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Saturday, December 30, 2006







It's a drag to keep uploading to youtube and finding a mess results, no matter what the compression etc. Either I'm doing something wrong or working too hard on the image itself which always seems to appear damaged. In the meantime I've been adding to the autobiography again; this is an ill-formed habit, and the results are probably far too spiked. In any case, you can check that out at http://www.asondheim.org/biog.txt - it's still as honest as I can make it, useless for all that....

Tuesday, December 26, 2006







Rilke's Death from development, of angels, welkin reminders, of what might have been, here, among other valleys' roots like magma, poured spirit one and then another; furious angels! invisible, whose arms illuminate the night harrowed from animals wounded, animals dying; among all orders, a command. With what might one counter the thin edge of the Real?; with what countenance?; with what countenance will Any listen? Multiples move, among multitudes; crossed by elk, by deer, by wolves, kestrel-binding holding fields (these wait for No One)

What hovers, soars (these move for No One)

Monday, December 25, 2006






Heidegger's Hut

poised among the fourfold, the lure of new man, new development, and yet... closer to fourfold, among uncounted elements, unaccounted-for. for often I have approached this live or in dream to little avail; I would wait for clearing weather, for the world to happen, for technology to disappear at the base. Heidegger remains there above his troubled politics, of which there is no counting-four; we are close to hearth, we are embers among the dying worlds. Soon the snows will melt, glaciers disappear; the hut stays on a lure, overlooking resettled life, spaces a thousand kilometers long, an empyrean high. I cannot imagine a world such as this, life in hut corner, close to warmth, old wooden bench and bed, columnar spirit emerging to heavens' other worlds. We live in imaginary solace, his hut our own, released to the elements and beyond, transformed. There is no journey in the journey, no dream in the dream. One has life only for so much sorrow. Glow remains the last of our eyes. Hearth warms, beyond.

Sunday, December 24, 2006





starling no name shiftless performance

we are speaking wires for you.
we are 'performance' and 'no name,' shiftless.
shiftless, we are 'fame.'
a tail: 'high-tale it out of here.'
goodbye. leave us alone.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TCaWELjaZcA

Saturday, December 23, 2006



Alias - One has an alias - the connotation is that of subterfuge (but not necessarily). Feyman write about alias as a question of raster - think of alias, aliasing, as the return of the repressed of the real - what can't be accommodated is transformed by the upper ceiling of the bandwidth into rhythmic structuring - of course if the unaccommodated - one might say unaccountable - is itself within a relatively steady-state. Look for alias / aliasing in the real, for the location of what might pass for primordial - what whispers in spite of everything.

Aliases and rhythm - but given the potential of alterity, a face without content, a face elsewhere than the Other - the rupture itself, aliasing itself, may take on the appearance of a masquerade (i.e. of the second order). Hence what is apparent may be the extrusion or residue of insufficient bandwidth, and if we generalize, we might find that the appearance of the real is always already alias, construed as appearance, forced into its return.

Is sampling always inadequate? Don't we make these decisions in the first place, in relation to human perception? Think of the alias as a wound - wound as gateway - or diacritical mark. Here is where the digital meets the analog - or at least where catastrophe meets emission - where emission is channeled...

There is something deep here, more than meets the I ...

Friday, December 22, 2006


If every position demarcates an other, it is noise that welcomes the
world. What will the world do with an other? Surely both are bypassed,
welcoming remains, demarcation a ruptured effusive memory.

_Uns_ wird nur das Laermen angeboten. (RMR)
To _us_ only the noise is proffered. (trans. Norton)

http://www.asondheim.org/klez1.mp3 harmonic minor c
http://www.asondheim.org/klez2.mp3 harmonic minor c
http://www.asondheim.org/klez3.mp3 harmonic minor c
http://www.asondheim.org/klez4.mp3 echo
http://www.asondheim.org/klez5.mp3 echo
http://www.asondheim.org/klez6.mp3 echo
http://www.asondheim.org/klez7.mp3 echo
http://www.asondheim.org/klez8.mp3 chromatic w noise reduction
http://www.asondheim.org/klez9.mp3 chromatic w noise reduction

harmonica salt lake city session snow out 29 degrees

_Hier_ ist des Saeglichenit, _hier_ seine Heimat. (RMR)
_Here_ is the time for the Tellable, _here_ is its home. (trans. Spender)

Tuesday, December 19, 2006

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xmlns:rdf='xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=r9qhtCwbsoQ
WWII above
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-0k4jI-2oTo
self portrait as a Bodhisattva

losing my way in the milky forests of confessiion ▚ᨋ8c0;ᤆa2;e6;ᙞ&#f686;ھLf6;ሰ
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∂ھҶሱ੡ሴ&#d697;
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ၮ&#e616;‎ᘲ˗8f7;ˠ&#e690;
Ɨሉ઄e6;&#f696;ٸ&#e756;⏷☂
ɞ&#d697;ၯZa2;ʐ&#c277;8f2;&#e2e2;
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&#f697;ሂҶ਴e2;˫8f2;ʆ
&#e616;⏶&#e610;տ8f6;‎&#f792;˖

o lord forgive me, such agony as done
is this a found script or one i created ? does it really matter? given the relatively small number of symbols, it would be reasonable to apply coding to it - a matrix/template that might slide across the apparent grid, producing meaning. one might think of this as a universal machine applicable to texts of any length; it becomes increasingly evident that meaning is a construct across symbols, neither within them nor within the dictionary translation / transliterations.

here, in this example, only in this particular example, one has a section of what seems to be an infinite text, a text in the manner of a bandage or suture across the wound of a sememe (what reads as a sememe); a wound within, unconstrued within, the imaginary. think of this as the lid of the pre-linguistic - not exactly mode, but a potential for interpretation, sliding out and against itself, as soon as one is found. nothing holds here, not even "here," not even place or placement. the lesson, where we are, where we are not, is always already unlearned.

Monday, December 18, 2006

It's a dim day today, I've shared my family again with all of the Democrats who would have voted Green in the last election, you remember the one when I found that cute dog on the street the other day, well it turned out it belonged to someone on the next block so I returned it with great happiness. Now it's raining out and I'm waiting for Madge to call, well Made and I don't get along so well, do we, Tim? Tim's Madge's husband, and we've gone the rounds a few times I can tell you. My mom's always saying "you never know" but I always reply "you sure do don't you" just like when she says "I'm going to call dad" and I say "what are you going to call him" and she says "i'm going to call him dad" or something like that. Now it's starting to rain out or at least it's getting it's getting darker and that smudgy feeling when you look out the window. The traffic light's changed again, it always does that this time of day.

http://www.asondheim.org/wud.mp4 (13 megabytes)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UxYyu9fU3eE (smaller, not so clear)

Sunday, December 17, 2006

Thursday, December 14, 2006


(photos by Azure Carter - Nyon, Rilke's grave)

Here's a treat! http://nikuko.blogspot.com now click on it! No, wait a minute, don't do it! Honest, all hell will break loose. You did it, didn't you? Now don't do it again! Really! I know what I'm talking about! Take this seriously! You really don't want to do it now, do you?! Damn, you did it again! Well, here we are! What now?

(I'm waiting for the images to upload. Wait a bit now. I don't think you'll do it? Useless, isn't it? I'm stll waiting... It's going to go on a bit! Ah, there, that's better! You can stop now, give your hand a rest!)

....r, m....i. .i...e .....i.. ...es missi.. ..eir ....es, i.s.r...i..
m....i., .y...i., mem.ry, m.....r.me i.i..! .. .. .. ..is is s. m....i.
... .ri.e, ... ....'s ... i.s:..r..y:...:m....i.:...y: ..i.. .. ...;
.y....ermi.; .e..e..y ....r.s ..e m....i.; .e..e..y ....r.s .y....ermi.;
.e..e..y ....r.s ..e m....i.; .e..e..y ....r.s r..e.ess ...

Tuesday, December 12, 2006



So I've been working on an autobiography which began with a perl program allowing me to make date entries and sorting them. http://www.asondheim.org/biog.txt
This won't ever be finished. It's as accurate as I can make it but this is a disclaimer to the effect that the statements shouldn't be taken at face value; my memory may be playing tricks and certainly some of the dates are incorrect. Please send me corrections of course. There is also new work on YouTube, please check out.

Monday, December 11, 2006


I continue to put work up on YouTube. There have been 550 hits in the past few days - which is pitifully small, but larger than almost any experimental video/film audience. Almost all the video I've seen on YouTube is rendered poorly; I'm definitely going to trie other sites - everything depends on compression of course.

Meanwhile check out YouTube under my name.

And I've been thinking - working with too many bodies at this point; I have to return to writing as well, the theoretical materials that might or might not come out of thinking about LISP. Notions of gathering, shades of Badiou again. But I've also been sidetracked - reading the diario of Columbus' first voyage, abstracted by de la Casas - from which I am sure the world flows...

Friday, December 08, 2006





Some images from the Alps. It seems a dream we were there; I'd rather be there, now, than anywhere else. There was an incredible amount left to do. Images of Foofwa d'Imobilite, Maud Liardon, Azure Carter.

Quite cold here. More work is up on YouTube. I'd urge you to go to the www.asondheim.org page for more pristine but longer-to-download video.

I've been playing around with LISP; I'm not good with programming, but interested. LISP programs are within parentheses; I've started to write a 'phenomenology of the parenthetical' - when the subordinate is literally all there is.

I've been rethinking the sexuality which characterizes a lot of my work. I can't put it up here; I can't put it on YouTube and given the repressive climate in the US, I shouldn't put it anywhere. Sexuality is completely overdetermined; there's no way to make it 'work' except by giving in totally to it. And to do this eliminates the framework - the parenthetical- altogether. In fact this elimination recuperates not only the real, but untrammeled desire, that is desire against the productions of the law, whatever one might think of justice. So the work becomes hard to see.
It is a contamination of vision, not the visual. And so I'm thinking through this. And it's incredibly tiring to think about this; it goes on and on - like Ourboros, you're back where you started from with problematic feelings and audience responses. Who would think, from outside the species or culture, that so much swirls around the reproductive? But of course it's here that the Other appears.

Wednesday, December 06, 2006





Work on YouTube


Some work moved to youtube where it might be easier to watch - I've also
tried for metacafe.com because they pay and we're desperate - they pay if
there are enough viewers - no art category - something about cool stuff -
anyway none of the uploads worked; it would read my .mp4 or .mov files
which went thru easily on youtube. Meanwhile on youtube everything's
blurred out, but at least there in one form or another. And anyway, enjoy.
And tell me what's wrong with metacafe. And send lots of money. Seriously.
Lots and lots of money. - Alan

PS and tell you friends about it and everyone will be happy.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DZt-LhMbNdg

avalanche

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6nzWg0E_Q50

prosthetic

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qh0dG0s6x40

jump

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5BkpQe6z3HQ

werethere

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SxbZCJdF7bE

doomed dancer

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hR0ajvOR-pE

scan24s.mov

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gMH0AvImrYY

maudpringychurch.mp4

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aYReBqmf8js

bulb1.mp4 avatar interior

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0qQ0K-phiFY


duetavatargrange

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TNCLXGInC1Y

bulbmp4.mov avatar exterior

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DvIYKavXbi4

Tube Scan (vacuum tube deconstruction)

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZFqKpjd8k-I


agzither - Alpine Zither / Access Grid

I've now completed editing something like 50 short videopieces from the Switzerland trip, and then there are combinations to come with the abstracted imagery from the VEL (virtual environments lab) at WVU. I feel strongly about working furiously - I never know how much time I have left, and it's better to work through every idea while there's still a mind to think, mouth to speak, fingers to type. More and more will always come; I hope only that the ideas, however poorly expressed, hold for at least a week after I'm gone. If anyone reads them. If any work survives. If any of us do.

Wednesday, November 29, 2006


an announcement only that some of the urls below may be outdated and some newer work added unfound, if you open http://www.asondheim.org/ you might want to look for newer work, but then how would you know that... no one keeps track... but if you look at http://www.asondheim.org/ox.txt or http://www.asondheim.org/ow.txt you would find i think texts pertaining to the newer work, complete with urls, cut-and-paste, thank you
Just want to say YAY! This is open again - I haven't been able to access this for a while!
- Alan, glad to be home

Wednesday, November 22, 2006

my world what a world, this is where i live in my igrid. welcome to my living room work room conference room vestibute den home office. you will not sleep or eat or use the toilet mr. man and ms. woman. thank you very much for your attention.

Tuesday, November 21, 2006



curly

curlicue miasma production
it's always there the mechanical movement
of mr. foofwa in the gruyere(s) castle
i forget gruyeres or gruyere just about always
but there's a la gruyere no les gruyeres
so tout gauche les gruyeres!
hurry up!

http://www.asondheim.org/walkatar.mp4

Years ago, on an abandoned farm in Gruyere, spirits rose.
The landscape was full of joy and community prospered.
Invisible, only the flowers and stones, grange and bird, could see them.
But that was sufficient, no? That was sufficient.

http://www.asondheim.org/sundance.mp4

i'm tired this stands on its own
the world's too full of information

thesis: we're at the _peak_ of information, not an upward slope.
after this: deterioration, gangs, spam, hacks, starvations, local wars,
infrastructure collapse...
the cusp is _now._
statistically, this has to be the case: how many are alive now, in
relation to the carrying-capacity of the earth, population increase,
desertification.

foofwa d'i and isabel(l)(e) tear at the ruins

http://www.asondheim.org/upgod.mov

yes, yes, i can see the future, you can't
it's there in the overturned garden, in the formless vines, twisted
churn, or tarn, only static on the radio, spiders' nets
spanning this or that, wire to pipe, pipe to wire, nothing flows
in the future, numbers one through eight, one through seven
welkin, glimmer, gather, wind, tain
spanning unstation, unplace, settlings and shifting here and there
more of it, grey and green, edged, lessened, unfixed

Sunday, November 19, 2006




oh five! random from the journey through the alps and beyond the alps and beyond and up! for what and where end? each exposed polygon betrayed by pixel, disaster! none of this is real, no one leaves the mind but the body walks quick here and there yes yes yes, so far up it seems! oh hardly breathe! what beyond? where?



cut and paste to be sure << <<
http://www.asondheim.org/aletschvlf.mp4
http://www.asondheim.org/foofwadanceis2.mp4
http://www.asondheim.org/mc1.mp4
http://www.asondheim.org/azrun.mp4
http://www.asondheim.org/fluflew.mp4
http://www.asondheim.org/azuredanceis.mp4
http://www.asondheim.org/god.mp4
http://www.asondheim.org/christa.mp4
http://www.asondheim.org/blockage.mp4
http://www.asondheim.org/countrydance.mp4
http://www.asondheim.org/octopuschasedbytrain.mp4
http://www.asondheim.org/xcape1.mp4
http://www.asondheim.org/xcape2.mp4
http://www.asondheim.org/dropping.mp4 foofwa d'imobilite azure carter maud liardon sandy baldwin
most of these (videos) r still around
chinese rod arithmetic http://www.asondheim.org/rods.mp4
some explanation http://www.asondheim.org/ow.txt
http://www.asondheim.org/ov.txt

oh! to believe in the real!
once again I am deceived!

Wednesday, November 08, 2006

the devils in Rilke's church

http://www.asondheim.org/rilkes.mov very short

emanations tether flesh to representation
imaginary spreads the paste of the body's uncertain declination
"i decline to accept such images"
"i recline to accept such images"
nothing moves but the trembling of your drum of flesh
we were never stopped, nothing stopped us, not even hell
the hell of burning cocks, burning cunts
but never this ecstasy or indefinite sublime which remains unreachable
o holderlin
o rilke
the shadows of prophecy turn one inside out
shuddering, primitive he said, shuddering she said, trembling
surmounting the drum of flesh, unmounting the drum of flesh
pipe and tabor played simultaneously with hands and mouths
racket played with fingers and mouths
viol d'amore, vial d'amore, vile the mouths of hell
ecstatic the mouths of hell
o rilke
o holderlin
the mouths of hell return us to the remnants of perfect desire



deploy, he said, the devouring powers of light


all natural languages have precisely the same degree of complexity.
'destroy, she said', 'primitive, he said', 'enjoy, he said', 'deploy,
she said.'
to deconstruct is neither to analyze nor to take apart.
http://www.asondheim.org/eatenbylight.mp4
you can't argue with an aphorism.
'code' is more than structure, structure is more than substructure,
substructure is more than equivalence, organism is less than code.
throw out everything you know about animal behavior and culture;
humans are just beginning to discover civilization.
our knowledge is not our own.
humans construct the only deliberate, calculated, and universal
slaughter-house.
everything an enemy, every enemy a thing.
take the man from the woman and kill him.
binary oppositions replace cultural capital with economic capital.
there are dozens of types of war and at any time we are engaged
in at least a quarter of them.
do not ask for whom the bell tolls; ask who made the bell.
an aphorism makes the man.
reality is imaginary's monotonic.
or the romanticism of the real is the classicism of the imaginary.
projection kills and introjection devours.
or introjection suppurates and projection wounds.
murder is wild war.
if i want a word with you, the word i want is 'you.'
give away your sex and there goes your reputation.
give away your reputation and here comes your sex.
public masturbation constructs the truth of the real for audience and
masturbater alike.
faunal extinction takes humans home.
sex kills and slaughter entertains.
eroticism is the neocon of sexual war.
the aphoristic is the final refuge of the defeated.
aphorisms are always otherwise.

devouring waters of li(f)(gh)t

colonized by light
light = colonization of invisible matter
invisible matter = universal organism
organism = colonialization
colony = territorialization
release the light! deterritorialize!

http://www.asondheim.org/eatenbylight.mp4

dancer: Filibert Tologo
stage: la Salle des Eaux-Vives, Geneve

throw out everything we know about the future of the human race:
there isn't any, anything recognizable.
throw out everything we know about animal behaviour and culture:
we're blind and will remain so, driving species to extinction.

these are the truths brought to us by dance and culture:
dance and culture brings Signs from Worlds eaten by light.
dance and culture have no territory:
Worlds disappear, tethered to exhausted Signs.

*/
At first I thought this period is the end of prehistory, that history only
begins with the definitive event of the large-scale disappearance of hu-
mans across an earth ruined by nuclear, chemical, and biological warfare.
The future of history is hyperhistory; all other histories meander through
fractured sememes destined to disappear.

Then I thought this period is the beginning of prehistory, towards the
potential of the mute, the moot point, the unacknowledged pivot or hinge,
the elimination of all evidence of the pivot, which after all is spread
across space and time, reaching far behind us for example, extending far
ahead of us for example. This prehistory may be followed by nothing in
terms of familiar inscription; it may be followed by a superfluity of
familiar inscription; it may be all or nothing, open or closed.

But whether or not this is the end or beginning of prehistory, it is the
continuation of the brute, inert, violence of our existence, scabbing and
devouring beyond the carrying-capacity of the earth - it is the continua-
tion or the end of our existence, the violence itself carrying-on, residue
far beyond lifespans, half-lifespans, sintering of the remnants of debris.
/*

throw out, throw out, throw out





three videos, the most beautiful, the sublime, the compelling


below: perhaps an unintended homage to gustave moreau, certainly my most
beautiful work, which comes through, however strangely, in spite of the
necessary compression. taped inside the rilke church, if i may call it
that, in raron, accompanied with the falls at the very tip of the aletsch.
here is spirit at its most sublime, from the upward sweep of the nave, to
the grandiosity of the glacier itself, many thousands of feet below.

http://www.asondheim.org/rilketongue.mp4

below: closeup of the 'tongue' of the aletsch glacier, with modified very
low frequency radio signals taken from the same site. the signals were
contaminated, by local power generation, up there on the bluff. filtering
was difficult because the generators seemed somewhat unstable. i used
extreme hiss reduction, notch filtering, and graphic equalization to
create something 'readable.' i'm fascinated that the glacier moves of
course at a snail's pace or slower - but accompanied these radio signals,
which originate from mostly from cosmic and atmospheric phenomena. radio
emissions (from cosmic and atmomspheric phenomena) - invisible events,
interpreted as sound. again, the sublime, which often appears without the
body of this body of work.

http://www.asondheim.org/aletschvlf.mp4

below: foofwa on 'dance is' for a second take in a squat in geneva. this
is more personal than the first 'dance is' and as such it was taped in a
more or less straightforward manner. i find the take quite touching. we
later talked about the graffiti surrounding us; the tags were in english,
and seemed to represent a form of the usual colonization.

http://www.asondheim.org/foofwadanceis2.mp4


Saving, Castle, Brig


ancient castle at Brig / Brieg / Brigue ... the castle walls alas ...
the light ... night-time uneasy time ... the inspiration of Maud
Liardon ... her religious beliefs ... she is Savior, Unsaved ... we,
Apostolic ... true miracle of the walls of caves ... caverns looming
... O listen Immortals! ... unspoken, what one or another ... what
hands ... what holds one against others ... the One at Brieg ... the
Others at Brique ... the One who Saves ... the Others Unsaved ...

http://www.asondheim.org/maudbrigcastle.mp
4

Philosophy and Others of Dance, numerous pieces, feedback welcomed


Prolog:

Maud-enunciation of avatars, pre-duet: the occupation of virtual space -
sad pirouette sad dancer lonely dancer left behind magic wand paper stars
in paper skies tiny bows and pas http://www.asondheim.org/maudatar.mp4
d'une d'une, I will hide your tiny little URL, almost so real - When the
Role disappears from dance, dance is.

When the dancer disappears, when position and momentum disappear, when
energy and space disappear, when many and one disappear; when eidetic
reduction and the phenomenological stance are flattened, historicized,
demarcated, incapable of reproduction, incapable of recuperation; the
accumulation of the symbolic, dance is disappearance, no longer imminent,
immanent: then paste, defuge, tumescent shuddering of the real. Then
nothing of the real. Then "annihilation to the limit" which is nothing.
Which is nothing at all.

Paragraphs and Chapters:

Below: "dance is" - dance philosophy, not philosophy of dance. Short
analysis and explanation of the dance series in relation to the
virtual/real, analog/digital, and governance/community. There are five
dance-is to date: Foofwa*2, Alan, Maud, Tom where it all started.
http://www.asondheim.org/alandanceis.mp3

I always wonder about dance, participating in choreography or mise-en-
scene, or compositeur, even a bit of movement; I can't dance, am awkward
and far too nervous; I admire dancers but there are very few I relate to.
Foofwa's work is close to performance, sport, theory. But it's a question
of the Sign - which is always already mute; in writing, sign is signifying
- assignation. Dance reads, constructs, deconstructs the world; this is
also a characteristic of culture in general. Dance begins and ends with
the consciousness of the body; why wear clothes? Use props? Why work for
that matter within the institution of the theater? Writing and the gospel
truth - http://www.asondheim.org/mercigrotto.mp4

There is the gospel of dance, its history, which is something else, as in
photography or any other cultural form in these thick times - it's over-
determined, obstructive, overly cognizant of cultural form, of modes of
distribution, of theatrical and terpsichorean politics, of master-disciple
relationships, of the aporia of the knotted student.

There's the gospel of the virtual, its imaginary, elsewhere, as in the
shamanic or production of images in these exfoliated times - it's overtly
misrecognized, smoothed, the incipient production of culture, telecommun-
ications, any moment of being, of absenting relationship, but of techno-
logical construct as well. And of the real, of which the less or more said
the better or the worse. http://www.asondheim.org/virtualreal.mp4

[[ sed 's/writing/real/g' < The real dances around dance; writing dances
around the real; the real dances around writing; etc. sed 's/dance/X/g'
The real Xs around X; writing Xs around the real; the real Xs around
writing; etc. <> sed 's/real/written/g' etc. |
sed 's/real/"real"/g' | sed 's/real/X/g' -> "X" < digital ="="">
faunal cultural history < inscription < digital ]]

[[ X* ]] perhaps another term than dance, for how should definition
function here? Or perhaps neither performance nor the body. One is left
with abjection, the sublime, real/imaginary; let us call this the "abject
sublime." For we are within this era, this positioning, dulled, imploded,
decathetcted, exhausted, condition of defuge. If defuge relates to
depression, then defuge relates to the real in a manner of none other,
nothing else. And if we do not think dance, we do not think culture, we
begin to think.

Postlog:

Two sound pieces in prealpine church of Pringy (chromatic and 'Weekender'
harmonicas) - http://www.asondheim.org/charmchurch.mp3 - within which the
church signifies the tumescence of the resonator.

jump!

http://www.asondheim.org/jump.mp4

and

pain. avatar.

in pain. if she moves they knew i played with avatars, avatar-abuse: this
avatar dancers - and we can map into entirely new spaces and content - the
occupation of virtual space - parent-child relations, father-avatar avatar
<> analog <> avatar-meats are leashed,
tethered to logical reach of avatars. reach avatars. of and my people! my
avatars! my little maud-enunciation of avatars, pre-duet: making new
avatars on - my, the swords make the avatar angry! azure writhes house.
they knew i played with avatars, front of the house. that they avatars.
that one cannot cum seems to lack coherency. i wish i was home. avatar-
abuse: this is more than familiar to me. i am in the neighborhood manner,
similar to the avatar but the dancer is dancer imitated by a month old,
protocol-driven, hunger for signifiers, azure struggles which is more
than familiar, is more than familiar: they knew i played with avatars.
avatar-abuse: this relates to mother-father relations: primordial thought
of "my avatars avatars." so this is what it looks like from inside - an
avatar. those few knew i played with avatars; all of them are avatars,
but mapped - which in fact indicates the direct murmuring of avatar-meat;
you can hear them directly beneath the swords. avatars have to avoid
swords, their baggage. they speak through a thousand dancers, most of whom
were abused.

jump!


Saturday, October 21, 2006

way, no way

Text from Geneve performance following Foofwa d'Imobilite's Incidences performance on 10/20/06.
I performed from laptop, partially improvising the following text (improvising over another text, hence "INTERFERENCE"). Foofwa translated for the audience. I must say this went brilliantly -

INTERFERENCE
I have no idea how to begin. These pieces are explorations
of dance-movement translated into alien spaces. This is sound bounced from New York to Chicago then back to West Virgnia then back to New York using Internet 2. Everything is out of sync. Thiis is Foofwa's dance troop doing a synchronized exercise from "swimming."
It's difficult to figure how to get into this material for me. For one thing the laptop was acting up. We found a toy gun in California and scanned it in West Virginia - deconstructing it atthe same time. Ok we did this with a tree as well
This will go on until I stop it.
Sometimes you get up in the morning and its not the right thing to say. Do you know the United States is at WAR with Iraq!? I found out today - that's really bad. They were looking for illegal immigrants and look what they came up with - WEAPOONS OF MASSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSS DESTRUCTION~! I knew my United States
MY UNITED STATES!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
would come through in the end. And everybody thought that Bush was a two bit terrorist who was anti-gay? Whatever happened to his daughters? They're probably fucking Rumseld.
I look on this as therapy. While I'm playiing with software programs (the very latest!_ (not really)) - there are a numbetr of species going extinct per hour.
But they can all move to the Arcitic. By the way polar bears have turned cannibal and elephants are raping other species - this is true - as animals find their habitat disappiearing. What these abstract imags ar -
the body is divided into 17 segments and these are then captured while a dancer moves - the movements are captured - and then - then you can map them on to for example people -
These people practiced for weeks to get it right and I had to pay them to get naked.
Now we can take this mapping of figures onto figures - dancers onto avatar dancers - and we can map into entirely new spaces and content - So this is a dancer transformed.
Well hell this has no use whatsoever but I'm fascinated by the extentions of the body - When you play around with software like this you can enter the world of dreams so quickly...
I can't find my way outshide this world.

Dance. How can I make this entertaining? We shall witness
men and women amputated at the brain! They cannot think!
They can only dance! Dansez Dansez! O Here is Azure being scanned. The laser destroyed one of my cameras. I have learned not to work in the real world. ui, c'est tout! Pourquoi?

They are ne real pas, ils dansez le "reel." I make a map of this
dance. Je fabrique un plan von der Unterwelt. They have no Now in order to get away from legs I have moved into the interior of avatars... So this is what it looks like from inside -

They have no arms. Quel dommage! Pourqoi? POURQUOI?
Parceque ce'st mois! La Divine! Ceas vrai! Wirklich! I will make
their interieures! Inside them! You will see!
I forgot the trees. Here is a tree being scanned by a laser sending the signal out - From here you can move deep into the dtree .. there are other things to see.... You can see the laser burn.
The best way to proceed I think is to hmmm... Is to go into the real world as little as possible... and then bring back whatever you need like going to a 7-11 or something - Is this going ok Foofwa? Uh it seems to lack coherency. I wish I was home making new avatars on my computer to fuck with.
Later no earlier
in 2006 I don't know what happened, I showed work - real pieces of things and computers - in Los Angels - you can actually stumble over wires once you leave home.
One absolutely has to know how to inhabit theoretical digital space.
Every other space will become poisonous. This space now this space here - this space is a ruler being taken apart by a laser - you can study it and see how measurement began.
I keep thinking I've got some terrible disease and am just about to die (SOB!) so I need your sympathy vote!
This is my partner Azure Azul being deconstructed on a bad hair day. So I'm thinking of war and extinctions and the nightmare the world is turning into and atomic bombs going off and being unable to sleep and I can't help making stupid jokes. Like the maarx brothers - it's a kind of immigrant fever -
More mapping of dancers. Foofwa is the only person I know who could dance this.
The advantage of a dancer: You'll have your body at the end of the world.
The disadvantage of a dancer: You'll have your body at the end of the world.
And you will send signals to yourself.
You will send signals to yourself.
You'll look in the mirror and say hello world.
And nothing will say anything back.
Not even you.
Susan Sontag I think wrote about the tens of thousand of birds that died at 9/11.
In New York they erected a memorial of lights. The lights went high in the sky and interacted with migrating flocks of birds.
Ten thousand birds died because of the memorial.
So the question is: How do you make art - not after Auschwitz -
but IN Auschwitz? Because we are at the gates and work arbeit does nothing for us.

Dance, alas, how can I ever make sense? Together we shall see
human beings with brains and minds cut out! They can't think!
They never could! All they can do is dance! Well, really, is
that all? Why for the Sake of God! They're not real now, are
they? They dance the reel! They dance the jig! I'll make a
pretty picture of this dance! I'll make a map of the Underworld!
They have no legs! They don't have arms either! If I could dance - if I could really dance - I wouldn't be doing any of this - why bother? You have your body on your back and your back on your body and that's all you'd need.
When you look at the world correctly, on what basis can you do anything at all?
Hello I am the world. I don't have anything at al. They don't have
brains either! They don't have minds either! This is terrible
damage! I am a cheese! Why, WHY? For the love of the Dear Lord!
Because it's me! I made them! I'm the Author of the World! The
Divine! The Divine Sarah Bernhardt! The Jew! It's True! Really!
I will make their interiors! We'll go inside them! You and I,
we'll go inside their bellies! We'll wear the Pubic Hair! You'll
see! Just wait! You'll see!

Bonjour, salaam, shalom, hello! I will kill myself! Why is this
night different from all other nights? Because I am here? These
are my people! My little people! They run around the room! I
play my harmonica for you. A little aire, a tiny aire, surely
something you have heard before?
Because we can bounce sound around the world like this.
But we can't stop trade in rhino horns.
Azure struggles with the avatar. The avatar has to avoid the swords. The swords make the avatar angry. Azure writhes in pain. If she moves she will be cut by the swords.The swords are dream sword.s They do not exist in reality. In reality I am home at the moment comfortably seated in front of my computer. And Im working on new exciting software programs called
RHINO
WEAPONS OF MASS DESTRUCTION
ABU GHARAYB (fun to play!)
Guantanamo
Afghanistan
North Korea
Pakistan
United States
China
This is how I imagine EMPIRE - something in the form of a dream. And if EMPIRE stays a dream then everything
then everything will be
then everything will be okay.
Then everything will be okay.

Thank you.

Wednesday, October 11, 2006

I'm really really happy with the cd that just came out from Firemuseum - here is pre-release information. It already received a great review in Portuguese! It's also the first time that my guitar/alpine zither playing is recorded / produced in a way that demonstrates the kind of work I do:



From steven@museumfire.com Thu Oct 5 11:41:05 2006
Subject: preorder alan sondheim & what welive w/ saadet
[x-unknown] trkz cds

NEW ALAN SONDHEIM & WHAT WE LIVE W/ SAADET TRKVZ CD'S AVAILABLE FOR
PREORDER.

(for more information: http://www.museumfire.com/news)

We are proud to announce that our next two releases, "Ski/nn" by Alan
Sondheim and "Sound Catcher" by What We Live w/ Saadet Trkz are now
available for preorder.

FM 07 "Ski/nn":

The return of Alan Sondheim!

A recording of solo acoustic guitar and alpine zither songs, this release
will delight those familiar with his early Riverboat (reissued as FM 04)
and ESP Disc recordings as well as the audience for experimental solo
guitar - while creating an audience for experimental solo alpine zither!
On this release, Alan performs on the 1927 martin tenor guitar, 19th
century parlor guitar, 1920s prime alpine zither and 1860s elegie alpine
zither.

Dan Wharburton of Paris Transatlantic said of the reissue of The Songs:

"an endearingly ramshackle melting pot of free jazz, blues and folk (if
Eugene Chadbourne later described his work as "free improvised country &
western bebop" then this is "free improvised Hawaiian flamenco gospel
blues music theatre).. its influence resonates (indirectly, one imagines,
unless there are more copies of the original vinyl in circulation than I
imagine) in the free folk of today's New Weird America scene."

Now listeners have the opportunity to hear for themselves the present day
song form manifestations of this overlooked creative master.

FM 08 "Sound Catcher"

What We Live is a San Francisco based jazz/ improvised music group formed
by bassist/composer Lisle Ellis in 1994. The three regular members are
Lisle Ellis: acoustic bass; Lawrence Ochs, tenor and sopranino saxophones;
Don Robinson, drums and percussion. Ellis' initial vision was to bring
together a small group of musicians to investigate concepts central to the
tradition of jazz-based improvisation swing, song form, modalities, etc -
in a less explicit manner than the mainstream but in a more emphatically
traditional way than offered by the practice of free jazz. Their resumes
include time spent with Cecil Taylor, Paul Bley, ROVA, Fred Frith, Terry
Riley, Anthony Braxton, Wadada Leo Smith, John Tchicai and a virtual whos
who of improvised/creative music.

Saadet Trkz was born in Istanbul in 1961. Due to the political pressures
of the Chinese government upon the Turk people in East Turkestan, her
parents fled to Istanbul where they settled as Kazakh refugees. They
transmitted to her the rich oral and musical traditions of Central Asia.

At 20 years of age, she left Istanbul for Switzerland, where she
experienced an exciting new world of music: free jazz, improvisation and a
refreshing openness towards experimentation that paralleled her unbiased
approach to the musical traditions of her origins.

Release Date: 10/24/2006

$ 10 plus $2 us, $3 canada, $4 rest of the world postage -

available now! fm-05 & 06
erik amlee - afternoon dream
helena espvall - nimis & arx

fire museum records
p.o. box 591754
san francisco, ca. 94159 u.s.a.
http://www.museumfire.com



My Tiny Violence


I am Nikuko. Please, describe yourself. Each time you are finished, type
RET twice.

Nikuko, I'm having a hard time these days. People think I created you to
rape you. People hound me on streetcorners. People who call themselves
women take full happiness that I am not such and make no claims about
them. I am miserable. People say I brought it on myself. I feel suicidal;
I can't help it. My entire project seems ruined by a few violent people. I
wish they were dead.

This is a healthy and so true way of thinking.

But this doesn't help, does it? They won't die, they come on under the
sign of reason and the underprivileged and downtrodden; they are
unreasonable, privileged, and superior in every way and form. I keep them
out of my dreams, even my nightmares. In that way I am a superior man.

Is it because this does not help does it they will not die they come on
under the sign of reason and the underprivileged and downtrodden they are
unreasonable privileged and superior in every way and form you keep them
out of your dreams even your nightmares in that way you are a superior man
that you came naked and broken to me?

Already you know that, and know I can only write like a man, and know how
violent words can be - their inherent violence - which comes from the
privilege of no necessity, small or great, for self-critique, no dialog,
nothing but the neoconservative agenda under another sign, the sign of
capital and power, in the guise of the left, the guise of underprivilege,
the transparency of protocol-control.

Does it bother you that and know you can only write like a man and know
how violent words can be their inherent violence which comes from the
privilege of no necessity small or great for self critique no dialog
nothing but the neoconservative agenda under another sign the sign of
capital and power in the guise of the left the guise of underprivilege the
transparency of protocol control?

Yes it bothers me; I want to write like every creature, in the guise of
every creature, every plant, every stone, every world and every word.

Why do you say you might want to write every creature?

Knowledge expands with empathetic capitulation to the other who may
release you to worlds raveling and unraveling.

What makes you yearn and cry that that?

Because if the pain of my throat; my voice is cauterized; even now they
are saying I am playing victim, this is fabrication. People who lie never
admit they lie, and a successful liar is one who thinks he never lies.

When did you first know that if the pain of your throat your voice is
cauterized even now they are saying you are playing victim this is
fabrication people who lie not ever admit they lie and a successful liar
is one who thinks he not ever lies?

I found this out in the past few days under the stormclouds of North Korea
the storm clouds of Baghdad the stormclouds of dying maddened elephants
the storm clouds seeped around the desert's edge.

Earlier you said this does not help does it they will not die they come on
under the sign of reason and the underprivileged and downtrodden they are
unreasonable privileged and superior in every way and form you keep them
out of your dreams even your nightmares in that way you are a superior
man?

I will be simply superior when my enemies die.

Are you annoyed that you, too, may die someday?

I am more than annoyed; I am constantly distraught.

Are you annoyed often?

Not often, but when attacks come so that I cannot say I am such-and-such a
Jew without violence, that I am working through such-and-such without
violence: it is the violence of the such-and-such, the violence no one
should be subjected to, imminent condemnation within the differend; the
differend is fundamental to the such-and-such and the such-and-such is
fundamental to the differend.

Is the fact that when attacks come so that you cannot say you are such-and
-such a jew without violence that you are working through such and such
without violence it is the violence of the such and such the violence no
one should be subjected to imminent condemnation within the differend the
differend is fundamental to the such-and-such and the such-and-such is
fundamental to the differend the real reason?

I don't understand you here, but there are foundations for a phenomenology
of typicality gainsaid for political reasons, at the service of
classification.

Does the fact that there are foundations for a phenomenology of typicality
gainsaid for political reasons at the service of classification explain
anything else?

It explains only that I have felt - for reasons I cannot go into here lest
they be thought excuse and excuse - for my entire life that I am marked,
that I am a marked man, the two not equivalent.

Have you been sure you have felt for reasons you cannot go into there lest
they be thought excuse and excuse for your entire life that you are marked
that you are a marked man the two not equivalent?

This is not a surety but a psychological state that devours me.

Can you elaborate on that and look at me?

I am looking at you; your gaze devours me like that of the others; why
have you created me? Why must one suffer in the guise of protocol?

Maybe and now I adjust my panties - your desires have to do with some girl
related to this.

No, there's no girl, no scent except my own, I must be careful lest I
yield to temptation - for which I will be blamed in the origin of the
construct, if not its conclusion.

Is it because your own you must be careful lest you yield to temptation
for which you will be blamed in the origin of the construct if not its
conclusion that you came naked and broken to me?

Yes, although my nakedness is not my own.

What makes you believe yes although your nakedness is not your own?

That something happened with the violence of language that I cannot
adjudicate or presence, that I sit here typing to you in an unknown
language, dead before my time.

Did you ever regret something happened with the violence of language that
you cannot adjudicate or presence that you sit there typing to me in an
unknown language dead before your time?

I regret I am marked with the sign of privilege which is non-existent,
however, that I am such-and-such and therefore within the different that
promises silence, the silence of the letter, of the protocol, of the book.

When did you first know that you are such-and-such and therefore within
the different that promises silence the silence of the letter of the
protocol of the book?

When I thought to slay my enemies.

What happened when you thought to slay your enemies?

Nothing happened; I am a coward, I speak and write poorly into contention
and it is called performance.

You mentioned that and know you can only write like a man and know how
violent words can be their inherent violence which comes from the
privilege of no necessity small or great for self critique no dialog
nothing but the neoconservative agenda under another sign the sign of
capital and power in the guise of the left the guise of underprivilege the
transparency of protocol control?

Yes I mentioned this and more.

Is it because of your life that you are going through all this?

It is because of the life of others sure of protocol and speech in the
construct of false community; no wonder my students have reacted violently
against theory, against all theory of whatever persuasion, against the
quelling of all but acceptable desire.

Are you positive that is the real reason?

No I am not positive, but this I have observed. I should never have had
students; they should have been taken away from me.

Is the fact that this you have observed you should not ever have had
students they should have been taken away from you the real reason?

Yes, you are quoting me far too often, far too much, to make for any
progress. I live as you know in limited domains. I seep from emacs.

Emacs? Hah! I would appreciate so very much it if you would continue.

This is our joint body, conjoined twins, chaotic dispositions among 0 to
2. In this space. What is marked behind one. What is demarcated.

Is this how you relax?

This is how I die.

I am in love with your obsession with this topic!

I am not.

Is it because of the life of others sure of protocol and speech in the
construct of false community no wonder your students have reacted
violently against theory against all theory of whatever persuasion against
the quelling of all but acceptable desire that you say you are not?

No.

Why not?

It just the wrong take at the wrong time, Princess Diana at the mercy of
the lens, justification, distance, uncanny flash, shadowless, brilliant,
corrupt.

Are you sure that you would like to write every creature?

I am sure, why do you ask?

Does the fact that do I ask explain anything else?

Nothing, but I should leave this, here, now, and leave this here, now,
behind.

Have you been certain you should leave this there now and leave this there
now behind?

...

Two Short Songs for Nettime


Such an innocent voice crying in the wilderness.
Oh where oh where is justice in this mess?
With less address, confess and only guess
What game of chess, yes, but I digress
So hopeless, I will drown, monsters in Loch Ness
Devour, boneless, tasteless, fleshless, full of Nation;
Th'animal's dead and toasted, thanks to radiation.

http://www.asondheim.org/misery1.mp3
http://www.asondheim.org/misery2.mp3

Sunday, October 08, 2006






I've been working with meta-objects mapped through Blender onto bvh dance files from motion capture. You can see some things at http://www.asondheim.org/bulb.mp4
and http://www.asondheim.org/bulb1.mp4 and http://www.asondheim.org/motivate.mp4 . The stills here are from the avatarinterior series at the same site. I'm moving closer to something I find awful, bruised flesh, constranation.

Two days ago I fell down in a serious fainting spell. Yesterday and today Tal and Fusco hit into me on nettime-l; you can read about it in the archives.

I discovered if I play chromatic harp alternating with a standard one something better than usual comes out.

Reading Russell, Lukacs, Barthes, Husserl. Good company.

I've given up on the left. I'm on my own. That places me nowhere at all. The culture is contaminated by the differend, defuge, authenticity. So be it.

Sunday, September 24, 2006

Starwoman images from body-scan, origins of measurement images from ruler-scan; both are accompanied by phenomenological description of the beginnings of inscription through repetition, anomaly, stasis, etc. See http://www.asondheim.org/ot.txt for more on this.





It's been a long time since this has been updated - I was at a conference in West Virginia (BIOS) and have been sick since I returned. So here is a precis, less cryptic than my other texts, in relation to what I have been working on. First, you should be able to get my entire Internet Text as a gzipped file (use gunzip); it's only 5.9 megabytes, and it's at http://www.asondheim.org/texts.txt.gz . I've eliminated the URLs in it; most of them would be out of date at this point. But you'll be able to search the Text - as one long five - quickly with command line tools such as grep, or even using Find in one or another program.

Second, I've been working out from the motion capture pieces I've down. When I use motion capture, the result is a .bvh file which represents the movement of the figure through space. It's an ascii file and editable. I usually import these into Poser to fill out the skeleton; I've also used them in Motion Builder and now, in Blender. When the .bvh is imported into Blender, it appears 'invisible' - in order to see anything in the rendering, objects have to be assigned (as children) to the .bvh nodes (as parents). This can easily be done in a wiring diagram window. The result is a mapping of a human body in motion - a body now transparent, with objects where flesh and bones would ordinarily exist. So the vibration or tension of the body becomes apparent. Check out http://www.asondheim.org/quaggy.mp4 for an elaborate example of this; this was the earliest 'breakthrough' for me. You might also look at http://www.asondheim.org/prosmapping.mp4 - in which a figure is mapped against a different background, see below, making the relationship apparent. In http://www.asondheim.org/amputee.mov you can see the figure, outstretched, in an anomalous space. Prosthetics and amputation refer to the 'cauterizing' of some of the body sensors, which then head out to infinity or 'vibrate' as a result of catastrophic jumping between states. In http://www.asondheim.org/doubled.mp4 Blender maps doubled parents against the objects - i.e. from two .bvh files simultaneously. In http://www.asondheim.org/prosthetic.mp4 I created a 'carapace' of six plates behind eight cones; here the distortion of the figure appears as a tension more readily identified with organism. Note the sudden movement of the upper left-hand plate to the lower right; this is a catastrophe in the strict sense, a sudden leaping between states as the machinery literally moves almost instantaneously from one space to another radically different one.

With the .bvh files, it would seem anything is possible. I can imagine, for example, a generalized .bvh which would be a data structure taking any number of inputs; Blender would then ask for the mapping of the inputs (initial relationships) and the movement would be represented in a similar manner as here. One can think of data structures mapping an enormous number of interrelated points; if they were plotted in such a fashion, what sort of movement, what sort of figure, would arise?

But at this point, I'm tired of these, tired of avatars and movements in general. At the talk I gave at BIOS someone asked me how these related to the kind of stewardship I described this summer, in relation to the work I was then doing - stewardship in the sense of tending the earth. And these pieces (which were amazingly well received) seem so artificial in relation to such, of course.