Andre Breton

Louis Aragon

I'm reading Louis Aragon's Paris peasant. The first half of it is an extended description, with interludes, of the Passage de l'Opera, an arcade that contains the dadaist hangout the Cafe Certa:

To be sure, the word dada is understood rather differently at the Certa than elsewhere, and with a great deal more simplicity, too. Here, the word connotes neither anarchy nor anti-art nor any of the other things that so frightened the journalists* that they preferred to designate this movement by the name of Hobbyhorse. To be dada is no dishonour, it simply means a group of regular customers, a few young people, a bit boisterous at times, but likeable. One says : a dada, as one might say ; the fair-haired gentleman. One mark of identification is as good as another. Indeed, dada has become such an accepted term that there is even a dada cocktail here.

On the next page is reproduced:

Apparently, this list was 'surmounted by a placard advertising some drink whose name escapes me, a placard hand-painted by one of their former waiters in the style of Francis Picabia's mechanical pictures, but which vanished some time ago'.

Aragon, the cunt, neglects to record for posterity the recipe for the dada cocktail.

The asterisk on the word 'journalists' in the quote above leads to this footnote:

*I shall have passed through this world with a few people all graced with a quality of absolute purity, that same purity you may have had the fortune to glimpse in the sky one summer evening (Andre Breton, for example) scorned, insulted, spat upon. But if one day my words become sacred – they are already – then let my laughter echo back from far away. My words will never serve your miserable ends, you who thought to sneer at us, filthy creatures. And when I say journalist I always mean scum. To hell with you at L'Intran, Comoedia, L'Oeuvre, Les Nouvelles Litteraires, etc, morons, creeps, bastards, swine. All of you, without exception : glabrous bugs, bearded lice, burrowing your way into reviews, into dubious publications of all sorts, you'll get what's coming to you in the end. It all stinks. Ink. Squashed cockroach. Shit. Death to all you who live off the lives of others, off their loves, their boredoms. Death to those whose hand is pierced by a pen, death to those who paraphrase what I say.

Some pics

Something in Auckland to go to

People

There are very few people I like. Most of you are scum.

I much prefer animals.

It was quite interesting when I went mad, the ones I could rely on and the ones I couldn't. A valuable lesson.

It doesn't matter where you come from, and it's not about what you're doing to improve the world. Ha! Improve the world.

The world can go fuck itself as far as I'm concerned. Oh, that's right, it is.

Raoul Vaneigem categorised it well. In feudal times, there were masters and slaves. After that, we should have had masters without slaves. Instead, we've got slaves without masters.

Human history is so fucking ridiculous. What a lame-arse species we are. Can't work anything out.

When everything's stupid and absurd, when everything's so fucked, what're you going to do, motherfuckers?

Have some fucking fun.

It's not that hard.

Cunts.

I can't believe I forgot this

A friend sent me a link to an article about how Massey has been ranked as the worst university in the country.

They do have a point about it being a tad unfair. However, it's very funny and very gratifying.

Useless qualification from the worst university! All right!

And a bonus, just for laughs

The readings

...assuming you can read them – and work out where the first one begins and finishes.

Seminar

Last week, we had a pretend crit as preparation for the real one next week.

The next day, I had to give a seminar for the theory class. I was up second, but the guy who was meant to go first was so disorganised that he had to reschedule.

For the seminar, you select three readings, formulate five questions about those readings, and then lead the discussion about them. I chose The Amorphist manifesto from 1913, The cacodylic eye from 1921, and a rather long but very readable article about the transition from Picabia's Amorphist paintings to his mechanomorphic ones.

It was a good thing the first guy was so useless. I was most of the way through the first two of the five questions when the tutor interrupted me to say that it'd been an hour already already. I was deeply shocked. It had seemed like about 20 minutes.

I rushed quickly through the rest of it, which was a shame, as we'd been having a good discussion, with almost everyone in the class getting stuck in. When we'd finished, the tutor, who'd been visibly twitching throughout the proceedings, asked me to respond to the criticisms of the avant-garde, particularly those of postmodernism.

I didn't laugh, tempting though it was.

Another funny comment

I've put the stupid comment moderation, cos I'm sick of deleting porn spam. However, this one's pretty funny:

Ihr habt eine schoene Webseite hier, und vielciht schaut Ihr euch auchmal meine an, ok Sex im Internet ist nicht jedermans Sache, aber eben meine erste Homepage. Danke und macht weiter so!

Actually, I'm not sure it's that funny, except it's in German, which always makes me laugh.

Best comment for a while

I'm at school in the middle of my crit right this very minute.

We're talking about this comment a lot:

No fuck you, you useless piece of shit whino art cunt. How exactly are you helping the fucking world out? By taking art at Massey? lol.
Eat shit in fire and die in a hail of frozen sewage you tiresome failbucket.

The intertemporal avant-garde is old fashioned anyway. :P

Something in Wellington to go to

You

You, you reading this, you lame-arse cunt, concerned with your professional life, your mediocre money-grubbing malaise, what are you doing with your life?

Look around you. The world is built on murder and everyday bloody pain. The 'food chain' – what a disgraceful term. And it describes the fucking world. And yet you eat your flesh while spouting your specious arguments.

And then there's society. The collection of human beings, an ant pit of striving ambition, ambition for what? Your petty desires are pathetic.

What do you live for?

What are you worth?

You fucking cunts. Fuck off.

You think you're into art? You think that makes it okay? You think you're a fucking exception?

You fucking cunts. Fuck off.

Fuck off.

Artists

Artists aren't good or bad, only friends or enemies.

Scott Walker vs Julian Cope

Last night's radio show was quite fun. It was neck and neck to the end, which was judged a draw.

You can download the podcast here.