{events} – { feuilleton }

Weekend links 747

Eden Flag with Solar-Anal Emblems and Hexes (2017) by Elijah Burgher.

• A note for regular readers that I’ll be in London for a couple of days next week, so the weekend post may be delayed by a day, if it arrives at all. I’ll be attending this event at The Century Club, Shaftsbury Avenue, a talk about The Moon and Serpent Bumper Book of Magic which will be published here and in the USA a few days from now. I’m told that copies of the book will be on sale if anyone wishes me to sign a copy.

• “Published two years before André Breton’s Manifeste du surréalisme (1924), which delineated the contours of the capital-S Surrealism movement, Les Malheurs represents a proto-Surrealist experiment par excellence.” Daisy Sainsbury on Les Malheurs des immortels (1922) by Paul Éluard and Max Ernst.

• “It has been two decades since Japan’s tidying boom began, and the nation remains as cluttered as ever. I know this because I live here.” Matt Alt in a long read exploring the Japanese cultivation of clutter. Don’t be shamed by minimalist interiors.

…with the Bumper Book, we wanted to present what we hope are lucid, coherent and joined-up ideas on how and why the concept of magic originated and developed over the millennia, a theoretical basis for how it might conceivably work along with suggestions as to how it might practically be employed—and, perhaps most radically, a social reason for magic’s existence as a means of transforming and improving both our individual worlds, and the greater human world of which we are components. And we wanted to deliver this in a way that reflected the colourful, psychedelic, profound and sometimes very funny nature of the magical experience itself. That, we felt, would be the biggest and most useful rabbit to pull out of the near-infinite top hat that we believe magic to be.

Alan Moore talking to Rob Salkowitz about the Moon and Serpent Bumper Book of Magic

• “When it comes to pure cinematic terror The Texas Chain Saw Massacre has no equal,” says Mat Colegate. I’d avoid being quite so definitive but it’s a film I’d put in a list of my favourite cinematic horrors.

• At Smithsonian Magazine: See 15 winning images from the Wildlife Photographer of the Year contest.

• At The Quietus: Lara Rix-Martin on the heavy existentialism of Soviet science fiction. Previously: Zone music.

• New music: Decimation Of I by Meemo Comma.

• Steven Heller’s font of the month is Exentrica.

• Hex (1971) by Gil Mellé | Hex (1978) by Jon Hassell | Hexden Channel (2012) by Pye Corner Audio

Tomita’s Mind of the Universe

In the week that celebrates the 50th anniversary of the Apollo 11 mission to the Moon here’s a cosmic flashback from 1984. (I wrote about my own memories of the Apollo era in July, 2009.)

Mind Of The Universe was an ambitious outdoor performance of music by Isao Tomita for the annual Ars Electronic Festival in Linz, Austria. I’d known about this event ever since the release of the subsequent live album, and always wondered if there was more of a visual record than the one or two short clips to be found on YouTube. This 65-minute documentary from NHK TV was made following Tomita’s death in 2016, and features a much longer recording of the concert, together with a look at the preparations undertaken by the composer and his Japanese team. The documentary is in Japanese throughout, but I’ve had Tomita’s albums on continual play for the past couple of weeks so it was a welcome discovery. The Linz footage is bracketed by a short studio discussion of Tomita’s work and the concert itself with two of his assistants, Hideki Matsutake and Akira Senju. Matsutake is better known for his programming work with Yellow Magic Orchestra, and his own albums under the name Logic System, but he began working with synthesizers as Tomita’s studio assistant in the 1970s; Senju is a composer of anime soundtracks. The documentary includes some all-too-brief film footage of Tomita’s studio in 1974, and a sequence (with Tomita-san on a motorbike!) concerning the Dawn Chorus (1984) album which incorporated recordings of the electromagnetic “Dawn Chorus” phenomenon.

Part of Tomita’s Moog system, the backbone of his early electronic recordings.

Mind Of The Universe (or Tomita’s Universum as it was advertised to the citizens of Linz) comprised a nocturnal performance spanning the River Danube, with Tomita combining some of his earlier recordings with new pieces created for the event, including an extract from Stravinsky’s Rite of Spring. This was conducted by the maestro and assistants from within a transparent pyramid suspended by crane on the river bank. Speakers were positioned on both banks of the river, and there was a lavish lightshow with fireworks and lasers, all of which was somehow meant to depict the entire history of the Universe, from Big Bang to the present moment.

Discussing Dawn Chorus, and a visit to a radio telescope.

If this wasn’t ambitious enough, Tomita had musicians and a choir floating on boats and platforms in the river: Goro Yamaguchi played a traditional Japanese piece on shakuhachi while seated in a perilously small craft being towed behind a larger vessel; the bigger boat provided a stage for violinist Mariko Senju whose excellent performance of Vaughan Williams’ The Lark Ascending is the musical highlight of the concert. This was followed by a violin rendition of the five-note motif from Close Encounters of the Third Kind, a nod to Tomita’s UFO-themed Bermuda Triangle album, which introduced one of the less successful aspects of the event in the noisy arrival of a helicopter bearing a platform laden with lights and speakers. The helicopter provided the booming response of the Close Encounters mothership although this isn’t obvious on the live album where all you have is the music and the noise of the rotors. Tomita’s concept of “pyramid sound” is more evident in the TV documentary than on record.

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Alice’s Adventures in the Horse Hospital

A few snapshots of the exhibits from Wednesday’s sold-out event at the Horse Hospital, Bloomsbury, London. As noted here before, the impetus for the event was Paul Guest’s printing of my series of psychedelic Alice pictures (above) as blotter prints, sheets of blotting paper having been a common medium for the delivery of LSD doses in the late 60s and 1970s. Since my pictures are relatively small and only filled out one of the walls the rest of the exhibition space was filled with Alice art of a similar tone. The opposite wall also featured a variety of fascinating period artefacts from The Psychedelic Museum, including a few original (and rare) blotter sheets. My time was taken up preparing for the discussion so I wasn’t as diligent as I usually try to be in documenting all the artists involved.

The discussion itself went really well. The audience was receptive and small enough to be easily communicable, while the talk never strayed too far from the subject at hand. My thanks to my fellow participants—Nikki Wyrd, Jake Fior, Sophia Satchell-Baeza and Andy Roberts—and huge thanks to Vyvy and John and the rest of the Horse Hospital staff for making the event run so smoothly.

The exhibition continues through to Saturday (Feb. 4th), noon to 6pm; entry is free. My blotter prints will remain on sale at the exhibition, and they can also be ordered from Paul at Blotterart.biz, either as single prints or a collected set of 12. For serious collectors the set of 12 will be available as a boxed edition of signed and numbered prints (limited to 100 sets) with a lid design adapted from my 2010 Alice calendar. I should note that the print quality is excellent, and web reproduction doesn’t do justice to the colour or the detail.

Continue reading “Alice’s Adventures in the Horse Hospital”

Exhibitionism

Art by Enki Bilal.

My work is featured in two very different exhibitions over the next few weeks, so different, in fact, that they’re almost at opposite poles to each other.

Hard Core Horror 5 (1990).

The first, Shoah et bande dessinée, takes place at Mémorial de la Shoah, Paris, and opens on 19th January. This is an exhibition of comic-book art dealing with the Holocaust, and will include three of my pages from the death-camp scenes in the final issue of the Lord Horror series, Hard Core Horror (created with David Britton in 1990, and published by Savoy). This is one instance where the term “comic” is particularly inappropriate, unlike the more neutral French designation, bande dessinée. I haven’t yet seen a list of all the other artists being represented but I was very pleased to see a drawing by Enki Bilal being used to promote the event. Bilal was one of several French comic artists whose work I discovered in the pages of Heavy Metal/Metal Hurlant in the 1970s, and it was the example of the artists there that kept me interested enough in the comics medium to attempt something of my own a few years later. The exhibition will run until 30th October, 2017, and will feature a printed catalogue.

The second event, Alice’s Adventures in the Underground, has already been mentioned here, and takes place at the Horse Hospital, London, at the beginning of February:

“Feed your head…” An evening discourse on all things Wonderland, with John Coulthart, Andy Roberts, Nikki Wyrd and Jake Fior (facilitator).

This event marks the opening of a three day exhibition hosted by the Horse Hospital, featuring John Coulthart’s psychedelia-themed ‘Alice’ artwork, printed for the first time as (drug-free) blotter art. John’s depictions of the twelve chapters of ‘Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland’ view the 1860s through the iridescent lens of the 1960s; Victoriana refracted through a psychedelic prism. Come along for a discussion of the links between psychedelic art and music, and the persistent fascination of Lewis Carroll’s books. There will be talk of many things, not only cabbages and kings, but far more than you can possibly imagine before breakfast. Signed blotter prints will be on sale.

Psychedelic artists – particularly in the 60s – and many other outsider creative types (before and since that influential decade), have drawn their inspiration from the well of imagery found within the ‘Alice’ books. As well as John’s artwork, there will be Alice themed creations by other artists on show. In addition, the Psychedelic Museum will be holding its second pop-up museum display, with particular focus on the 60s counterculture.

This show came about after an offer from Paul at Blotter Art to produce a series of blotter prints from my psychedelic Alice series. The first set of sheets are shown here, and I’m very pleased with the print quality after having been a little worried that the paper might not reproduce the colour and detail to the best effect. As noted above, signed sheets will be on sale (either as singles or a series of 12) during the event and afterwards via the Blotter Art website. People often ask about signed prints but most of my print sales are through CafePress which doesn’t allow this; so here’s a rare opportunity to get something spoiled by my signature. In addition to my work there should be Alice-themed art by other artists filling out the space. This exhibition will run to 4th February. I’m looking forward to it.

Alice’s Adventures in the Underground: Feed Your Head

My work will appear in two exhibitions in the new year. The first hasn’t been announced yet so this post concerns the second event which will take place in London on 1st February:

“Feed your head…” An evening discourse on all things Wonderland, with John Coulthart, Andy Roberts, Nikki Wyrd and Jake Fior (facilitator).

This event marks the opening of a three day exhibition hosted by the Horse Hospital, featuring John Coulthart’s psychedelia-themed ‘Alice’ artwork, printed for the first time as (drug-free) blotter art. John’s depictions of the twelve chapters of ‘Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland’ view the 1860s through the iridescent lens of the 1960s; Victoriana refracted through a psychedelic prism. Come along for a discussion of the links between psychedelic art and music, and the persistent fascination of Lewis Carroll’s books. There will be talk of many things, not only cabbages and kings, but far more than you can possibly imagine before breakfast.

Signed blotter prints will be on sale.

Psychedelic artists – particularly in the 60s – and many other outsider creative types (before and since that influential decade), have drawn their inspiration from the well of imagery found within the ‘Alice’ books. As well as John’s artwork, there will be Alice themed creations by other artists on show. In addition, the Psychedelic Museum will be holding its second pop-up museum display, with particular focus on the 60s counterculture.

The event was suggested by Paul at Blotterart, a specialist in quality printing on the perforated blotting-paper sheets that used to be (and possibly still are) the commonest carrier for doses of LSD. My psychedelic take on the Lewis Carroll books was a reaction to the way in which psychedelic culture had adopted Alice and co. as part of the larger collision of childhood and Victoriana that was so prevalent at the end of the 1960s. So in that respect blotting sheets are a much more fitting medium for these pictures than the calendar pages they filled originally. As noted above, I’ll be talking about the artwork and related matters, and will also be on hand to sign things. I’ve been involved with a number of exhibitions recently but they’re not all as close to home as this one.

The Horse Hospital website has the ticket details. Those who can’t make it but are interested in the prints should know that they’ll be for sale online at some point. Further details will be posted here.

Previously on { feuilleton }
• Psychedelia and Other Colours by Rob Chapman
• LSD-25 by The Gamblers
• More trip texts
• Listen to the Colour of Your Dreams: Part Six
• Listen to the Colour of Your Dreams: Part Five
• Listen to the Colour of Your Dreams: Part Four
• Listen to the Colour of Your Dreams: Part Three
• Listen to the Colour of Your Dreams: Part Two
• Listen to the Colour of Your Dreams: Part One
• Trip texts
• Acid albums
• Acid covers
• Lyrical Substance Deliberated
• The Art of Tripping, a documentary by Storm Thorgerson
• What Is A Happening?
• My White Bicycle
• Ogdens’ Nut Gone Flake
• Tomorrow Never Knows
• Enter the Void
• In the Land of Retinal Delights
• Smashing Time
• The Dukes declare it’s 25 O’Clock!
• A splendid time is guaranteed for all
• The art of LSD
• Hep cats