Friday, May 15, 2009

John Mountain -Add&Pass-287

John Mountain -Add&Pass-286

John Mountain - Add&Pass-273

John Mountain -Add&Pass-274

John Mountain -Add&Pass-276

John Mountain -Add&Pass-275

John Mountain -Add&Pass-285

John Mountain -Add&Pass-284

Thursday, May 14, 2009

must see tv improv(e)


must see tv improv(e)
Originally uploaded by jim leftwich

must see tv improv(e)


must see tv improv(e)
Originally uploaded by jim leftwich

must see tv improv(e)


must see tv improv(e)
Originally uploaded by jim leftwich

must see tv improv(e)


must see tv improv(e)
Originally uploaded by jim leftwich

must see tv improv(e)


must see tv improv(e)
Originally uploaded by jim leftwich

must see tv improv(e)


must see tv improv(e)
Originally uploaded by jim leftwich

must see tv improv(e)


must see tv improv(e)
Originally uploaded by jim leftwich

must see tv improv(e)


must see tv improv(e)
Originally uploaded by jim leftwich

must see tv improv(e)


must see tv improv(e)
Originally uploaded by jim leftwich

must see tv improv(e)


must see tv improv(e)
Originally uploaded by jim leftwich

must see tv improv(e)


must see tv improv(e)
Originally uploaded by jim leftwich

must see tv improv(e)


must see tv improv(e)
Originally uploaded by jim leftwich

must see tv improv(e)


must see tv improv(e)
Originally uploaded by jim leftwich

must see tv improv(e)


must see tv improv(e)
Originally uploaded by jim leftwich

must see tv improv(e)


must see tv improv(e)
Originally uploaded by jim leftwich

must see tv improv(e)


must see tv improv(e)
Originally uploaded by jim leftwich

must see tv improv(e)


must see tv improv(e)
Originally uploaded by jim leftwich

must see tv improv(e)


must see tv improv(e)
Originally uploaded by jim leftwich

must see tv improv(e)


must see tv improv(e)
Originally uploaded by jim leftwich

must see tv improv(e)


must see tv improv(e)
Originally uploaded by jim leftwich

must see tv improv(e)


must see tv improv(e)
Originally uploaded by jim leftwich

must see tv improv(e)


must see tv improv(e)
Originally uploaded by jim leftwich

must see tv improv(e)


must see tv improv(e)
Originally uploaded by jim leftwich

must see tv improv(e) 1


must see tv improv(e) 1
Originally uploaded by jim leftwich

must see tv improv(e) 2


must see tv improv(e) 2
Originally uploaded by jim leftwich

must see tv improv(e) 3


must see tv improv(e) 3
Originally uploaded by jim leftwich

Wednesday, May 13, 2009

John Crouse & Jim Leftwich

ACT FIVE THOUSAND FIVE HUNDRED EIGHTY EIGHT


placid mount homophone: “researchers thought making”

flirt concave sawhorse: “anthropologists equally these”

scab motor immune: “were monday the”

forehead dawdle bumper: “cave found acacia”

antifreeze sewer tumor: “required keeping glues”

starboard reputation sluice: “were alchemists the”

shut recent paralysis: “the some doodles”

ladder grain duplicate: “the must many”

chatter balk nickname: “that reverse thought”

knelt mutt insulate: “glue usually profound”

interact fought handmade: “were manipulate proceedings”

conqueror begonia stud: “design still trees.”





ACT FIVE THOUSAND FIVE HUNDRED EIGHTY NINE


from the fire: “almost suggested used”

a loud noise: “soon simple temperature”

giving off smoke: “fire caves first”

confused or tangled: “consisting cognitive careful”

was sneaking through: “between mind multilevel”

a dirty mark: “found composite modern”

with a trap: “properties paper decade”

an ordinary camera: “traces attach functional”

pieces of something: “techniques sustained required”

wedding vows made: “bubbles wrote symbolic”

by using hormones: “crosshatched convincing condition”

stocking new products: “methodology multitasking operations.”




ACT FIVE THOUSAND FIVE HUNDRED NINETY


lick remains lifeboat: “who glue usually”

bloat relay thermal: “equally artisans able”

thighbone squint shuttle: “the took site”

dragonfly pimple downcast: “bark gum role”

champion streetwise umbilical: “when tools much”

stanza motherly mainstay: “fire mixed weak”

immune doubtless cutting: “about art rather”

comrade battlefield winch: “maker switch action”

tattle lance silkworm: “find superglue powers”

grits doorknob civics: “cognition adhesive published”

pitchfork circus urn: “sciences excavation debated”

teeth sumac ration: “nothing making attention.”





ACT FIVE THOUSAND FIVE HUNDRED NINETY ONE


rattlesnake pauper act: “abstract the found”

lyrical jumprope act: “discovery modern thinking”

groom knife act: “earlier abstract found”

undersea unawares act: “ochre southern the”

technique relay act: “previously art complex”

manatee laughter act: “they symbolic unknown”

epilepsy gown act: “the quite geometric”

incision gavel act: “there patterns we”

submarine weasel act: “they are think”

tremendous sip act: “interpreted people meaning”

robust projectile act: “been others engraved”

exhaustion chapter act: “from cave town.”





ACT FIVE THOUSAND FIVE HUNDRED NINETY TWO


fallout chassis factual: “pieces of make”

hoodlum scaffold quack: “ochre stone old”

primate highness hoof: “decorative the first”

folk unpack wrung: “surfaces hatches the”

wheelchair unrest tattoo: “the humans modern”

standard exhale hoax: “the modern years”

hipbone explanation chapel: “the biologically about”

bayonet abacus insomnia: “there the were”

watchdog tributary squid: “behaviorally just scientists”

pedigree hitch grandstand: “these demonstrate use”

erratic blindfold aside: “was exclusively and”

edgewise garter hostility: “the syntactical while.”





ACT FIVE THOUSAND FIVE HUNDRED NINETY THREE


pulp monarchy fiord: “scientists form thought”

firewood publication barely: “the work but”

bangle garlic subset: “were alleged different”

scuffle sturdy lain: “doodlings the science”

excrete wakefulness chauffeur: “art been the”

railway underpants rudder: “that of far”

grope complicates verbatim: “think was pieces”

sculpt stink recital: “the shore ocean”

cheek reckless hospitality: “abstract eurasian ago”

blankets chicanos wrought: “state says with”

tuft regarding landslide: “now itself complex”

leaks fathom congregate: “pattern to patterns.”





ACT FIVE THOUSAND FIVE HUNDRED NINETY FOUR


bullet apartheid gene: “what they i”

crime season mammals: “been those having”

generating born pressure: “would understand others”

volunteers meadow rouse: “recovered at east”

rosebud would griddle: “old other many”

upstairs grind champion: “to powder found”

croak confidence yeast: “years body paint”

yesterday abbreviated prowl: “was flat cross”

bowel recorder exhilerate: “motif years modern”

expel twister weep: “developed behavior that”

sinister cucumber windmill: “around ago occupied”

offshoot magical yak: “evolved ago that.”





ACT FIVE THOUSAND FIVE HUNDRED NINETY FIVE


marketplace gag duty: “were modern ago”

eardrum chariot apathy: “that finds ochre”

appeal shack pester: “stone not utilitarian”

degrees bling wastebasket: “sharing fully language”

siphon peer insignia: “not as abstract”

gin holster aphorisms: “says good researchers”

flounder constellation anvil: “there these times”

afresh juggernaut gospel: “just anything national”

conch graze alias: “the science prehistoric”

eclipse tongs sadden: “ancient editor example”

dote toothpaste inspiration: “more cave shows”

spore rally harmonica: “ways developed than.”

Tuesday, May 12, 2009

John Mountain - Add&Pass-281

John Mountain - Add&Pass-280

John Mountain - Add&Pass-277

John Mountain - Add&Pass-278

John Mountain - Add&Pass-282

John Mountain - Add&Pass-283

John Mountain - Add&Pass-279

John Biando - The Mystery

photo from st. petersburg, russia

John Biando - Da Vinci


John Biando - Da Vinci
Originally uploaded by jim leftwich

John Biando - punk rock

photo from st. petersburg, russia

John Biando - pointy head


John Biando - never again ninja

photo from st. petersburg, russia

Monday, May 11, 2009

John Crouse & Jim Leftwich

ACT FIVE THOUSAND FIVE HUNDRED EIGHTY ONE


inequality flex cobbler: “suicide from between”

ceremony navy tecumseh: “bombings spate new”

knowledge horseback deforestation: “against new bomb”

herzegovina booty sleeve: “bombings bases targeted”

reptile petunia motor: “massive deadliest suicide”

indent digital cider: “iraqi officials with”

chum plywood pauper: “spotlight bombings successfully”

overwork monument incubate: “president particularly secretary”

hourglass honeydew handball: “infamous claiming reverse”

gong bong prong: “visit interpret going”

exaggerate bugle rescue: “reality united withdrawal”

miscue peking parallelogram: “bombings backed continued.”





ACT FIVE THOUSAND FIVE HUNDRED EIGHTY TWO


parlor begins distance: “american neocolonialism suicide”

homophone goalkeeper everlasting: “despite announced rather”

calorie bosom rhubarb: “withdrawal occupying combat”

reel quarry peso: “brigades american roam”

kernel deaf laundry: “installations troops subject”

debris slouch siphon: “withdrawal foreign war”

flute lathe sinister: “through prime apparatus”

sister international egocentric: “population tribal government”

corncob bumblebee hobnob: “together hence initial”

bullfight submarine bump: “extend insurgents system”

subset pavement lagoon: “behind establishing leaving”

fleece wolves bangladesh: “neocolonialism trappings insurgents.”





ACT FIVE THOUSAND FIVE HUNDRED EIGHTY THREE


diversified investment advisors: “wave iraqi occupation”

is your plan: “prevent logic surprising”

record keeper diversified: “suicide observed occupation”

working with your: “majority organized ejection”

plan actuary prepared: “predictably invasion lethality”

the annual funsing notice: “attacks response political”

please note that: “stability spike campaign”

this new notice: “coinciding forces elements”

replaces the summary: “forces supporters backed”

annual report and: “create forces conditions”

is intended to: “surging strategic campaign”

permit plan participants: “organizations renewed umbrella.”





ACT FIVE THOUSAND FIVE HUNDRED EIGHTY FOUR


accountants accupuncturists architects: “asserted several harvest”

artisans chiropractors breastfeeding: “supporters deputy insurgents”

bicycles carpeting caterers: “audiotape government result”

cooking dentists detoxification: “maintain political attack”

ecotourism entertainment fertilizers: “ominous order iraq”

fuels gifts gutters: “ending return enduring”

hauling housing hypnotherapy: “regime continuation virtually”

imports insurance jewelry: “doubtful violence insurgency”

lighting mattresses nutrition: “observes earlier assailants”

orthodontists pizza psychics: “magnify message ordinary”

psychologists reiki saunas: “suicide forces panic”

tarot upholstery xeriscaping: “iraqi eternally war.”





ACT FIVE THOUSAND FIVE HUNDRED EIGHTY FIVE


merrymaking greenhouse confederacy: “bombers taproot forms”

annually racetrack bongos: “presence compromise attempts”

once servants pasta: “iraq disingenuous government”

veer brazil wreak: “insurgency order administration”

phlox upon lemur: “war complete timetable”

excursion budge amethyst: “fully interests states”

relentlessly timid squat: “earlier military administration”

silkworm motor dais: “preferably formulate sponsored”

daddy stingray refill: “analyst compact spoilers”

spore peking conch: “continuing waves defense”

abate gear telephone: “prolonged favor terrorist”

recital ink prance: “iraq killings iraq.”





ACT FIVE THOUSAND FIVE HUNDRED EIGHTY SIX


putt puzzle pyramid: “over paikistan north”

ring ritual river: “washington meaningful principled”

patriot pattern paw: “fact jihad remains”

plea plentiful plot: “proliferate address liberals”

emerald emergency emotion: “countless wiped language”

fat fatigue faucet: “frontier changed playing”

enjoy enlighten enrage: “without unbridled machine”

blackboard bladder blade: “duplicity media sacrifices”

bulb bullet bullfrog: “choreograph lauded decide”

shack shade shadow: “bent consider opposition”

semicircle semicolon sentiment: “ruins repeatedly language”

zinc zipper zither: “ceaselessly afterthought anywhere.”




ACT FIVE THOUSAND FIVE HUNDRED EIGHTY SEVEN


impostor book dust: “category society turn”

dusk book earmuffs: “narrative responsible creating”

fluffy book congregate: “afghanistan long posed”

gateway book drawback: “otherwise elite havens”

greenback book driftwood: “indoctrinated consensus neighborhoods”

liftoff book plunge: “cleansing necessary played”

lunge book spacewalk: “terror propaganda protagonists”

traces book upload: “parallels military generated”

motherlode book untangle: “reflects future mongering”

bedraggled book predicate: “decades training institutions”

credentials book fluent: “society commitment barbarian”

affluent book buffet: “rhetoric empire volumes.”

Collab Fest 19 - 05.06.09

collab fest 19 was a public viewing of an episode of Art 21. the quotes in this post are from interviews available at the Art 21 site.

hoola hoop decoration and aerial silk ballet by beth deel and friends.

photographs by ralph eaton.

Nancy Spero: Maybe the strongest work I’ve done is because it was done with indignation. Considering myself as a feminist, I don’t want my work to be a reaction to what male art might be or what art with a capital A would be. I just want it to be art. In a convoluted way, I am protesting—protesting the usual way art is looked at, being shoved into a period or category. But I don’t want to tell anyone they have to do this or that. I do what I do, and I’m not standing up for women’s art. I just do what I do, and if people want to take something from it I’m thrilled because in a way that gets my message to the world.

An-My Lê: The kind of work that I make is not the standard political work. It’s not agitprop. You would think, because I’ve seen so much devastation and lived through a war, that I should make something that’s outwardly antiwar. But I am not categorically against war. I was more interested in drawing people into my work to think about the issues that envelop war—representations of war, landscape and terrain in war.

Alfredo Jaar: People describe me sometimes as a conceptual artist, as a political artist, with work of a strong political connotation or social content. I always reject those labels. I’m an artist, and believe it or not I’m interested in beauty and I’m not afraid of it. It is an essential tool to attract my audience, and sometimes I use it to introduce horror because the audience has to be seduced. If we learned anything from the activist art of the 1960s it is that when you make that kind of work people don’t even get close to you. They don’t want to see another drop of blood on the floor. So beauty becomes a tool to bring the audience in.

Jenny Holzer: It has always been hard for me to write, as I think it is for anyone who wants to write well. I was pleased to leave it, and I have no idea whether I’ll write again. One reason why I stopped was because I tend to write about ghastly subjects. So it’s not just the difficulty of having something turn out right, but it’s also the difficulty of staying with the material long enough to complete it. It’s necessary to be emotionally engaged when writing about these topics. It’s exhausting.
I know that my researchers and I have had to stop various times reading the material for these redacted paintings. Sometimes it’s a relief to come to the pages that are wholly blacked out because then for at least a page or so you don’t have to read what was there.

Collab Fest 19 - 05.06.09

Jenny Holzer
TRUISMS (1979-1983)

# A LITTLE KNOWLEDGE CAN GO A LONG WAY
# A LOT OF PROFESSIONALS ARE CRACKPOTS
# A MAN CAN'T KNOW WHAT IT'S LIKE TO BE A MOTHER
# A NAME MEANS A LOT JUST BY ITSELF
# A POSITIVE ATTITUDE MAKES ALL THE DIFFERENCE IN THE WORLD
# A RELAXED MAN IS NOT NECESSARILY A BETTER MAN
# A SENSE OF TIMING IS THE MARK OF A GENIUS
# A SINCERE EFFORT IS ALL YOU CAN ASK
# A SINGLE EVENT CAN HAVE INFINITELY MANY INTERPRETATIONS
# A SOLID HOME BASE BUILDS A SENSE OF SELF
# A STRONG SENSE OF DUTY IMPRISONS YOU
# ABSOLUTE SUBMISSION CAN BE A FORM OF FREEDOM
# ABSTRACTION IS A TYPE OF DECADENCE
# ABUSE OF POWER COMES AS NO SURPRISE
# ACTION CAUSES MORE TROUBLE THAN THOUGHT
# ALIENATION PROCUES ECCENTRICS OR REVOLUTIONARIES
# ALL THINGS ARE DELICATELY INTERCONNECTED
# AMBITION IS JUST AS DANGEROUS AS COMPLACENCY
# AMBIVALENCE CAN RUIN YOUR LIFE
# AN ELITE IS INEVITABLE
# ANGER OR HATE CAN BE A USEFUL MOTIVATIVING FORCE
# ANIMALISM IS PERFECTLY HEALTHY
# ANY SURPLUS IS IMMORAL
# ANYTHING IS A LEGITIMATE AREA OF IN VESTIGATION
# ARTIFICIAL DESIRES ARE DESPOILING THE EARTH
# AT TIMES INACTIVITY IS PREFERABLE TO MINDLESS FUNCTIONING
# AT TIMES YOUR UNCONSCIOUS IS TRUER THAN YOUR CONSCIOUS MIND
# AUTOMATION IS DEADLY
# AWFUL PUNISHMENT AWAITS REALLY BAD PEOPLE
# BAD INTENTIONS CAN YIELD GOOD RESULTS
# BEING ALONE WITH YOURSELF IS INCREASINGLY UNPOPULAR
# BEING HAPPY IS MORE IMPORTANT THAN ANYTHING ELSE
# BEING HONEST IS NOT ALWAYS THE KINDEST WAY
# BEING JUDGEMENTAL IS A SIGN OF LIFE
# BEING SURE OF YOURSELF MEANS YOU'RE A FOOL
# BELIEVING IN REBIRTH IS THE SAME AS ADMITTING DEFEAT
# BOREDOM MAKES YOU DO CRAZY THINGS
# CALM IS MORE CONDUCIVE TO CREATIVITY THAN IS ANXIETY
# CATERGORIZING FEAR IS CALMING
# CHANGE IS VALUABLE WHEN YHE OPRESSED BECOME THE TYRANTS
# CHASING THE NEW IS DANGEROUS TO SOCIETY
# CHILDREN ARE THE CRUELEST OF ALL
# CHILDREN ARE THE HOPE OF THE FUTURE
# CLASS ACTION IS A NICE IDEA WITH NO SUBSTANCE
# CLASS STRUCTIURE IS AS ARTIFICIAL AS PLASTIC
# CONFUSING YOURSELF IS A WAY TO STAY HONEST
# CRIME AGAINST PROPERTY IS RELATIVELY UNIMPORTANT
# DECADENCE CAN BE AN END IN ITSELF
# DECENY IS A RELATIVE THING
# DEPENDENCE CAN BE A MEAL TICKET
# DESCRIPTION IS MORE VALUABLE THAN METAPHOR
# DEVIANTS ARE SACRIFICED TO INCREASE GROUP SOLIDARITY
# DISGUST IS THE APPROPRIATE RESPONSE TO MOSE SITUATIONS
# DISORGANIZATION IS A KIND OF ANESTHESIA
# DON'T PLACE TOO MUCH TRUST IN EXPERTS
# DON'T RUIN PEOPLE'S LIVES FOR THEM
# DRAMA OFTEN OBSCURES THE REAL ISSUES
# DREAMING WHILE AWAKE IS A FRIGHTENING CONTRADICTION
# DYING AND COMING BACK GIVES YOU CONSIDERABLE PERSPECTIVE
# DYING SHOULD BE EASY AS FALLING OFF A LOG
# EATING TOO MUCH IS CRIMINAL
# ELABORATION IS A FORM OF POLLUTION
# EMOTIONAL RESPONSES ARE AS VAULABLE AS INTELLECTUAL RESPONSES
# ENJOY YOURSELF BECAUSE YOU CAN'T CHANGE ANYTHING ANYWAY
# ENSURE THAT YOUR LIFE STAYS IS FLUX
# EVEN YOUR FAMILY CAN BETRAY YOU
# EVERY ACHIEVMENT REQUIRES A SACRIFICE
# EVERYONE'S WORK IS EQUALLY IMPORTANT
# EVERYTHING THAT'S INTERESTING IS NEW
# EXCEPTIONAL PEOPLE DESERVE SPECIAL CONSESSIONS
# EXPIRING FOR LOVE IS BEAUTIFUL BUT STUPID
# EXPRESSING ANGER IS NECESSARY
# EXTREME BEHAVIOR HAS ITS BASIS IN PATHOLOGICAL PSYCHOLOGY
# EXTREME SELF-CONSCIOUSNESS LEADS TO PERVERSION
# FAITHFULNESS IS A SOCIAL NOT A BIOLOGICAL LAW
# FAKE OR REAL INDIFFERENCE IS A POWERFUL PERSONAL WEAPON
# FATHERS OFTEN USE TOO MUCH FORCE
# FEAR IS TEH GREATEST INCAPACITATOR
# FREEDOM IS A LUXURY NOT A NECESSITY
# GIVING FREE REIN TO YOUR EMOTIONS IS AN HONEST WAY TO LIVE
# GO ALL OUT IN ROMANCE AND LET THE CHIPS FALL WHERE THEY MAY
# GOING WITH THE FLOW IS SOOTHING BUT RISKY
# GOOD DEEDS EVENTUALLY ARE REWARDED
# GOVERNMENT IS A BURDEN ON THE PEOPLE
# GRASS ROOTS AGITATION IS THE ONLY HOPE
# GUILT AND SELF-LACERATION ARE INDULGENCES
# HABITUAL CONTEMPT DOESN'T REFLECT A FINER SENSIBILITY
# HIDING YOUR MOTIVES IS DESPICABLE
# HOLDING BACK PROTECTS YOUR VITAL ENERGIES
# HUMANISM IS OBSELETE
# HUMOR IS A RELEASE
# IDEALS ARE REPLACED BY CONVENTIONAL GOALS AT A CERTAIN AGE
# IF YOU AREN'T POLITICAL YOUR PERSONAL LIFE SHOULD BE EXEMPLARY
# IF YOU CAN'T LEAVE YOUR MARK GIVE UP
# IF YOU HAVE MANY DESIRES LIFE WILL BE INTERESTING
# IF YOU LIVE SIMPLY THERE IS NOTHING TO WORRY ABOUT
# IGNORING ENEMIES IS THE BEST WAY TO FIGHT
# ILLNESS IS A STATE OF MIND
# IMPOSING ORDER IS MAN'S VOCATION FOR CHAOS IS HELL
# IN SOME INSTANCES IT'S BETTER TO DIE THAN TO CONTINUE
# INHERITANCE MUST BE ABOLISHED
# IT CAN BE HELPFUL TO KEEP GOING NO MATTER WHAT
# IT IS HEROICE TO TRY TO STOP TIME
# IT IS MAN'S FATE TO OUTSMART HIMSELF
# IT'S A GIFT TO THE WORLD NO TO HAVE BABIES
# IT'S BETTER TO BE A GOOD PERSON THAN A FAMOUS PERSON
# IT'S BETTER TO BE LONELY THAN TO BE WITH INFERIOR PEOPLE
# IT'S BETTER TO BE NAIVE THAN JADED
# IT'S BETTER TO STUDY THE LIVING TFACT THAN TO ANALYZE HISTORY
# IT'S CRUCIAL TO HAVE AN ACTIVE FANTASY LIFE
# IT'S GOOD TO GIVE EXTRA MONEY TO CHARITY
# IT'S IMPORTANT TO STAY CLEAN ON ALL LEVELS
# IT'S IMPOSSIBLE TO RECONCILE YOUR HEART AND HEAD
# IT'S JUST AN ACCIDENT YOUR PARENTS ARE YOUR PARENTS
# IT'S NOT GOOD TO HOLD TOO MANY ABSOLUTES
# IT'S NOT GOOD TO OPERATE ON CREDIT
# IT'S VITAL TO LIVE IN HARMONY WITH NATURE
# JUST BELIEVING SOMETHING CAN MAKE IT HAPPEN
# KEEP SOMETHING IN RESERVE FOR EMERGENCIES
# KILLING IS UNAVOIDABLE BUT IS NOTHING TO BE PROUD OF
# KNOWING YOURSELF LETS YOU UNDERSTAND OTHERS
# KNOWLEDGE SHOULD BE ADVANCED AT ALL COSTS
# LABOR IS A LIFE DESTROYING ACTIVITY
# LACK OF CHARISMA CAN BE FATAL
# LEARN THING FROM THE GROUND UP
# LEARN TO TRUST YOUR OWN EYES
# LEISURE TIME IS A GIGANTIC SMOKESCREEN
# LETTING GO IS THE HARDEST THING TO DO
# LISTEN WHEN YOUR BODY TALKS
# LOOKING BACK IS THE FIRST SIGN OF AGING AND DECAY
# LOVING ANIMALS IS A SUBSITUTE ACTIVITY
# LOW EXPECTATIONS ARE GOOD PROTECTION
# MANUAL LABOR CAN BE REFRESHING AND WHOLESOME
# MEN ARE NOT MONOGAMOUS BY NATURE
# MODERATION KILLS THE SPIRIT
# MONEY CREATES TASTE
# MONOMANIA IS A PREREQUISITE OF SUCCESS
# MORALS ARE FOR LITTLE PEOPLE
# MOST PEOPLE ARE NOT FIT TO RULE THEMSELVES
# MOSTLY YOU SHOULD MIND YOUR OWN BUISNESS
# MOTHERS SHOULDN'T MAKE TOO MANY SACRIFICES
# MUCH WAS DECIDED BEFORE YOU WHERE BORN
# MURDER HAS ITS SEXUAL SIDE
# MYTHS MAKE REALITY MORE INTELLIGIBLE
# NOISE CAN BE HOSTILE
# NOTHING UPSETS THE BALANCE OF GOOD AND EVIL
# OCCASIONALLY PRINCIPLES ARE MORE VALUABLE THAN PEOPLE
# OFFER VERY LITTLE INFORMATION ABOUT YOURSELF
# OFTEN YOU SHOULD ACT LIKE UOU ARE SEXLESS
# OLD FRIENDS ARE BETTER LEFT IN THE PAST
# OPACITY IS AN IRRESISTIBLE CHALLENGE
# PAIN CAN BE A VERY POSITIVE THING
# PEOPLE ARE BORING UNLESS THEY ARE EXTREMISTS
# PEOPLE ARE NUTS IF THEY THINK THEY ARE IMPORTANT
# PEOPLE ARE RESPONSIBLE FOR WHAT THEY DO UNLESS THEY'RE INSANE
# PEOPLE WHO DON'T WORK WITH THEIR HANDS ARE PARASITES
# PEOPLE GO CRAZY ARE TOO SENSITIVE
# PEOPLE WON'T BEHAVE IF THEY HAVE NOTHING TO LOSE
# PHYSICAL CULTURE IS SECOND-BEST
# PLANNING FOR THE FUTURE IS ESCAPISM
# PLAYING IT SAFE CAN CAUSE A LOT OF DAMAGE IN THE LONG RUN
# POLITICS IS USED FOR PERSONAL GAIN
# POTENTIAL COUNTS FOR NOTHING UNTIL IT'S REALIZED
# PRESENTATION IS AS IMPORTANT AS CONTENT
# PURSUING PLEASURE FOR THE SAKE OF PLEASURE WILL RUIN YOU
# PUSH YOURSELF TO THE LIMIT AS OFTEN AS POSSIBLE
# RAISE BOYS AND GIRLS THE SAME WAY
# RANDOM MATING IS GOOD FOR DEBUNKING SEX MYTHS
# RECHANNELING DESTRUCTIVE IMPULSES IS A SIGN OF MATURITY
# RECLUSES ALWAYS GET WEAK
# REDISTRIBUTING WEALTH IS IMPERATIVE
# REALITIVITY IS NO BOON TO MANKIND
# RELIGION CAUSES AS MANY PROBLEMS AS IT SOLVES
# REMEMBER YOU ALWAYS HAVE FREEDOM OF CHOICE
# REPETITION IS THE BEST WAY TO LEARN
# RESOLUTIONS SERVE TO EASE YOUR CONSCIENCE
# REVOLUTION BEGINS WITH THE CHANGES IN THE INDIVIDUAL
# ROMANTIC LOVE WAS INVENTED TO MANIPULATE WOMEN
# ROUTINE IS A LINK WITH THE PAST
# ROUTINE SMALL EXCESSES ARE WORSE THAN THE OCCASIONAL DEBAUCH
# SACRIFICING YOURSELF FOR A BAD CAUSE IS NOT A MORAL ACT
# SALVATION CAN'T BE BOUGHT AND SOLD
# SELF-AWARENESS CAN BE CRIPPLING
# SELF-CONTEMPT CAN DO MORE HARM THAN GOOD
# SELFISHNESS IS THE MOST BASIC MOTIVATION
# SELFLESSNESS IS THE HIGHEST ACHIEVMENT
# SEPRATISM IS THE WAY TO A NEW BEGINNING
# SEX DIFFERENCES ARE HERE TO STAY
# SIN IS A MEANS OF SOCIAL CONTROL
# SLIPPING INTO MADNESS IS GOOD FOR THE SAKE OF COMPARISON
# SLOPPY THINKING GETS WORSE OVER TIME
# SOLITUDE IS ENRICHING
# SOME STONES ARE BETTER LEFT UNTURNED
# SOME WOUNDS NEVER HEAL
# SOMETIMES ALL YOU CAN DO IS LOOK THE OTHER WAY
# SOMETIMES SCIENCE ADVANCES FASTER THAN IT SHOULD
# SOMETIMES THINGS SEEMS TO HAPPEN OF THEIR OWN ACCORD
# SPENDING TOO MUCH TIME ON SELF-IMPROVEMENT IS ANTI-SOCIAL
# STARVATION IS NATURE'S WAY
# STATIS IS A DREAM STATE
# STERLIZATION IS THE WEAPON OF THE RULERS
# STRONG EMOTIONAL ATTACHMENT STEMS FROM BASIC INSECURITY
# STUPID PEOPLE SHOULDN'T BREED
# SURVIVAL OF THE FITTEST APPLIES TO MEN AND ANIMALS
# SYMBOLS ARE MORE MEANINGFUL THAN THINGS THEMSELVES
# TAKING A STRONG STAND PUBLICIZES THE OPPOSITE POSITION
# TALKING IS USED TO HIDE ONE'S INABILITY TO ACT
# TEASING PEOPLE SEXUALLY CAN HAVE UGLY CONSEQUENCES
# TECHNOLOGY WILL MAKE OR BREAK US
# THE CRUELEST DISAPPOINTMENT IS WHEN YOU LET YOURSELF DOWN
# THE DESIRE TO REPRODUCE IS A DEATH WISH
# THE FAMILY IS LIVING ON BORROWED TIME
# THE IDEA OF REVOLUTION IS AN ADOLESCENT FANTASY
# THE IDEA OF TRANSCENDENCE IS USED TO OBSCURE OPPRESSION
# THE IDIOSYNCRATIC HAS LOST ITS AUTHORITY
# THE LAND BELONGS TO NO ONE
# THE MORE YOU KNOW THE BETTER YOU ARE
# THE MOST PROFOUND THINGS ARE INEXPRESSIBLE
# THE MUNDANE IS TO BE CHERISHED
# THE NEW IS NOTHING BUT A RESTATEMENT OF THE OLD
# THE ONLY WAY TO BE PURE IS TO STAY YOURSELF
# THE SUM OF ALL YOUR ACTIONS DETERMINES WHAT YOU ARE
# THE UNATTAINABLE INVARIABLE IS ATTRACTIVE
# THE WORLD OPERATES ACCORDING TO DISCOVERABLE LAWS
# THERE ARE TOO FEW IMMUTABLE TRUTHS TODAY
# THERE'S A FINE LINE BETWEEN INFORMATION AND PROPAGANDA
# THERE'S NO SENSE BEING ANYWHERE BUT THE TOP OF THE HEAP
# THERE'S NOTHING EXCEPT WHAT YOU SENSE
# THERE'S NOTHING REDEEMING IN TOIL
# THINKING TOO MUCH CAN ONLY CAUSE PROBLEMS
# THREATENING SOMEONE SEXUALLY IS A HORRIBLE ACT
# TIMIDITY IS LAUGHABLE
# TO DISAGREE PRESUPPOSES MORAL INTREGRITY
# TO VOLUNTEER IS REACTIONARY
# TORTURE IS BARBARIC
# TRADING A LIFE FOR A LIFE IS FAIR ENOUGH
# TRUE FREEDOM IS FRIGHTFUL
# UNIQUE THINGS MUST BE THE MOST VALUABLE
# UNQUESTIONING LOVE DEMONSTRATES THE LARGESSE OF SPIRIT
# USING FORCE TO STOP FORCE IS ABSURD
# VIOLENCE IS PERMISSIBLE EVEN DESIRABLE OCCASIONALLY
# WAR IS THE PURIFICATION RITE
# WE MUST MAKE SACRIFICES TO MAINTAIN OUR QUALITY OF LIFE
# WHEN SOMETHING TERRIBLE HAPPENS PEOPLE WAKE UP
# WISHING THINGS AWAY IS NOT EFFECTIVE
# WITH PERSEVERANCE YOU CAN DISCOVER ANY TRUTH
# WORDS TEND TO BE INADEQUATE
# WORRYING CAN HELP YOU PREPARE
# YOU ARE A VICTIM OF THE RULES YOU LIVE BY
# YOU ARE GUIELESS IN YOUR DREAMS
# YOU ARE RESPONSIBLE FOR CONSTITUTING THE MEANING OF THINGS
# YOU ARE THE PAST PRESENT AND FUTURE
# YOU CAN LIVE THROUGH YOUR DESCENDANTS
# YOU CAN NEVER OUTRUN YOURSELF
# YOU CAN PULL YOURSELF OUT OF ANY HOLE
# YOU CAN'T EXPECT PEOPLE TO BE SOMETHING THEY'RE NOT
# YOU CAN'T FOOL OTHERS IF YOU'RE FOOLING YOURSELF
# YOU DIG YOUR OWN GRAVE
# YOU DON'T KNOW WHAT'S WHAT UNTIL YOU SUPPORT YOURSELF
# YOU GET THE FACE YOU DESERVE
# YOU HAVE TO HURT OTHERS TO BE EXTRODINARY
# YOU MUST BE INTIMATE WITH A TOKEN FEW
# YOU MUST DISAGREE WITH AUTHORITY FIGURES
# YOU MUST HAVE ONE GRAND PASSION
# YOU MUST KNOW WHERE YOU STOP AND THE WORLD BEGINS
# YOU NEVER KNOW WHAT PEOPLE REALLY THINK ABOUT YOU
# YOU ONLY CAN UNDERSTAND SOMEONE OF YOUR OWN SEX
# YOU OWN THE WORLD NOT THE OTHER WAY AROUND
# YOU SHOULD TRAVEL LIGHT
# YOU SHOULD STUDY AS MUCH AS POSSIBLE
# YOUR ACTIONS ARE POINTLESS IF NO ONE NOTICES
# YOUR OLDEST FEARS ARE THE WORST ONES

Collab Fest 19 - 05.06.09

William Blake (1757-1827):
Proverbs of Hell

1. In seed time learn, in harvest teach, in winter enjoy.
2. Drive your cart and your plow over the bones of the dead.
3. The road of excess leads to the palace of wisdom.
4. Prudence is a rich, ugly old maid courted by Incapacity.
5. He who desires but acts not, breeds pestilence.
6. The cut worm forgives the plow.
7. Dip him in the river who loves water.
8. A fool sees not the same tree that a wise man sees.
9. He whose face gives no light, shall never become a star.
10. Eternity is in love with the productions of time.
11. The busy bee has no time for sorrow.
12. The hours of folly are measur'd by the clock; but of wisdom, no clock can measure.
13. All wholesome food is caught without a net or a trap.
14. Bring out number, weight and measure in a year of dearth.
15. No bird soars too high, if he soars with his own wings.
16. A dead body revenges not injuries.
17. The most sublime act is to set another before you.
18. If the fool would persist in his folly he would become wise.
19. Folly is the cloak of knavery.
20. Shame is Pride's cloke.
21. Prisons are built with stones of law, brothels with bricks of religion.
22. The pride of the peacock is the glory of God.
23. The lust of the goat is the bounty of God.
24. The wrath of the lion is the wisdom of God.
25. The nakedness of woman is the work of God.
26. Excess of sorrow laughs. Excess of joy weeps.
27. The roaring of lions, the howling of wolves, the raging of the stormy sea, and the destructive sword, are portions of eternity, too great for the eye of man.
28. The fox condemns the trap, not himself.
29. Joys impregnate. Sorrows bring forth.
30. Let man wear the fell of the lion, woman the fleece of the sheep.
31. The bird a nest, the spider a web, man friendship.
32. The selfish, smiling fool, and the sullen, frowning fool shall be both thought wise, that they may be a rod.
33. What is now proved was once only imagin'd.
34. The rat, the mouse, the fox, the rabbit watch the roots; the lion, the tyger, the horse, the elephant watch the fruits.
35. The cistern contains: the fountain overflows.
36. One thought fills immensity.
37. Always be ready to speak your mind, and a base man will avoid you.
38. Every thing possible to be believ'd is an image of truth.
39. The eagle never lost so much time as when he submitted to learn of the crow.
40. The fox provides for himself, but God provides for the lion.
41. Think in the morning. Act in the noon. Eat in the evening. Sleep in the night.
42. He who has suffer'd you to impose on him, knows you.
43. As the plow follows words, so God rewards prayers.
44. The tygers of wrath are wiser than the horses of instruction.
45. Expect poison from the standing water.
46. You never know what is enough unless you know what is more than enough.
47. Listen to the fool's reproach! it is a kingly title!
48. The eyes of fire, the nostrils of air, the mouth of water, the beard of earth.
49. The weak in courage is strong in cunning.
50. The apple tree never asks the beech how he shall grow; nor the lion, the horse, how he shall take his prey.
51. The thankful receiver bears a plentiful harvest.
52. If others had not been foolish, we should be so.
53. The soul of sweet delight can never be defil'd.
54. When thou seest an eagle, thou seest a portion of genius; lift up thy head!
55. As the caterpiller chooses the fairest leaves to lay her eggs on, so the priest lays his curse on the fairest joys.
56. To create a little flower is the labour of ages.
57. Damn braces. Bless relaxes.
58. The best wine is the oldest, the best water the newest.
59. Prayers plow not! Praises reap not!
60. Joys laugh not! Sorrows weep not!
61. The head Sublime, the heart Pathos, the genitals Beauty, the hands and feet Proportion.
62. As the air to a bird or the sea to a fish, so is contempt to the contemptible.
63. The crow wish'd every thing was black, the owl that every thing was white.
64. Exuberance is Beauty.
65. If the lion was advised by the fox, he would be cunning.
66. Improvement makes strait roads; but the crooked roads without improvement are roads of genius.
67. Sooner murder an infant in its cradle than nurse unacted desires.
68. Where man is not, nature is barren.
69. Truth can never be told so as to be understood, and not be believ'd.
70. Enough! or too much.

Collab Fest 19 - 05.06.09

Friedrich Nietzsche
from Beyond Good and Evil

Part 4: Epigrams and Interludes

63

Whoever is a teacher through and through takes all things seriously only in relation to his students—even himself.

64

“Knowledge for its own sake”—that is the last snare of morality: with that one becomes completely entangled in it once more.

65

The charm of knowledge would be small if so much shame did not have to be overcome on the road to it.

65a

One is most dishonest towards one’s God: he is not permitted to sin!

66

The inclination to disparage himself, to let himself be robbed, lied to and exploited, could be the self-effacement of a god among men.

67

Love for one person is a piece of barbarism: for it is practiced at the expense of all others. Love of God likewise.

68

“I have done that,” says my memory. “I cannot have done that,” says my pride, and remains inexorable. Eventually—memory yields.

69

One has been a bad spectator of life if one has not also seen the hand that in a considerate fashion—kills.

70

If one has character one also has one’s typical experience which recurs again and again.

71

The sage as astronomer.— As long as you still feel the stars as being something “over you” you still lack the eye of the man of knowledge.

72

It is not the strength but the duration of exalted sensations which makes exalted men.

73

He who attains his ideal by that very fact transcends it.

73a

Many a peacock hides his peacock tail from all eyes—and calls it his pride.

74

A man with genius is unendurable if he does not also possess at least two other things: gratitude and cleanliness.

75

The degree and kind of a man’s sexuality reaches up into the topmost summit of his spirit.

76

Under conditions of peace the warlike man attacks himself.

77

With one’s principles one seeks to tyrannize over one’s habits or to justify or honor or scold or conceal them—two people with the same principles probably seek something fundamentally different with them.

78

Whoever despises [verachtet] himself still respects [achtet] himself as one who despises.

79

A soul which knows it is loved but does not itself love betrays its dregs—its lowest part comes up.

80

A thing explained is a thing we have no further concern with.— What did that god mean who counseled: “know thyself!”? Does that perhaps mean: “Have no further concern with thyself! become objective!”— And Socrates?— And the “man of science”? —

81

It is terrible to die of thirst in the ocean. Do you have to salt your truth so heavily that it does not even—quench thirst any more?

82

“Pity for all”—would be harshness and tyranny for you, my neighbor! —

83

Instinct.— When the house burns down one forgets even one’s dinner.— Yes: but one retrieves it from the ashes.

84

Woman learns how to hate to the extent that she unlearns how—to charm.

85

The same emotions in man and woman are, however, different in tempo: therefore man and woman never cease to misunderstand one another.

86

Behind all their personal vanity women themselves always have their impersonal contempt—for “woman.”

87

Bound heart, free spirit.— If one binds one’s heart firmly and imprisons it one can allow one’s spirit many liberties: I have said that before. But no one believes it if he does not already know it .....

88

One begins to mistrust very clever people when they become embarrassed.

89

Terrible experiences make one wonder whether he who experiences them is not something terrible.

90

Heavy, melancholy people grow lighter through precisely that which makes others heavy, through hatred and love, and for a while they rise to their surface.

91

So cold, so icy one burns one’s fingers on him! Every hand that grasps him starts back!— And for just that reason many think he is growing hot.

92

Who has not for the sake of his reputation—sacrificed himself? —

93

There is no hatred for men in geniality, but for just that reason all too much , contempt for men.

94

A man’s maturity—consists in having found again the seriousness one had as a child, at play.

95

To be ashamed of one’s immorality: that is a step on the ladder at the end of which one is also ashamed of one’s morality.

96

One ought to depart from life as Odysseus departed from Nausicaa—blessing rather than in love with it.

97

What? A great man? I always see only the actor of his own ideal.

98

If one trains one’s conscience it will kiss us as it bites.

99

The disappointed man speaks.— “I listened for an echo and I heard only praise—.”

100

Before ourselves we all pose as being simpler than we are: thus do we take a rest from our fellow men.

101

Today a man of knowledge might easily feel as if he were God become animal [Thierwerdung: a play on Menschwerdung, the incarnation (of God as man in Jesus Christ)].

102

To discover he is loved in return ought really to disenchant the lover with the beloved. “What? She is so modest as to love even you? Or so stupid? Or—or—.”

103

The danger in happiness.— “Now everything is turning out well for me, now I love every destiny—who would like to be my destiny?”

104

It is not their love for men but the impotence of their love for men which hinders the Christians of today from—burning us.

105

The free spirit, the “pious man of knowledge”—finds pia fraus [pious fraud] even more offensive to his taste (to his kind of “piety”) than impia fraus [impious fraud]. Hence the profound lack of understanding of the church typical of the “free spirit”—his kind of unfreedom.

106

By means of music the passions enjoy themselves.

107

To close your ears to even the best counter-argument once the decision has been taken: sign of a strong character. Thus an occasional will to stupidity.

108

There are no moral phenomena at all, but only a moral interpretation of phenomena .....

109

The criminal is often enough not equal to his deed: he disparages and slanders it.

110

A criminal’s lawyers are seldom artists enough to turn the beautiful terribleness of the deed to the advantage of him who did it

111

Our vanity is hardest to wound precisely when our pride has just been wounded.

112

Those who feel predestined to see and not to believe will find all believers too noisy and obtrusive: they fend them off.

113

“You want to make him interested in you? Then pretend to be embarrassed in his presence—”

114

The tremendous expectation in regard to sexual love and the shame involved in this expectation distorts all a woman’s perspectives from the start.

115

Where neither love nor hate is in the game a woman is a mediocre player.

116

The great epochs of our life are the occasions when we gain the courage to rebaptize our evil qualities as our best qualities.

117

The will to overcome an emotion is ultimately only the will of another emotion or of several others.

118

There is an innocence in admiration: he has it to whom it has not yet occurred that he too could one day be admired.

119

Disgust with dirt can be so great that it prevents us from cleaning ourselves—from “justifying” ourselves.

120

Sensuality often makes love grow too quickly, so that the root remains weak and is easy to pull out.

121

It was a piece of subtle refinement that God learned Greek when he wanted to become a writer—and that he did not learn it better.

122

To enjoy praise is with some people only politeness of the heart—and precisely the opposite of vanity of the spirit.

123

Even concubinage has been corrupted:—by marriage.

124

He who rejoices even at the stake triumphs not over pain but at the fact that he feels no pain where he had expected to feel it. A parable.

125

When we have to change our opinion about someone we hold the inconvenience he has therewith caused us greatly to his discredit.

126

A people is a detour of nature to get to six or seven great men.— Yes: and then to get round them.

127

Science offends the modesty of all genuine women. They feel as if one were trying to look under their skin—or worse! under their clothes and finery.

128

The more abstract the truth is that you would teach, the more you have to seduce the senses to it. [See: Letter to Lou Salomé, Tautenberg, August 8 to 24, 1882.]

129

The devil has the widest perspectives for God, and that is why he keeps so far away from him—the devil being the oldest friend of knowledge.

130

What a person is begins to betray itself when his talent declines—when he ceases to show what he can do. Talent is also finery; finery is also a hiding place.

131

The sexes deceive themselves about one another: the reason being that fundamentally they love and honor only themselves (or their own ideal, to express it more pleasantly—). Thus man wants woman to be peaceful—but woman is essentially unpeaceful, like the cat, however well she may have trained herself to present an appearance of peace.

132

One is punished most for one’s virtues.

133

Whoever does not know how to find the way to his ideal lives more frivolously and impudently than the man without an ideal.

134

All credibility, all good conscience, all evidence of truth come only from the senses.

135

Pharisaism is not degeneration in a good man: a good part of it is rather the condition of all being good.

136

One seeks a midwife for his thoughts, another someone to whom he can be a midwife: thus originates a good conversation.

137

When one has dealings with scholars and artists it is easy to miscalculate in opposite directions: behind a remarkable scholar one not infrequently finds a mediocre man, and behind a mediocre artist often—a very remarkable man.

138

What we do in dreams we also do when we are awake: we invent and fabricate the person with whom we associate—and immediately forget we have done so.

139

In revenge and in love woman is more barbarous than man.

140

Counsel as conundrum [Rath als Räthsel].— “If the bonds are not to burst—you must try to cut them first.”

141

The belly is the reason man does not so easily take himself for a god.

142

The chastest expression I have ever heard: “Dans le véritable amour c’est l’âme, qui enveloppe le corps.” [“In true love it is the soul that envelops the body.”]

143

Our vanity desires that what we do best should be considered what is hardest for us. Concerning the origin of many a morality.

144

When a woman has scholarly inclinations there is usually something wrong with her sexuality. Unfruitfulness itself disposes one to a certain masculinity of taste; for man is, if I may be allowed to say so, “the unfruitful animal.”

145

Comparing man and woman in general one may say: woman would not have the genius for finery if she did not have the instinct for the secondary role.

146

Whoever fights monsters should see to it that in the process he does not become a monster. And when you look into the abyss, the abyss also looks into you.

147

From old Florentine novels, moreover—from life: “buona femmina a mala femmina vuol bastone.” Sacchetti, Nov. 86. [“Good and bad women want a stick.” Franco Sacchetti (c.1335-c.1400): Italian poet and novelist.]

148

To seduce one’s neighbor to a good opinion and afterwards faithfully to believe in this good opinion of one’s neighbor: who can do this trick as well as women? —

149

What a time experiences as evil is usually an untimely echo of what was formerly experienced as good—the atavism of a more ancient ideal.

150

Around the hero everything becomes a tragedy, around the demi-god a satyr-play; and around God everything becomes what? Perhaps a “world”? —

151

Having a talent is not enough: one also requires your permission for it—right, my friends?

152

“Where the tree of knowledge stands is always Paradise”: thus speak the oldest and youngest serpents.

153

Whatever is done from love always occurs beyond good and evil.

154

Objection, evasion, happy distrust, pleasure in mockery are signs of health: everything unconditional belongs in pathology.

155

The sense of the tragic increases and diminishes with sensuality.

156

Madness is rare in individuals—but in groups, parties, nations, and ages it is the rule.

157

The thought of suicide is a powerful solace: by means of it one gets through many a bad night.

158

To our strongest drive, the tyrant in us, not only our reason but also our conscience submits.

159

One has to requite good and ill: but why to precisely the person who did us good or ill?

160

One no longer loves one’s knowledge enough when one has communicated it.

161

Poets behave impudently towards their experiences: they exploit them.

162

“Our neighbor [Nächster: neighbor in the religious sense] is not our neighbor [Nachbar: neighbor in the literal sense] but our neighbor’s neighbor”—thus thinks every people.

163

Love brings to light the exalted and concealed qualities of a lover—what is rare and exceptional in him: to that extent it can easily deceive as to what is normal in him.

164

Jesus said to his Jews: “The law was made for servants—love God as I love him, as his son! What have we sons of God to do with morality!” —

165

Concerning every party.— A shepherd always has need of a bellwether [Leithammel] too—or he must himself occasionally be a wether [Hammel: a castrated ram].

166

You may lie with your mouth [Munde], but with the mouth [Maule: mouth or grimace] you make as you do so you nonetheless tell the truth.

167

With hard men intimacy is a thing of shame—and something precious.

168

Christianity gave Eros poison to drink—he did not die of it, to be sure, but degenerated into vice.

169

To talk about oneself a great deal can also be a means of concealing oneself.

170

In praise there is more importunity than in blame.

171

Pity in a man of knowledge seems almost ludicrous, like sensitive hands on a Cyclops.

172

From love of man one sometimes embraces anyone (because one cannot embrace everyone): but one must never let this anyone know it .....

173

One does not hate so long as one continues to rate low, but only when one has come to rate equal or higher.

174

You utilitarians, even your love for everything utile [useful] is only a vehicle of your inclinations—don't you really find the noise of its wheels intolerable?

175

In the end one loves one’s desire and not what is desired.

176

The vanity of others offends our taste only when it offends our vanity.

177

Perhaps no one has ever been sufficiently truthful about what “truthfulness” is.

178

Clever people are not credited with their follies: what a deprivation of human rights!

179

The consequences of our actions take us by the scruff of the neck, altogether indifferent to the fact that we have “improved” in the meantime.

180

There is an innocence in lying which is the sign of good faith in a cause.

181

It is inhuman to bless where one is cursed.

182

The familiarity of the superior embitters, because it may not be returned. —

183

“Not that you lied to me but that I no longer believe you—that is what has distressed me.” —

184

There is a wild spirit of good-naturedness which looks like malice.

185

“I do not like it.”— Why?— “I am not up to it.”— Has anyone ever answered like that?

Collab Fest 19 - 05.06.09

Antonin Artaud

The race of prophets is extinct. Europe is becoming set in its ways, slowly embalming itself beneath the wrappings of its borders, its factories, its law-courts and its universities. The frozen Mind cracks between the mineral staves which close upon it. The fault lies with your moldy systems, your logic of 2 + 2 = 4. The fault lies with you, Chancellors, caught in the net of syllogisms. You manufacture engineers, magistrates, doctors, who know nothing of the true mysteries of the body or the cosmic laws of existence. False scholars blind outside this world, philosophers who pretend to reconstruct the mind. The least act of spontaneous creation is a more complex and revealing world than any metaphysics.

There are souls that are incurable and lost to the rest of society. Deprive them of one means of folly, they will invent ten thousand others. They will create subtler, wilder methods, methods that are absolutely DESPERATE. Nature herself is fundamentally antisocial, it is only by a usurpation of powers that the organized body of society opposes the natural inclination of humanity.

Beneath the poetry of the texts, there is the actual poetry,
without form and without text.

All true language is incomprehensible, like the chatter of a beggar's teeth.

Hell is of this world and there are men who are unhappy escapees from hell, escapees destined ETERNALLY to reenact their escape.


I myself spent nine years in an insane asylum and I never had the obsession of suicide, but I know that each conversation with a psychiatrist, every morning at the time of his visit, made me want to hang myself, realizing that I would not be able to cut his throat.


It is not opium which makes me work but its absence, and in order for me to feel its absence it must from time to time be present.


Never tire yourself more than necessary, even if you have to found a culture on the fatigue of your bones.


No one has ever written, painted, sculpted, modeled, built, or invented except literally to get out of hell.


So long as we have failed to eliminate any of the causes of human despair, we do not have the right to try to eliminate those means by which man tries to cleanse himself of despair.


There is in every madman a misunderstood genius whose idea, shining in his head, frightened people, and for whom delirium was the only solution to the strangulation that life had prepared for him.


Those who live, live off the dead.


We must wash literature off ourselves. We want to be men above all, to be human.


When we speak the word "life," it must be understood we are not referring to life as we know it from its surface of fact, but to that fragile, fluctuating center which forms never reach.


Written poetry is worth reading once, and then should be destroyed. Let the dead poets make way for others.

The theater, which is in no thing, but makes use of everything -- gestures, sounds, words, screams, light, darkness -- rediscovers itself at precisely the point where the mind requires a language to express its manifestations. To break through language in order to touch life is to create or recreate the theatre.

And what is an authentic madman? It is a man who preferred to become mad, in the socially accepted sense of the word, rather than forfeit a certain superior idea of human honor. So society has strangled in its asylums all those it wanted to get rid of or protect itself from, because they refused to become its accomplices in certain great nastinesses. For a madman is also a man whom society did not want to hear and whom it wanted to prevent from uttering certain intolerable truths.

It is thus that the few rare lucid well-disposed people who have had to struggle on the earth find themselves at certain hours of the day or night in the depth of certain authentic and waking nightmare states, surrounded by the formidable suction, the formidable oppression of a kind of civic magic which will soon be seen appearing openly in social behavior.

Ah! How neatly tied, in these people, is the umbilical cord of morality! Since they left their mothers they have never sinned, have they? They are apostles, they are the descendants of priests; one can only wonder from what source they draw their indignation, and above all how much they have pocketed to do this, and in any case what it has done for them.

However fiercely opposed one may be to the present order, an old respect for the idea of order itself often prevents people from distinguishing between order and those who stand for order, and leads them in practice to respect individuals under the pretext of respecting order itself.

It is almost impossible to be a doctor and an honest man, but it is obscenely impossible to be a psychiatrist without at the same time bearing the stamp of the most incontestable madness: that of being unable to resist that old atavistic reflex of the mass of humanity, which makes any man of science who is absorbed by this mass a kind of natural and inborn enemy of all genius.

With society and its public, there is no longer any other language than that of bombs, barricades, and all that follows.

But how is one to make a scientist understand that there is something unalterably deranged about differential calculus, quantum theory, or the obscene and so inanely liturgical ordeals of the precession of the equinoxes.

You are outside life, you are above life, you have miseries which the ordinary man does not know, you exceed the normal level, and it is for this that men refuse to forgive you, you poison their peace of mind, you undermine their stability. You have irrepressible pains whose essence is to be inadaptable to any known state, indescribable in words. You have repeated and shifting pains, incurable pains, pains beyond imagining, pains which are neither of the body nor of the soul, but which partake of both. And I share your suffering, and I ask you: who dares to ration our relief? We are not going to kill ourselves just yet. In the meantime, leave us the hell alone.

If I commit suicide, it will not be to destroy myself but to put myself back together again. Suicide will be for me only one means of violently reconquering myself, of brutally invading my being, of anticipating the unpredictable approaches of God. By suicide, I reintroduce my design in nature, I shall for the first time give things the shape of my will.

Theater of cruelty means a theater difficult and cruel for myself first of all. And, on the level of performance, it is not the cruelty we can exercise upon each other by hacking at each other's bodies, carving up our personal anatomies, or, like Assyrian emperors, sending parcels of human ears, noses, or neatly detached nostrils through the mail, but the much more terrible and necessary cruelty which things can exercise against us. We are not free. And the sky can still fall on our heads. And the theater has been created to teach us that first of all.

Tragedy on the stage is no longer enough for me, I shall bring it into my own life.

Collab Fest 19 - 05.06.09


Collab Fest 19 - 05.06.09


Collab Fest 19 - 05.06.09


Collab Fest 19 - 05.06.09


Collab Fest 19 - 05.06.09


Collab Fest 19 - 05.06.09


Collab Fest 19 - 05.06.09