilliant colour of red. Getting on the bus, the
driver is startled out of his mind.

"Can I have a transfer please?" the man in red asks.

Downtown on a busy Saturday night, the man in red hands out
cherry lollipops to the masses of bar going people. There is no reason
behind it.

Then, later in my vision, I saw the red man -- who would be me --
accompanied by a green man and a blue woman and a purple man. The lot of
us would march through the city, our faces smiling. The people wouldn't
know what to make of us, and we wouldn't tell them our secret.

Confronting people, startling people, shocking people isn't necessarily
about kicking them off their feet and stuffing politics up their ass. It
can be about providing them with a confusing sense of wonder. Remember
that, Dale, next time you write another angry anti-corporate letter.

Rage makes people look away. Play makes them laugh and listen.

But thanks for telling me about some of the things you've done. I would,
however, like some more specific details. Tell me more.

Robert Scott Martin

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Jul 9, 1999, 3:00:00 AM7/9/99

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In article <3784C3...@earthlink.net>,
Andrea Chen <fallin...@earthlink.net> wrote:

> "Sympathetic magic," once again religion creeps in.

> You practice a sympathetic magic trying to keep out all things you
>don't know.

Is surrealism an empire of yes or an empire of no? I misremember.

Michael Voytinsky

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Jul 9, 1999, 3:00:00 AM7/9/99

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In article <3785CD40...@gte.net>,
Dale Houstman <dale.h...@gte.net> wrote:

> Sorry, don't drink lattes. It's a question of what surrealism has done
> for me. It has aided me in producing a magazine, in producing several
> anti-coporate leaflets

Why not use surrealism for the benefit of everyone, not just those who
do not work for corporations?

Surrealist anti-corporate leaflets accomplish nothing, and exclude
those who derive considerable economic benefits from corporations -
such as myself.

> I do have to admit it has not led me to attempt to startle or confuse
> the already-exploited minimum wage earners of my city.

Often they are in the greatest need of startlement.

I used to work for minimum wage - and while I always knew that I am
destined for greater things, like working in an air-conditioned office,
a lot of my fellow minimum-wage slaves had never even though of
anything greater. Perhaps if they had seen an onion in a phone booth,
they would realize that there is more to life than working for minimum-
wage. (In my own case, I did reach my dream of working in an
airconditioned office.)

> Why don't you attempt to startle or confuse those in power,

Have you ever seen those in power speak in public? They are already
confused.

> Onions are fine. Paint one so it resembles a bomb and toss it into a
> passing stretch limo.

Tossing things at or into stretch limos is quite common. Just watch a
stretch limo pass by any political demonstrations. It is an act of
unimaginative fools.

--
Michael Voytinsky
Ottawa Ontario Canada
http://www.igs.net/~michaelv

Sent via Deja.com http://www.deja.com/
Share what you know. Learn what you don't.

Michael Voytinsky

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Jul 9, 1999, 3:00:00 AM7/9/99

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In article <37851DF1...@gte.net>,
Dale Houstman <dale.h...@gte.net> wrote:

> cube" and the control of "false surrealists") actualy claiming that
>the
> only path to true surrealism is through YOU? A mite restrictive for
>the
> anti-lead cube brigade isn't it? I wonder at your dedication to
>freedom
> when you start spouting control nonsense like this.

Nik is like that. He goes on about freedom, but he actually believes
in freedom only for himself. Only yesterday he forced me, at gunpoint,
to place onions in phone booths. He said that if I did not do as he
said, he'd murder me and the next few random bastards he came across.

After we were done, he showed me the heads he keeps in his room - heads
of people who do not agree with his own peculiar interpretation of
surrealism.

Andrea Chen

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Jul 9, 1999, 3:00:00 AM7/9/99

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> I do have to admit it has not led me to attempt to startle or confuse

> the already-exploited minimum wage earners of my city. You have me
> there.

In other words you oppose the use of the streets as a place for the
display of surrealism. Incidently city and telephone company workers
are not usually minimum wage.

Michael Voytinsky

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Jul 9, 1999, 3:00:00 AM7/9/99

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In article <GZ6h3.393$ri.1...@newse3.tampabay.rr.com>,
"Leo Sgouros" <lsgo...@tampabay.rr.com> wrote:

> I shall carry out this experiment here.
> I wonder what kind of scientology tie in I can give to my onion.

Well, you could put a sticker on the onion that says

"Who is Xenu? Call 1-800-FOR-TRUTH. You could win a valuable prize!"

Dale Houstman

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Jul 9, 1999, 3:00:00 AM7/9/99

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Michael Voytinsky wrote:
>

> Why not use surrealism for the benefit of everyone, not just those who
> do not work for corporations?

Certainly, but I am afraid I find corporations (and by the way most
people, including myself, DO work for them) rather more of a problem
than a solution. From my own perspective, even though I work for them, I
can only consider that I and many others would be better off if they
were chopped up or controlled a bit. And that's a conservative notion.
At any rate, the critique of corporate culture benefits everyone, not
just corporate workers.

>
> Surrealist anti-corporate leaflets accomplish nothing, and exclude those who derive considerable economic benefits from corporations - such as myself.

I could argue with this point, but find no need to: as I admit myself
the leafleting is probably not going to bring down (say) NBC tomorrow or
a thousand tomorrows from today, BUT in the process of expressing my
concerns I fell into conversations with many people, and felt these
conversations had an impact on them. Where that may (or may not go) is
unverifiable, but it can't be bad. As for deriving economic benefits
from corporations, I am certain you are right. However, this isn't much
to the point; there were a lot of people who derived considerable
economic benefit from the institution of slavery also. The questions lie
elsewhere; who is making the most of the stolen resources, what other
crimes are they involved in, how do we force culpability for those
"indiscretions"? And so on. And surely the spread of creatively produced
information is more efficacious than harassing the workers at McDonalds?

> > I do have to admit it has not led me to attempt to startle or confuse the already-exploited minimum wage earners of my city.
>

> Often they are in the greatest need of startlement.

I cannot see how harassing them accomplished anything. Their level of
harassment is " sufficient unto death."

> I used to work for minimum wage - and while I always knew that I am destined for greater things, like >working in an air-conditioned office, a lot of my fellow minimum-wage slaves had never even though of

> anything greater. Perhaps if they had seen an onion in a phone booth,b they would realize that there is more to life than working for minimum-wage.

Yes - like working for minimum wage AND cleaning up an oinion some
self-satisfied fool left in the phone booth. I've worked for minimum
wage most of my life, and I can tell you most workers are already quite
aware of their situation, and an onion in a phone booth, or a popsicle
in a bag of peat is not going to address any of their concerns. Anyway,
they're too busy reaping all those "benefits" to care much.

> Have you ever seen those in power speak in public? They are already
> confused.

But they're not frightened. And you confuse your perception of their
absurdity with their own perception of their "economic correctness":
they cannot be wrong because they have the money to prove it. They seem
quite sure of their "reality" even if it seems absurd to you. Harassing
the "underlings" is pointless. Aren't they harassed enough by the
economic realities of their situation? Can you really imagine any
positive outcome from their seeing an onion in a phone booth?

>
> > Onions are fine. Paint one so it resembles a bomb and toss it into a passing stretch limo.
>
> Tossing things at or into stretch limos is quite common. Just watch a stretch limo pass by any political demonstrations. It is an act of unimaginative fools.

I've been to plenty of political demonstrations, and this doesn't happen
much, desapite what you say. But, it was off the cuff, and not meant as
a suggestion so much as a direction. And even if the act is
unimaginative, it isn't foolish: the people doing that at least know who
the "enemy" is, and I know it isn't the guy or gal in the paper hat.

DMH

Brandon J. Freels

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Jul 9, 1999, 3:00:00 AM7/9/99

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I would actually be more shocked if I found a bomb in a phone booth than an
onion.

Andrea Chen

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Jul 9, 1999, 3:00:00 AM7/9/99

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Brandon J. Freels wrote:
>
> I would actually be more shocked if I found a bomb in a phone booth than an
> onion.

How about an onion which says, "this is not a bomb."

The problem is that someone would call the cops anyway.

Leo Sgouros

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Jul 10, 1999, 3:00:00 AM7/10/99

to

Michael Voytinsky <mich...@igs.net> wrote in message
news:7m5e4b$gph$1...@nnrp1.deja.com...

Yikes.
No I don't think I care to mess with them.
I live in the heart of Scientology land, and even typing this words screams
sporgery at me.
_L_

Nikolaus Maack

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Jul 10, 1999, 3:00:00 AM7/10/99

to

"Brandon J. Freels" (fre...@teleport.com) writes:
> I would actually be more shocked if I found a bomb in a phone booth than an
> onion.

Then let your personal tastes guide you -- construct a bomb and place it
in a phone booth.

Dale Houstman

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Jul 10, 1999, 3:00:00 AM7/10/99

to

"Brandon J. Freels" wrote:
>
> I would actually be more shocked if I found a bomb in a phone booth than an
> onion.

What if they opened up the bomb and found an onion inside?

DMH

elag

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Jul 10, 1999, 3:00:00 AM7/10/99

to

NEEK:

Regardless of what anyone thinks or says, there is a RED onion sitting
in the phone booth at the corner of 10th St. & 3rd Ave. in NYC. It is
marked with a sticker indicating that it is number "2". The first one
was unmarked. The next will be marked as "3", and with a plea to "leave
me alone".

larfingly,

e

Andrea Chen

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Jul 10, 1999, 3:00:00 AM7/10/99

to

Next time I'm leaving the house I shall be carrying 2 onions.

I oppose such mass movements on principle, but I guess I'm getting
carried away by the crowd.

I am however planning on starting a schism so I shall also be carrying
2 potatoes.

Andrea Chen

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Jul 10, 1999, 3:00:00 AM7/10/99

to

Dale Houstman wrote:
>
> Certainly, but I am afraid I find corporations (and by the way most
> people, including myself, DO work for them) rather more of a problem
> than a solution. From my own perspective, even though I work for them, I
> can only consider that I and many others would be better off if they
> were chopped up or controlled a bit.

You don't want them simply chopped up a bit (at least when you're an
"anarchist") you want them destroyed along with all other "artificial"
structures. Remember?

How do you go from flaming radical to hemming liberal depending on your
audience? Have you no shame?

> > > Onions are fine. Paint one so it resembles a bomb and toss it into a passing stretch limo.
> >
> > Tossing things at or into stretch limos is quite common. Just watch a stretch limo pass by any political demonstrations. It is an act of unimaginative fools.
>
> I've been to plenty of political demonstrations, and this doesn't happen
> much, desapite what you say. But, it was off the cuff, and not meant as
> a suggestion so much as a direction.

So who drives stretch limos? Certainly not the rich and powerful.
It's a form of mass transportation with one of the main sets of
customers being high school kids on a date. You really are bitter about
that teasing aren't you Dale? But be careful, they might jump out and
beat you up.

But why do you find it so important to mess a big night for a bunch of
kids who are probably paying for it with the minimum wage they make at
MacDonalds?

The Queen of Cans and Jars

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Jul 10, 1999, 3:00:00 AM7/10/99

to

Nikolaus Maack <ac...@FreeNet.Carleton.CA> wrote:

> elag (el...@concentric.net) writes:
> > Regardless of what anyone thinks or says, there is a RED onion sitting
> > in the phone booth at the corner of 10th St. & 3rd Ave. in NYC. It is
> > marked with a sticker indicating that it is number "2". The first one
> > was unmarked. The next will be marked as "3", and with a plea to "leave
> > me alone".
>

> I love you Elag. This sort of plotting is what the internet was once
> about -- university and military types sharing information and plans in an
> attempt to achieve something. Time to drag the 'net back to its roots.
> Let's all DO something, damn it.

ok, now i'm inspired.
i promise to double the onion content in my next onion pie.
cooking can be subversive too, if you know what you're doing.

Nikolaus Maack

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Jul 11, 1999, 3:00:00 AM7/11/99

to

elag (el...@concentric.net) writes:
> Regardless of what anyone thinks or says, there is a RED onion sitting
> in the phone booth at the corner of 10th St. & 3rd Ave. in NYC. It is
> marked with a sticker indicating that it is number "2". The first one
> was unmarked. The next will be marked as "3", and with a plea to "leave
> me alone".

I love you Elag. This sort of plotting is what the internet was once
about -- university and military types sharing information and plans in an
attempt to achieve something. Time to drag the 'net back to its roots.
Let's all DO something, damn it.

Here in Ottawa, I have a number of people interested in a surrealist
movement, as I define the term surrealist. Acts to startle and amuse and
amaze. Now I have to write them all email, suggest a time and place for
us to gather, and then the plotting can begin. I'd invite them all to my
home, but I worry that some of them might be the type of guest who pisses
on the furniture.

Nikolaus Maack

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Jul 11, 1999, 3:00:00 AM7/11/99

to

Andrea Chen (fallin...@earthlink.net) writes:
> Next time I'm leaving the house I shall be carrying 2 onions.
> I oppose such mass movements on principle, but I guess I'm getting
> carried away by the crowd.
> I am however planning on starting a schism so I shall also be carrying
> 2 potatoes.

Heretic! This movement consists solely in the use of onions! How dare
you move on to other vegetables! You openly mock all that we stand for.
The onion is the key.

Or maybe the sweetpotato. I forget. The shape of a sweetpotato is
beautiful. Like an elongate orange turd with a skin, it sits large and
lumpy in the phonebooth of life. I adore sweetpotatoes. Or maybe I adore
yams. I never could get anyone to rationally explain the difference
between a yam and a sweetpotato. People tend to be very emotional on the
subject.

In any case, don't show any individual initiative again, or I'll be forced
to feed you to Dale when he's being particularly rabid.

Next thing you know, people will be leaving just ANY old thing in a phone
booth. Celery, cabbage, shoe horns, envelopes full of monopoly money for
imaginary drug deals... Then where would we be?

Well, not that far from where we started, actually.

(I actually like the image of a big envelope full of monopoly money with
the words DRUG MONEY written across the plain white envelope in big black
letters. Ever had the joy of finding a lost wallet, full of money? Or a
single fifty dollar bill blowing in the wind? This would provide that
very same sensation, until the person noticed the money was of pastel
colours with pictures of Uncle Moneybags on it.)

On an unrelated topic:

I'm reading LUST FOR LIFE, a biographic novel on Vincent Van Gogh and it's
shredding my emotions, page after page, gutting me like a salmon destined
for the finest crackers. The descriptions of the coal mines, working as
an evangelist, trying to keep the people fed, Vincent starving himself to
for their sake... Hard to believe this is a man who spent most of his
life painting gardens.

I don't know if I have new respect for Vincent, so much as incredible
respect for the author of this book, Irving Stone. His straight-forward
prose is ripping my heart-stings out at the root. Wowee.

Michael Voytinsky

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Jul 11, 1999, 3:00:00 AM7/11/99

to

In article <3786718F...@gte.net>,
Dale Houstman <dale.h...@gte.net> wrote:

>> Why not use surrealism for the benefit of everyone, not just those >>who do not work for corporations?
>

> Certainly, but I am afraid I find corporations (and by the way most
> people, including myself, DO work for them) rather more of a problem
> than a solution.

Why do you work for them, then?

In what way are corporations a problem? Certainly they have been a source of
problems for me.

> can only consider that I and many others would be better off if they
> were chopped up or controlled a bit.

Is there any reason to believe that the people chopping up and controlling
corporations would be any more moral than the corporations themselves?

> At any rate, the critique of corporate culture benefits everyone, not
> just corporate workers.

Unfortunately, art that has a political agenda tends to suck. I can not
think of any counterexamples.

> The questions lie
> elsewhere; who is making the most of the stolen resources,

Corporations are no more (or less) prone to theft and other crimes than any
other groups of people of comparable size. Political movements have done
more harm than corporations, should we chop up and control political
movements?

> information is more efficacious than harassing the workers at >McDonalds?

Are you telling me leaving an onion in a phone booth constitutes harassment?

> Yes - like working for minimum wage AND cleaning up an oinion some
> self-satisfied fool left in the phone booth.

How difficult can it be to remove an onion?

> I've worked for minimum
> wage most of my life, and I can tell you most workers are already quite
> aware of their situation,

The ones that are aware that minimum wage jobs suck get better jobs - I know
I did. What exactly is the problem, then?

> quite sure of their "reality" even if it seems absurd to you. Harassing
> the "underlings" is pointless. Aren't they harassed enough by the

Who said anything about harassment?

> I've been to plenty of political demonstrations, and this doesn't >happen much, desapite what you say.

Thing being throw at demonstrations has been fairly common here in Ontario as
of recent.

> unimaginative, it isn't foolish: the people doing that at least know who
> the "enemy" is, and I know it isn't the guy or gal in the paper hat.

Perhaps your real problem is that you label people you do not even know as
"enemies".

g.v.w. iv

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Jul 11, 1999, 3:00:00 AM7/11/99

to

Michael Voytinsky wrote:

> Unfortunately, art that has a political agenda tends to suck. I can not
> think of any counterexamples.

Art that has a political agenda is not art. Another word exists for it: propaganda.

> --
> Michael Voytinsky
> Ottawa Ontario Canada
> http://www.igs.net/~michaelv
>
> Sent via Deja.com http://www.deja.com/
> Share what you know. Learn what you don't.

--

Dale Houstman

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Jul 11, 1999, 3:00:00 AM7/11/99

to

"g.v.w. iv" wrote:
>

> Art that has a political agenda is not art. Another word exists for it: propaganda.
>

Mostly true, but Emile Zola would be surprised, and there are politcial
and social "agendas" behind Ralph Ellsion's work, Mailer's "Armies of
the Night," much of Jonathan Swift, e e cummings, Voltaire, Picasso's
"Guernica"; the list is long. I suppose the difference between
propaganda and politically-based art is whether or not the artist is
overwhelmed AT THE POINT OF CREATION by political points rather than
creative points. Much South American literature is consumed with
political statements. I just don't think the "blanket statement" here is
complex enough to cover all examples of art.

DMH

Michael Voytinsky

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Jul 11, 1999, 3:00:00 AM7/11/99

to

In article <ISAh3.3970$R5.9...@newse2.tampabay.rr.com>,
"Leo Sgouros" <lsgo...@tampabay.rr.com> wrote:

> > Well, you could put a sticker on the onion that says
> >
> > "Who is Xenu? Call 1-800-FOR-TRUTH. You could win a >>valuable prize!"

> Yikes.

> No I don't think I care to mess with them.
> I live in the heart of Scientology land, and even typing this words >screams sporgery at me.

I would not worry about messing with Scientology too much. For a while I had
the entire "Operating Thetan III" alleged secret Scientology scripture
(aside: to legally cover my ass I think its best that I continue publically
stating that I am not certain if this is in fact real Scientology scripture)
on my website - all I got was lawsuit threats. I have a fair extract version
now, and they have not even bothered to threaten me with a lawsuit - and the
extract still mentions evil galactic overlord Xenu.

Take it you live in Clearwater or vicinity?

Personally, I think onions could be a new intesting variation on fighting the
cult.

g.v.w. iv

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Jul 11, 1999, 3:00:00 AM7/11/99

to

Dale Houstman wrote:

Is ''art'' a normative, or a descriptive term?

Answering that question will allow us to fan away all the smoke you just blew. Clue:
partisan or political content do not necessarily speak to the didactic function (if any)
of an aesthetic object. Second clue: your proposed evaluative criterion asks us to read
the minds of artists, always a difficult enterprise.

> DMH

Brandon J. Freels

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Jul 11, 1999, 3:00:00 AM7/11/99

to

g.v.w. iv wrote

>your proposed evaluative criterion asks us to read the minds of artists,
always a >difficult enterprise.

Much of the time, such as with Picasso, no mind reading is needs. Picasso
was very up front about the anti-fascist political agenda behind Guernica,
and this political painting is often considered his greatest piece.

Also consider John Heartfield's collage "Hitler Swallows Gold and Spouts
Junk." Now that is a fascinating Dada collage with an overwhelming political
agenda! It is one of my favorite collages of Heartfield's yet it is dripping
with politics!

Your dislike of Dale has bewildered you ignorant. You should take time to
read his "smoke."

g.v.w. iv

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Jul 11, 1999, 3:00:00 AM7/11/99

to

"Brandon J. Freels" wrote:

Your corset of grim didactic intent has cut off your circulation. Hence, you can
no longer string two words together in any meaningful way. ( ... ''no mind
reading is needs ... Your dislike of Dale has biwildered you ignorant'' ... ?)

Art and criticism are two seperate and distinct disciplines. One is a regime of
production; the other, a field of inquiry. No critic enjoys a privileged
position with respect to an artist or aesthetic object, even if the critic *is*
the artist. How could it be otherwise? Do you know your own motivations? Can you
articulate them exhaustively at any level of description? Do you have complete
insight into the creative process, yours or anyones? Are you transparent to
yourself, like in a Cartesian meditation? No, Brandon, you are not. No one is.

Frye argues that Wordsworth's introduction to his Lyrical Ballads rates only a
B+ as Wordsworthian criticism. Dante's commentaries on his own works--though
insightful--are hardly the definitive statement on Dante. Historical evidence
suggests that Coleridge's claims about his own creative process were simply
false (he lied or mislead).

Before we can begin a serious inquiry, you or Dale Houstman must answer this
question: is ''art'' a descriptive or an evaluative term? Tell me how you use
the term.

Now stop ''bewilder[ing] [my] ignorant''--whatever that means--and strike a more
intelligible pose.

Andrea Chen

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Jul 11, 1999, 3:00:00 AM7/11/99

to

Nik:

You didn't even ask me what I wrote on the post it notes I stuck on my
onions. One of them is so cynical it should get Dale fuming about
exploiting naive, kind people.

"This onion is here because it's the last wish of a little girl. She
dreamed of an onion in every phone booth. So if you care about the
feelings of a dead little girl please copy this note and put an onion in
a phone booth. If enough people do this it will prove the existence of
Elvis."

My other note said, "This onion isn't surrealistic. It's weird. If
you want to make a surrealistic phone call please find a potato."

I named my potatoes Brandon and Dale which could encourage some
sympathetic magic and get us some synchronicity

.

Brandon J. Freels

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Jul 11, 1999, 3:00:00 AM7/11/99

to

As usual you have missed (or ignored) my point completely.

Dave F.

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Jul 11, 1999, 3:00:00 AM7/11/99

to

The Queen of Cans and Jars wrote:

>
> Nikolaus Maack <ac...@FreeNet.Carleton.CA> wrote:
>
> > elag (el...@concentric.net) writes:
> > > Regardless of what anyone thinks or says, there is a RED onion sitting
> > > in the phone booth at the corner of 10th St. & 3rd Ave. in NYC. It is
> > > marked with a sticker indicating that it is number "2". The first one
> > > was unmarked. The next will be marked as "3", and with a plea to "leave
> > > me alone".
> >
> > I love you Elag. This sort of plotting is what the internet was once
> > about -- university and military types sharing information and plans in an
> > attempt to achieve something. Time to drag the 'net back to its roots.
> > Let's all DO something, damn it.
>

> ok, now i'm inspired.
> i promise to double the onion content in my next onion pie.
> cooking can be subversive too, if you know what you're doing.

i draw joey with a big round head
--

dave f.'s comix every tuesday at
http://members.tripod.com/~d_foster/comix.html

g.v.w. iv

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Jul 11, 1999, 3:00:00 AM7/11/99

to

"Brandon J. Freels" wrote:

> As usual you have missed (or ignored) my point completely.

You tried to say that we can read minds in instances where a
mind chooses to reveal itself. i said that we cannot read
minds, even in those instances. What did i miss?

g.v.w. iv

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Jul 11, 1999, 3:00:00 AM7/11/99

to

Dale Houstman squirted:

[...] irrelevant handwaving snipped. Dale, apparently, sniffs glue.

Content does not make an aesthetic object an aesthetic object. An aesthetic
object can choose anything for its object--however partisan, political, or
didactic--and still be an aesthetic object. Dadaism and Pop art taught us
that. Yet you argue that content certifies an aesthetic object as such. If
this were the case, how would you account for Duchamps ready-mades, or
Warhol's Brillo-Boxes?

But if you agree that art can choose anything for its object and still be
art, then ask yourself, what does make art art, and not something else?

You may stumble on to the truth if you answer this question. Answer this
question and you have grounds to puzzle out for yourself what makes one
object art, and another propaganda (without an absurd appeal to what goes on
in an artist's mind ''AT THE MOMENT OF CREATION'').

(If you use the term ''art'' in a descriptive sense, you have a case. But
you open yourself up to other analytical problems. i use the term ''art'' in
a normative sense. Since you refuse to declare a position, i can simply
pummel you on your other ridiculous inconsistencies.)

> Clue: "A Modest Proposal" has a political agenda. No mind-reading
> necessary. "A Modest Proposal" is art. No mind-reading called for.

Why do you make me repeat myself, little boy? Please re-read what i wrote
the first time. For your convenience i include it in the following.

> Answering that question will allow us to fan away all the smoke you just
blew. Clue:
> partisan or political content do not necessarily speak to the didactic
function (if any)

> of an aesthetic object. Second clue: your proposed evaluative criterion

asks us to read
> the minds of artists, always a difficult enterprise.

You did ask that we read minds. Read the following absurdity.

> propaganda and politically-based art is whether or not the artist is
> overwhelmed AT THE POINT OF CREATION by political points rather than
> creative points. Much South American literature is consumed with

How does one know what occurs AT THE POINT OF CREATION without privileged
access to the hidden intents of the artist's heart?

>
> DMH

The Queen of Cans and Jars

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Jul 11, 1999, 3:00:00 AM7/11/99

to

Dave F. <fos...@earthlink.net> wrote:

> The Queen of Cans and Jars wrote:
> >
> > Nikolaus Maack <ac...@FreeNet.Carleton.CA> wrote:
> >
> > > elag (el...@concentric.net) writes:
> > > > Regardless of what anyone thinks or says, there is a RED onion sitting
> > > > in the phone booth at the corner of 10th St. & 3rd Ave. in NYC. It is
> > > > marked with a sticker indicating that it is number "2". The first one
> > > > was unmarked. The next will be marked as "3", and with a plea to
> > > > "leave me alone".
> > >
> > > I love you Elag. This sort of plotting is what the internet was once
> > > about -- university and military types sharing information and plans

> > > ain an ttempt to achieve something. Time to drag the 'net back to its
> > > aroots.

> > > Let's all DO something, damn it.
> >
> > ok, now i'm inspired.
> > i promise to double the onion content in my next onion pie.
> > cooking can be subversive too, if you know what you're doing.
>
> i draw joey with a big round head

like a onion?

Veronica Speedwell

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Jul 11, 1999, 3:00:00 AM7/11/99

to

Andrea Chen wrote:

> Nik:
>
> You didn't even ask me what I wrote on the post it notes I stuck on my
> onions. One of them is so cynical it should get Dale fuming about
> exploiting naive, kind people.
>
> "This onion is here because it's the last wish of a little girl. She
> dreamed of an onion in every phone booth. So if you care about the
> feelings of a dead little girl please copy this note and put an onion in
> a phone booth. If enough people do this it will prove the existence of
> Elvis."
>
> My other note said, "This onion isn't surrealistic. It's weird. If
> you want to make a surrealistic phone call please find a potato."

Cute. Have you ever heard of Yoko Ono? She was doing this schtick in 1913.
You should check out Priva Del Leoni, Morrow Lambdal or Heloise for more
advanced takes on the old 101 silly things to do with silly things around the
house
bit. Housewife humor never dies.

Dale Houstman

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Jul 12, 1999, 3:00:00 AM7/12/99

to

"g.v.w. iv"

I am sorry. I know I should have been even more solicitous than usual in
explaining that your blanket statement " Art that has a political agenda
is not art. Another word exists for it: propaganda" was not true. It
makes no difference if (after the fact) you try to make the "blanket"
larger by throwing in your vain pendantry. I was responding to your
statement, which (as anybody who thinks can tell) is just incorrect;
"normative" or not"

My response doesn't require any mind-reading: Zola's books ("Germinal"
for one) are full of political agenda. Dotoevsky's novels (unless you
deny they are art) are blatantly political, and (rather unfortunately
for you) he made no bones about it. We won't mention Solzenitzen, to
spare you the embarassment. Many pieces of art front an obvious
political agenda, and are spoken of by the artist (in letters, in
essays, etc.) as politically motivated. Your "after-varnish" doesn't
cover your mistake. And only an absolute idiot (or a willfull aggressor
unable to admit a simple error) could miss the fact that Dickens (as
only one example) had an obvious liberal political agenda in his art.
This would only require "mind reading" if you were an illiterate.

Then there is an entire body of purely political writing (Lincoln's
Gettysburg Address as only one example among thousand going back as far
as the ancient Greeks) that has become an established part of "art."
However you define your terms, or (really) attempt to justify a rash
sentence or two, the truth is your original statement won't hold water.
And you're not secure enough in your psyche to simply admit you were
merely phrase-making at the sacrifice of intellectual verity. This isn't
a very big deal, considering every aphorist does it as a rule of thumb,
but your attempt to weasel out of it is silly.

Clue: "A Modest Proposal" has a political agenda. No mind-reading
necessary. "A Modest Proposal" is art. No mind-reading called for.

DMH

Dale Houstman

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Jul 12, 1999, 3:00:00 AM7/12/99

to

"g.v.w. iv" wrote:
>

>
> Art and criticism are two seperate and distinct disciplines. One is a regime of production; the other, a field of inquiry

Again an erroneous blanket statement. It seems obvious that art involves
criticism even in its production, and many artists of all disciplines
(becuase of this "insider" stance) are also critics. This easy
segregation is as incorrect as your previous "art/propaganda" statement.

The real point however is your continuing inability to engage in a
communication. To truly have a dialogue, each participant has to exhibit
some brand of "vulnerability" or "porous" character to their arguments;
in other words, they have to be willing to admit simple error so as to
allow for true interaction. All you had to say was "my initial statement
was too glibly put and somewhat inaccurate. What I meant to say was..."
At this point we might have been able to initiate a conversation
(heated or otherwise) upon the entire notion of "art" and "politics" and
"propaganda." Others could have joined in, sharing personal experience
and information germane to the topic. Instead, you only wish to "win."
Even if you basically have to front a feeble argument to cover what was
really such a small mistake. Such a large fig leaf for such a small...

> No critic enjoys a privileged position with respect to an artist or aesthetic object, even if the critic *is*
> the artist.

But how could the artist also be the critic according to your blanket
statement?

>How could it be otherwise? Do you know your own motivations? Can you articulate them exhaustively at any level of description? Do you have complete insight into the creative process, yours or anyones? Are you transparent to yourself, like in a Cartesian meditation? No, Brandon, you are not. No one is.
>

But this is only interesting, not relevant to the discussion of your
initial statement. Whether or no Swift (for only one example) has a
"privileged position" with respect to his own work (and obviously he is
more privileged, if not exhaustively so as in your "straw man" notion),
it is self-evident that many of his works have a political agenda, and
it is self-evident that they are art. This one example alone disproves
your initial assertion, and there are thousands more.

>Frye argues that Wordsworth's introduction to his Lyrical Ballads rates only a

> B as Wordsworthian criticism. Dante's commentaries on his own works--though

> insightful--are hardly the definitive statement on Dante. Historical evidence
> suggests that Coleridge's claims about his own creative process were simply
> false (he lied or mislead).

You're arguing a different point again: whether or not Coleridge knew
anything about his art, it is self-evident that the "Ancient Mariner"
has an albatross in it. We are not arguing about the artist's ability to
plum the depths of their deep psyches, but only about OUR ability to
recognize an obvious truth: some texts with political agendas are also
art.

IF however you declare mind-reading is needed to ascertain the intent of
an artist before one can declare any of their productions as having
"political agendas" then don't we also need mind-reading to ascertain if
any of their productions contain art? In other words: either your
initial statement is mildly incorrect, or it is massively empty.

>
> Before we can begin a serious inquiry, you or Dale Houstman must answer this
> question: is ''art'' a descriptive or an evaluative term? Tell me how you use
> the term.

This is an interesting question, and one with probably no good answer,
and certainly no conjecture or theory on my part that could elicit
anything but your usual antagonism. BUT, much as I would like to get
back to that: it is irrelevant to the discussion before us. Clue: I use
the term "art" in as many different ways as art uses itself. An
evaluation of a particular piece involves as many sorts of consideration
as one can muster. Historical, intuitive, political, emotional... and so
on. But we are talking here of a substance we already assume IS art. We
are merely trying to ascertain if this substance and political agendas
can exist in the same space. Since this is obviously true (Brandon's
example of Heartfield's collages is pertinent, and there is George
Grosz, and my example Swift), there is no need for your quasi-academic
obfuscations.

You are the one blowing smoke.

Before we can begin a serious inquiry, you must answer this question:
can you learn to admit to the small errors in your thinking (since
everyone has them), and to drop the constant antagonism?

DMH

This picking on typos and the like is the sign of a real boor. You are
almost hysterical in the writhings you'll put yourself through to avoid
admitting a rather simple error.

Nikolaus Maack

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Jul 12, 1999, 3:00:00 AM7/12/99

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Andrea Chen (fallin...@earthlink.net) writes:
> "This onion is here because it's the last wish of a little girl. She
> dreamed of an onion in every phone booth. So if you care about the
> feelings of a dead little girl please copy this note and put an onion in
> a phone booth. If enough people do this it will prove the existence of
> Elvis."

That's brilliant. Disturbing, but brilliant. My God, you might actually
get the "normals" putting onions in their OWN phone booths. Then we can
just sit back and watch.

Ian Hammond

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Jul 12, 1999, 3:00:00 AM7/12/99

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He always goes quiet after he says the "R" word.

--
ian

Nikolaus Maack

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Jul 12, 1999, 3:00:00 AM7/12/99

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Dale Houstman (dale.h...@gte.net) writes:
> Again an erroneous blanket statement. It seems obvious that art involves
> criticism even in its production, and many artists of all disciplines
> (becuase of this "insider" stance) are also critics. This easy
> segregation is as incorrect as your previous "art/propaganda" statement.

I think what Dale is trying to say -- and failing to say, because he has
no poetry in his soul and is afraid to make huge pronouncements -- is that
all art is criticism, all art is propaganda, all art is political.

(I'll take it a step further and say all art is everything, and now Dale
will want to punch me in the nose.)

Listen to me get all postmodern on your ass:

When I create art of any kind, I respond to all art that I have perceived
up until this point. Even if I choose to ignore the works of others, in
an attempt to express my own personal angst, I cannot help but RESPOND to
all art I have ever seen. Hence, all art is criticism.

Following this logic, even if I choose to be utterly apolitical, I cannot
help but express some politics. I perceive the world, and I respond to
the world through my own art. Even if I paint a boring landscape, it's a
political statement. I conform to the art world demands for paintings of
trees and lakes. Hence, all art is political.

And, through no fault of my own, I try to promote my world view. This is
what I saw, this is how I see things, this is what I experienced. The
subtle flavor to all art, whether intentional or not, is, "This is how I
saw it, and you should see it this way too." Hence, all art is
propaganda.

Don't jump on my ass just yet. Wait for it.

I think Andy Warhol's painting of Brillo boxes is political. It was a
kick in the nuts to the art gallery weasels of the world. Did Warhol
intend it to be such, or was he just some flakey, wig-wearing,
money-grubbing nutcase? His intentions are unclear.

Dale seems to be saying: if Warhol SAYS "It was political," then it's
DEFINITELY political.

To this I say: Bullshit.

Art has almost nothing to do with the artist. I create something. It's a
soap bubble I blew. It floats away. Art escapes the artist and drifts
off into the world. People perceive it. They try to figure out what the
hell it is they are seeing. One way to figure it out is to ask me, the
guy who blew the bubble, what the hell I was thinking.

As GVW has been trying to say, my answer could be highly inaccurate and
utterly useless. I do not have access to all the information. I just
blew the bubble. Why I blew it, what secret motivations I had, what I am
responding to consciously and unconsciously, I do not know.

Maybe I think my soap bubble it utterly apolitical. I just painted a
face. The people who see it see something incredibly political. It's
Hitler's face and he's made to look like a clown.

Who is right? Who is wrong? Political or apolitical?

According to the good postmodernist: we are both right.

As said elsewhere, the artist is NOT in a privileged position. The artist
can know what events brought about the creation of the art, but cannot
fully explain all motivations. In fact, an outsider is often in a better
position to explain motivations.

Taking this stance, yes, all art is propaganda, because it can be
perceived that way. All art is criticism because, yes, it can be
perceived that way. All art is political, because, hey-ho, it can be
examined from a political angle.

This is why art is so much fun. Take a story, a painting, an object, and
you can examine it from an infinite number of perspectives and never truly
understand it.

An example from my university days: Chaucer. I did a paper on the
Prioress' tale. Doing some research, I discovered a dozen papers that
said this story was proof that Chaucer was an antisemite. A dozen other
papers apologized for Chaucer, saying he was a product of his time. Who
is right? The person with the best argument? Or is everyone POSSIBLY
right?

Does this mean if someone argued that the Prioress' Tale was proof that
aliens visited our planet, would I accept it? Sure. Why not? It is
possible. Unlikely, but perhaps still worth considering.

When it comes to art, the truth tends to be a popularity contest. Whether
or not a Brillo box is political is determined by who says it is, and who
says it ain't, and what kind of pull these people have.

In other words, TRUTH is FASHION.

Dale talks about "obvious truths". It is OBVIOUS that some art is
deliberately political. "A Modest Proposal" is blatantly political.

Okay, sure. In some cases, it does in fact seem that certain truths are
unquestionable. All the more reason to question them, perhaps?

THIS IS NOT A PIPE.

Everything is questionable. Especially the "obvious truths".

On a side note, Dale says:
> Before we can begin a serious inquiry, you must answer this question:
> can you learn to admit to the small errors in your thinking (since
> everyone has them), and to drop the constant antagonism?

I'm assuming, Dale, that "dropping the constant antagonism" is something
you're working on lately as well? I've actually noticed you're being much
less of an asshole, as of late. Congratulations. Seriously.

Dave F.

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Jul 12, 1999, 3:00:00 AM7/12/99

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i was thinking about swim goggles...

Brandon J. Freels

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Jul 12, 1999, 3:00:00 AM7/12/99

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Shit Nik, I actually think I agree with you. This is nuts! I better re-read
your post just to double check!

Nikolaus Maack wrote

g.v.w. iv

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Jul 12, 1999, 3:00:00 AM7/12/99

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Dale Houstman wrote:

> "g.v.w. iv" wrote:
> >
>
> >
> > Art and criticism are two seperate and distinct disciplines. One is a regime of production; the other, a field of inquiry
>
> Again an erroneous blanket statement. It seems obvious that art involves
> criticism even in its production, and many artists of all disciplines
> (becuase of this "insider" stance) are also critics. This easy
> segregation is as incorrect as your previous "art/propaganda" statement.

Of course art involves an element of criticism, especially modern art where the boundary conditions of art itself are often questioned. But would you also want to say that art and criticism are one? Military commanders are influenced by advances in military science. Technologists and engineers are informed
by scientists. But their goals, norms, and values are fundamentally different.

The two *practice* different *disciplines*.

i never said that one does not inform the other, especially in a case where one chooses the other for its object of inquiry. How could i defend so ridiculous a claim? Apparently you believe yourself clever when you argue against claims i never expressed, suggested, or implied.

> The real point however is your continuing inability to engage in a
> communication. To truly have a dialogue, each participant has to exhibit
> some brand of "vulnerability" or "porous" character to their arguments;
> in other words, they have to be willing to admit simple error so as to
> allow for true interaction. All you had to say was "my initial statement
> was too glibly put and somewhat inaccurate. What I meant to say was..."

But it wasn't glib or inaccurate. You yourself admit that much through your failure to prove it. You made the charge; the burden of proof is on you.

> At this point we might have been able to initiate a conversation
> (heated or otherwise) upon the entire notion of "art" and "politics" and
> "propaganda." Others could have joined in, sharing personal experience
> and information germane to the topic. Instead, you only wish to "win."
> Even if you basically have to front a feeble argument to cover what was
> really such a small mistake. Such a large fig leaf for such a small...

Lacking arguments, you fall back into your lecture mode. None of this finger-pointing or name-calling substitutes for reasoning, whiner. Your control top panty-hose of grim didacticism are strangling you, Dale.

>
> > No critic enjoys a privileged position with respect to an artist or aesthetic object, even if the critic *is*
> > the artist.
>
> But how could the artist also be the critic according to your blanket
> statement?

i never said an artist could not be a critic. i simply said that art and criticism were two separate *disciplines*. A person can be a doctor and also a lawyer. i am trained in linguistics, philosophy, English, and the social sciences.

i even gave examples of artists as critics, Wordsworth and Dante. i could add many others (e.g. Wilde, Smithson, Warhol, Goethe).

Ian Hammond

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Jul 12, 1999, 3:00:00 AM7/12/99

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On Mon, 12 Jul 1999 07:33:34 -0400, "Dave F." <fos...@earthlink.net>
wrote:

Is this the joke where the guy always thinks of breasts, no matter
what you say?

--
ian

Michael DiCola

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Jul 12, 1999, 3:00:00 AM7/12/99

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Nikolaus Maack (ac...@FreeNet.Carleton.CA) writes:
> Andrea Chen (fallin...@earthlink.net) writes:
>> "This onion is here because it's the last wish of a little girl. She
>> dreamed of an onion in every phone booth. So if you care about the
>> feelings of a dead little girl please copy this note and put an onion in
>> a phone booth. If enough people do this it will prove the existence of
>> Elvis."
>
> That's brilliant. Disturbing, but brilliant. My God, you might actually
> get the "normals" putting onions in their OWN phone booths. Then we can
> just sit back and watch.

I once put a hand-lettered sign beside a window inside one of the
modern art galleries in the National Gallery here in Ottawa. It said,
"'View of Ottawa', by Andy Warhol".

Does that count?

--
Michael J
"My myopic view of life"
me and The Barras

Nikolaus Maack

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Jul 12, 1999, 3:00:00 AM7/12/99

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Michael DiCola (ae...@FreeNet.Carleton.CA) writes:
> I once put a hand-lettered sign beside a window inside one of the
> modern art galleries in the National Gallery here in Ottawa. It said,
> "'View of Ottawa', by Andy Warhol".

This is also funny and subversive. If I were giving out "Surreal and
Funny and Subversive" awards, you'd get one. Chances are good, however,
that the prize would be an onion, or possible a baked potato.

Dale Houstman

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Jul 12, 1999, 3:00:00 AM7/12/99

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Nikolaus Maack wrote:
>

> I think what Dale is trying to say -- and failing to say, because he has no poetry in his soul

What is your definition of "poetry"? And since you think definitions are
tyranny, how can you hold to that definition? And since you cannot hold
to that definition, how can you make this erroneous statement? Is it one
of those "obvious truths" you proclaim should be questrioned? The same
series of questions can be applied to "soul."

I have written 29 books of poetry. What are they comprised of? If not
poetry then what? And how do you know? Is your assumption here also one
of those "obvious truths" that you should question?

>and is afraid to make huge pronouncements

Literally unfathomable. And (anyway) what does "poetry" have to do
(necessarily) with "huge pronouncements"? Most poetry is filled with
small ambiguities and frail whispers. One CAN make huge pronouncements
in poetry, but it is only one small weapon in an arsenal.

>all art is criticism, all art is propaganda, all art is political

I agree with this, and only add the comment that I didn't say it in a
similar form because I felt a different brand of rhetoric was called for
initially. There is a time and place for huge pronouncements. I was
doing the rather more difficult task of demonstrating that his blanket
statement was incorrect in detail, and (at that point) another blanket
statement would have been counterproductive. Thank you for supplying the
appropriate diatribe.

(I'll take it a step further and say all art is everything, and now Dale
will want to punch me in the nose.)

Why would I want to do that? You have the erroneous notion that I am
aggressive, rather than lazy. I am not certain what the above statement
means: what determines that said substance is "art."

> When I create art of any kind, I respond to all art that I have perceived
> up until this point. Even if I choose to ignore the works of others, in
> an attempt to express my own personal angst, I cannot help but RESPOND to
> all art I have ever seen. Hence, all art is criticism.

I agree.

>
> Following this logic, even if I choose to be utterly apolitical, I cannot
> help but express some politics. I perceive the world, and I respond to
> the world through my own art. Even if I paint a boring landscape, it's a
> political statement. I conform to the art world demands for paintings of
> trees and lakes. Hence, all art is political.

I agree.

>
> And, through no fault of my own, I try to promote my world view. This is
> what I saw, this is how I see things, this is what I experienced. The
> subtle flavor to all art, whether intentional or not, is, "This is how I
> saw it, and you should see it this way too." Hence, all art is
> propaganda.
>

I agree. Except to say that there are artists who are more aware of this
ambiguous relationship between artist and viewer and who (in fact) play
to this "desire to imbue all substance with meaning" process. In other
words, there are many artists who are less "tyrannical" than the crowd
is happy with. I for one, often write with the idea that the viewer will
be doing his work also. I am not overly-protective of a poem's "meaning"
(although there are exceptions; overt political satires for one), and am
more than gratified with a variety of responses.

> I think Andy Warhol's painting of Brillo boxes is political. It was a kick in the nuts to the art gallery weasels of the world. Did Warhol intend it to be such, or was he just some flakey, wig-wearing,
> money-grubbing nutcase? His intentions are unclear.

I agree. Although I might also add that he may have intended for his
intentions to remain unclear. And also that this statement (intentional
or not) was already done by Duchamp and in a less "artistic" manner.

>
> Dale seems to be saying: if Warhol SAYS "It was political," then it's DEFINITELY political.
>
> To this I say: Bullshit.

You can if you want, but I'm not saying anything of the sort. I don't
care what Warhol SAYS about his work. I myself went to some lengths to
declare the political content of art as "self-evident." Why are you
going out of your way to forge a disagreement where there essentially is
none? YET if Warhol had gone to some lengths to SAY his work was
political then that act would have been political whether it was true or
not. His NOT SAYING that his work was political is also political.

> Art has almost nothing to do with the artist. I create something. It's a soap bubble I blew. It floats away. >Art escapes the artist and drifts off into the world. People perceive it.

I think most art is never seen by anyone except the artist. The artist
is a part of the world also, and (if all art if everything) then surely
that artist can be a viewer also. Thus art may never drift too far from
the original "pipe" and yet still remain art.

>They try to figure out what the hell it is they are seeing. One way to figure it out is to ask me, the
> guy who blew the bubble, what the hell I was thinking.

This CAN be a beginning. Whether or not you can agree to this, some
artists are more conscious than others of their intent and its
manifestation in the work and its effect on viewers. Asking you might be
useful, or it might not.

>
> As GVW has been trying to say, my answer could be highly inaccurate and utterly useless. I do not have access to all the information. I just blew the bubble. Why I blew it, what secret motivations I had, what I am
> responding to consciously and unconsciously, I do not know.

It makes no difference whether or not you have this "straw man" of
exhaustive self-knowledge, you (as the creator of said work) have as
much to say as most, and more than others. Your involvement (since you
are a critic also) is AS USEFUL as any other; so if an artist has little
to do with the art, then neither does anyone else. But the artist did
make the damn thing! Individuals are not interchangeable: Da Vinci is
not the same as Peter Max, although playing a thought-game that assumes
that are may be challenging and even productive.

So yes... but all this is still (as you say yourself!) irrelevant to the
question of whether or not "art with a political agenda is not art", as
was said. Nothing was said about whether that agenda was the artist's,
the object's, or the viewer's. Since you claim that Warhol's Brillo
boxes are both art and politics, then you have already disproved the
original statement, whatever the further complications of the question
might be.

> Maybe I think my soap bubble it utterly apolitical. I just painted a face. The people who see it see >something incredibly political. It's Hitler's face and he's made to look like a clown.

I would have to say at this point that the artist had a serious
perception problem: this example is too blatant to take seriously. Are
IndentiKits political? Mr. Potato Head?

>
> Who is right? Who is wrong?

Who is asking? What depends upon the answer? Who is asking you to ask?

> As said elsewhere, the artist is NOT in a privileged position. The artist can know what events brought about the creation of the art, but cannot fully explain all motivations.

But that small knowledge (knowing "what events brought about the
creation") is a privileged position, no matter what you believe its
value to be.

But no one is asking them to explain all the motivations. A person of
"privilege" is not required to have all the answers. In fact, a position
of privilege may absolve you from answering ANY queries. Maybe that's
what the benefit of privilege consists of?

>Does this mean if someone argued that the Prioress' Tale was proof that aliens visited our planet, would I accept it? Sure. Why not? It is possible. Unlikely, but perhaps still worth considering.

Maybe; but given that we only have a limited time on earth, it might be
as much "fun" and also more productive if we winnowed out the obvious
dead ends before walking down them. Since any art is infinitely
approachable, such a "narrowing" of your focus will not diminish your
enjoyment.

>
> When it comes to art, the truth tends to be a popularity contest. Whether or not a Brillo box is political is >determined by who says it is, and who says it ain't, and what kind of pull these people have.
>
> In other words, TRUTH is FASHION.

I agree.

>
> Dale talks about "obvious truths". It is OBVIOUS that some art is deliberately political.

I didn't say "deliberately." I said it is obvious that "A Modest
Proposal" has a political agenda. And it is obvious that Swift also felt
that it had a political agenda. And it is obvious that the public felt
it had a political agenda. It's a marvelous consensus, but all that
really matters at the close of day is what I think about it. However,
(and I admit it's a personal habit) I feel I would be unfair to MYSELF
if I hadn't considered all the views stated above. IF there exists no
"privileged position" from which to view art then it suggests that a
consideration of the entire field is in order.

> Okay, sure. In some cases, it does in fact seem that certain truths are unquestionable. All the more reason to question them, perhaps?
>

Possibly; but to question whether or not "A Modest Proposal" has a
political agenda strikes me as a dead end endeavor. You are welcome to
the consideration yourself. But I find there is plenty to do in this
world without reinventing the clip-on tie every morning. I COULD
question whether the sun is made of aluminum shingles. I COULD question
if the ocean is made of lemonade ice tea. And (in poetry and creative
works of all kinds) such considerations are often fronted. But (forgive
this little tyranny) I prefer to think that at least a FEW questions
have been settled to my satisfaction. These may be called "axioms" so we
can get on to other work...

> THIS IS NOT A PIPE.
>
> Everything is questionable. Especially the "obvious truths".
>
> On a side note, Dale says:
> > Before we can begin a serious inquiry, you must answer this question: can you learn to admit to the small errors in your thinking (since everyone has them), and to drop the constant antagonism?
>

> I've actually noticed you're being much less of an asshole, as of late.

Your assumption that I am "an asshole" is questionable. The fact of your
continuing condescension still appears "obvious."

DMH

Dave F.

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Jul 12, 1999, 3:00:00 AM7/12/99

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naw. this is the one about the guy in the hotel lobby...

Andrea Chen

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Jul 12, 1999, 3:00:00 AM7/12/99

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>
> Cute. Have you ever heard of Yoko Ono? She was doing this schtick in 1913.
> You should check out Priva Del Leoni, Morrow Lambdal or Heloise for more
> advanced takes on the old 101 silly things to do with silly things around the
> house
> bit. Housewife humor never dies.
>

I wasn't that enthused about the onion thing to begin with, but it came
to a sort of test. Could a number of people agree to cooperate with the
"vision" of one, was collective action possible?

The problem with your whole point of view is that like Dale, Brandon
and Barrett you are fifties sophisticated and unaware. Your contempt of
the "housewife" is sad and telling.

Propose your own project and we might do it, but I suspect you have no
talent byt being like really, really, I mean like totally like cool.

Michael Voytinsky

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Jul 12, 1999, 3:00:00 AM7/12/99

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In article <3788F00E...@gte.net>,
Dale Houstman <dale.h...@gte.net> wrote:

> Art that has a political agenda is not art. Another word exists for

>it: propaganda.
>
> Mostly true, but Emile Zola would be surprised, and there are
>politcial and social "agendas" behind Ralph Ellsion's work, Mailer's
>"Armies of the Night," much of Jonathan Swift, e e cummings,
>Voltaire, Picasso's "Guernica"; the list is long.

However, good "political" art rarely (if ever) pushes a specific
ideology. George Orwell's "1984" and "Animal Farm" were definitely
political, but they certainly did not push a specific ideology.

Jonathan Swift's work actually suffered as a result of his politics.
"Gulliver's Travels", especially the part where Gulliver is in the land
of Puritan horses, is often painful to read because you are hit over
the head with Puritan ideology. The story would have been more
enjoyable without it.

Good political art should stand on its own even without the politics.
I've tested "Animal Farm" on a ten year old unfamiliar with history of
socialism, and he liked it. Can your political art stands on its own,
and be appreciated by someone unfamiliar with your ideological stance?
Further, could it be appreciated and enjoyed by someone who disagrees
with your ideological stance?

Nikolaus Maack

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Jul 12, 1999, 3:00:00 AM7/12/99

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Seeing as how Dale and I agreed on almost everything, I almost feel there
is no need to follow up. Except maybe to say, yeah, the world agrees that
"A Modest Proposal" was written for political reasons. If everyone
agrees, is it a point worth arguing? Probably not, unless you want to
cause contraversy, which is sometimes useful. Yes, our time can be better
used elsewhere.

In other words -- good lord! -- I agree with your statements about "A
Modest Proposal", Dale.

The reason, Dale, I said you lack poetry in your soul is because your
arguments tend to be so very dull, so very nit-picky, so very
point-by-point analysis to determine who is the most right on any given
issue. I feel the broader scheme of things gets lost in conversations
like this. While we may entirely agree on a whole bunch of issues, quite
often your style grates on my soul.

The failing is mine, quite possibly, and not yours. Oh well.

(I like the word soul, by the way. People keep trying to take it away
from me. I won't let them. I don't care if the definition of it is vague
and watery. If I say to you, "I feel it in my soul," it gives me that
warm, wet, squishy feeling inside my lungs and heart. Isn't that enough?)

A lot of my friends have the same argument style as you do, and they irk
me as well. I see their communication style as a lack of poetry and art
in their spirits, being anal and small. They see their technique as being
rational, objective, and sane. The split between me and them occurs
because I'm more concerned with the pig picture than the pixels that make
it up.

> I was
> doing the rather more difficult task of demonstrating that his blanket
> statement was incorrect in detail, and (at that point) another blanket
> statement would have been counterproductive.

Unfortunately, all arguments seem to eventually stoop to the level of
counting the grains of sand on the beach. This usually results in
everyone forgetting what the argument was about in the first place, as
people debate whether a speck of birdshit counts as a grain of sand or
not.

But on to other matters...

What I find weird, Dale, is that if you agree with me that TRUTH is
FASHION, how come you give me such a hard time for saying that definitions
are liquid? A definition is, in many cases, nothing more than yet another
"fashionable truth".

Some fashions never go out of style: that yellow fruit with the thick peel
will most likely always be referred to, when using the English language,
as a "banana". This doesn't change the fact that the only reason we call
it a "banana" and not a "xylophone" is fashion. Given enough time, the
English language might mutate to the point where we call a "banana" a
"bana" instead. Who needs that extra "na"?

When it comes to vaguer concepts -- words that represent ideologies and
abstracts -- the fashion is much more flexible. What is "surrealism" in
the 1950s might not be "surrealism" in the 1990s. I think even you can
agree with that.

We can all agree that a banana is a banana. We seem at odds when we talk
about "surrealism". If we talk about our concrete efforts -- what art we
actually DO -- and how we see this as "surrealism", all conversation on
the matter would be much more useful.

If I show you a banana and say, "This is a BANANA," you can understand
what I mean.

If you describe to me a particular surrealist project you executed and
say, "This is SURREALISM," I can understand what you mean.

Talking about the philosophy of bananas without showing me an actual
banana is a complete waste of time. Just like talking about the
philosophy of surrealism, without showing me your "surreal banana".

> I have written 29 books of poetry.

Keen. How come you never post any of your poetry in this newsgroup? For
that matter, how come getting you to talk about your art is like pulling
teeth? I would love, for example, to know more about the pamphlets you
directed at corporate America. My girlfriend is a big fan of Adbusters,
and I happen to like a lot of their rhetoric.

> So yes... but all this is still (as you say yourself!) irrelevant to the
> question of whether or not "art with a political agenda is not art", as
> was said.

I think that you and I agree that ALL ART has a political agenda.
Therefore the question of whether art with a political agenda is still art
is rendered meaningless. ALL ART has a political agenda.

> Your assumption that I am "an asshole" is questionable.

All right, let me state it like this...

I have perceived you to be both aggressive and insulting in communications
with others. It could be classified as almost guarded. I have talked to
others, in regards to your style, and we have reached a consensus that
quite often you come across as "enraged for the sake of being enraged."
Even your friends in this newsgroup seem to back away when you begin to
lose your temper. Which is quite often.

What you are like in real life -- lazy, angry, whatever -- I do not know.
I can only speak of my perceptions of you on this newsgroup.

However, as of late I sense that you are actually attempting to
communicate with people. I can't imagine the Dale of six months ago
actually admitting that he agrees with me on any topic. So all of this
makes me happy.

Having said this, let me admit that I can be quite an asshole myself. I
like to poke people in the side, textually speaking, until they want to
clobber me. I can't explain why, but doing so seems like a lot of fun.
Its something I'm trying to stop in myself. Lately, teasing people
doesn't seem like a productive or fun thing to do.

Life is big.

Michael Voytinsky

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In article <378944EA...@gte.net>,
Dale Houstman <dale.h...@gte.net> wrote:

> for you) he made no bones about it. We won't mention Solzenitzen, to
> spare you the embarassment.

Solzehnitsin is probably a good counterexample to your point. As an
artist, as a writer of fiction, he was not all that good. He did not
suck, but he was unremarkable. His achievement lies in the field of
history - he has done incredible amount of research in incredibly
difficult conditions (to put it mildly), creating a record of events
that may have otherwise been forgotten.

Veronica Speedwell

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Jul 12, 1999, 3:00:00 AM7/12/99

to

Andrea Chen wrote:

> >
> > Cute. Have you ever heard of Yoko Ono? She was doing this schtick in 1913.
> > You should check out Priva Del Leoni, Morrow Lambdal or Heloise for more
> > advanced takes on the old 101 silly things to do with silly things around the
> > house
> > bit. Housewife humor never dies.
> >
>
> I wasn't that enthused about the onion thing to begin with

You're forgiven, Sweetie-Pie. It's a big surrealist girl who can so quickly
own up to a lack of imagination and apologize for it with such humility,
even though I'm sure you'll come up with another cute, anti-art ":idea"
again very soon. How about using one of those nice onions of yours to
cook up something tasty in the kitchen while we're waiting? In any case,
carry on, Doll.

barrett john erickson

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Jul 12, 1999, 3:00:00 AM7/12/99

to

Nikolaus Maack <ac...@FreeNet.Carleton.CA> wrote in message
news:7mdfb0$2...@freenet-news.carleton.ca...

> Even your friends in this newsgroup seem to back away when you begin to
> lose your temper. Which is quite often.

just for the record:

my silence is not the result of disagreement with Dale, but bemused contempt
for the "new and improved" alt.surrealism (now less filling with "surrealism
lite"!).

-- barrett

bar...@MagneticFields.org
http://www.MagneticFields.org/

==============================================

"Everything tends to make us believe that there exists a
certain point of the mind at which life and death, the real and
the imagined, past and future, the communicable and the
incommunicable, high and low, cease to be perceived as
contradictions."

...André Breton

==============================================

g.v.w. iv

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Jul 12, 1999, 3:00:00 AM7/12/99

to

i blame the crystal meth for my performance below.

Please allow me to correct a two of my more glaring errors.

[...]

> But, first, realize that i *already* acknowledged that content does determine whether an object is art. So Swift's oeuvre may choose for its object whatever it wishes, and still be art (literature).

i meant to write that content does *not* determine whether an object is art.

[...]

> > This is an interesting question, and one with probably no good answer,
>
> And what you give me in return for my interesting is a transparent dodge. Now how is that fair?

... for my interesting *question* ... Ugh.

g.v.w. iv

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Jul 12, 1999, 3:00:00 AM7/12/99

to

barrett john erickson squirted:

> Nikolaus Maack <ac...@FreeNet.Carleton.CA> wrote in message
> news:7mdfb0$2...@freenet-news.carleton.ca...
>

> > Even your friends in this newsgroup seem to back away when you begin to
> > lose your temper. Which is quite often.
>

> just for the record:
>
> my silence is not the result of disagreement with Dale, but bemused contempt
> for the "new and improved" alt.surrealism (now less filling with "surrealism
> lite"!).

We cut the fat (you) and reduced the bitterness (Dale).

Tastes great. Less filling.

g.v.w. iv

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Jul 12, 1999, 3:00:00 AM7/12/99

to

Dale Houstman wrote:

> Nikolaus Maack wrote:
> >
>
> > I think what Dale is trying to say -- and failing to say, because he has no poetry in his soul
>
> What is your definition of "poetry"? And since you think definitions are
> tyranny, how can you hold to that definition? And since you cannot hold
> to that definition, how can you make this erroneous statement? Is it one
> of those "obvious truths" you proclaim should be questrioned? The same
> series of questions can be applied to "soul."
>
> I have written 29 books of poetry. What are they comprised of? If not

Must you ask? They are comprised of sing-song jingles, the dregs of the poetaster's art, simple, shallow, mawkish, precious, clumsy, derived.

> poetry then what? And how do you know? Is your assumption here also one
> of those "obvious truths" that you should question?

We evaluate on comparitive grounds.

> >and is afraid to make huge pronouncements
>
> Literally unfathomable. And (anyway) what does "poetry" have to do
> (necessarily) with "huge pronouncements"? Most poetry is filled with
> small ambiguities and frail whispers. One CAN make huge pronouncements
> in poetry, but it is only one small weapon in an arsenal.

What would a hack like you know of a poet's arsenal?

i demonstrated for everyone in this group what a moron you are with figurative language.

> >all art is criticism, all art is propaganda, all art is political
>
> I agree with this, and only add the comment that I didn't say it in a
> similar form because I felt a different brand of rhetoric was called for

You nothing of rhetoric.

Nor do you even know what i did to you.

>
> initially. There is a time and place for huge pronouncements. I was
> doing the rather more difficult task of demonstrating that his blanket

''Blanket statement?'' Do you mean categorical claim? This explains why you tried to multiply counter-examples: you simply lack reading skills. i never issued a categorical claim (i.e. all 's' are 'p' or no 's' are 'p';
what you inelegantly refer to as a ''blanket statement''). i issued a conditional claim (i.e. if 's', then 'p'): in this case, i specified a boundary condition.

You are too easy, too un-skilled. i tie you up in knots so effortlessly, little Dale Houstman. Believe me, you puffed-up eunuch, you have no aptitude for dialectics, argument, conceptual or logical thinking. Above all,
you have no aptitude for written discourse.

You could argue against the boundary condition i specified, but you never did. i left myself wide open several times. Although you correctly intuited a vulnerability in my claims, you could never act on it. i tried to help
you, pointing out for you again and again the real issues; but you persisted, gibbering incoherently, whining inconsolably, scolding furiously, further entangling yourself in error and confusion.

Instead of discussing the real issues, you puffed your little scrotum, you wiggled your tiny penis with unwholesome glee, chanting the phrase ''blanket statement,'' believing in your ignorance that you could prove my claim
false by multiplying counter-examples.

> statement was incorrect in detail, and (at that point) another blanket
> statement would have been counterproductive. Thank you for supplying the
> appropriate diatribe.

Does your policy of aggressive stupidity ordinarily work for you? How often do you prevail in a dispute? Do your interlocutors simply give up on you in disgust?

> (I'll take it a step further and say all art is everything, and now Dale
> will want to punch me in the nose.)
>
> Why would I want to do that? You have the erroneous notion that I am
> aggressive, rather than lazy. I am not certain what the above statement
> means: what determines that said substance is "art."

You first, Dale. What makes art art?

> > When I create art of any kind, I respond to all art that I have perceived
> > up until this point. Even if I choose to ignore the works of others, in
> > an attempt to express my own personal angst, I cannot help but RESPOND to
> > all art I have ever seen. Hence, all art is criticism.
>
> I agree.

As do i.

> >
> > Following this logic, even if I choose to be utterly apolitical, I cannot
> > help but express some politics. I perceive the world, and I respond to
> > the world through my own art. Even if I paint a boring landscape, it's a
> > political statement. I conform to the art world demands for paintings of
> > trees and lakes. Hence, all art is political.
>
> I agree.

As do i.

[...] Dale's handwaving excised.

>
> >
>
> It makes no difference whether or not you have this "straw man" of
> exhaustive self-knowledge, you (as the creator of said work) have as
> much to say as most, and more than others. Your involvement (since you
> are a critic also) is AS USEFUL as any other; so if an artist has little

As useful in some cases, but not more useful. As i said, no one, not even the artist herself, enjoys privileged access to the hidden intents of an artist's conscious awareness.

> to do with the art, then neither does anyone else. But the artist did
> make the damn thing! Individuals are not interchangeable: Da Vinci is
> not the same as Peter Max, although playing a thought-game that assumes
> that are may be challenging and even productive.

Now you strike a pose naively resembling Kant, Coleridge, Goethe, or Baumgarten, or any more vulgar Romantic, arguing for some vague notion of native genius.

How revolutionary you are, you reactionary little boy.

Will you argue that an artist is possessed by the Gods next?

[...] Dale's desperate handwaving excised.

> DMH

--
gilbert vanburen wilkes iv
http://eserver.org/home/wilkes
<a href="http://www.2600.com/mindex.html">Free Kevin</a>

Revolutions are always verbose.
Leon Trotsky

i can tie you up in ways you cannot even comprehend. i say this because
you failed to identify my more tactical gestures. You let all of them
pass by without comment. For example, before i did anything else i
pre-empted most of what you wanted to say when i conceded that art can
choose anything for its object and still be art. As we observed, my
concession denied you the use of counter-examples. It also denied you
grounds on which to claim that i define art too strictly. Yet you let my
concession pass by without comment, failing to realize that you had
fallen headlong into your own pit, a pit you had intended for me. With
your most compelling arguments pre-empted, i could spend the rest of our
discussion tying you up in knots, finishing you off at my leisure.

Brandon J. Freels

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Jul 12, 1999, 3:00:00 AM7/12/99

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Definitions of Propaganda:

"Systematically distributed material which advocates a point of view, or
information reflecting the views and interests of those people advocating
such a point of view. Also see fascist aesthetic and socialist realism."
(from http://www.artlex.com/ )

"A latin word that was first used by Pope Gregory XV in 1622, when he
established the Sacred Congregation of Propaganda, a commission designed to
spread the Catholic faith worldwide. Since then propaganda has taken on a
much broader meaning, and refers to any technique, whether in writing,
speech, music, film or other means, that attempts to influence mass public
opinion. Progaganda was used by both sides in World War I to demonize the
enemy and so make the war more acceptable at home. It was refined by the
totalitarian societies that emerged between the two world wars in Russia,
Germany and Italy. For example, Leni Riefenstahl's film, Triumph of the
Will, which recorded Hitler's Nuremberg rallies, was a masterpiece of
propaganda for the Nazi regime (and is still used for propagandist purposes
by white supremacy groups). Propaganda is also used in democratic societies,
although it is rarely called that-except by those who oppose its content or
message. Any group that advocates its cause with the intent of influencing
opinion might be said to be practising propaganda-especially if its methods
are blatently biased or misrepresent facts." (from
http://www.fast-times.com/political/political.html )

"Any form of communication in support of national objectives designed to
influence the opinions, emotions, attitudes, or behavior of any group in
order to benefit the sponsor, either directly or indirectly." (from
http://www.dtic.mil/doctrine/jel/doddict/ )

Propaganda art
http://www.mcad.edu/classrooms/POLITPROP/politprop.html

Nazi and Soviet art
http://www.primenet.com/~byoder/artofnz.htm

Stalin
http://www.stanford.edu/~gfreidin/courses/147/propart/propart.htm

Official Page of Breastfeeding Propaganda
http://members.aol.com/cgrapentin/brstfeed.html

Dilbert as Propaganda
http://www.andrew.cmu.edu/~dmb/dilbert.html

g.v.w. iv

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Jul 12, 1999, 3:00:00 AM7/12/99

to

Dale Houstman wrote:

> "g.v.w. iv" wrote:
> >
> > barrett john erickson squirted:

> >
>
> > We cut the fat (you) and reduced the bitterness (Dale).
> >
> >

> Too bad you couldn't filter out the shattered assbone (you).

You mean jawbone, you un-testicled boy, as in the ''jawbone of
an ass,'' the instrument with which i mowed down your Philistine
misconceptions, one after the other.

> DMH

PS: Everytime i respond to one of your posts my formatting goes
to hell. When i used MSOutlook your messages always hosed my
font values.

If it happens this time i'll take you to a veterinary.

Brandon J. Freels

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Jul 12, 1999, 3:00:00 AM7/12/99

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Definitions of art from
http://www.arts.ouc.bc.ca/fiar/glossary/gloshome.html

"Any simple definition would be profoundly pretentious and tendentious, but
we can say that all the definitions offered over the centuries include some
notion of human agency, whether through manual skills (as in the art of
sailing or painting or photography), intellectual manipulation (as in the
art of politics), or public or personal expression (as in the art of
conversation). As such, the word is etymologically related to artificial --
i.e., produced by human beings. Since this embraces many types of production
that are not conventionally deemed to be art, perhaps a better term would be
culture. This would explain why certain preindustrial cultures produce
objects which Eurocentric interests characterize as art, even though the
producing culture has no linguistic term to differentiate these objects from
utilitarian artifacts."

"Ellen Dissanayake's What is Art For? (a shorter version of which appeared
in Journal of Aesthetics and Art Criticism [Summer 1980]), tries to avoid
partisanship by simply listing the various ways art has been understood
through history: (in no particular order) the product of conscious
intention, self rewarding activity, a tendency to unite dissimilar things, a
concern with change and variety, aesthetic exploitation of familiarity and
surprise or tension and release, the imposition of order on disorder, the
creation of illusions, indulgence in sensuousness, the exhibition of skill,
a desire to convey meanings, indulgence in fantasy (cf day-dreaming),
aggrandizement of self or others, illustration, the heightening of
existence, revelation, personal adornment or embellishment, and so on. In a
brief review of new cave paintings discovered in France in 1995, critic
Robert Hughes wrote: "art -- communication by visual images -- ... is, at
its root, association -- the power to make one thing stand for and symbolize
another, and to create the agreements by which some marks on a surface
denote, say, an animal, not just to the markmaker but to others" ("Behold
the Stone Age," Time [February 1995]: 42)."

g.v.w. iv

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Jul 12, 1999, 3:00:00 AM7/12/99

to

"Brandon J. Freels" wrote:

> Definitions of art from
> http://www.arts.ouc.bc.ca/fiar/glossary/gloshome.html

[...] quoted material excised.

Are you working your way slowly toward a point, Brandon?

Brandon J. Freels

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Jul 12, 1999, 3:00:00 AM7/12/99

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g.v.w. iv wrote

> Are you working your way slowly toward a point, Brandon?

NEVER!

Brandon J. Freels

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Jul 12, 1999, 3:00:00 AM7/12/99

to

Nikolaus Maack wrote
> Have you actually read any of Dale's poetry? If not, then your commentary
> is a waste of alphabet. If you have read some of his works, by all means,
> direct some of it our way.

A good old search on yahoo would send some of his works your way.

Dale Houstman

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Jul 13, 1999, 3:00:00 AM7/13/99

to

"g.v.w. iv" wrote:
>
> barrett john erickson squirted:
>

> We cut the fat (you) and reduced the bitterness (Dale).
>
>
Too bad you couldn't filter out the shattered assbone (you).

DMH

Nikolaus Maack

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Jul 13, 1999, 3:00:00 AM7/13/99

to

Dale:

>> I have written 29 books of poetry. What are they comprised of?

GVW:

> Must you ask? They are comprised of sing-song jingles, the dregs of the
> poetaster's art, simple, shallow, mawkish, precious, clumsy, derived.

Have you actually read any of Dale's poetry? If not, then your commentary

is a waste of alphabet. If you have read some of his works, by all means,
direct some of it our way.

I would reserve judgement on his art until I see some. And I'd like to
see some -- I keep asking, out of genuine interest, to see or hear about
what Dale has done. But with the name calling crap you're now posting,
chances are pretty good Dale won't show us a damn thing. And who could
blame him? There's blood in the water, and you, GVW, are wearing a shark
costume.

GVW:

> Instead of discussing the real issues, you puffed your little scrotum,
> you wiggled your tiny penis with unwholesome glee

Who is puffing their scrotum and wiggling their penis now, dear boy? You
have become your own enemy. A deliberate pose on your part, perhaps? A
new strategy in this chess game? Or are you simply pissing on your foe,
now that you consider him knocked down?

It's much more useful to try to talk, rather than beat each other.
Unfortunately talk usually results in fist-fights.

Maybe you see Dale on the ropes, and feel ready to go in for the kill.
All the more reason to let him back up again. Everyone, even Dale, has
something useful to say. He has some experiences I, personally, want to
know about.

And didja notice that all three of us seem to be agreeing on a whole bunch
of issues? So what is this fight about, exactly? Remind me.

Nik

--

"Thank you for supplying the appropriate diatribe."

-- Dale Houstman, alt.surrealism

Bill Palmer

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Jul 13, 1999, 3:00:00 AM7/13/99

to

In <7mefq3$f...@freenet-news.carleton.ca> ac...@FreeNet.Carleton.CA
(Nikolaus Maack) writes:
>
>
>Dale:

>>> I have written 29 books of poetry. What are they comprised of?
>

>GVW:

>> Must you ask? They are comprised of sing-song jingles, the dregs of
the
>> poetaster's art, simple, shallow, mawkish, precious, clumsy,
derived.
>

>Have you actually read any of Dale's poetry? If not, then your
commentary
>is a waste of alphabet. If you have read some of his works, by all
means,
>direct some of it our way.
>
>I would reserve judgement on his art until I see some. And I'd like
to
>see some -- I keep asking, out of genuine interest, to see or hear
about
>what Dale has done. But with the name calling crap you're now
posting,
>chances are pretty good Dale won't show us a damn thing. And who
could
>blame him? There's blood in the water, and you, GVW, are wearing a
shark
>costume.
>
>GVW:

>> Instead of discussing the real issues, you puffed your little
scrotum,

>> you wiggled your tiny penis with unwholesome glee
>
>Who is puffing their scrotum and wiggling their penis now, dear boy?
You
>have become your own enemy. A deliberate pose on your part, perhaps?
A

>new strategy in this chess game? Or are you simply pissing on your
foe,

>now that you consider him knocked down?
>
>It's much more useful to try to talk, rather than beat each other.
>Unfortunately talk usually results in fist-fights.
>
>Maybe you see Dale on the ropes, and feel ready to go in for the kill.

>All the more reason to let him back up again. Everyone, even Dale,
has
>something useful to say. He has some experiences I, personally, want
to
>know about.

Don't let Gilbert Vanburen "Wormy" Wilkes get anyone
over here alt.surrealism rattled. His role in rec.
arts.prose, for instance, is that of a vast bladder
of wind attached to a pole high over the r.a.p.
newsgroup. From his daunting vantage point, Wormy
makes horrible faces; screams in a blood-curdling
manner; and tries, by blasting malodorous streams of
hot air out of the anal orifice that serves as his
mouth, to intimidate those in the group who provoke
his wrath.

Bill Palmer
"The most fascinating assemblage of words in net history."
"Words on a Screen"
"Leaves blowing around in a backyard in the Midwest"
alt.genius.bill-palmer

>
>And didja notice that all three of us seem to be agreeing on a whole
bunch
>of issues? So what is this fight about, exactly? Remind me.
>
> Nik
>
>--

> "Thank you for supplying the appropriate diatribe."

> -- Dale Houstman, alt.surrealism

Dale Houstman

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Jul 13, 1999, 3:00:00 AM7/13/99

to

Nikolaus Maack wrote:
>
>
> I would reserve judgement on his art until I see some. And I'd like to
> see some -- I keep asking, out of genuine interest, to see or hear about
> what Dale has done. But with the name calling crap you're now posting,
> chances are pretty good Dale won't show us a damn thing. And who could
> blame him? There's blood in the water, and you, GVW, are wearing a shark
> costume.
>

It's not a costume, and he isn't anywhere near being a shark, more a sea
cucumber with pretensions; yet this is almost reasonable. I could show
some of my poetry here, but I do think it would be wasted on the likes
of "Ivy." I am not (in any stretch of the imagination!) insecure as to
its "value," but I have no desire to see it turn into another thread
with which "Ivy" can hang his little head.

Actually I have posted poetry here, now and then. And you can (as
Brandon so nicely informs us) find a few sites where my "crap" is
besmearing the walls.

But I don't find this ng (at the moment) to be an appropriate areana for
creative expression. After "Ivy"
dies in a pool of his own sick, I'll consider it.

DMH

g.v.w. iv

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Jul 13, 1999, 3:00:00 AM7/13/99

to

Nikolaus Maack wrote:

> Dale:

> >> I have written 29 books of poetry. What are they comprised of?
>

> GVW:

> > Must you ask? They are comprised of sing-song jingles, the dregs of the
> > poetaster's art, simple, shallow, mawkish, precious, clumsy, derived.
>

> Have you actually read any of Dale's poetry? If not, then your commentary

Yes. Of course i have. Robert and i shared a hearty belly laugh over it. It
genuinely sucks.

> is a waste of alphabet. If you have read some of his works, by all means,

So it follows that my commentary stands. i also study literature. Would you
like me to provide a line-by-line analysis of one of Dale's atrocities for our
group?

> direct some of it our way.

<http://personal.riverusers.com/~kmyon/daleh.htm>

> I would reserve judgement on his art until I see some. And I'd like to
> see some -- I keep asking, out of genuine interest, to see or hear about
> what Dale has done. But with the name calling crap you're now posting,
> chances are pretty good Dale won't show us a damn thing. And who could
> blame him? There's blood in the water, and you, GVW, are wearing a shark
> costume.

i look good in a dorsel fin.

> GVW:

> > Instead of discussing the real issues, you puffed your little scrotum,

> > you wiggled your tiny penis with unwholesome glee
>
> Who is puffing their scrotum and wiggling their penis now, dear boy? You

Apparently, you are.

> have become your own enemy. A deliberate pose on your part, perhaps? A

> new strategy in this chess game? Or are you simply pissing on your foe,

> now that you consider him knocked down?

i would guess pissing on him.

> It's much more useful to try to talk, rather than beat each other.
> Unfortunately talk usually results in fist-fights.

Read this aloud, whoever you are. What are you trying to say? Unfortunately,
one of us in this conversation can hardly talk at all. That would be you.

> Maybe you see Dale on the ropes, and feel ready to go in for the kill.
> All the more reason to let him back up again. Everyone, even Dale, has
> something useful to say. He has some experiences I, personally, want to
> know about.

Enough moralizing. i'll give you seven days, gratis.

Next Wednesday i will return to alt.surrealism and resume my discussion with
Dale.

Show me what you can do with him. Impress me.

> And didja notice that all three of us seem to be agreeing on a whole bunch
> of issues? So what is this fight about, exactly? Remind me.

The fight is about three gibbering idiots who thought they owned a newsgroup,
Dale, Barrett, and Brandon.

Try to stay current, little one. Especially if you want to intervene.

>
> Nik
>
> --

> "Thank you for supplying the appropriate diatribe."

> -- Dale Houstman, alt.surrealism

g.v.w. iv

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Jul 13, 1999, 3:00:00 AM7/13/99

to

"Brandon J. Freels" wrote:

> Nikolaus Maack wrote

> > Have you actually read any of Dale's poetry? If not, then your commentary

> > is a waste of alphabet. If you have read some of his works, by all means,

> > direct some of it our way.
>

> A good old search on yahoo would send some of his works your way.

i prefer Google (in beta), AltaVista, or Looksmart.

Apparently Nik has never used a search engine.

g.v.w. iv

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Jul 13, 1999, 3:00:00 AM7/13/99

to

"Brandon J. Freels" wrote:

i thought not. Carry on.

g.v.w. iv

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Jul 13, 1999, 3:00:00 AM7/13/99

to

Bill ''empty scrotum'' Palmer gibbered and squeacked:

> I thought I had better send this one around the horn.
> Wouldn't want Wormy to think I was being sneaky...

You could no more be ''sneaky'' than you could achieve an erection, you
Depends undergarment wearing eunuch.

> >>know about.
> >
> >Don't let Gilbert Vanburen "Wormy" Wilkes get anyone

> >over here alt.surrealism rattled. -- [...] Billshit flushed.

Too late.

Nikolaus Maack

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Jul 14, 1999, 3:00:00 AM7/14/99

to

"g.v.w. iv" (gv...@andrew.cmu.edu) writes:
> Yes. Of course i have. Robert and i shared a hearty belly laugh over it. It
> genuinely sucks.

> So it follows that my commentary stands. i also study literature. Would you
> like me to provide a line-by-line analysis of one of Dale's atrocities for our
> group?

By all means. I recommend posting the poem in its entirety, followed by
line-by-line commentary, if you don't mind.

> The fight is about three gibbering idiots who thought they owned a newsgroup,
> Dale, Barrett, and Brandon.

Funny, the last posting I read, you were asking Dale to define ART, and
arguing about politics, and whether art that is overtly political is art
or not. Now you tell me the argument is about these three thinking they
own alt.surrealism. Perhaps it's time to start arguing what you think
you're arguing about?

Nik

--

"Thank you for supplying the appropriate diatribe."

-- Dale Houstman, alt.surrealism

Dale Houstman

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Jul 14, 1999, 3:00:00 AM7/14/99

to

"g.v.w. iv" wrote:
>
> Nikolaus Maack wrote:
>
> > Dale:

> > >> I have written 29 books of poetry. What are they comprised of?
> >

> > GVW:

> > > Must you ask? They are comprised of sing-song jingles, the dregs of the
> > > poetaster's art, simple, shallow, mawkish, precious, clumsy, derived.

You're such a tool, Ivy. I leave a spot open for the trained monkey to
pee in and guess what? He goes and pisses right in the middle! It is
things like this that restore one's faith in lower-primate psychology.
You're an entirely predictable act however, and will soon be replaced
with a dog that speaks Latin through its ass.

As for "Robert" and you sharing a hearty belly laugh over the poetry;
Robert has already made the mistake of claiming he found the poetry to
be quite "dulcet" among other non-aggressive opinons. It makes no
difference what he really thinks of it (what could the opinion of two
such morons really mean to anyone who has a brain in their heads?), but
it does show that either of you is more than happy to say anything to
suit your antagonistic "agenda." And talk about bitterness! Simply
because you were caught out saying something entirely specious about
art, you feel it is time to change the subject. What a nasty little
monkey! Bebbo has an attitude...

Not one of those things you list is a true analysis of what I write.
"Mawkish"? Oh please... I can give you a better critique than THAT.
You're an idiot, Ivy. I can bet you confuse (purposely) evocative with
mawkishness, and purposeful ambiguity with preciousness. Hell, I can bet
you confuse your brain with a condom. Too bad it had a hole in it, you
got sploodge all over your keyboard! Thankfully you're sterile...

Luckily there is not one thing "precious" or even "semi-precious" about
you; you're a lump of dried dinosaur dropping.
> >

You are intellectually dishonst, and (because you utilize emotion where
you should use thought) really just an amusingly aggravating form of
sentimentalist. One might time an egg by your outbursts of cold
cognitive sludge into the corrupted air of your "brown study."

What an ass polyp!

DMH

Brandon J. Freels

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Jul 14, 1999, 3:00:00 AM7/14/99

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I would very much appreciate it if "g.v.w. iv" would please explain to me
what a "good" poem is . . .

g.v.w. iv

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Jul 14, 1999, 3:00:00 AM7/14/99

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Nikolaus Maack wrote:

> "g.v.w. iv" (gv...@andrew.cmu.edu) writes:
> > Yes. Of course i have. Robert and i shared a hearty belly laugh over it. It
> > genuinely sucks.
> > So it follows that my commentary stands. i also study literature. Would you
> > like me to provide a line-by-line analysis of one of Dale's atrocities for our
> > group?
>
> By all means. I recommend posting the poem in its entirety, followed by
> line-by-line commentary, if you don't mind.

*This* should be fun. (i've won awards for criticism.) When i return i'll provide
it. Let the responsibility be on your head: i would have undertaken so cruel an
enterprise on my own.

Meanwhile, read the ''Night of a Thousand Dale Houstmans,'' where i completely
up-end Dale's blundered firgurative language. Dale or Barrett proved themselves
unable to argue against any of my principal claims. They carped about my comments on
anorexia and my use of the term ''latent,'' but soon fell grimly silent, shaking
with impotent rage.

> > The fight is about three gibbering idiots who thought they owned a newsgroup,
> > Dale, Barrett, and Brandon.
>
> Funny, the last posting I read, you were asking Dale to define ART, and
> arguing about politics, and whether art that is overtly political is art
> or not. Now you tell me the argument is about these three thinking they
> own alt.surrealism. Perhaps it's time to start arguing what you think
> you're arguing about?

What a boring idea. What an unsophisticated strategy.

Provoking Dale Houstman or Barrett John Erickson to share their views demonstrates
the truth of my principal claim: the two of them are gibbering idiots who know
nothing about art in general, or surrealism in particular. When i force the two
joyless buffoons to defend their ridiculous claims, i, in a sense, recruit them to
my side: the two of them make a far more powerful case for their ignorance and
impotence than i ever could. Besides, i enjoy poking the two of them with a pointy
stick. They shriek on cue. They gibber on cue. They lose bladder control on cue.

Why would you deny me the pleasure of so harmless a distraction?

i will see you in seven days. If by then you have produced a newer, more interesting
Dale Houstman, i will leave again, or simply not appear. If not, i will resume my
remedial training and reinforcement.

> Nik
>
> --

> "Thank you for supplying the appropriate diatribe."

> -- Dale Houstman, alt.surrealism

PS: Brandon i enjoy, despite myself. He sides with the idiot twins, but i still like
him. He has a sense of humor about himself.

Dale Houstman

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Jul 14, 1999, 3:00:00 AM7/14/99

to

"g.v.w. iv" wrote:
>
> Nikolaus Maack wrote:
>

>
> *This* should be fun. (i've won awards for criticism.)

So what? Even if I believed you. If "art that has a political agenda is
not art" is a sample of your critical powers, I am less than anxious to
see your sentimental and wrong-headed take on anything. your opinions
(whatever they might be) are tainted by your overt need to be "winner"
in some aggressive act of idiocy. Real critics usually attempt to read
the work first THEN form some opinions. The fact that you seem to have
it backwards is not surprising, only disheartening.

> Meanwhile, read the ''Night of a Thousand Dale Houstmans,'' where i completely
> up-end Dale's blundered firgurative language. Dale or Barrett proved themselves
> unable to argue against any of my principal claims. They carped about my comments on
> anorexia

I never said anything about anorexia. You're deluded. But how is it that
comments on your stupidities ("art with a political agenda is not
art..."etc) are carping, and your yahooisms are commentary? Who do you
think you are diddling besides yourself? And your assumption that my
ignoring your less than edifying fare constitutes an "inability" is
laughable; I am certain the fact that your parents ignored you when you
were growing up doesn't mean they were unable to comprehend you: quite
the contrary I would think. They just knew a lost cause when they saw
it.

DMH

Dale Houstman

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Jul 14, 1999, 3:00:00 AM7/14/99

to

"g.v.w. iv" wrote:
>
>
>
> Meanwhile, read the ''Night of a Thousand Dale Houstmans,'' where i completely
> up-end Dale's blundered firgurative language. Dale or Barrett proved themselves
> unable to argue against any of my principal claims.

You had no claims, you only turned back insults that you initially
created yourself. you haven't posted one thing worth discussing
intelligently. All you can do (as barrett proved with his "I would like
to hear more from you, i.v." posts) is react, often to nothing. A dog
can be trained to do the same.

Your intellectual embarrassments howver are both more recent and more
overt. You response to the discussion of your "art/propaganda" error was
total blather of a particularly uncunning sort. Anyone on the ng could
have listed an artwork with profound political import, and (even more
importantly) delineated the agenda that stood behind it. Many examples
were given. you simply were wrong; not slightly incorrect or taken out
of context, but massively wrong in your supposition. The truly damning
thing about your shoddy performance is that I am certain you know you
were wrong, but can't admit it, because it would diminish your "manhood"
in some vague and old-fashioned way. When you lose face, you make sure
it stays lost, don't you?

By the way, I won't be reading any "analysis" of my work by you because
(A) paraphrase is a bore (B) you are a boor (C) you have an "agenda" I
find trivial and childish (D) you are unlikely to be honest with
yourself or others and (E) you're a yahoo.

Oh yeah, that's from Swift, the guy who wrote "A Modest Proposal" which
(according to your truly awe inspiring statement) is either not art or
has no political agenda. Satire?

Damn you're dumb...

DMH

Roger Williams

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Jul 19, 1999, 3:00:00 AM7/19/99

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Also spracht Dale Houstman <dale.h...@gte.net>:

> Damn you're dumb...

Alert the manager - there's an irony spill in aisle one.

--
{}{}{}{}{}{}{}{}{}{}{}{}{}{}{}{}{}{}{}{}{}{}{} \|/
{} RogerW rog...@newsguy.com {} 0< -- parrot.net!
{} http://www.parrot.net ad...@parrot.net {} ^^^^(*)^^^^
{}{}{}{}{}{}{}{}{}{}{}{}{}{}{}{}{}{}{}{}{}{}{} ^^ / \ ^^

Andrea Chen

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Jul 19, 1999, 3:00:00 AM7/19/99

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>
> You had no claims, you only turned back insults that you initially
> created yourself. you haven't posted one thing worth discussing
> intelligently. All you can do (as barrett proved with his "I would like
> to hear more from you, i.v." posts) is react, often to nothing. A dog
> can be trained to do the same.
>

Gilbert has been involved in a lot of noise and I hope if you guys have
to continue your personal vendetta you will take it to
alt.arts.poetry.comments (I know it can't be confined in rap because
despite the hundreds of post you made on topic there (it's a flame
group) you refused to read it.)

I also feel Gilbert fell down on his claimed willingness to intervene
in alt.surrealism and help recreate it (this isn't a flame group) and
from my quick skims of the art and politics thread I feel Gilbert took a
fairly shakey position (I don't hold it) and failed to successfully
justify rhetorically (he could have "won" (with his verbal cleverness)
if he had taken the position that art transcends politics and the
authors politics are no more important than the author's drug addictions
(a variant of the artists intentions are irrelevant so common in post
modernism)...

so yes Dale I would say that you came out more successful in that
particular debate, you did indeed win.

I will also agree that Gilbert frequently avoids issues but then again
that is to be expected, he has clearly defined himself as a guttersnipe
and there has never been any question that his primary purpose is to
bait you which he and Robert have done so successfully (a bit of advice,
Robert brought up his house and degree after you stated they were
probably just a bunch of loser kids, he found that his wordly success
infuriates you so he brings it up on occassion, but you do so far more
often. You've fallen into a trap.)

However it's incorrect to say that Gilbert never posts any thing of
value. I can think of several and they at times show brilliant
writing.

One which was for the most part on the mark was his illustration that
the method your friends use for the reconcilation of opposites (ak the
Breton quote that Barrett uses as a sig) is simply to define these
opposites in ways which aren't opposites and thus voila reconcile the
contradictions. This is silly, weak sophism and not at all consistent
with the deep level struggles and unities that Breton's approach
implies.

It's very likely if such a reconcilation exists (there is no evidence
that Breton actually experinced it but only that he longed for it) it is
beyond words or at least would require an author such as Joyce with both
immense logical and emotional power.