beat poe et ree

and in the great hollow space that divides us we would make a birthday cake and drink to what would be if we could think any different, kerouac said always use the first thing, i think he got it from the jazz guys, they might play 20 takes but they would use the first take as long as it fit the criterea.  i don't think about kerouac that much and it's a long time since i read one of his books, the subtarraeneans and pic, two in one, reminds me now in retrospect of jim jarmusch, jims early stuff anyway.  it's hard to think of things to say all the time so every now and again it's good to feel the flow, better to wait and reap the rewards maybe.  maybe so maybe no.  spring again, i sign my works to the seasons, not sure if anyone else does that but i feel it's good to remind the masses to keep in contact with the natural flow in some form of concious and not just the subconcious, the allergies to pollen and turbelent weather that interrupts texting and pixting on the iphone.  so where are we at, i've been noticing a trend towards 4th dimensional paintings, a relapse back to surrealism, digs back to the past.  i'm going back to the start of this passage, maybe to find a way out, a way to end, a knot to tie the string, the little tree's on my table distract me and i have to shower so kick out the jams.

the nihon interchange

this post isn't completely about the current exchange between japan and melbourns art scenes, but it is a thread of something i've been noticing lately.

interest in japanese culture and exchanges between japan and other cultures has been going on for a while, it was known as japonism in france and influenced many the artists including picasso, matisse and others working in paris at the time.

melbourne has aways had a healthy exchange with japan, as it has also with many other countries, allowing for artists and other travellers to come and live and exchange their ideas with ours.

looking at some of the artists currently at work in melbourne esp the fitzroy areas shows this exchange is thriving, everfresh has had a few japanese artists this year and exponents of the japanese noise and improvisational scene have also been around.  and i also see a lot of japanese people around.

this can only be advantageous for our general arts community and hopefully spark some interesting developments.

interesting like the mini zen stone garden with mini rake for your office or study desk
or has that already been invented.

tune in next week to find out

explanations

in luc bessons - the last battle, the future is bleak.
sand has covered the earth, and only part of high buildings remain, covered in a vast desert, the remaining parts of towns remain populated by adults only.
surface water is contaminated and the only water can be found flowing out of deep underground.
women are kept captive by men.  the isolated settlements are centered around water locations.
the people no longer speak, they communicate with violence towards gaining water and territorial rights and control over the women.  in group situations an alpha leader controls the supplies of water and the women, keeping hold over the communities.
food supplies are dwindling canned food goods, human flesh and fish which rain from the sky during the deluges.

this was the future for luc besson in 1983, his first forage into the world of feature films.  It is filmed entirely in black and white with virtually no dialogue, the parts of dialogue portrayed being barely comprehendable.
luc was teamed with jean reno and pierrie jolivet -  actors who would together with besson and form an enduring working relationship.  ( leon {leon the professional} , the fifth element, le grand bleu.
Eric sierra, whom besson met in early 1980's composed the music for the film, music which seems drawn from this time, - blade runner had shown a year earlier and 1984 would see the premier of terminator.  The 70's were ending and the 80's had long begun, new generations stepped forward and new sounds evolved from the swansongs of the old.  besson chose black and white as the empty palate of which the graduations deduct little from the opposing forces of positive and negative, the yin and the yang, good and bad.  "is it real? is it a dream? is it a fairytale?" besson

in the early 1980's film critic and experimental film partisan raphael bassan coined the term 'cinema du look', of which besson and a few directors of the 1980's-1990's were part.  The term described them as a movement focusing more on style with a minimalist plot.  le denier combat would epitomize this, with its lack of verbal language and raw communication of survival and desires, desires for sex and water,survival and controll in a world with seemingly little else to focus.

besson grew up taking his material from comic books and many of his popular movies were developed from sketches made when he was still in his teens.  a monchrome style would be more than a passing fad, he would revisit this device in movies such as Angela, also set in the future.  A style that draws us in with its fantastic scenery, scenery that forms the escape from the suffocating reality of the future.

the post apocalyptic haze

so here we are survivors, - the haze and spread of the world post armageddon 2012.
what was supposed to happen, another cycle in the mayan calender of birth till death of a society.  one that will reccur in the next 52 years ( if your into following that kind of thing )
i suppose we must have ripped enough hearts out of people and fed them to the hungry sun.
still here amongst the same streets and the same tree's, still lined with oil fed autos. still cold in winter and warm in summer. there was no quick escape, no easy way out.  winter begins to creak under the lengthening days, the weather shifts and rolls as the cold systems find it harder to push up the continent.
the acacias are well into bloom, fortelling the sun to come.  hungry for hearts

666 and counting

so seeing as that i now have 666 page views i should dedicate to all you special people out there ticking over the bean counter to such a lucky number.
not that there should be any reason for anyone to visit as my browser does not seem to support blogger windows and indeed i will be suprised if this doesn't crash before i am able to upload it.  Wel not much happening anyway, have been out hunting for dwarve trees to make into bonsai.  weather in the deep south getting pretty wet and cold, time to watch movies and read all those books from the warmth of a low turnover cafe.
ha

nocturnes

when i 1st got to town, it felt like fitzroy was in the throes of it's final hours, the other day i felt like it's last breath whispered by.
Like the passing of anything that was held close there is a sadness but there is also the knowledge that with the passing of the old comes the place for the new.
the melting pot culture fired by numerous international sharehouses and cheaper accomodation, large parties incorporating many of these places and it's guests is gone, and unless a huge decentralization event occurs it will not recur.  It lasted while it could.
What it has been replaced by is room enough for another post if this browser will hold out long enough.
Institutions like everfresh born in the heart of this is only one of the many that developed out of the cultural exchange and creative possibility.  With the changing everfresh has moved to street related gallery shows though many of the original artists are still working with street commisions and works out there i wonder is any of the energy still present and passed on or is it a fading light, born again only when the spirit of a new atmosphere can purvey.
i don't go to their shows much and only rarely do i keep abreast of the local influx in international artists, it is simply too hard- a full time job to keep track of.
I am reading the street, hearing the fading words of the old guard and wondering as i walk.
Like the sometimes imperceptible change in the air on the cusp of seasons working their way before the cordial dates arrive the swansong felt to me long ago has passed and now what is to be can be realised.
How and what it can be time will only tell.