Oulaf Pataphysique
{!} “The bitterness you taste, the sweetness I pour.”
He was a form of approximately three feet in diameter, on a dandy day. Pink and as patches of hair, he plopped at a coffee bar near Hugo de Grootekade. At the immediate, he waited for his wife. he: feeling quite intelligent and horny
Chairs made him uncomfortable. His organic curves and his salmon circumference draped poorly in the reserved and geometric design of his country. He was one year of age ±. ON THE WAY TO THE L TRAIN, SMALL MISS SPOKE: THE WORLD WILL END MAY 1ST 2011. WHAT A SAD THREE MONTHS. THE WORLD WOULD END IN SUMMER. IT WAS ONLY SUMMER FOR THE NORTH. Anyway, he was disappointed and unemployed. He and his wife had been estranged his wife for sometime ago. During their estrangement, he stayed with a pair of friends. “Sorry, as well as friends individually.” Their friendship began at the Yale School of Forestry, where Oulaf studied Topology, Observational Drawing, and Urban Farming. They were a comforting ear during his clashes with the faculty. Insults to Expulsion. Could he be a believer in nature! Fundamentally, he was without arms and still was not. If such a thing can be said. ñSandpaper raised across his surface. ñPTSD ñAvoid the conversation back at the squat. Her arrival wore a yellow scarf kinked around her elongated neck. She still embodied a bright violet tail and a torso of emerald scales. Each erogenous zone was demoed by a checkered bikini rending two trunks of legs. A blasé gaze was tossed upward. A successful campaign of Cover Girl explosions surrounded her compound eyes. Aroused Again? This was the source of such disagreement. She perched gracefully, her talons gently skirted the aluminum chair. A waiter flexed behind his mesh garb. His ivory biceps bowed away from the patio,“Miss, may I offer you a more comfortable seat? We have seating set aside for such scaled clients.” “Bless your heart, No Thank You.” He hesitated, politely “I Need No Assistance.” “As is your pleasure.”
His returned to busing the tables. “Omni! I hate when they serve me. I would have spoken my mind, if I were inconvenienced.” “Just normal.” “Gardener of excuses—really?” “Another needless criticism--nuh? Even with your Fullerism.i” “Don’t be an Ant.” “Fine. Documents please.” “Here are the papers you need to sign: the annulment, the subjectivity agreement, and the pre-nup-post-nup. Just got them notarized by my spiritual adviser.” “Timothy Reagan?” “He was called that before he found Omniii” “What an ass--” “Don’t wear your rags on your tongue” “?!” “Oh, really I didn’t mean anything–” “–Huh.” “Sorry, I wasn't suggesting–” “I’ll run the papers by my advocate.” “Shall I get a coffee? I could–” “Shan’t bother.”
{@} A touch of wind curled from the canal. Zeeburg was another series of short bridges. Walkman gently stretched her branches, communing gusts and stones. Her willows ran along her companion’s erect penis. 400aa held a handstand against the cobbled partition of the walkway. His greasy white A-shirt lay down past his armpits, overalls bundled at her roots. His eyes were transfixed on the color of her bark. Her soft willows swayed across his twitching phallus. Synchronized ebbs and flows. The object moaned ejaculating into the wind, on her wood, and into the canal. 400aa collapsed metallic frame tumbling with a gymnastic flare, from his occasion – O “Oulaf! Just in time! How great to see you,” still half-naked and bald-faced. “I must have heard your prayer,” sardonically gray and diagrammatic, a planet unmoved by the persistent breeze. “You shouldn’t be so glum.” Willow signaled through a buff of oxygen. “.” “Can’t you see the wind move among the leaves.” Her gesture. Replacing his overalls, and rinsing in the canal. 400aa shouted from the water’s edge, “What brings you here, sir?” “Babe, he’s here for our Tuesday walk.” Her roots grew ever so slowly. “Okay. But, I can't join you two until later, at the house.” Oulaf rotated in failure. “I have to get back to R.U.R,” His hands ran across Walkman’s knots, “We barely had time for a quickie.” “Okay, then.” Oulaf had settled to beige. “Fine, Oulaf and I for now. Shall we?”, another puff.
400aa took toward the 10 Tram, into peripheral vision. Exit 400aa. “I hope you weren’t offended by our poor scheduling,” Walkman’s roots perished in one direction and grew toward the squat… “Nope.” He was unemployed. They walked nearly all day, Walkman biding time, growing slowly. Weteringschan cycles do revolutions around Naussaukade.
{#} An ultra-polished pleather jacket displayed a banana breast nursing an infant hammock slung across her chest. An enormous set of wine ovals, her head had been shaved along the sides, parted at the top of which one layer met right above the shoulder. The other a complex braid. Her top lip was matte black as the bottom shone a glossy red dot. Tights ended in a pair of elf suede boots. She stood examining an invisible artwork. Tattooed eyebrows vexed in examination. Oulaf spoke first. HOW CAN I HELP YOU? “I would like to register a home business.” “Did you go online?” “I didn’t know I could do it online.” “I see, we can do that here, but it can be done online.” She vanished behind sunglasses. “Right.” “What type of business would you like to register, today?” “I’m not sure.” “What does your business do?” “I piss on men for money.” “I see. Have you contacted the Sex Workers Union around Westermaart?” She vanished behind sunglasses. “Regardless, I have a few forms you can fill out.”
{$} With the spirit he hovered upon the surface of the water and ran against the dark teal of La Seine. He touched across Saint-Michelle. Some notable cathedral. With the spirit, he moved upon the surface of the deep teal Seine. Rue Saint-Germain doves seen at the Louvre. With the spirit he moved upon the surface of the deep, which ran against a protest that succeeded in stopping traffic on the Rue St. Germain, No longer occupied or better yet, liberated from the movement of vehicles. Poof, Poof, Poof. Nearly free of the people whose cotton, suede and leather had pressed upon it: Slavish asphalt. Grand Tour clothing racks. They advertise the flesh of Sorbonne. Never mention the cosmopolitan parade of antiheroes vs antagonists. L'Carton Rouge outspread the circuits with a bit of oldies, norte musique and hip-hop. Its for Le Jenne and for grandparents. The red buttons shouted to Oulaf. “I'm not French.” He bought a baguette and rushed the red velvet steps, she would see him present. The rococo interior dwarfed the sherbet feline. It purred. It did so around Oulaf's buoyant body. He was unemployed. The 15th lacked a better feeling, but was homey. Detective Avecel-Mauss had been accompanying a group of clowns while wasting her time in Paris. Their unexpected form of busking included: gallivanting around the Latin Quarter; sneaking into kitchens to have orgies; distributing Hentai at the Palais de Tokyo, mutually masturbating in the bathrooms at Orsay. The clowns were entirely composed of Brown University PhD candidates. These semioticians had expatriated to avoid their student loans and the unit's public appearance proved terrifying– a mixture of Butoh physicality, Punch and Judy, and foul play. It engendered constant tension through the police state of France. Although she did not work for the police, Avecel-Mauss speculated that any documentation of the group's activity would soon develop into a salable commodity. Her apartment was submerged in binders. Each kept record of comical sex acts, deranged laughter and post-bukaki mop-ups. She wrote covert biographies and meticulously copied their reading lists. The samizdat they circulated underground had been scanned. Oulaf had known her before her mercenary work, when she studied sociology at Yale. In those moments, the department was under constant dissolution. She and Oulaf would often encounter at the Gryphon’s pub--BLOW and dance parties full of the most meaningless anxiety, a pure form of irony and despair that was just enough enjoyment. Excluding the memories and despite the catalog of binders, her apartment was orderly. She ignored her cat Cyrano, which after given some time, Oulaf found some affinity. "Why have it?” pleading. "He's a conversation piece." "That's all?" "That's all?" accompanied by an air jet. "You can't be convincing if you are lonely. Animals fend off rats and isolation...Its a requirement of my job to be convincing." OULAF > [. ] > OULA > OUL > OU > O >|[ ]| > |[O]| >Counter-clockwise, his lazy spin straddled the laggard personnel elevator.
{%} The protest continued; second round. The Jardin du Luxembourg was exposed to March's loitering cold. The dusty paths offered Oulaf a pause as he waited for O Imperador. A cellphone. A pass time, Oulaf decided to recite a poem he had committed to memory: C'est une question de justice socaile et d'egalité. Dans l'action pour l'education Des enquetes internationales et des rapports offciels montrent pour tant que le systeme educatif doit changer pour corriger les injustices.iii
Not bad at all. So obvious, mundane, common. Bit by bit, wrong with my brain. I can't feel structure. Another: In the future the insane will judge the insane paper is ga-so-line.
Rubbish. Simply poetry. Bit by bit. Unemployed. Another: The major query is how to be. The major query is how to be twice. The major query is how to be three. You, you and you live in a waste bin of values.
Oulaf remembered the flight from AMS to CDG. He fell into waiting again. There was no making up the weather and things were clear. Titles pulsed through the occipital brain; burning bridges. O Imperador hand a golden tongue. The Castellano was dressed as Santa Claus. He spoke French, Portuguese, English, German and Japanese. Santa was inflated and echoed. Oulaf was hoping to cash in family monies. O Imperador was the login. When they finally met on a bench, rock doves scattered. They often do! They eat shit, bread and cigarettes! Vermin! The discarded McDonald's was cleared from the bench. O Imperador's arrival! He placed his
height upon it and opened his caliginous cheeks full of education. “Fala, Oulaf, tudo bem?-Sim, tudo bem amigão.-Que Saudade!-E mesmo quanto tempo, ne?-Faiz quasi cinco anos-Vis-E sua famila, tudo joya com eles?-Mas o menos.- E sua esposa?Ainda formosa, intellegente, e radical?-Verdade.-Claro, e da e, Ainda somos piratas cultureis?-O que é mais radical que iso primo?-Nada.iv
Slowing down. Bom?... Eu... Não tem que falar mais. Eu entendo. Looking round Oulaf was silent. Você é um malandro. E a gente tem um jeto, e da um jeto. Sua irma ja introduceu sua situtacão numa messagem. Que Bom. Aqui. He folded his arms. Eyed Oulaf. Then he placed is arms behind his back. Choose a hand.
{^} CDG to AMSTERDAM. Crying on the
A Â
phone. Public and on her cellphone-For Heavens sake, he had no sympathy for her. The Accordion was happy and only gave contrast to the stupid bubbling of her tears. Could anyone really cry on the RER B. The impossibility of sincerity lacquered horror onto rose buds wiped repeatedly. Simple, small and isolated in her ever-closing eyes. Bovine rust from too many rides and so many empty seats. Her baggage, her right curl and ponytail warp around her wrist weakened from the rail. Slow down he said. He murmured manically and quietly into an invisible headset. His incorporation prayed not to the principalities of Air France but to a flight operated by KLM Royal Dutch Airlines. He had a vision of freely arranged sandwiches. He would count backwards from France 15th, 14th, 13th, 12th, 11th, 10th. 9th, 8th, 7th, 6th,5th, 4th, 3rd, 2nd, 1st. Bye-bye
Santa.
{&} He was constipated and aroused. His integral body had turned from pink to glossy purple. The longing to shit over the camouflage fatigues that stitched Paris to Amsterdam made his gaze fat. But, the radiating irrigation was quickly replaced by a scatter of a glowing niches nested with the cushion affronting each passenger atomized. Placed the following into a bubble: A beautiful blue ball. Two blue balls. A cross above and a bar below. = Kiss Like a Man. Or Kids Like Meth. Or Killers Love Mangos. Or Kites Last Momentarily. I got it! But, Dutch Airlines hands out no sandwiches. Instead, savory: sweet! Two bags state most objectively, Delicious treats selected for you. Two flavors to choose, delicious yellow and magenta. Sugar cookie: tea biscuit.
{*} Oulaf and a Nordic flight attendant set about penetrating the lardy but permeable membrane of his frontal hemisphere. Her fist proceeded willfully into his dampest inner core. Fishing inside, Rosa signed "ORGASM"v Take your hand and pinch a portion of your right cheek. Keep your mouth closed. Now pull repeatedly on your cheek with increasing speed. Stop and reflect upon this sound.
After removing and removing and removing her manus, she proceeded to mold the massive globe of Oulaf's body into a slender spring roll and slowly piped it into her left nostril. Twenty five minutes before she was to fasten her belt, a roughshod climax harnessed her into urinating a congealed foam, then a froth, then spume, then suds, then a fermentation, then fizzle, which lead to an amusing titter.
{(} Reflections off the milk cotton fields surrounded the airplane’s shadow with a lemon aura, the sun kiss. The shadow surpassed its aura, then grayness, now the earth. Again patches line up to their stylish dikes and the sea. Fungi and farming sheets coat the beach below. Wooded pools, wooden bridges, telephone rays. Dark serpents flattened by traffic, biting their tails. Sense recycling air. Zips. Photos jostled. Now! A winged auto. Packed gibberish. Two daisy lines, racing parallel dotted squares and arrows. Chatter. Oulaf dropped eaves on a gentlemen scribbling in a little gray book. He was arrogant with glasses rounder than required and adorned himself in enough color to be drab. He had eyebrows that didn't move. Instead, they pointed and twitched along the pages of his manuscript. He tossed his head along Oulaf's transparent shallow surface. Oulaf spoke first: "Why are you so unhappy." "Excuse me?" "You seem to be writing violently" "My violence has not to do with sadness. Happiness comes only from our plausibility. That is, if you insist on it.”
B
{)} An Appel painting placed on the COBRA Museum's whitest wall. Exactly where it had been planned. Lifting between the canvas's superficial coats, a three foot orb condensed or appeared. He was unemployed. He came to visit the Assistant Curator of Contemporary Art. She was organizing a show which would take the entire second floor of the museum. Starring the 3rd Capitalist Internationalvi or at least their most emergent artists: Alan Chipkard-‐Ricard G.V. B Line S. Parnassaweg Jeff Koons Ramo Nash "Well, Oulaf what do you think?" The monumental halls were papered with A4 prints of pink sheets, yellow and tangerine cardstock. Each one was a failed company, a foreclosed home and a dismissal paper. Along one wall was a 14 by 14 meter canvas. “Orange Tree” Opposing it was a massive Koons panting. “A Goose Guards Her Eggs from Predators” "Well, you've come a distance from your private work." "I was told to stop kidding around with performance pieces." "Too preliminary, a little too AFo."vii "I was still in school." "Anyway, It appears impressive. But, how will this sync with the Fraternal Order of Debordviii, exhibit last season? Another compare and contrast essay?" "To be sincere, it matters. It just doesn't mean. Except Koons, he's no good."
Preliminaries Sketches for Volume 2, etc. Chapters and Characters
Modified Ready-Made “Me, You and Everyone We Know.” racket ball, wax , architectural model figurines, screw, washer, tile, bass wood, glue anxiety
Bricolage “Scene of the City, with Small Character� toilet repair kit, battery operated warning light, rubber ball, air pump, map tack tile, metal shelf Morton Schambergix
Two Modified Ready-Mades “Encounter with Unnamed Character and Tarsila de Amarla�x graphite, rubber ball, screw, cork, yarn, nylon thread, eye hook, wax, tile, basswood madness
Ready-Made “The Imperialist Are Still Alive!xi No.2” rubber toilet flapper, wax, tile, basswood intimidation
Ready-Made “The Imperialist Are Still Alive No.2� rubber toilet flapper, metal rod, wax, tile, basswood intimidation
Modified Ready-Made “Look Back in Pity” racket ball, wax, metal pipe end tile, bass wood pathos
Appendix: a life
Lets begin with life and death. A life is a single persons existence. If death is the end of a person’s existence, then that person will not exist to be dead. So, for an individual person, there is no death. If you believe in an after-life then there is no death, just more life. Then, if the choice is between life and death you really have no choice but life. It is easy: choose life. If you have no choice but to live, or no choice but to exist then your existence is independent from you. Thus you do not choose to live. Also, you cannot choose to die because you will not be when you are dead. Thus you are trapped into a one-sided relationship with life. Death where is your sting? Now, that death has been put into question, the primary question becomes what should you do if you must live and cannot die? First, draw a circle. Then draw a circle overlapping the previous circle. Label one “life” then label the other “art”. Imagine these two overlapping circles, what is the space in between them? Harder still what would you label what surrounds them? Worst of all, if you had to chose, which one would you choose, art or life? Again, draw a circle. Then draw a smaller circle inside the first circle. Label the first circle “life” then label the smaller circle “art”. Now, if you had to chose? Which one would you choose art or life? If it is between art and life. Choose life. In the first drawing, as well as being confused you have to choose between art and life. But, in the second drawing you do not. We can choose both art and life, only if art is a smaller part of life. Now that the division between art and life has been put into question, can you imagine what choosing both art and life would be? If you can, you are ready to answer the question made above: What should you do if you must live?
SCHEMA FOR A LIFE
a life continuously yields a texture saturated with moments. A moment occurs when life's texture acts upon itself. A moment may yield a subjectivity or not.
Paradigms of momentary subjectivity or a subjective moment. LOG A moment yields a subjectivity capable of affinity, identification, resonance between particularities. This manifests or materializes as an affirmation or in a mono-logical construction. [“x” = ”x”] Difference A moment yields a subjectivity capable of bifurcation into animosity, difference and dissonance between particularities. This opens toward critical deconstruction and the preconditions of dialog. [“x” ? ”x” ] Dialog A moment yields a subjectivity capable of approximation, ambiguity and curiosity as a movement between particularities emerged, suppressed, or compressed in an analog transmission of dialog. [“x” ? ”y” or “x” ? ”x”] Topolog A moment yields a subjectivity capable of accumulation, inflation, buoyancy, silence, variety, nausea as a topological arrangement displaying particularities. [“x” + ”y” + ”z”...]
a life Thus the Paradigms of Log, Difference, Dialog and Topolog may recreate by taking recourse in one another. For example, the existent force of Difference's possibilities causes Log to take recourse in Dialog. Topolog must present itself as Log to assert its presence as in the case i.e. philosophy. Difference can only be traced via Topolog to be uttered at all. Dialog must move analogically either between Log and Difference or up toward Topolog. This constructive movement is called a situation. Thus these movements between paradigms of subjectivity is a subject. Making it possible to construct artificial moments, situation and a subject.
TERMS a life “We will say of pure immanence that it is A LIFE, and nothing else. It is not immanence to life, but the immanent that is nothing is itself a life. A life is the immanence of immanence, absolute immanence: it is complete power, complete bliss. It is to the degree that he goes beyond the aporias of the subject and the object that Johann Fichte, in his last philosophy, presents the transcendental field as a life, no longer dependent on a Being or submitted to an Act – it is an absolute immediate consciousness whose very activity no longer refers to a being but is ceaselessly posed in a life. The transcendental field then becomes a genuine plane of immanence that reintroduces Spinozism into the heart of the philosophical process. Did Manie de Biran not go through something similar in his “last philosophy” (the one he was too tired to bring to fruition) when he discovered, beneath the transcendence of effort, and absolute immanent life. The transcendental field is defined by a plane of immanence, and the plane of immanence by a life.”
−
Gilles Deleuze, Pure Immanence: Essays on a Life. 1965
A life continuously yields a texture. texture “As I pointed out earlier, what we are concerned with here is not texts but texture. We already know that a texture is made up of a usually rather large space covered by networks or webs; monuments constitute the strong points, nexuses or anchors of such webs. The actions of social practice are expressible but not explicable through discourse: they are, precisely, acted-and not read.” Henri Lefebvre, The Production of Space 1991
A particularity is any subdivision of life's texture. Thus the use of the term texture is meant to unify these common subdivisions. These subdivisions are arbitrary and dependent on a situation. Two common subdivisions: SEMIOITIC divisions resulting in a relation between signifiers and their referents whichin turn result in a contingent permeable structures called languages. Languages develop into narratives, psychologies and institutions with subsequent contingencies. PHYSICAL divisions of quarks composing electrons, neutrons, and protons composing atoms composing molecules. Then molecular relations forming chemistry and chemical reactions periodically resulting in biological life, which is then put to further taxonomy. More generally, physical division between relativity and quantum mechanics, or now debunk divisions such as space and time. a moment “At the level of everyday life, this intervention would be translated as a better allocation of its elements and its instants as "moments," so as to intensify the vital productivity of everydayness, its capacity for communication, for information, and also and above all for pleasure in natural and social life. The theory of moments, then, is not situated outside of everydayness, but would be articulated along with it, by uniting with critique to introduce therein what its richness lacks. It would thus tend, at the core of pleasure linked to the totality, to go beyond the old oppositions of lightness and heaviness, of seriousness and the lack of seriousness.” Henri Lefebvre, La Somme et Le Reste 1989
Life's texture is saturated with moments. This constant hemorrhage of moments erodes any static as well as the contingent subjectivity yielded by it. A life's force cannot be stopped, thus a subjectivity is constantly promoted to recreate as moments occur and dissolve into passivity. recreation Recreation is the defining activity of a subject. Thus recreation will be defined as the constant and continuous responsibility of a subjectivity to new moments and new subjects. Only a subjectivity which chooses to be the way it is, could rightly be called a subject. The question of “why recreate?” according to this schema is unnecessary, there is no desire here to prove that any subjectivity exist more then momentarily nor to secure the existence of a subject in all moments. Instead it will try to describe how, if possible can a subject avoid passivity. How can it recreate? And one must consider that both questions may be answered with “NO”. But, if this is the case than nothing more can be said.
Now, what if it can? If a subjectivity could recreate, its recreation remains contingent on the moment. Also, a moment must first be generous. It must be generous in the sense that it offers particularities, If it responds to it dissolution, each momentary subjectivity must do so by turning particularities into paradigms. a paradigm “A paradigm, an example, is something which is what it seems. In it being and seeming are undecidable. Philosophy and poetry coincide insofar as both are contemplation of phenomenon in the medium of their knowability, as examples...” “The paradigm is neither universal nor particular, neither general nor individual, it is a singularity which, showing itself as such, produces a new ontological context. This is the etymological meaning of the word paradigme in Greek, paradigme is literally "what shows itself beside." Something is shown beside, "para"...” “The paradigmatic relation does not occur between a plurality of singular objects or between a singular object, and the general principle or law which is exterior to it, the paradigm is not already given, but instead the singularity becomes a paradigm - Plato says it becomes a paradigm by being shown beside the others. Thus the paradigmatic relationship takes place between the single phenomenon and its intelligibility. The paradigm is a singularity considered in the medium of its knowability. What makes something intelligible is the paradigmatic exhibition of its own knowability...” “The analogy with phenomenology is only apparent. Here we have a peculiar ontology which we could define with respect to phenomenology - para-ontology, an ontology which is still to be thought. The problem here is that it’s not the phenomenon as such which is being seen, but only by means of the example which is a kind of strange movement beside, it is not itself, but beside itself. This para is the essential problem of the example, so we have to invent and define the para-ontology, paradigm, paradoxa, it’s still to be defined, it’s kind of a pataphysics. What adds itself to be metaphysics, what is besides metaphysics, a para-ontology. It is the problem of this being shown beside and not the immediate knowability of the thing itself. The problem is this para, beside being...” Giorgio Agamben. What is a Paradigm? Lecture at European Graduate School. 2002.
A paradigm is a particularity of the moment that could act as an example of what subjectivity is possible both outside and within a moment. From these exemplary particulars made into paradigms, a propagation of moment maybe constructed. This propagation and procreation of the moment is a situation. a situation “In the programmatic thinking outlined above by Henri Lefebvre, the problems of the creation of everyday life are directly affected by the theory of moments, which defines as "modalities of presence" a "plurality of relatively privileged moments." What relation do these "moments" have with the situations the SI has set out to define and construct? What use can be made of the relationship between these concepts to realize the common possibilities that are now emerging? The situation, as a created, organized moment -- Lefebvre expresses this desire as "the free act defined as the capacity . . . to change a 'moment' in metamorphosis, and perhaps to create one" -- includes perishable instants, ephemeral and unique. It is a totalizing organization that controls and favors such chance instants. From the perspective of the Lefebvrian moment, the constructed situation, then, is pitted against the instant, but at an intermediary stage between instant and moment. And so, while it is repeatable to a certain degree (as direction or "way"), the constructed situation is not in itself repeatable as the "moment." Like the moment, the situation "can be extended in time or be condensed." But it seeks to found itself on the objectivity of artistic production. Such production breaks radically with durable works. It is inseparable
from its immediate consumption as a use value essentially foreign to conservation as a commodity. The difficulty for Henri Lefebvre is to draw up a list of his moments (why cite ten of these and not fifteen, or twenty-five, etc?). The difficulty with the "situationist moment" is, on the contrary, marking its precise end, its transformation into a different term within a series of situations (the latter perhaps constituting a Lefebvrian moment), or even into dead time. In effect, the "moment" posited as a rediscoverable general category involves, in the long term, the establishment of an increasingly complex list. Less differentiated, the situation lends itself to an infinite number of combinations. A situation, and its cut-off point, cannot be so precisely defined. What will characterize the situation is its very praxis, its intentional formation. For example, Lefebvre speaks of the "moment of love." From the point of view of the creation of moments, from the situationist point of view, one must envisage the moment of a particular love, of the love of a particular person. Which means: of a particular person in particular circumstances. The maximum "constructed moment" is the series of situations attached to a single theme -- that love for a particular person -- a "situationist theme" is a realized desire. In comparison to Henri Lefebvre's moment, this series of situations is particularized and unrepeatable, yet greatly extended and relatively durable in comparison to the unique-ephemeral instant. In analyzing the "moment," Lefebvre has revealed many of the fundamental conditions of the new field of action across which a revolutionary culture may now proceed: as when he remarks that the moment tends toward the absolute and departs from it. The moment, like the situation, is simultaneously proclamation of the absolute and awareness of passing through it. It is, in actual fact, on the path toward a unity of the structural and the conjectural; and the project for a constructed situation could also be defined as an attempt at structuring the conjunction between the two. The "moment" is mainly temporal, forming part of a zone of temporality, not pure but dominant. Articulated in relation to a given place, the situation is completely spatio-temporal (cf. A. Jorn on the spacetime of life, and A. Franklin on the plane-ification of individual existence.) Moments constructed into "situations" might be thought of as moments of rupture, of acceleration, revolutions in individual everyday life. On a more extended -- more social -- spatial level, an urbanism that almost exactly corresponds to Lefebvre's moments, and to his idea of choosing these and leaving them behind at will, has been proposed in the "states-of-the-soul quarters" (cf. "Formulary for a New Urbanism" By G. Ivain, Internationale Situationniste #1) -- disalienation being the explicit goal behind the arrangement of the "Sinister Quarter." Lastly, the problem of the encounter in the theory of moments, and of an operational formulation of the construction of situations, suggests the following question. What admixture, what interactions ought to occur between the flux (and resurgence) of the "natural moment," in Henri Lefebvre's sense, and certain artificially constructed elements, introduced into this flux, perturbing it, quantitatively and, above all, qualitatively?” Unattributed,”The Theory of Moments and the Construction of Situations”, Internationale Situationniste #4,1960 “The construction of situations begins beyond the ruins of the modern spectacle. It is easy to see how much the very principle of the spectacle — nonintervention — is linked to the alienation of the old world. Conversely, the most pertinent revolutionary experiments in culture have sought to break the spectators’ psychological identification with the hero so as to draw them into activity by provoking their capacities to revolutionize their own lives. The situation is thus designed to be lived by its constructors. The role played by a passive or merely bit-part playing “public” must constantly diminish, while that played by those who cannot be called actors, but rather, in a new sense of the term, “livers,” must steadily increase.” Guy Debord, Report on the Construction of Situations and on the International Situationist 1957
Notes
i Fullerism the metaphysical philosophy of Richard Buckminster “Bucky” Fuller turned into a religion. ii Omni is abstract deity of the fuller religion. iii Some talk about education reform. iv Chats about how the families are long it been, questions about the with some talk about piracy v In (ASL) American Sign Language vi By now they should have a revolution enough for such a thing to exist. Its about time right? vii Art Foundations suggesting introductory or sophomoric derogatory. viii By now they should have a revolution enough for such a thing to exist. Its about time right? ii is abstract deity of the fuller ix Omni God by Morton Schamberg, 1918. religion. iii talk about education reform. x Some O Sono, 1928. iv about how the families areShe longreceived it been,her questions about theStudies with some aboutUniversity piracy and xi Chats Zeina Durra is a writer/director. BA in Oriental fromtalk Oxford v In (ASL) American Sign Language vi By now they should have a revolution enough for such a thing to exist. Its about time right? vii Art Foundations suggesting introductory or sophomoric derogatory. viii By now they should have a revolution enough for such a thing to exist. Its about time right? ix God by Morton Schamberg, 1918. x O Sono, 1928. xi Zeina Durra is a writer/director. She received her BA in Oriental Studies from Oxford University and MFA from NYU's Tisch School of the Arts, Graduate Film Programme. Her directorial debut, THE IMPERIALISTS ARE STILL ALIVE!, starring the French actress Elodie Bouchez premiered in US Competition at Sundance 2010. Sundance called THE IMPERIALISTS ARE STILL ALIVE! " an exceptional work and heralds the arrival of Durra as an exciting new directorial talent" and Movieline labeled her, " Sundance's most fascinating filmaker, ". Warsaw also awarded THE IMPERIALISTS ARE STILL ALIVE! Best First Feature. Durra is currently working on her second feature and other art projects.