David Jones, artist and poet (1895-1974) begins his PREFACE TO THE ANATHEMATA :

'I have made a heap of all that I could find.' (1) So wrote Nennius, or whoever composed the introductory matter to Historia Brittonum. He speaks of an 'inward wound' which was caused by the fear that certain things dear to him 'should be like smoke dissipated'. Further, he says, 'not trusting my own learning, which is none at all, but partly from writings and monuments of the ancient inhabitants of Britain, partly from the annals of the Romans and the chronicles of the sacred fathers, Isidore, Hieronymous, Prosper, Eusebius and from the histories of the Scots and Saxons although our enemies . . . I have lispingly put together this . . . about past transactions, that [this material] might not be trodden under foot'. (2)

(1) The actual words are coacervavi omne quod inveni, and occur in Prologue 2 to the Historia.
(2) Quoted from the translation of Prologue 1. See The Works of Gildas and Nennius, J.A.Giles, London 1841.


05 August 2009

Who else is with me?

.
Yesterday, the regard of proximate consciousness. In that dream, the mighty being came so close at one moment I drew back in trepidation.

This morning, looking at Andre Dias' cinema blog We have yet to start thinking, I saw again a familiar and similar image to that of my dream; but here the exchange is actually in the water/
consciousness and it is not going well. Klaus Kinski in Werner Herzog's Aguirre, the Wrath of God (1972) :


detail
A Person Looks At A Work Of Art/
someone looks at something ...

LOGOS/HA HA





"On November 26, 1965, Beuys put the hare into the leading role in an Action. The title: How to Explain Pictures to a Dead Hare. The place: Galerie Alfred Schmela, in Dusseldorf, a gallery that had commited itself early and strongly to Beuys and had done a great deal to promote his reputation. Beuys sat on a chair in one corner of the gallery, next to the entrance. He had poured honey over his head, to which he had then affixed fifty dollars worth of gold leaf. In his arms he cradled a dead hare, which he looked at steadfastly. Then he stood up, walked around the room holding the dead hare in his arms, and held it up close to the pictures on the walls; he seemed to be talking to it. Sometimes he broke off his tour and, still holding the dead creature, stepped over a withered fir tree that lay in the middle of the gallery. All this was done with indescribable tenderness and great concentration."

Heiner Stachelhaus, Joseph Beuys, Abbeville Press, New York, 1987, (Translated by David Britt) p.135
Several days ago another such image, one of a more equal regard, arrived in the mail: this poster, FACE TO FACE (2004), by Lindsey Kuhn of (as chance would have it) Swamp posters.

2004_Lindsey Kuhn_FACE TO FACE-400w
detail
A Person Looks At A Work Of Art/
someone looks at something ...

LOGOS/HA HA