Watching TV right now. Bionic Woman to be precise. Watched an episode of Big Shots, Dirty Sexy Money and Carpool. Maybe another show can’t remember. One thing that struck me was the title of Big Shots. Similar to Shoot ‘Em up, Scary Movie 1-4. Is Bionic Woman now referencing The Matrix, when Neo tried to jump to the other skyscraper? Or is that just me frame of reference. Was the Matrix referencing something else? Funny how the evil bionic is blonde and the good one is a brunette. Betty and Veronica all over again. Who is Archie? Jughead?
But back to my point about the titles. The show Big Shots is about big shots. Scary Movie is about scary movies, Carpool is about 4 men who are a carpool. And Shoot ‘Em Up is an action flick. By using the type of movie it is to identify the movie strips of any identity, well maybe that is the wrong word, but something is lost. Identity in that the movie is not named for itself but for a whole genre. This just shows that the film is nothing but a study of that genre but not a creation using that genre as a vehicle for an idea beyond the genre. What Gone with the Wind had been called Love Story (oh, wait, there is movie called that)? How ironic, the po-moness of it all.
People just want a certain slot in their sensory perception filled; jack me in and fill it up. What was that thought? Maybe it will come back to me later.
Tom Cruise is Nuts
Tom Cruise is nuts. He is building a bunker to protect his family against Xenu. Weird, yes, but any different than red heifers and the apocalypse? Or circumcision and Kolob? or transubstantiation (which if you think about it is cannibalism)? Why do we consider Tom Cruise a whack job (or am I the only one?) for worrying about an evil cosmic ruler bent on revenge but think its sane to go to a big stone building and pretend to eat and drink the blood of someone who died but then came back to life?
Jack Handey’s Evil Twin
Whenever I am leaving a bookstore or an elevator and someone else is walking in, I like to fart. This way the person who walked by me can have a little experience of me and meet me even if they don’t know that they just met me.
Crack in the 880 South
I have been living in the Bay Area now for about 5 years. Not sure when I noticed this, but there is a long crack in the 880 South in Oakland. I do not know how long this crack has been there, but I freaks me out. Why is there a crack in the freeway? Why is nothing being done about the crack? Yes, it is on a very busy stretch of freeway so it is difficult to repair it, but that is precisely why the crack should be repaired.
Has anyone else noticed this crack? Is anyone else worried about? I emailed the Governator, both senators, Barbara Lee (who speaks for me), NBC, ABC, FOX News, the SF Chronicle, the Oakland Tribune about this with a link to the video I made and put on YouTube.
Repairs needed on the infrastructure in this country will cost $1.7 trillion (saw that on the web somewhere, can’t find it now).
Bruce Nauman is a Contact Dancer
Body Pressure
Press as much of the front surface of your body (palms in or out, left cheek or right cheek) against the wall as possible.
Press very hard and concentrate.
Form an image of yourself (suppose you had just stepped forward) on the opposite side of the wall pressing back against the wall very hard.
Press very hard and concentrate on the image pressing very hard.
(the image of pressing very hard)
Press your front surface and back surface toward each other and begin to ignore or block the thickness of the wall. (remove the wall)
Think how various parts of your body press against the wall; which parts touch and which do not.
Consider the parts of your back which press against the wall; press hard and feel how the front and back of your body press together.
Concentrate on the tension in the muscles, pain where bones meet, fleshy deformations that occur under pressure; consider body hair, perspiration, odors (smells).
This may become a very erotic exercise.
© Bruce Nauman 1974
Royalty
Europe has/had royalty. The US does/did not. Whether or not the Bushes/Gores/DuPonts etc are royalty is another topic. Royalty has a history of supporting the arts. Has the state in Europe replaced royalty in terms of art funding? Is the reason the US has such a poor record for funding the arts because the US never had royalty?
Culture vs. Entertainment
Something I wrote a while back, Jan 25th 2005, and was thinking about again recently…
“…leads into my questions of audience. Why are they here? Entertainment, investigation expectation? Do they want to be challenged? If your expectations are not met then do you feel disappointment? But then if you as audience have expectations do we (the performers) need to be there? The audience could pay their money and just sit there and imagine the whole thing.
To be simplistic about it, there are two types of audience members. Those who go to a show with a certain amount of or with expectations. And there are those who go to a show with no expectations at all. But if you have ever seen an artist’s work before, it is impossible to go to their show and not have some expectations of what the show will be like. That is why people go back and see certain artist’s work again. The previous experience was satisfactory in some manner. The audience enjoyed themselves on some level.
This brings in the question of enjoyment. Do you enjoy having your expectations met? or contradicted/contrasted? Do you want your world view challenged or reaffirmed? Do you want recognizable elements, quotidian events re/arranged related in a suprising manner? Do you want to see something completely unrecognizeable that you cannot relate to at all? Do you come here to be offended? Do you come here for cultural edification? Or is it pure sensational masturbation?
Some might say that the opera, the ballet, the symphony are signs or events of high culture. Of higher value than a baseball game, a monster truck rally, or a wet T-shirt contest. But not the events in and of themselves are important but how the audience members relate to the event is important; is what makes them of cultural import. At the truck rally, people go to hear the roar of the engines, the smashing of the cars to see the huge trucks fly through the air and land or flop over.
At the ballet people go to hear the orchestra and see the lithe ballerina fly through the air and land in the arms of her partner. But @ either event the audience knows what is going to happen. They know the elements that make up the spectacle. They, the audience, are there to satisfy a certain desire, to fulfill an expectation. What would be more of a cultural event is is the typical ballet audience member went to the truck rally and the Nascar Dad went to the Lincoln Center to see the American Ballet Theater retrospective etc. Does the audience want to hide?”
My main point of something being cultural or not is the relationship between the audience and the material. If the audience is going for fulfillment then all events are of the same cultural value – sensational masturbation as I wrote above. If the audience is going to expand its horizons, that is culture.”
Homeland Security…
Fighting Terrorism since 1492.
Yes, I agree with the sentiment of the T-Shirt. Or do I? What is the meaning behind the shirt? Maybe I do not fully understand it. The only people I see wearing this shirt have been Caucasians, white folks. So are they saying that they support the Native American Homeland Security that encountered Columbus in 1492? If so, what are these white people still doing in the USA? Go back to Europe then. Are these white people saying that they want to be kicked out of the United States? Or are they saying that Homeland Security is a joke, cuz look how successful Native Americans were at keeping out the white man, so we should not bother with Homeland Security now?
Seems like knee jerk liberalism to me. It contains pictures of Native Americans, has words associated with GWB & Co, must be a good thing. Funny to see mself write that-knee jerk liberal, being a liberal and all. Also could be that I am missing the point. If so, please tell me.