ANYTHING BUT HUMAN

SHAME (Rated R): short film review

2012-02-13T17:30:00.000+11:00

If you're a cinephile you would be aware of the 'say fuck me' line in David Lynch's 1990 film Wild at Heart and you would know that in this highly charged sexual encounter between Bobby Peru (Willem Defoe) and Lula Fortune (Laura Dern) Bobby attempts to seduce Lula, whilst simultaneously wanting her to beg for sex. It's a moment in which he needs to see that her vulnerability and desire is greater than his.

There's a similar scene in Shame (Steve McQueen, 2011) in which Brandon (Michael Fassbinder) attempts to seduce Carly, a young woman in a bar. When she looks across at her boyfriend, Brandon says: What? Are you with someone? Does he go down on you? I do..That’s what I like to do..' He places his hand under her skirt and says: 'I like the way it feels. I like the way it’s just me and it... I wanna taste you. I'd like to slip my tongue inside you.' When her boyfriend approaches Brandon he tells the boyfriend: 'I was just telling your pretty girlfriend here, that I’d like to fuck her in that tight pussy of hers... I mean bone her real hard til she’s clawing up my back... After I fuck her hard up the ass, I put my balls in her mouth while I come on her face'. He then shoves his fingers, covered with the odor of Carly's vagina into the boyfriends face. Suffice to say that the boyfriend attacks him after wards outside the bar.

His blase description of his brief conversation with Carly and his obvious lack of concern for her feelings or that of her boyfriend, returns us to earlier scene in which Brandon's confiscated office computer, now returned, was according to his coworker David - 'filthy...I mean, it is, it is, dirty. I’m talking like hoes, sluts, anal, double anal, penetration, inter racial facial, man. Cream pie. I don’t even know what that is'. He later tells Brandon that 'It takes areally really sick fuck to spendall day on that shit'. Michael may or may not be considered a 'sick fuck' for many people spend much of their leisure time trawling pornography sites and interacting sexually with others on line. I'm not sure if part of the message of the film was that face to face personal relationship may be destroyed by this kind of detached activity in which pleasuring yourself with or without the presence of another can be a lonely and soul destroying pursuit, however Michael does has an obsessive sexual addiction fed in part by magazines, computers and social network sites. He has an inability to become close to anyone. His sister Sissy (Carey Mulligan) appears to have the same affliction and they share some deep and dark past that is hinted at, but never really revealed. Indeed the scene in which Sissy sings 'New York, New York' is haunting beautiful and the connection between her and her brother's pain is revealed in one tear that rolls down Brandon's cheek as she sings. I was reminded of Rebekah del Rio's powerful Capella version of 'Llorando' - Roy Orbison's "Crying" in Spanish at the Cafe Silencio in Mulholland Drive (David Lynch, 2001) and Isabella Rossellini's rendition of 'Blue Velvet' in the film of the same name (David Lynch,1986). In all these scenes the songs are related to sexual desire. This is a beautiful if not painful film with superb acting from all cast members. I saw it this morning at the Kino Cinema in Melbourne. A must see, not because of the vivid sex scenes, but because it acutely displays the anxieties experienced by those who are addicted to sex and feel the shame.

Martha Marcy May Marlene - short film review

2012-02-12T14:40:00.000+11:00

http://www.imdb.com/media/rm1329708288/tt1441326

You know the strange feeling that you have when your head is submerged in water; you’re either in the bath or in the sea. Your body is floating lightly and all exterior sounds are dulled to the point where you can no longer decipher what's being said. If you open your eyes forms in front and all around you are also distorted. Indeed, the world, at least for the time you are immersed has changed. Twice in Martha Marcy May Marlene (Sean Durkin, 2011) there are underwater scenes in which Martha’s body is distorted and this exemplifies her fragile psychology disturbed by haunting past events presented in flash-back sequences that tease us with perception and reality. This film, which had the potential to be better than it was relied upon a stylistic device that framed the scenes in wide-angel rather than close-up in order to create a feeling of unease, and it did that until it became familiar (and for me that was quite soon after the film began), which is not to say that this kind of camera work has no merit. It does. However, with all its good acting and stylistic cleverness the film fell short, not only because of its abrupt ending, which only reinforced what we already knew, that the main protagonist Martha (Elizabeth Olsen) was paranoid after absconding from an abusive hippy cult, but that the angst that she was obviously experiencing was never as intense as it might have been. One of the biggest problems I had with the film was the notion that her behavior was crazy – at one point she strips naked to swim in a lake and later lies down on the bed when her sister and brother-in-law are having sex - unconventional perhaps, but NOT crazy! One might expect given what she experienced in the two years with the cult that her demeanor might be more disruptive and shocking. Instead, her calm, almost detached persona appears to typify her total inculcation into cult ideas, such as ‘death is love’, that forced sex with the cult leader was ‘part of the cleansing’ and that she was ‘a teacher and a leader’. Whilst watching this film we can become vigilant about Martha’s deteriorating psychology when in fact the film painfully shows the coercive and destructive behavior of the male cult leader, mirrored in the actions of her brother-in-law who wants a certain amount of power over the women (his wife and Martha) who live ‘in his house and eat his food’. I saw this film earlier today at the Rivoli Cinema and believe that although some films suffer from being too lengthy, this film may have been improved by being extended from its 102 minutes.

Applause

2012-02-10T16:27:00.002+11:00

taking a bow

STELARC: Performance and sculpture at Lorne Sculpture Bienalle 2011

2012-02-10T07:24:00.002+11:00

http://stelarc.org/?catID=20319

This image of Stelarc lying prone on a large-scale sculpture of his Ear on Arm was part of a performance/sculpture display at the Lorne Sculpture Bienalle in 2011. It is one of the most beautiful and evocative images that Stelarc has produced so far in his career (photographed by Nina Sellars). The most recent photographs of his Ear on Arm also photographed by Sellars were rather detached images of the surgical procedure, devoid of passion or the ability to elicit pathos from the viewer, since the identity of the artist's body remained absent. However this performance reverts back to one of Stelarc's early works - Event for Clone Suspension (1982) when he made a plaster clone of his exterior body and metaphorically shed his skin.

Although Stelarc has been influenced by technological developments since the sixties, legacies from art historical periods pervade his work. The excesses associated with the Baroque, Futurism’s concern with depicting the speed and affect of technology, and Surrealist and Postmodern fragmentation of the human body. Stelarc’s work engages with human evolution, the redesign of the human body through advanced technologies, post-humanist philosophy, and aesthetics. His performances have dealt with the spatial and temporal aspects of the body in relation to machines, have highlighted the voluntary and involuntary actions of the human body, as well as the automatic and repetitive behavior of human and not human machines. More importantly his work raises questions about what it means to be human, at a time when the divide between the human and not human (machines and animals) have become increasingly blurred through advanced medical and computer technologies and the relationship between the human arm and technology.

Although Darren Tofts maintains Stelarc's body resembles some weird detritus washed up overnight; a strange visitation anticipated in the 1981 Seaside Suspension: Event for Wind and Waves in Jogashima, Japan. It is a figure literally and metaphorically writ large, a play of scale between a human body and a huge fragment of a body, whereby the artist’s arm is equivalent in size to a finger on its Leviathan avatar, I believe that this work highlights, more than anything else human vulnerability and is more Lazarus than Leviathan.

Stelarc's body is covered with what resembles Vernix caseosa, the white substance that covers a newborn's skin. Vernix is composed of sebum (the oil of the skin) and cells that have sloughed off the fetus' skin. So, not only is Stelarc making reference to the 'shedding of skin' of his early performance Event for Clone Suspension (1982), but also speaks of human evolution since all creatures arose from the primordial ocean mass. He embraces the monstrous, over-sized aberrant arm with ear to acknowledge that human evolution under the reign of biomedical technologies signals our development will involve not only random mutation, but intentional redesign of the human form, which will be totally dependent upon surgical/medical/technological intervention. However, it is Stelarc's silent nakedness that interests me for it is the body bereft of any masks (other than the thin white powdery coating) that suggests that this work, set against a watery background, is about birth, death and resurrection.

Stelarc’s body actually takes on the physical look of a sculpture. Smeared with white clay, he was for most of the performance, porcelain still. This insight reinforces in my mind the notion of him somehow being reborn or resurrected through an association with body sculpting (through cosmetic surgery/liposuction, tissue or genetic engineering) and his body’s proximity to the sea.

http://margartia.tumblr.com/post/134374909

Orlan's Holy Shroud (1993) - a reliquary, Blood and phototransfer on gauze from her 7th Surgical Operation Omnipresence (reproduced in Art and Text magazine 21 November, 1993) is reminiscent of the facial section of the Shroud of Turin posited as holding the image of Christ after the crucifixion.When cloth is wrapped around a corpse, various substances are expelled into the material, leaving traces of corporeal matter. In some ways the cloth becomes a body of evidence, in similar fashion to when traces of Stelarc's skin were left in the plaster cast from his body in 1982 and which would similarly be within the residue on his body in this 2011 performance.

So here, Stelarc, naked, vulnerable, his body supported by a man-made structure, closes his eyes to the world outside, instead to enter inward into another in which he encounters a sensual and soft surface. Concerned with aesthetics and affect, this artwork nonetheless speaks to our current concerns about the human in contemporary society.

Collisions: Julie Clarke + Mark McDean (February 2012)

2012-02-07T16:22:00.000+11:00

just a hint of Cashmere Bouquet. Julie Clarke 2012

Clutch purse with back flap was constructed from recycled cardboard and covered with fine Arches Rives paper. Overall it measures 12.5 X 11 cm. The vintage pearl earring clasp is held together with thin silver ribbon. On the front I've pasted two butterflies cut from a vintage Doily. I stained the pink and blue one using dye from boiled Heirloom purple carrots. The back flap contains a photograph of my maternal grandmother - Mary Anne Elizabeth Victoria Willoughby (1896-1975). I've pasted typed and handwritten text on the inside flap. Inside the purse I've placed one dried, blue hydrangea flower, similar to the ones my grandmother grew at the side of her house. I've dusted the dried flower with Cashmere Bouquet powder. It's the scent I associate with her more than anything else.

Back flap with photo of my grandmother.

Inside flap is typed text from my book Strange Blood Sport. Handwritten text is about the Great Depression.

What can I say about a life, my grandmother's life? I can only say what I observed. This homage of sorts appears insignificant to what she must have endured and what she thought her life might be when this photograph of her was taken five years prior to my birth. I can't believe that through the deep depression I've experienced whilst making this artwork that none of the darkness I felt within myself shows. All is light and pretty!

Thinking about the work, I feel its tactility is important, each surface - the rough and smooth, raised and even, shinny and matte finish, white and colored, bounce off one another & within the work is just a hint of Cashmere Bouquet.

Preying mantis

2012-02-07T07:33:00.002+11:00

This will be a quick post. On Friday I had three separate biopsies carried out on different parts of my body to remove aberrant skin growths. On Saturday morning I had an extreme vertigo event, whilst walking up to Kew Cemetery to take some photographs. An ambulance was called and the paramedics kindly took me home, because I did not want to be admitted to hospital for a vertiginous migraine. I stayed in most of the weekend, having dinner with a friend on Saturday and my son and his girlfriend over on Sunday. I'm waiting for Mark McDean to receive my latest artwork response and then I can post info here. Yesterday was rather ordinary. I had my dressings changed by a nurse and will have the sutures removed on Friday, when I receive the test results. I had a lovely email from Charles Strebor this morning who quoted a line from my little book Strange Blood Sport and said that it was 'just beautiful'. The line is: Somewhere in the gap between language and thought memories become sticky with other things. I've just checked the ten thousand word document and I've used the word sticky five times. I think I've found all the spelling and typographical errors in the document and so the next copies that I produce should be more perfect. Is there really such a thing as a perfect document? Anyway, I've been up since 5am and have yet to plan my day. If it is going to be eventful, I certainly hope that it is positive.

Here is a photograph of a Tenodera Australasiae - purple-winged preying mantis, that was on the glass partition at my place yesterday. When I first saw it I thought it was a stick insect, primarily because of its coloring. I apologize to friends on face book who would have already heard all of this.

Hope

2012-02-03T02:46:00.002+11:00

Jerking to a grinding salvo...

2012-01-30T07:11:00.000+11:00

I've been awake and up since 4.38 am this morning. It's been raining steadily all night and still gently falling. I've opened the windows and front door to let in the cool after yesterday's 35C degree heat. Every now and then I hear cicadas chirp, though I've never heard them make their mating sounds so early in the day. Perhaps too, they are relishing the crisp air. Ah! 5.42 am and the first Magpie call. Soon they will be demanding their daily bread. I wonder what it means if you have a dream of insects? I woke in the early hours to such a dream. Last night I watched This Is It a documentary-concert film of Michael Jackson's rehearsal and preparations for a concert series that never happened because he died on 25 June 2009. The dance sequences were absolutely amazing and Jackson both energetic and robotic with his hand on his crotch, pelvis jerk and his hand rising and falling from adjusting an in-ear style voice amplifier, a leader in front of those wanting to be lead. It may be because I'm reading Michael Mann's book Fascists, that I read the film sequence for the song They Don't Care about Us (using CGI) in which eleven dancers were reproduced over and over again, to resemble an immense powerful and regimented army of 1100 soldiers one that mirrored the entourage of people (creatives and otherwise) that surrounded the Michael Jackson machine, but was more likely Jackson's comment on authoritarian governments and injustice.

Beat me, hate me
You can never break me
Will me, thrill me
You can never kill me
Jew me, sue me
Everybody do me
Kick me, kike me
Don't you black or white me.

However, that aside, the sequence I enjoyed was for Smooth Criminal in which Jackson was sewn-into footage from 1940's black and white films such as Gilda to appear as if he was starring alongside Rita Hayworth, Edward G. Robinson and Humphrey Bogart. I can't say that I was a fan of all of Jackson's music, but you can't argue with his immense talent and I was saddened after watching this documentary that his life & creativity ended so abruptly. 6.27 am and the rain has eased. The sky behind the trees is white-washed in ashen tint. It's daylight, but clouds obscure the sun. Dragonflies are darting about and a Wattle bird is calling to its mate. Repetition and pattern, repetition and pattern - step, step, tramp, tread.

As they faced the vast, empty, rain-drenched square and played for occasional passersby, all these Nazi boys (some of them were blonde, with doll-like faces) seemed, in their sticklike stiffness, to be possessed by some cataclysmic exultation. In front of then, their leader - a degenerately skinny kid with the sulky face of a fish - kept time with a long drum major's stick. He held this stick obscenely erect, with the knob at his crotch, it then looked like a monstrous monkey's penis that had been decorated with braids of colored cord. Like a dirty little brute, he would then jerk the stick level with his mouth; from crotch to mouth, from mouth to crotch, each rise and falling jerking to a grinding salvo from the drums.
(George Bataille, Blue of Noon, Marion Boyars, 1978: 151)

Visit to Collected Works Bookshop

2012-01-29T07:11:00.001+11:00

I visited Collected Works Bookshop yesterday, settled myself on one of the tall black chairs in the homely environment and chatted with long time friends & proprietors Kris and Retta Hemensley. Collected Works is a poetry in translation oasis tucked away up on Level 1 of the historic Nicholas Building in the heart of Melbourne. It was great to be there, to make contact, to talk about writing, to be surrounded by books. Kris was the first person to publish my poetry over thirty years ago in his publication The Merri Creek or Nero. Where has the time gone? It's a secret that remains hidden until, like an unwelcome and indecent display it flashes its naked truth. When I left Kris and Retta's company I vowed not to walk through the city crowds, the jostling, twisting and turning of the body in order to avoid people who were eager to get somewhere, anywhere, so I strolled instead down the long, narrow, cool lane ways shielded from the blazing sun. I was good, it was good. I was managing the sound and movement, I even sat for a short while in Bourke Street until two fire engines roared in to tend fire & smoke billowing from the top of the old Bradman's store. I read from the book I purchased on the way home on the tram and later around dusk, whilst I savored a slice of the rhubarb tart I'd made a couple of days ago. I am reminded as I recall this of a piece of writing in Kris Hemensley's Exile Triptych (Vagabond Press, Sydney, 2011).

My nose pressed o the bedroom window I watch my father continue digging. The smoke rises from Old Wilkes' bonfire of rhubarb & cabbage leaves, thistles, grass, branches, newspapers, rags, old sacks & boxes. I watch until dusk. Later, when I walk up the hall, my father turns from his noisy washing at the bathroom sink to regale me with the cryptic phrase. The morphing owl. And he repeats the poem's opening verse. He'd repeat it all night if my mother didn't stop him with her tea-time summons. He's the same boy as before the War, turning the ways of the world over & over in his mind. He is never the elegist, twin of the night. The boy-father is a lyricist, delighting in the couplets & quatrains that celebrate one sunny day upon another. Now darkness falls upon the garden. It alone drives him from his remarkable toil. His digging is left unfinished as each day is for every boy.

Kris also writes a blog called Poetry and Ideas, which includes poetry from Australian and overseas writers.

Collisions: Mark McDean + Julie Clarke (27 Jan 2012)

2012-01-27T18:58:00.000+11:00

A hard, metal, cylindrical tea strainer hangs at the end of a thin chain attached to six crocheted rounds forming a flowery medallion with eight petals. It may represent the number of a members in a family. The container full or emptied of what? Memories? A shinny steel, reflective surface against soft crocheted circles - metal and wool, the comfort of family and those close to you. Here, soft does not necessarily represent the feminine and hard not necessarily the masculine, for in this work hard represents stoicism, an ability to endure when times are tough. But what of the strainer, does it speak of the tension and anxiety of family relationships, or intellect drained and filtered through the lens of sorrow? Is it reference to 'the old ball and chain' - the partner hung around ones' neck, a burden perhaps to the male, who, unlike the woman (in the years between 1949 &1961) could and would escape domesticity. The Grand Honor of Domestic Service, Mark's title for this and the previous artwork is understood here as time devoted to family, but never recognized. Labors of love - cups of (the old cliche) tea and sympathy around the table where the family gathered, their hopes and sorrows laid bare and sometimes, too, the tears overflowing. The more I think about and view the object, I consider it about Haptics (touch) and the way that objects feel, solicit our remembering. I plan to do my response next week to both this and Mark's earlier artwork and will post here.

Horrified to see Julia Gillard fall, Australia Day 2012

2012-01-27T10:04:00.000+11:00

I was horrified to see our Prime Minister Julia Gillard stumble and fall whilst being lead through an angry group of Indigenous folk protesting against Australia Day celebration yesterday. Whether or not you like her politics she has a right to be safe from possible injury. I support Indigenous rights, but I don't think that any one of us, Indigenous Australian or not, should resort to violence or threatening behavior to get their point across or get their own way. Being a true states person, Gillard shrugged off the whole ordeal, which I think was very generous of her, given the frightened look on her face as she was being assisted by a security guard. When non-Indigenous people behave in this manner they are arrested, as it was, no Indigenous person was arrested for banging loudly on the glass window of the building in which Gillard and others were gathered or shouting remarks. I don't think this kind of behavior does anything for these people or their cause. It just adds to the existing negative stereotype. If we continue to condone this behavior we only promote the divide. I applaud instead those Indigenous Australians, who, like other individuals from diverse cultural backgrounds who live and work together, joined in the Australia Day march in Melbourne. This IS the future, an Australia populated by peoples of mixed-culture, taking the best from one another and discouraging the worst kind of behavior.

Collisions: Mark McDean + Julie Clarke (December 2011)

2012-01-26T14:01:00.001+11:00

Happy news this Australia Day. Mark and I thought that his art response sent to me before Christmas was lost. Happily my next door neighbour Amit handed me the parcel this morning. He might have given it to me earlier, but has just returned from having a holiday in India, the place of his birth. Anyway, here is Mark's response to my artwork of 23 November 2011. Mark said:

I would like to call the pieces "Grand Honour of Domestic Service - Nos.1949 & 1961". Responding to your lace doily I reflected on the female 'loaded' craft of crochet. There is always something sad about seeing a finely crafted blanket in a second hand shop. I think of the hours devoted to creating a possible heirloom. The decorative elements reflect the over decoration in medals of honor. Take it all back to our mothers.

I apologize to Mark for the way I have photographed the artwork. He would have preferred that it be shown hanging from a wall, however in order for it to be clearly seen on a dark background I have been photographing all pieces on my black table. I understand the piece to be a kind of medal, the crocheted flower is made up of many layers of pink, blue and white wool, colors we associate with baby clothes. So, I see this artwork as not only embracing the skills required in order to fabricate garments or decorative objects, but an acknowledgment of the feminine. So often throughout history it has been the male who has received a medal for noble achievements or participation in war, however in this piece Mark awards the mother for her often quiet and unacknowledged deeds.

No plan

2012-01-25T08:21:00.000+11:00

Melbourne morning. Dark clouds hover over the stark white sky. It might rain. The Magpies, Wattlebirds and Crested pigeons in the garden call out in the cool air. Thank goodness it's not hot! I'd planned to write something sooner, but all my best intentions dissolved. My next longer blog will be written after I've received Mark McDean's artwork for the Collisions project, it's due to arrive this week. Unfortunately the one that he made for me prior to Christmas was lost amidst the flurry of parcels and letters received and dispatched by Australia Post. I am reminded as I hear the rubbish bins being collected that the gardeners will be arriving soon, along with the usual racket associated with lawn mowing and leaf blowing, that I need to get out of here to avoid the persistent sounds. I'm so used to the quiet now that any intrusion, other than the blissful sounds from the birds or Schlock's laughter (he is the little boy next door) is indeed an imposition. Most mornings around about this time I begin to plan my day and the BOM's weather forecast has great bearing on what I decide to do. At least today I should be able to be out and about for longer than a few hours. It has been way too hot over the past few days for me to contemplate being outside. So, the plan is to get out, but apart from that I may just let the day guide me. I guess no plan is still a plan?

Tinker, Tailor, Soldier, Spy: a short review

2012-01-19T15:56:00.000+11:00

I have to admit to being a bit of a sucker when it comes to spy films. Alfred Hitchcock's The 39 Steps (1939), Notorious (1946) and North By Northwest (1959) as well as The Spy Who Came in from the Cold (Martin Ritt, 1963) were some of the first films I saw and still stand as some of my favorites. However, more recently the BBC Television series Spooks has surpassed any spy film I've ever seen and set a level of sophistication that I expected when I went to view Tinker, Taylor, Soldier, Spy (Tomas Alfredson, 2011) at the Rivoli Cinema this morning.
I've never read a novel by John le Carré so wasn't, like many in the audience, comparing the film to the book, but realized that in its adaptation to the screen, slices of information about the myriad of characters who surrounded the central MI5 agents needed to be supplied as background information in the early part of the film. Unfortunately this meant that viewers were offered fragmented vignettes that eventually made sense once the film progressed.
This was a quiet and measured production that revealed, as many spy dramas do, the complexities of espionage, the politics and personalities. I personally didn't find it either intriguing or exciting, but enjoyed the bleak aesthetic of the film achieved by an emphasis on rather dull architecture, punctuated briefly by scenes that included decorative ironwork staircases.
I did find Garry Oldman's acting superb as George Smiley, Control's right hand man and John Hurt, just brilliant as Control.
In this film dominated by old men of British Intelligence; men who decided who should live and who should die within and without their own ranks, I enjoyed one particular frame, which showed a piece of graffiti written across a wall outside the secret house. It read: The Future is Female. Unlike Ros Myers (Hermione Norris) who is a formidable spy in Spooks, the few women in this film are allotted stereotypical roles of keeper of the house where the spies meet, a love interest who has vital information to share and a teacher who used to work for the circus and reminisces over photographs of 'her boys' - the old MI5 guys when they were young.
For me at least there were several scenes that made the film more interesting. In one, a bee is trapped inside the car in which the operatives are traveling and in another, an owl, which has been trapped inside a lit fireplace, screeches headlong into the class room, but is callously bludgeoned to death by the male teacher in front of the children. Another scene, which puts a human touch on this otherwise cold and callous film shows Smiley unwrap a mint whilst waiting, gun in hand for the mole.
If you love le Carré novels then you are probably going to love this film, but if you love Spooks, or films that are high powered then you may be a little disappointed.

New Year

2012-01-17T22:25:00.003+11:00

2012-ing

Iron Lady: a short review

2012-01-17T14:43:00.001+11:00

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Iron_Lady_film

I caught an early session of The Iron Lady (Phyllida Lloyd, 2011) at the Rivoli Cinema today and all the hype around the film was correct. Meryl Streep was brilliant as the aging Margaret Thatcher suffering from Alzheimer's disease but, no matter how engaging in terms of a historical overview (albeit limited) of Thatcher's rise to power and eleven and a half years of office as Britain's first and only female Prime Minister, this was an extremely sad film, not only because it did not (in my opinion) reflect Thatcher's strength - she always appeared formidable in media reportage of the 80s, but because the focus upon her obvious dementia seemed to undermine her past status and enduring legacy. However, even though her hallucinatory discussions with her dead husband Denis (Jim Broadbent) made her appear as though she had completely lost the plot, I found this aspect of her fragility endearing. Indeed, Denis and his antics, portrayed in the film as flashbacks and fantasy gave a lighter feel to Thatcher's deteriorating health, since he was almost always clowning about and she was always so serious. Since Thatcher was a driven individual throughout her life, the films emphasis upon three days in her life in which she is sorting out her deceased husband's effects and her constant lapses into states of dementia profiles the self-effacing and detrimental affect of the disease on the individual and people who must care for them. More than once I nearly cried as Thatcher admitted to not recognizing herself and more than once I was reminded of Lady Diana Spencer, not only because Meryl Streep as Thatcher looked a little like the older, thinner Lady Diana - Princess of Wales with her pale, English rose complexion and fair hair, but because they were significant public figures who appeared quite lonely in their quest not only to stand out as women, but to make a difference to society. If you are expecting to see a film that depicts the Iron Lady, then this film does not fulfill its name, however, if you are prepared to recognize the complexities of Margaret Thatcher and her life, then this film certainly goes some way toward providing the subtleties of her persona.

A stab in the dark

2012-01-15T08:19:00.000+11:00

Well, with all that build up to me being allergy tested last Thursday, it didn't happen. It may have been because an hour before my appointment with the immunologist I broke out in fiery red hives. So, I'm none the wiser about what's causing my recent inflammations and outbreak of hives and probably won't know until I've kept a diary of everything I've eaten and medicines I've taken just prior to outbreaks over a four month period to present back to the hospital. I was going to say, and then laughed at the thought of saying it, but will anyway - that my body has a mind of its own, meaning of course that my conscious self has absolutely no control over bodily processes. It might be a good time here to talk about the public health system. An hour before my appointment I thought I'd drop by and talk to one of the nurses in emergency, thinking that perhaps they could give me an anti-histamine or lotion for my itchy spots (forgetting of course that I wasn't supposed to take an anti-histamine prior to testing). I discovered that at 8.30am there was absolutely no-one in emergency and that they had no medicines to help me - their suggestion being that I purchase what I required from the pharmacy! Even though there was no one in emergency, the clinic(s) upstairs where I waited for my appointment was so full that there were no available chairs for waiting patients. I paced, had several glasses of water and attempted to cope with the overheated environment and flickering fluorescent lights and although I'd turned up ten minutes prior to my scheduled appointment, I still had to wait 65 minutes to see anyone! Pointless complaining, but when I did I was advised that I was in the public health system! And, the tone of the staff, please don't start me on that because I'll never finish. So, my questions is always, if staff have an idea of how long it will take for each patient to be seen why can't they give a more accurate appointment time? Is it just that they like making people wait like cattle, ready to be rounded up? I figure that if I keep a diary then I'm likely to be able to identify which substances I am allergic to without having to go back to the hospital and have an expert tell me. A friend recently said, have you noticed how doctors do very little doctoring these days. Yes, I have noticed, but more than that I've noticed how many times, regardless of which branch of medicine their expertise lay, that they constantly assert 'medicine is not an exact science' and that, in my case, I have 'complex medical issues', which basically means they don't have answers and they're just taking a stab in the dark.

Early morning

2012-01-12T06:00:00.002+11:00

Time shifts quickly in the early hours of the morn. I've been awake and up since 4am and time has passed with incredible speed. Already it's half past five and I've done virtually nothing. There is never pure quiet and yet the early morning quiescence is overwhelming silent to the point where I can hear myself breathe and the low hum of the computer is a kind of consolation, as is my tap tapping of the keys. I spent half of yesterday indoors, but because I'd also spent all day Tuesday at home having lunch with friends, I really needed to get out in between bouts of rain to have a good, solid walk. I found myself having coffee at a shop that was all but closing its doors and the owner bringing in the tables and chairs at 4.20pm. Quiet had descended upon everyone because of the inclement weather. There was absolutely no-one, either walking their dog or doing a run in the park opposite as I passed by on my way home. I'm remembering yesterday as I begin today and it's still dark. I imagine I am the only person up at this hour, not even the birds are awake, or if they are, they are still huddled together in the trees. Two cups of filtered coffee and one cup of tea, a few posts on face book and I've washed the dishes that I forgot to wash last night. I've only the bed to make and then I can get myself ready to head off to my appointment at the Royal Melbourne Hospital where I will be allergy tested. The long tram ride will enable me to catch up on some reading, or day-dreaming or just watching the world go by through the windows. My fantasy is always that I'll have the tram all to myself, that no-one will sit next to me and read a paper, folding and turning pages and sticking their arm near my face. My fantasy is that no-one will cough or sneeze, in my direction, that the tram won't be crowded, that no-one will be talking loudly on their mobile phone. I'm not good with the general public. I have absolutely no tolerance for other people's behavior, especially when it intrudes on my thoughts. 5.46am now. When is day-break? I want to be able to look out of the window and see if it's wet underfoot. I want to be able to assess what to wear. It's rather cold as I write, although I'm well rugged up. I am reminded of Winter and I notice as I look to the right of my desk, Neil Stephenson's novel Snow Crash. I open the cover, inside I've put a note to myself Cafe Bohemia, every second Thursday. This is yet another reference to the 90s as I read the book in 1992. Maybe when you meet someone from the past, as I have recently, you open a little door in your psyche that lets in all kinds of things and information. I really do prefer to remain in the now. It's 6am and I'm signing off.

Untitled

2012-01-10T07:03:00.000+11:00

Untitled - Julie Clarke 1992: Colored pencil and digital images glued onto Arches paper.

What makes me frozen, stills me in the quiet of the morning, makes me incapable of writing on this blog with more consistency, is not that I have nothing to say, 'heaven forbid that she actually be able to be silent,' but that I have too many thoughts and therefore fixing upon one thing can be most difficult. So, as ideas float in and out, traveling as they do, one point to another, leaping back and forth in time ~ earlier this morning I was thinking of nothing but the 90s and then moved on quickly because the 90s were filled with love, loss and disappointment; I remain in this, perhaps that, no, not that state. Here I am then, writing, but not really writing of anything. Love is the Devil DVD, which belongs to my friend Shaun, jumps out at me reminding me that I still haven't watched it and then I think, why can't I find Charles Roberts book Infected Queer: Notes of an Activist, I know it is somewhere in the bookcase, I distinctly remember covering it in plastic to protect it from dust. Everything so tidy and yet some things are just difficult to locate. It took me ages the other day just going through old photographs to find the ones I was looking for. It's easier with digital technology, because most of the photographs I've taken over the past few years are on my computer or stored on disk. I'm wondering as I look around me how many books I've bought but never finished and wondered why this is so. It's fascinating, the things that you find when you are looking for something in particular. I still have half a sheet of fake gold leaf I used in an artwork in 1997 and little green socks with metallic thread I bought in 1984. I wore them recently and although they have a run in them I haven't had the heart to throw them out. All the things I've given away or discarded over the years, heaven knows why I've held onto them. Never quite sure about these stream-of-consciousness type writings, I think perhaps they betray us in the most disconcerting way, because as we write and type and look over what we have written we see the strange minutia of the day, the disconnected, but somehow coherent musings of the mind. So, I'm looking through drawings and digital images that I made in the 90s (I thought I'd thrown most of them out) and I found the one above, which is mostly hand drawn with digital images of a DNA helix pasted onto the paper. I read this image as my interest in the body, art and technology, however am interested in the severity of the females face and wonder if it is a reflection of my own at that time, although I did not have short hair. I'm unsure whether any of this has been productive, perhaps not all activity need be, perhaps it is enough to understand that the past is always there, just lurking in the background, but it is the present time that is important.

Humanimalmachine

2012-01-08T08:43:00.000+11:00

This would have been a fantastic exhibition to see. It was titled: Human+The Future of Our Species and was held at the Science Gallery, Trinity College Dublin in 2011. I am fascinated by Eduardo Kac's Eduina, a Petuna he has created with his own DNA running through its veins. My other favorite is the photograph of Aimee Mullins. I'm not sure why the exhibition was called future of our species, when I appears to reflect current developments in robotics, bio-mechanics, cosmetic surgery and genetic engineering. At least Euthanasia Coaster is a little speculative. Perhaps after all, it demonstrates multiple futures, or, rather, the many twists and turns of a future being who is an amalgam of humanimalmachine.

Statistics

2012-01-07T08:19:00.002+11:00

The table below shows the top ten number of page views from each country since I placed Google Analytic on my blog at the end of 2009.

Australia 26,703

United States 14,188

United Kingdom 1,532

Germany 1,071

Canada 1,021

Russia 683

France 561

Netherlands 493

South Korea 370

Malaysia 295

It is interesting that about a quarter of the page views are from the United States, but strange that the UK has so little in comparison. I suspect that the majority of hits from Canada have been for the review I did of Shannon Bell's book Fast Feminism.

The top ten posts and the numbers of people who read or clicked on them are as follows (many of the other 800 or so posts have attracted between 10 - 200 hits):

Prosh ~ dots and a dash!
Aug 19, 2010
1,116 Pageviews

Andrew Bolt/Bindi Cole/Indigenous politics
Apr 7, 2011, 27 comments
755 Pageviews

Ron Mueck exhibition at the NGV
Jan 27, 2010, 1 comment
432 Pageviews

you want facts with that?
Jun 6, 2011, 45 comments
400 Pageviews

Short review of Rebecca Skloot's book 'The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks'
Jan 6, 2010
353 Pageviews

Prosh pranks
Aug 18, 2010, 4 comments
307 Pageviews

My sex robot: Gynoid revisited
Mar 19, 2011
292 Pageviews

Julie Clarke - Camping by the Murray River late 1950s
Feb 25, 2010, 3 comments
262 Pageviews

Julie Clarke bio
June, 2011
247 Pageviews

My Country ~ El Nina or HAARP?
Jan 12, 2011
242 Pageviews

Eternal return

2012-01-06T07:18:00.001+11:00

I've been awake and up since 4.30 am and can't believe that for the past few hours I've been reading FaceBook posts, making comments and flitting around the Internet, in between eating breakfast, making my bed and feeding the magpies. Each day that it's cooler than 30s or 40C degree I'm grateful. Every day I don't experience symptoms of a vertiginous migraine and don't have back pain I'm grateful. God, having all this gratitude is beginning to sound like one of those steps in a depression, alcohol or drug recovery program. But being grateful doesn't come easily. There is an old Taoist saying: All expectations are seeds for resentment and being active and capable all of my life I expect to remain that way and yet my body betrays me as it gets older. The fact is, I don't feel grateful much of the time. I have to remind myself to be thankful. Often though, recognition of gratitude comes with an inner voice that says I am not grateful when things go wrong and my thankfulness revolves around comparing myself with others - my health problems could be worse - or others are worse off. Nietzsche who was one thing, but his writings another (Ecce Homo, p3:s1) was plagued with chronic health problems as well as mental illness and through his writing attempted to overcome many debilitating conditions. Knowing this vindicates me in writing about my own struggles. And, anyway, as someone said to me the other day, some of those who read these posts may benefit from knowing they are not alone with their experiences. As I undertake repetitive tasks everyday I think about Nietzsche's notion of the eternal return and that amazing thought experiment of his that goes:

What if a demon were to creep after you one day or night, in your loneliest loneness, and say: "This life which you live and have lived, must be lived again by you, and innumerable times more. And there will be nothing new in it, but every pain and every joy and every thought and every sigh - everything unspeakably small and great in your life - must come again to you, and in the same sequence and series...". Would you not throw yourself down and curse the demon who spoke to you thus? Or have you once experienced a tremendous moment, in which you would answer him : "Thou art a god, and never have I heard anything more divine!" The Gay Science, 1882

I've thought about this a great deal and if we were to experience our life again without previous knowledge of the life we had already lived then it would be lived as we had lived it. I think that Nietzsche is not asking us to consider regret, for there is no place here for saying, well I'd live my life over again if I could change some things. He is asking whether we embrace pain and joy and our life in its totality. In déjà vu moments we might already feel that we have lived this life before. My biggest issue with it is that it fixes the individual in her choices, decisions, actions and doesn't allow a fluidity of expression in the next life lived in this eternal return, if indeed there is a next life. However, within the context and intent of Nietzsche's words, I say, bring it on!

Joy!

2012-01-02T07:15:00.001+11:00

I have to admit it has been way too hot to write a blog, however, at the moment I have my windows and doors open to let in the cool air before the impending 40C degree temperature in Melbourne today. I woke at 5am to dark quiet, however the peace was punctured at 5.35 am by someone letting off fireworks in the park opposite. I saw briefly the radiating sparks as they hit the air and the smell of sulpher lingered. Already it is the second day of 2012, seems just days ago that we were talking of Christmas ~ I don't know where the time goes. I've been reading Ashley Woodward's book Understanding Nietzscheanism, because interpretations of Nietzsche's writing are always interesting. I was reminded whilst reading, that joy was essential in Nietzsche's affirmation of suffering as the path to the Ubermensch. This was something I had overlooked in my previous post. Woodward explains:

For Nietzsche, the pain of life is inseparable from its joy. It is the natural tendency of joy to want more of itself; it is easy to affirm joy, to want it again. But if we want the joy again, then we must affirm the pain and suffering, for they are inalienable from joy. (2011:18)

Woodward's book is primarily about how Nietzsche's writings have filtered down through the years and influenced the thoughts of others. Yesterday afternoon after having a break from reading I watched Good Neighbor Sam (David Swift, 1964) on television. Jack Lemmon plays Sam Bissell, an all round, good, suburban family man who works in the art department of Burke and Hare advertising company and who makes, in his spare time, moving sculptures from found objects. The plot is not uninteresting, in fact because of his wholesome status he is put in charge of the Nurdlinger account, and later finds himself implicated in a deceit that actually compromises his strict moral code. However, what I found most interesting was that at the beginning of the film Sam literally perceives office workers wearing suits (like himself) as sheep, just part of a vast herd, all doing the same things every day ad infinitum. These three elements reveal an underlying reference to Nietzsche's notion of 'herd mentality', the 'eternal return' and 'nihilism' in which the only way the Ubermensch may emerge is through creation. Explained by Woodard as:

Essentially, the Ubermensch is an affirmer and creator. He or she is one who has survived nihilism, has affirmed life (together with suffering) at the ultimate level demanded by the eternal return and expresses his or her will to power through the active creation of values. (2011:19)

Nihilism maintains that there is no intrinsic meaning, purpose or value to life and that morals are contrived. Indeed in the face of nihilism we realize that 'we' give meaning to life or we create things that become meaningful to ourselves and others. The eternal return is a thought experiment about the repetitive aspect of life and whether or not one would embrace that same life if lived over and over again whist accepting nihilism. It seems that being a creator is the only way out of this impasse, and Sam is revealed as already having the potential to change his life and himself through his art. I enjoyed the film because it so beautiful demonstrates aspects of existentialism.

OK, its nearly 7.30 am and the sun is beginning to shine. Probably time to close the doors and windows and keep out the early heat. The birds are singing, they obviously weren't too distressed by the early morning fireworks!

Suffering & the higher man (or woman)

2011-12-29T08:52:00.000+11:00

Contemporary bio-medicine, which strives to create and enhance the human species, may be considered a vehicle for producing the hitherto but unknown individual of the future. However, with its dependence upon technology and animals the species created may be more than human and less than human in a humanist sense. I am interested in whether Nietzsche’s notion of the higher man or Ubermensch, is useful in considering this human of the future, even though, contra the human produced through biomedical intervention, the superman is a spiritual overcoming, rather than a physiological remaking, one that is, according to Nietzsche dependent upon suffering. I am wondering whether Nietzsche’s call for a morality which is beyond good and evil, is akin to some of the tenets of post ‘humanism’ since post-human theorist’s alert us to the blurring or erasure of the boundaries between male/female, good/bad, human/not human that is occurring in biomedical as well as communication technologies and which challenges some of the basic tenets of secular humanism. What kind of morality might develop out of an erasure of dichotomies and an acknowledgment of our alliances with and dependence upon not human others? How can the morality of Nietzsche’s higher man be used as a model for us to consider a new morality in the twenty-first century? Nietzsche explains:

First of all, one calls individual actions good or bad quite irrespective of their motives but solely on account of their useful or harmful consequences. Soon, however, one forgets the origins of these designations and believes that the quality ‘good’ and ‘evil’ is inherent in the actions themselves, irrespective of their consequences…by taking for cause what is effect. (A Nietzsche Reader, from Human, All Too Human: 71).

And further,

In the most noteworthy passage of his self-portrait…La Rochefoucauld certainly his the mark when he warns all reasonable men against pity, when he advises them to leave it to those common people who need passions (because they are not directed by reason) to bring them to the point of helping the sufferer and intervening energetically in a misfortune. For pity, in his (and Plato’s) judgment weakens the soul. Of course one ought to express pity, but one ought to guard against having it. (Human, All Too Human: 49).

He argues that emotions cloud the issues.

One example we could draw upon is the woman ‘in the boot’ case in 2005 of Maria Korp, who was on life support after being found in a coma after being placed in a boot of a car by a jealous girlfriend. Arguments for taking her off life support and allowing her to starve to death (which could take two weeks), is that she is brain dead. However a response from the medical professional to those who have accused them of intentional euthanasia and cruelty, are that they will have her on painkillers for the period of time they are depriving her of nutrition. My question is, if she is brain dead and presumably has no quality of life, why then do they need to alleviate her of pain if she is so insensate? If she still feels pleasure or pain then does she have the right to live even if that pleasure or pain is incommensurate with individuals who are living normal lives? Are we judging her life to be less valuable because she cannot enjoy life at the same level that we enjoy ours? Is the morality of the crowd defending her position born out of the fear that they might want to live in similar circumstances even if their life is greatly reduced? Those that watch as the medical fraternity determines what is considered alive or not, might fear that life once objectified and described in scientific terms, such as biological functionality does not allow for the value of that once embodied life. What I mean by this is that life, defined purely in functionalist terms disavows the relationship of that person’s life with others. Since we understand life not only as a descriptor of biological function, but also of the relationship or interaction with others and the world, we cannot reasonably separate the life ascribed to a body without reference to that particular individual in the world. Indeed, the body of the individual on life support, whilst brain dead, must be understood in relation to the life of others that his/her life has affected. A life, which had both a rational and emotional relation to others and things and which had similar relationship to her. The reason why Korp was taken off life support is because her brain would never again be alive and she cannot sustain normal function without medical support. We might ask: Why maintain a person in this condition on life support in the first place, if not for the family to hold onto an unreasonable expectation that her condition might change? We as a society value brain function as a measure of who were are as human beings, rather than just the existence of our slave body, however those individuals who are born extremely mentally and physically disabled, are valorized as human beings worthy of life and care. Does removing an individual from life support because they have extremely limited brain function undermine the well fought for rights of mentally disabled individuals? Can we make any claims that brain death is in any way similar to extreme mental disability? What of the individual who is born deaf, dumb, blind and physically disabled, should they be given the ‘good death’ because they have no value for us and are simply a burden to society? Or might we consider that as a society we value from our benevolence to others who are less fortunate than us? Nietzsche maintained:

Pity on the whole thwarts the law of evolution, which is the law of selection. It preserves what is ripe for destruction; it defends life’s {sic} disinherited and condemned; through the abundance of the ill-constituted of all kinds which it retains in life it gives life itself a gloomy and questionable aspect. (The Anti-Christ: 118)

Is he saying that pity for others thwarts our attempts for greatness? I am wondering if what makes us virtuous is that we have an ability to identify and empathize with others less fortunate than ourselves, because we rationally know that given a different toss of the coin we too could have been less than we currently are. We also know that life is fragile and we value it all the more because of this. Yes, we admire the strength born out of the fragility of life’s existence, but this strength of spirit would not have been possible without life’s imperfections in the first place. Perhaps this is what Nietzsche meant when he said:

Zarathustra is gentle with the sick. Truly, he is not angry at their manner of consolation and ingratitude. May they become convalescents and overcomers and make for themselves a higher body! (Thus Spoke Zarathustra: 60).

He wanted to impart the notion that in order to become strong an individual first needed to become sick, in order to experience that condition and to overcome it. It is only by overcoming that one can become better.

He further argued:

spiritual progress depends on those individuals who are less bound, much less certain, and morally weaker; they are men who try new things, and many different things. Where-ever progress is to ensue, deviating natures are of greatest importance. Every progress of the whole must be preceded by a partial weakening. The strongest natures retain the type; the weaker ones help to advance it. (Human, All Too Human: 138).

If we decide to go against the grain of the moral position of keeping someone alive when their condition does not warrant the expense and burden to society and does not afford anyone, particularly them, any pleasure, what if any, is the new morality sustained from this behavior? Is this still a moral position? Is this an argument from ‘the greatest pleasure for the greatest number’? The needs of the many outweigh the needs of the few (Star Trek).

Are medical developments born out of pity for individuals who are sick, because the primary aim of medicine is curative, or because sickness is a financial and psychological burden on society? Sickness (disease/accident) provides opportunities for ‘curative action’, and involves knowledge about the body as well as employment for those in the medical profession (researchers, drug companies, etc). Is it possible that compassion or empathy for others suffering is a prime motivator behind those who enter the profession of medicine? Is research being driven solely by a need to know – by a yearning for knowledge itself? Is there anything inherently wrong with this if human suffering is alleviated? If as Nietzsche maintains, that higher man cannot flourish without suffering, does the alleviation of suffering put the ‘higher man’ into jeopardy. In other words is biomedical development, whilst providing opportunities to alleviate suffering also mean that those who could become ‘higher men’ are robbed of the occasion to experience pain and suffering. I am wondering if Nietzsche was actually referring to psychological suffering, rather than physical suffering (or a combination of both). I think that his rationale was that if we seek only pleasure, like the herd, then we would not pursue our projects, which might contribute to an advancement of humanity, or perhaps more importantly to our own advancement or overcoming (becoming).

that which here glorifies itself with praise and blame, and calls itself good, is the instinct of the herding human animal: the instinct which has come and is every coming more and more to the front, to preponderance and supremacy over other instincts…(BGE:68)

Is the ‘higher man’ important purely because they stand outside the herd, because they challenge the status quo? Does science now provide the human of the future?

To teach man the future of humanity as his will, as depending on human will, and to make preparation for vast hazardous enterprises and collective attempts in rearing and educating, in order thereby to put an end to the frightful rule of folly and chance which has hitherto gone by the name of “history” (the folly of the “greatest number” is only its last form) – for that purpose a new type of philosopher and commander will some time or other be needed, at the very idea of which everything that has existed in the way of occult, terrible, and benevolent beings might look pale and dwarfed. (Nietzsche, BGE: 70)

I have no answers, I only know that through suffering we gain empathy for the suffering of others.

Colors of Christmas

2011-12-27T07:27:00.000+11:00

I don't think I can recall a Christmas day like the one we've just experienced. Almost everyone I know had some story to tell of the damage caused by the torrential rain, lightning and massive hailstones. It was nature at her best, or worst and she celebrated most of the day with high drama causing everyone to remain indoors. It was only after many hours of listening to the noise and watching intermittent flashes through the windows that we could finally go outside at around 8.30pm to see the glorious pink and orange sunset spread across a pale blue sky. All finally quiet, until later when the rain began again, but this time softer. The day before I'd visited Steve Middleton and his lovely wife Deb. We sat in the morning sun talking and admiring their garden, which I sincerely hope has survived the storm. Yesterday, my back still sore, I ventured out only to make some small food purchases. My local shopping center filled with people taking advantage of the Boxing Day sales. In the afternoon I noticed that the storm had all but destroyed my vegetable patch ~ most disappointing, for I was looking forward to being able to make several batches of delicious Borscht. However, I was happy that the half a dozen Rainbow Lorikeets that have taken up residence in the garden were happily feeding & playing together and making such a racket. It was difficult to see them as the colors of their feathers camouflaged them amidst the scarlet red gum flowers, emerald leaves & gumnuts, but even so I managed to take a photo of one of them during his antics. As I look at this image I wonder why we in Australia are still decorating with holly and ivy and red Father Christmas suits, when our colors for Christmas are certainly ones more associated with the Eucalyptus ficifolia, which blooms in Summer. You may need to click on the image above to see the Lorikeet who is sitting just left of center.

Life's a struggle

2011-12-24T09:10:00.000+11:00

Forgive me for neglecting the blog over the past few days, but I've endured injury to my lumbar spine and most significantly the muscles on the right hand side of my body. I consider this really bad timing on my part since tomorrow is Christmas Day. I feel absolutely stuffed. I woke in the early hours this morning, my body stiff and in the half light caught sight of myself in the mirror, sedated and restrained like Balatony Lajoska the taxidermist in Györgi Pálfi’s Taxidermia (2006). On my way back to bed I noticed my fleshed and mounted squirrel, its furry skin permanently fixed in time, the look on its face frozen - it is immortalized! My own body rigid for fear that movement would cause yet more pain. And yet, I need to move for if I don't I will become worse. Thinking about it, taxidermy animals are bodies without organs. Perhaps we need to become like this, as Antonin Artaud suggested: 'When you have made him a body without organs, then you will have delivered him from all his automatic reactions and restored him to his freedom'. (In: Susan Sontag, Antonin Artaud, Selected Writings, California, 1976:571). But what is this freedom that is only skin, only surface? It is not us and yet it is simultaneously us. However, my identity is changed by my internal surfaces ~ blood, bone, muscle, nerves that play out their theatre of disruption on the outside of my body, cause me to distort my facial expressions like a circus of madness. Finding a balance between movement and stasis is most probably the ideal way to proceed. But what is too little and what is enough? The scalpel raised, be careful to remove the skin with out tearing it, make a mold by dipping the remaining carcass in Plaster of Paris. Fashion the skin over the mold then sew a little or sew a lot with invisible thread. Jeremy Bentham, English philosopher and social reformer had his body mummified in a different way. After death his skeleton and head were preserved and stuffed out with straw. Dressed and placed in an 'auto-icon' cabinet he may be viewed by visitors to the University College London, where he has been sitting since 1832. No movement for him! OK, so by going through this little stream of thought, I've thought more about life and pain and agree with the old lady struggling down the stairs yesterday who said: Life's a struggle, but it's better than the alternative!

Human all too not human

2011-12-20T22:11:00.003+11:00

The Mad Square - a short review

2011-12-18T10:03:00.000+11:00

Hannah Höch's, Liebe (Love) 1931: rephotographed from Surrealism by Night catalogue.

Yesterday I visited the NGV International to see The Mad Square, a ticketed exhibition of 200 works (paintings, photographs, prints, films and sculptures) by August Sander, Christian Schad, Ernst Ludwig Kirchner, George Grosz, Hannah Höch, Karl Hubbuch, Kathe Kollwitz, Kurt Schwitters, Laszlo Moholy-Nagy, Max Beckmann, Otto Dix and Rudolf Schlichter spread over four large rooms.The exhibition, named after Felix Nussbaum’s 1931 painting includes the original lithograph movie posters from Metropolis, footage from The Degenerate art exhibition as well as furniture and pottery from the Bauhaus.
The exhibition is divided into categories, such as World War 1, Dada, Bauhaus, Constructivism and the Machine Aesthetic, New Objectivity & Power and Degenerate Art. I was advised as I purchased my ticket, that the exhibition 'was not for everyone' and that it was 'unsuitable for children' - this was expected since some of the imagery in the exhibition deals with death and sexuality as well as exposure and mutilation of human flesh. This is an exhibition that reveals how people were traumatized by war and the establishment of the Nazi Third Reich.
Apart from the works by John Heartfield who created powerful images satirising Hermann Goering as a butcher in 1933 and Hitler with a spine of gold coins. For me the most interesting works in the exhibition were photomontages by Hanna Höch who questioned the status of women in society post WWI. Her work depicts not only the fragmentation of the female body, but her own marginalization as the only female Berlin Dadaist. Höch's works reveal the paradox of being female in a world in which the mass media depicted woman as having sexual freedom, but which simultaneously subjected women to male dominance and low paying jobs. Many of her works raise issues about the identity and sexuality of the so called, new woman. The relationship between the female body, industry and machines in many of her works is most seductive, however, I have to admit that my favorite has always been Hannah Höch's, Liebe (Love) 1931, which confuses the racial identity of the woman lying prone, being approached by a flying woman with a cicada head. Both women appear winged (the arms of the horizontal woman attached to wing-like appendages patterned to a certain degree like those of the cicada wings) and suggest the fluidity of woman to express lesbian desire? Having said this, I was most taken and interested in her painting Imaginäre Brücke (Imaginary Bridge) 1926 that revealed an angularity noticeable in the Bauhaus works and had uber-realistic eyes. More than this, the work demonstrates a post-human, hybrid human/insect, the female form vector of freedom and transformation, one that opposes the notion of the post-human as perfectibility of the human form through eugenics. I would highly recommend this exhibition on until March 2012.

Saturday

2011-12-17T07:38:00.000+11:00

It was around about this time last year that Steve Middleton began contributing to this blog and what an amazing contribution he's made with his various observations and intriguing images. So, a big THANKS STEVE and happy one year blog anniversary! I have to admit that sometimes I approach the blog and have absolutely no idea what to write. The minutia of life, which is something we all experience just doesn't seem to be enough to inspire extensive explanation and yet this is mostly the measure of our day ~ our routines, the things we must undertake in order to survive. I always think that it's other people who have exciting lives; I certainly don't. But I ask myself do I really crave excitement and what is it that I might consider exciting? As I sit here writing this, dust on my computer table, the uneven stack of paper on the left side and my 2011 diary on the right side, scrawled notes, a reminder to myself that I need to purchase a new one for 2012, I know that it will be the everyday that will dominate next year. Sometimes for me the most exciting experience is feeling healthy and content. However, as I think about it all, it's also those things that remain constant and predictable that are important. Like this time last year I have begun to harvest beetroot growing in my vegetable patch. Today or tomorrow I'll make Borscht and I'll have that tell tale bright red dye from its flesh on my fingers whilst making the soup. The magpies, born in early August only visit occasionally to eat the bread that I leave most days. Next year they will most probably visit with their new babies. It's 8 sleeps until Christmas day and then not long after that a new year to ponder.

Butterfly

2011-12-15T08:34:00.000+11:00

This is my photo of what I think is a small Citrus Butterfly or Orchard Swallowtail. However, it's predominant wing colors are creamy yellow, rather than white. It's lower wings have small blue crescents above red eyes all framed in a black mosaic, like some beautiful stained-glass window. I rescued this dead butterfly from a plethora of ants that were attempting to disassemble its body. This spring and summer I've seen more insects than I've ever seen before. Perhaps it is due to so much rainfall in Melbourne? Apart from butterflies, my other all time favorite insect are Dragonflies however, they almost never watch where they are flying and on many occasions I've had to duck quickly to avoid one of them colliding with my head.

The Universe...

2011-12-12T06:56:00.000+11:00

It's good to take stock. I've been looking back at this year to consider what I've achieved. I've had two art exhibitions: Aut(o)ptics(o)ma (digital images of self) and The Body and The City (photographs of others) completed 14 acrylic paintings and 8 mix-media artworks in my collaboration with Mark McDean. I've also made digital artworks not yet exhibited. I wrote my rare book Strange Blood Sport (10,000 words) and gave it to close friends. I've seen 9 films at the cinema and written reviews of them on this blog. I've tutored, supervised a PhD project, read numerous academic books and texts and attended art exhibitions. And, phew, apart from usual day to day things like cooking, cleaning, baking, gardening, and sometimes swimming and exercising, I've made hundreds of blog posts. In between I've seen people I care about and had some interesting conversations. Like many people I also struggled with some health issues, which continue to affect my quality of life. Believe it or not I spend much of my time alone, but am nurtured in various ways by different people and have to say that I am inspired by Steve Middleton's intuitive artistic responses to Nietzsche'S Ubermensh, found here on this blog under the Zarathustra label.

I have no New Year's resolutions and if you asked me what I have planned for the future I'd have to say that I rarely fix my plans in concrete, for the unknown variables of life have a way of intruding and throwing things off balance. It's better sometimes to just go with the flow. But that doesn't mean that I don't have intent in the chaotic universe that surrounds me. I intend to continue doing what I do and maybe even try something I've never done before, but again, I have nothing in mind. Perhaps whatever it is will present itself to me. I'm open to the possibilities.

Over the past few days, whilst I've been sick I've read all of Louise L. Hayes You Can Heal Your Life. I don't know why I didn't read it in the 80s when it was published, since back then I was certainly into New Age Philosophy. It was a good read, which places emphasis on the power we each have within us to instigate change in our lives. My only criticism is that although it places responsibility on the individual for their own life choices and ultimately their good psychology and health it rarely takes into account the impact of the world outside the self that greatly impacts upon us. However, having said that, I do believe that the universe provides. It may not always give us what we want, but it does give us what we need. Almost everyday I remember to say: The Universe is conspiring in my favor - and it IS!

Perception, again

2011-12-10T07:59:00.000+11:00

We take everything for granted until it's not there. I'm eating toast spread with Vegemite but I can't taste it's particular salty flavor, nor can I taste the corn bread, which I know is delicious. I have a heavy head cold and my taste buds have just given up. Looking out of the kitchen window whilst I fill the kettle to make a cup of tea I notice all the different shades of green on the growing plants. The subtleties are paramount, our ability to distinguish one plant from another, entremets for the eye, and, what I ask myself, if the color seeped away and the world around me could only be viewed in black and white? Of course, we have all seen absolutely beautiful black and white photographs and the classic films of cinema were shot in B & W, but reality is this color field of which we are part. Why is it that sickness makes the color and flavor of life bleed away, until all that is left is a strange back-drop, hanging there in front of the stage, like it's a hundred years old and the scene in two dimensions reflects life, but is nothing like it at all ~ flat and uninteresting. You can see that I'm not feeling very well and this has colored my perception. My senses blunt, my inspiration and energy almost to the point of depletion. I will feel better soon, I say to myself. I can hear the Magpies calling, but it is bed and sleep that beckons me.

Life is refuted! (Postcard from Zarathustra)

2011-12-07T18:56:00.003+11:00

Everybody's looking for something...

2011-12-04T08:52:00.000+11:00

Is it only my perception of things, or does religion it its various forms become more prominent at this time of the year? Waiting for my tram yesterday I noticed a sign outside the local Anglican Church which stated: We preach Christ crucified and resurrected and when I stepped off the tram at Camberwell shopping centre the Salvation Army band was playing Christmas carols and Hare Krishna folk were handing out copies of the Bhagavad Gita with one hand and looking for a donation with the other. Later, over coffee I became involved in a conversation with two extremely articulate young women who told me they were volunteers at the Church of Scientology. They were not sprouting religion, only personal development, however did mention that they believed a spirit inhabited their body (is this why Scientology has been recognized as a religion?). Of course, they were careful not to mention that many Scientologists believe that spirits of space aliens become stuck to human bodies, but I figure that is because they were young and probably haven't yet reached that level in Scientology where they believe such nonsense. I did however mention to them that back in 1997 I was fascinated that the Heaven's Gate cult believed that aliens had planted the seeds of our humanity millions of years ago and would return with the arrival of the Hale-Bopp comet. More total nonsense! Believe me, I felt much better when I entered the market and was offered sweets by a man in a Santa costume. But I wondered as I put my hand in his little red bag to choose a chocolate or a toffee, whether he too ~ all red and white & bright, was yet another seduction to lead me into making a purchase.

Perception

2011-12-03T11:19:00.000+11:00

Ok, so I've probably been a little obsessed with sight of late, but I did have an appointment to see an Ophthalmologist yesterday afternoon about a growth on my left upper eyelid because my doctor was concerned it may have been cancerous rather than a neoplasm (skin tag) related to aging. Fortunately for me it is a benign Papilloma tumor (unrelated I believe to the papilloma virus that causes cervical cancer), which is classically identified by its pointy frond. Under normal conditions I would have had the little devil surgically removed yesterday (Ug ~ the thought of having an injection in the eyelid and a scalpel removing the tumor is just too much to bear! however this must be done and will most probably be undertaken in February next year). The procedure wasn't undertaken because when I arrived for my appointment my upper lip had swollen up and after visit to emergency at St. Vincent's hospital doctor determined I was probably allergic to something I had eaten for lunch. I was promptly sent home after taking an anti-histamine and steroid. Now I need to be allergy tested, with the possibility of having to carry around an epiPen because last week I had an extreme allergic reaction to bee toxin! The joys of life! But having said all this, being in the emergency department of a major hospital certainly makes you feel grateful for the fact that you have such minor things happen to your body. I felt positively well whilst looking around at the ailments of others and noted, that no matter how sick or injured people were that they were mostly calm and accepting of their situation - something that I really need to learn.

Light/enlightenment/Language

2011-12-02T08:11:00.001+11:00

The theme of this mornings post is light, enlightenment and language and by necessity, shadow, gestures, semiotics and technics. Kyriaki Maragozidis's photograph of an open hand shadow falling on a Lotus leaf injects the self into the image in a subtle way; the raised hand as gesture is both welcome and impasse, a moment of contemplation in which she embraces the leaf, but her touch leaves no impact upon glorious nature. Ethereal touch is also implied in Aliey Ball's painting in which perception, linked to the many eyes that cry a river of tears reaches out to the one who sleeps. Too many eyes and too many hands, and the terrors of creativity. The veiled figure in Juan Ford's painting The Disconnector, occupies a third of the space against a soft and smooth ethereal sky; light forming its own language in the shadows of the creased gown ~ the arm unmistakably pointing to or pointing away from enlightenment. But we cannot see the vision that the shaman sees, we understand only that a dichotomy prevails. Without light there can be no shadows and this is most gloriously seen in Clinton Hayden's photograph in which strange glyphs are formed by a lacy curtain draped over a window. The self, or evidence of self perception in all of these artworks may be read in Simon Park's photograph of bio-luminescent bacteria that assert a sense of agency in their formation of a trident glyph, symbolic at least in human terms as representing past, present and future. The iridescent, almost skeletal digits reminiscent of metal filaments in an incandescent light globe, speak of light and dark, ignorance and perception ~ a feature of my own photograph as well as that of Charles Strebor, whose eye with cloud forming on the crystalline lens is a dark planet in a milky sky. Many thanks to all the artists who have kindly given me permission to reproduce these images.

Sacred Lotus. Kyriaki Maragozidis, 2011

Oils on board. Aliey Ball, 2000.

The Disconnector. Juan Ford, 2010

Light: Clinton Hayden, 2011

Bio-luminescent bacteria and glyph. Photograph. Simon Park, UK, 2011

Gemstone. Julie Clarke, 2011.


Eye: Charles Strebor, 2011

Untitled doesn't really mean...

2011-11-30T22:15:00.003+11:00

...what it used to mean any more

Collisions: Julie Clarke + Mark McDean (23.11.2011)

2011-11-29T14:30:00.001+11:00

GATC: Julie Clarke 2011 ~ Vintage doily with lace trimming, circular insert covered with acrylic paint and fake gold leaf. Kewpie doll bound and attached to doily with black upholstery cotton.

My response is an intuitive one based on the fact that in Mark's last artwork he was not only creating a momento mori but was also making reference to his grandmother. I thought that I would approach this notion of remembering my mortality as a return to childhood ~ an embrace of death and life. The lace doily is an object that featured prominently in my grandmother's house where I lived for a few years. These delicate, circular objects, worked with nimble fingers graced the top of her sideboard as well as the highly polished dining table. So, the doily for me, inherently points to nurturing as well as decoration. However, here I am using the doily as representing intricate patterns in our lives ~ objects around us or biological connections, hence the reference to GATC ~ Guanine, Adenine, Thymine, Cytosine (nucleotides that make up our DNA). The Kewpie (or Cupie) doll named after the naked cupid is considered a symbol of love and desire, and I recall them being attached to a long wooden stick and sold at the Royal Melbourne Show; much to the delight of small girls who would covet them. More importantly in terms of the work, is the fact that I see nature and nurture, as well as highly constructed codes as impacting on the naked child.

We Need to Talk about Kevin: short film review by Julie Clarke

2011-11-28T18:31:00.001+11:00

Poster: http://www.imdb.com/media/rm2576724480/tt1242460

After seeing We Need to Talk about Kevin (Lynn Ramsay, 2011) this afternoon, the words on my lips were ones I'd often heard when I was a child: Spare the Rod, Spoil the Child. And, although I don't believe in hitting children, I do believe that they should be disciplined so that they can learn appropriate behavior. We Need to Talk about Kevin is a psychological thriller about the relationship between Eva (Tilda Swinton) and her son Kevin (Ezra Miller), but it is also about both parent's complicity in forming the child into the young, psychopathic adult, who is selfish, manipulative, ruthless and feels absolutely no guilt for his inappropriate and destructive behavior. At the beginning of the film I felt sorry for the young Kevin because I thought he was demonstrating characteristics of autism, which just didn't suit the middle-class Eva living in her beautiful house in the country. Indeed Eva's husband feels that she is way too hard on the child, who he readily forgives. But later I realized that Kevin was not slow, but was cleverly manipulating his mother and even so, I became unsympathetic to her since she appeared too weak to counter his attempts to control her. From the onset the director uses different time frames, flash backs and interesting montage to create the notion that Eva is unfit for mothering or of coping with her insecurities and anxieties. In her frustration and inability to change Kevin's behavior she throws him against a wall, breaking his arm. And, in another scene she recounts that, prior to Kevin's birth she was happy. Indeed, we are lead to believe in so many ways that Eva is not only complicit in Kevin's behavior, but may well be the cause of it, for so often throughout the film visual clues provide a correlation between them. In a scene at the beginning of the film Eva dunks her face into water in the bathroom basin. Since the camera is placed below the basin so that we may clearly see her, we are surprised that her face suddenly morphs into that of her child. This correlation between Kevin and his mother is evident in the scene in which Kevin is being visited by his mother in jail. He sits silently in front of her and systematically bites the top of each finger-nail and places each small, white nail on the table in front of him. A subsequent scene demonstrates that Eva has purchased a dozen broken eggs, simply so that she can escape quickly from a person she does not want to see in the supermarket and is later shown eating her cooked scrambled eggs and placing pieces of white egg-shell onto the table in front of her. Throughout the film there is an illusion to blood - blood ties and blood rites. The first few frames of the film contain an aerial shot of a vast crowd of people indulging in an orgy of squashed tomatoes. It is a reference to the festival of La Tomatina in Buñol in the Valencia region of Spain, in which about 150,000 tomatoes are thrown.and there is complete abandonment to the moment. The scene and entwined bodies within in represents unbridled passion, which is demonstrated more fully by the conclusion of the film in which Kevin is responsible for a bloody school massacre. The ruddy colored squashed tomatoes on naked flesh is continued throughout the film as stain: the smeared red paint on Eva's house, car and face and eventually on the blood smeared bodies. Tilda Swinton and the young Ezra Miller are absolutely convincing and brilliant in this film, which asks us to consider whether the kind of evil that can produce a murderer is innate or whether a of lack of compassion for human life is one that is learned. Eva is shown to be ambivalent about Kevin's birth and mothering in general and yet she is shown at times to be loving and concerned with the welfare of her children. I feel that audiences will be torn in their conclusions about nature, nurture and the roots of evil and may be left for days debating who in fact is responsible for such dire events. I saw this film at the Rivoli Cinema in Camberwell, with complements of Experimenta Media Arts who provided me with the ticket.

霊気

2011-11-26T07:14:00.000+11:00

I've been awake and up since 4.36am this morning, I do make a habit of this. However, this has occurred over the past few days because of the steroid I'm taking to counteract the bee toxin in my body. I've only one more tablet to take and I should be on the mend. It's been raining in Melbourne and a little stronger over the past half an hour. I have my front door open and can hear falling rain and distant bird sounds all mixed together in one glorious symphony. It sounds beautiful and feels a lot like the Reiki (霊気, meaning mysterious atmosphere and developed in 1922 by Japanese Buddhist Mikao Usui) session I had yesterday at the Usui Reiki Centre in Camberwell. Having hands-on healing from a complete stranger was interesting and rewarding. I felt heat generating from the back of my neck into my shoulders and I saw in my mind's eye a large, smooth, black lake. There were no people or animals in the scene, just a sense of calm and serenity. The ambiance was that of night, however it held a sense of magic. I've just undertaken a little research, which suggests that a lake is is not only a symbol of a mirror because of the water's reflective surface, but a point of transition between life, death and transformation. I also kept silently hearing the word 'John' and when I asked the Reiki person who laid her hands on my shoulder's who John was, she told me that he began the centre in 1991. At the end of the session I felt an urge to find something in the room. I was drawn to a tiny photo on a table, it turned out to be an image of John and his deceased wife. This was an extremely strange and interesting experience for me. I'll never really understand all this psychic stuff, though acknowledge it exists and that sometimes I appear to tap into it.The rain is still falling. I'm feeling peaceful and looking forward to the day, which, I imagine will be quiet.

Riddles, mysteries, enigmas

2011-11-25T11:32:00.002+11:00

I was living in a share house in suburban Melbourne more than thirty years ago when the brother of one of my housemates was shot through the leg by police.

There had been a burglary, a chase on foot through dark suburban streets and a deserted railway yard. Shots were fired, my housemates brother fell, and I recall a first thought that it was literally a shot in the dark that he was lucky to survive.

I knew the victim only slightly but remember the sudden, immense, shock and pain felt by his sister, and shared amongst us all, in the moments after the news came. And the struggle to make sense of the event, to bring reason to the aftermath of an inherently unreasonable situation.

The inquest into the death of knife-wielding fifteen year old Tyler Jordan Cassidy in Northcote on December 11 2008 during a confrontation with four police officers recounted the shock and bewilderment felt by many in the broader community after that dreadful event. During the inquest various rational explanations were offered, including a suicide by police hypothesis. That was discounted by the coroner, who found that the unfortunate teenager was probably incapable of forming the necessary intent to die at the hands of police. "He was so overwhelmed by his emotions that it is not appropriate to conclude he was acting voluntarily", Judge Jennifer Coate found.

Judge Coate also exonerated the police involved in the shooting, but clearly they have been profoundly affected by the unfortunate teenager's death. "One day my daughters are going to ask me if I ever used a gun, and I don't know how I'm going to answer them", one anguished officer told the inquest.

Judge Coate said "(Tyler) was desperate that night...perhaps seeking some distraction from the inner despair he was in for reasons, sadly, we can now never know."

We try to make some sense of that terrible night, but never can. Not really. All we can do is endure, somehow, try to transcend the shock and pain and be human, which means sometimes life offers mysteries, riddles and enigmas we can never quite solve, no matter how great the desire to.

Friday...

2011-11-25T07:29:00.000+11:00

We are bombarded every day with news stories or catastrophic world events that calls us to engage or somehow become involved in, even if that involvement is simply to support another person's cause and yet it is difficult, for as I look around at my friends and relatives I see that each of us is struggling in some way with personal or health issues and these are more urgent and more demanding of our attention and concern than the experiences of strangers. No wonder we want to turn off the television, radio and internet and just retreat into our own space where we can find some beauty. I, myself find solace in my mornings in which I hear the sounds of different birds as they call to each other and I almost forgot how angry I was at the police over the Tyler Cassidy killing, but was happy to hear a few days ago that the Judge concluded that Tyler did not commit 'suicide by cop', contrary to the arguments put forth, and that police officers who shot Tyler dead 'acted within the limitations of their training'. More and more I'm avoiding the news of the day, not so much as putting my head in the sand, but rather, filtering my experience of the horrors that surround us. However, we can't totally avoid things that become out of our control. Yesterday my pleasant swim in a local pool ended in me having to quickly find a doctor to look at my right hand, stung by some insect, it was almost twice its usual size with fiery red inflammation. Peace and calm turned quickly into a flurry of activity, as I rushed from the pool to the doctor and from the doctor to the chemist, eventually swallowing a pill and placing a cold compress on my hand, which I could not form into a fist. As I write this my friendly Magpies have arrived to eat their morning bread, the East Rosella's are chirping their glorious sounds and other birds are calling softly to each other. The sunshine is filtering through my windows. Later, I'll be visiting the doctor again, although the steroid and anti-histamine I took yesterday has worked beautifully and my hand is, as it was. Has anything major happened in the world today? I have no idea ~ I know only that last night's dishes are still in the sink waiting to be washed!

Collisions: Mark McDean + Julie Clarke (18.11.2011)

2011-11-22T16:06:00.000+11:00

A preservation of beauty: Mark McDean 2011

For Mark, the word 'preservation' in his artwork 'A Preservation of Beauty' (and I quote) reminds me of the Fowlers Vacola jars my grandma used to have. To preserve fruit was a feminine domestic ritual. I was always inspired by the way the fruits were organised (stacked) in the jar and became a colorful display. This piece is imbued with history, security and some kind of innate beauty. The 'exhibiting' of natural objects within a gilt frame adds an archival layer.
McDean's latest artwork is, in my view, an exquisite mechanism that speaks to the Victorian era's embrace of death and their overt expression of grief and sorrow. At each end of this totemic chain is a lock ~ at the top there is a small, brass bolt with key that when opened will disengage from the connection, and at the bottom, an oval frame, which contains and protects a length of half-amber, half-golden hair as memento mori (remembrance of death). The overall construct of lock & key, key chain, clasp, oval string of pearls and oval frame/locket is homage to mourning jewelry worn by both sexes in the Victorian era and engages with the distinct binaries: masculine/feminine, open and closed, interior and exterior, form and function, utilitarian/aesthetic, empty/full & life and death. It is a sturdy construct with only one link in the chain that has the potential to be broken and that element is the string of 23 pearls. These pearls reference both Mark's early piece in this project on 7 July and my response on 30 July this year. The real pleasure of this artwork for me is that it is akin to rosary or worry beads that may be held for prayer or meditation and the fact that whilst holding it, the sense of the tactile comes through; important in this virtual age in which absence is prefaced over the immediacy of physical presence and the closeness of touching. A pearl necklace in such close proximity to a lock of hair has sexual overtures as well as allusions to familial intimacy. Significant too, is Mark's use of metal, which in Feng Shui philosophy has always been associated with protection. However, the preciousness we associate with the monetary value of metals is figured here as an esteem associated with life and necessity to protect its fragile and passing beauty.

LINGUA: Cyber-poem by Julie Clarke 1999

2011-11-19T10:15:00.001+11:00

In 1999 I worked closely with Komninos Zervos and the State Library of Victoria to create an interactive cyber-poem, four of the frames are above. When you enter my site you click on the words, which should lead to text, sensuously move the cursor over the words until you find another click-able word, which should also lead to another poem. I created the text over the cover of an old Photo Album., which I colored. The words - Lingua, Mirabula, Machina, Desire, Body, speak of language, the mirror and my take on our relationship to technological screens. I've been looking for this site for a number of years now and thought that the work was lost. Happy to report that it has been archived through Pandora at the National Library of Australia.

LINGUA: CYBER-POEM BY JULIE CLARKE 1999

Drive - short film review by Julie Clarke

2011-11-18T16:14:00.000+11:00

Drive poster: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Drive_%282011_film%29

Sometimes silence just happens. Sometimes silence is necessary and sometimes silence, the kind of silence associated with a lack of spoken words has a way of gripping you by the throat and not letting go. The silent space that exists for much of the time between the two primary protagonists ~ the Driver (Ryan Gosling) and Irene (Carey Mulligan) his female neighbor in the film Drive (Nicolas Winding Refn, 2011) is like that, however it is not just a device used by the director as a way of offering repose between the ethereal electronic score composed by Cliff Martinez; the song lyrics of which afford a particular ambiance, or the sounds generated by high-speed car chases, here, silence is full of depth of feeling and meaning between the couple who, at least on the surface are strong, silent types who acquiesce to each other. And, it is this quiet intensity they share through looks and gesture that is mesmerizing to the point that we think we see a sexual attraction, but understand that within the confines of the narrative the glances they exchange are seductive and sensual rather than anything else. Indeed, at no point in this film punctuated throughout by strong, graphic violence is there a hint of a sexual act. However, that doesn't mean there is no passion, there is, for passion that cannot or will not be displayed through sexuality is displayed in this film through bloody, horrific encounters. Did I say there was no sexuality? Well, yes, but there is a scene of voluptuous naked women in a dressing room at a nightclub, but the sexuality virtually stops there. Described as a crime drama about a Hollywood stunt driver who has a contract put out on him after a heist goes wrong, the narrative is certainly more than this, and for me the most significant aspect, other than the absolutely superb acting on the part of the protagonists is the fact that love, a particular kind of love, one that has more to do with ethics, responsibility and caring, rather than the sexual act is highlighted at the beginning of the film in the way that the Driver interacts with Benicio (Kaden Leos), Irene's young son and later when he becomes involved in attempting to protect her and her son as well as her recently released from jail husband who is severely bashed by thugs who he owes money to. This film has got to be considered a contemporary masterpiece in that it manages to beautifully balance calm and chaos, silence and sound, love and bloody slaughter. I would highly recommend this film.

a post industrial post

2011-11-17T15:56:00.004+11:00

captain of industry

Arachnids + a glitch in the works

2011-11-16T08:55:00.004+11:00

http://www.lateralscience.co.uk/glitch/
Autonomous Phosphorous Rendering Engine by Ernest Glitch

http://technabob.com/blog/2011/11/02/spider-robot/

This morning was taken on a merry chase by a face book friend, Simon Park (biologist from UK) who posted an intriguing image of an Autonomous Phosphorous Rendering Engine on his site, apparently invented in the mid 18th Century by the savant Ernest Glitch to move about agricultural land, harvesting animals for the phosphorus in their bones. Can you imagine this large contraption lumbering along with its metallic mandibles and serrated teeth ready to devour some poor unsuspecting creature? I thought the drawing of the machine rather interesting since its form was similar to hexapods being designed within contemporary robotics, particularly The Muscle Machine, six-legged walking robot that Stelarc performed with in the past decade, the prototype micro-robot designed by our own Steven Middleton for Stelarc, or, more recently, the spider robot developed by the Fraunhofer Institute.

http://juliejoyclarke.blogspot.com/2010/01/steven-middleton-prototype-robot.html

Unfortunately I could not find anything substantial about Ernest Glitch and I suspect that rather than being an inventor he is the imaginative concoction of some mad scientist/artist/writer who writes a blog under the title of Lateral Science. Still, following up on all of this has been a delightful way to spent some of my morning. All I can say is I totally understand why some people are arachnophobic!.

Screen shot of 50,000 views on counter

2011-11-15T15:29:00.000+11:00

I've just returned home after having a lovely 30 minute swim at the Kew Recreational Centre. I dutifully undertook walking in the water exercises as instructed by my physiotherapist, but I mostly just swam. All the building works have finished at the Rec Centre and now there is a little coffee shop (inside) with some ice-creams and sandwiches for sale. However, I didn't eat there, I had lunch at a bakery and then checked out two op-shops and sat on a seat in the shade of a tree outside the local Mission Church. Thanks to Steve, who was up and on the computer in the wee hours of the morning we have this lovely screen shot of the blog with counter recording 50,000 page views. It's ever so cute!

Cause for celebration: 50,000 views

2011-11-14T09:29:00.000+11:00

By the end of the day this blog will most likely have recorded 50,000 page views, which is cause for celebration of some kind. There will be no flashing lights to record the moment, only the little counter on the right hand side of the page that will quietly click over, so, in lieu of any bells and whistles, I would like to thank Steve Middleton who has made a major contribution to the blog over the past year and to Lauren Howe and Mark McDean who have contributed some thoughtful, but limited posts during that time. I've personally made hundreds of blog posts and only recently slowed down due to the fact that I've returned to Face Book after a years absence and have spent more time making art rather than making words. Also, it's not like me I know, but I've been struggling with a little depression of late and when I'm depressed everything is thrown out the window and I find it difficult doing anything or seeing anyone. A loud clap of thunder and loud rain during the night woke me up with a start and consequently I slept in late this morning, and sleeping in, I find, is never good for my psychology. Still, the sun is up and it looks like it's going to be a nice day, thanks to our readers, thanks to those who make comments, the blog would be little without you!

Bananas and aging

2011-11-13T08:09:00.000+11:00

I was thinking the other day after having a banana for the first time in about three months, that when I was a child bananas tasted totally different. However, I remember making that remark about bananas about thirty years ago and wondered even back then, if it WAS something to do with aging. Was it simply that life didn't taste as sweet, that some things had lots their edge, that the flavor had gone? As I grow older I ask myself: Do I expect too much from life (& bananas), do I expect too much from myself (I've always expected a lot), am I aware of my own limitations? I'm already experiencing symptoms of aging, which alert me not to what I can no longer physically do, but to the consequences of what I do. Thankfully I haven't got involved in those strange lists that some people make as they get older about what they have or haven't achieved in their lives ~ I had no grand plans and yet am happy with what I have accomplished so far. Having never been physically beautiful or slim, thankfully I don't have to maintain any illusions about myself in that aspect. I periodically have a clean out of things I own ~ assessing what is and isn't important to keep and rarely hide my feelings in my dealings with others ~ so no hidden repression to sort out. Am I holding onto some secret that should be revealed.? Am I angry with someone from the past? Nope! So, I'm asking myself, what was this blog post about? I suppose it is my way of working through day to day issues of aging and somehow rationalizing the person I believe myself to be ~ my internal self and the external manifestation of that self ~ since they are different. Somewhere along the way those two selves will merge and I will begin to accept the aging process. In the meantime I've discovered the only truly sweet bananas that taste like those of my childhood are not those with a firm, perfect light yellow exterior, but ones with a slightly brown and blemished skin.

Australia as nuclear waste dump + nuclear power?

2011-11-11T08:08:00.000+11:00

This blog post is primarily for my son, since last night we were discussing Australia's possible future with nuclear energy. I was surprised to discover during my research that not only is there still a debate, post the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear disaster as to whether Australia should develop nuclear energy and nuclear power stations, but that parts of Australia are being considered as a nuclear waste dump. Here is just some of the information I've gleaned from the Internet this morning. Make of it what you will.

Nuclear waste dump in NT.

Liberal Party (2007) That Federal Council believes that Australia should expand its current nuclear industry to incorporate the entire uranium fuel cycle, the expansion of uranium mining to be combined with nuclear power generation and worldwide nuclear waste storage in the geotechnically stable and remote areas that Australia has to offer. (See full article here)

So potentially Australia can sell unprocessed uranium, be paid to store the waste from existing nuclear reactors, reprocess the waste and sell it, take back the resulting waste a second time, and eventually sell that waste product again ~ this quote is from CEDA, see article here

And, back in December 2009 quote from Tony Abbott:

I am not a theological opponent of nuclear power. I am quite happy to have the debate about the nuclear option. And I note that there are lots of people in the Labor Party like Martin Ferguson who are on the record as saying that it is something that Australian should consider. I don't think it is anything we should rush into.

However, in March 2011 he said:

We have no policy to introduce nuclear power in this country. See article here

What were John Howard government plans. Click here

Julia Gillard's Carbon Tax prompts call for a debate on nuclear power. See Australian article here

NOTE: The 'think tank' that they are referring to is a report from CEDA- Committee for Economic Development of Australia (see also second quote at the beginning of this blog). See membership list of CEDA.

Life is sweet!

2011-11-07T05:48:00.000+11:00

Tightrope Walker. Acrylic paint on canvas. Julie Clarke 2011

Devolution. Acrylic paint on canvas. Julie Clarke 2011

I've been up since 4am, most probably because I had way too much sleep over a weekend, in which I was struggling yet again, with the symptoms of vertigo. I went out briefly on Saturday morning but became so anxious in the shopping centre that I had to return home quickly. Vertigo does make it almost impossible for me to do anything outdoors, especially if that means (and it generally does) that I have to cross roads and move through crowds of people all moving in different directions.Vertigo is such a debilitating condition and makes for a very lonely life. I'm finding it more and more difficult trying to find something positive about this experience, which is the way that I generally approach life's challenges. Staying at home did mean that I had the opportunity to begin two new paintings. But just bending down to trace shadows onto a canvas was uncomfortable, but I did it just the same. I'm sure some of my readers on Face Book would have already seen these images, but for those who haven't I place them here for your comments and perusal.

The first one ~ Tightrope Walker (after Nietzsche's Zarathustra) is a comment on the way I feel whilst walking with vertigo, although in this image the walker has a outstretched beam to hold onto for balance, whereas I have no such prosthesis to aid me. The precariousness of life is exaggerated when we think that perhaps we all walk some kind of tightrope; making decisions all the while about going forwards or retreating backwards after we have arrived at the middle point, which of course, is always the most dangerous point to be, since there is the same distance in going forwards or backwards to a place of safety.

The second painting Devolution relates to the same condition, but here, Nietzsche's 'going down' is interpreted as the sudden impulse to let go of human (self-consciousness) to become other than man—animal or machine, in order to become. I see in the shadows of this image not so much a return to inhuman forms but a recognition of the inhuman inherent in life.

I've just made crepes for breakfast, probably not the best choice, but I went to bed last night after watching most of Julie and Julia and must have been a little inspired. I read the book a few years back, it was given to me by my friend Shaun because my name was formerly Julie Powell and I too owned both of Julia Child's cook books on Mastering the Art of French Cooking and had dabbled in many of Julia's recipes ~ I vaguely remember the rolling and folding involved in making several dozen croissants and inviting friends for breakfast many moons ago . Although I shared the same name with the protagonist in the film I was surely not as dedicated.

So, I've just finished eating the first crepe lavished in a good old Australian favorite ~ Golden Syrup and now I'm going back out into the kitchen to place more butter and batter in the pan. Life is sweet ~ I guess you just need to discover where to find it!

Eastern Rosella

2011-11-04T12:18:00.000+11:00

Photo of Eastern Rosella (one of a pair) that has been feeding in my garden over the past few days. Apparently they are quite rare, so I feel honored to have been able to capture it in its usual mode of being. Just wanted to share this with all of our readers.

Collisions: Julie Clarke + Mark McDean (03.11.2011)

2011-11-04T07:11:00.001+11:00

'She cries' - hand-carved cup with acrylic paint & pink texta: Julie Clarke 2011

As long as I can remember, I’ve been a bit of a flâneur and rag picker. Dumpster trucks and hard rubbish left on footpaths, has always held a certain interest since they might contain valuable objects or materials to inspire art or poetry. One man’s trash is another man’s treasure. However, it is the potential of the object to be transformed that is most absorbing. On 25 October, 2011 I found a discarded hand-carved, wooden mug with face (most probably a vintage New Zealand artifact) and immediately thought of some of Mark’s works in the Collisions project that relate to identity and masks, but I was also aware of the ethnographic and physiognomic details of the cup, which serve to produce a sense of otherness to the object. My response (using the found object) is less to Mark’s actual artwork and more to the photograph of the performative aspects of him wearing it, since the sash could be read as referring to competitive behavior and warrior culture. Because the garment forms an X over his solar plexus - a site of emotion, I regard it as topography ~ X marks the spot; a kind of somatic mapping of the spatial and temporal aspects of his body. I’ve painted the cup black and white to correspond with Mark’s black object over his white t/shirt and being mindful of the fact that it was the French poet, Charles Baudelaire who theorized the notion of the flâneur, I’ve written on the cup words from Baudelaire’s poem Le Masque/The Mask (1861) to demonstrate my psychological and physical state at the moment of altering the cup. The text reads:

She cries, you fool, because she has lived!

And because she lives! But what she deplores

Above all else, and what makes her tremble down to her knees,

Is that tomorrow, alas!, she must continue to live!

Tomorrow, and the next day, and always! -- like us!

Charles Baudelaire’s The Mask/Le Masque, 1861

joy for ever

2011-11-01T22:14:00.005+11:00

...Its lovliness increases; it will never

Pass into nothingness; but still will keep
A bower quiet for us, and a sleep
Full of sweet dreams, and health, and quiet breathing...

John Keats (Enymion,1818)

Halloween

2011-10-31T10:56:00.000+11:00

Well, I'm feeling rather saintly (if that means feeling somehow cleansed) on this All Hallows' Eve after blood letting (had a fasting blood test early this morning) at the hands of a rather vampiric pathologist who was lamenting the fact that she was working when most people were having long weekend for the Melbourne Cup Carnival or, in Christian speak ~ All Saints Day celebrations. Being more gnostic than religious I should acknowledge that tonight is Halloween and I will endeavor to engage in some kind of celebration. But, speaking of tomorrow, I'm all in favor of the 'race that stops the nation' and I'll be watching at 3pm as the horses line up in the barriers. Watching the cup has been a tradition in my family for as long as I can remember. Nan always had a bet (a win and a place), though most often she didn't win. There was always excitement around this time of the year; though I think Melbournians are excited more by the prospect of having a long weekend than anything else. Going purely on the horses names & given there is a blood theme happening here I'd pick Red Cadeaux to win in Race 7. But I won't make a bet, it's a bit of a 'mug's game' (idiomatic reference to an activity that makes you unsuccessful or unhappy) ~ I'll be happy just watching for that exciting three minutes. What I do loathe is the fascinators worn by all the women and the hoards of female clones that march machine-like to the races. Oh well! I don't know whether to blame the big department stores or the women themselves, who don't appear to be able to think outside the square! I guess there's no accounting for fashion!

Nietzsche, the Cardinal, and a leap of faith

2011-10-29T19:56:00.006+11:00

It was interesting to read a Thomist argument in a daily paper this week. The Australian published an address to the Global Warming Policy Foundation by leading Australian Catholic, Cardinal George Pell. Cardinal Pell invoked the spirit of Thomas Aquinas in a vigorous prosecution of the case against global warming. I don't care one way or another about the polemic but I'm always intrigued by Thomism. The speech is here (pdf)

Thomas Aquinas was a thirteenth century friar whose life's work was the partial reconciliation of fragments of Platonic and Aristolian thought. In the (somewhat unkind) words of contemporaries, Aquinas and his followers laboured mightily to reconcile in death those who never agreed in life. Drawing from Platonic and Socratic traditions, Thomist philosophy in part underpins modern, secular ideas about universal freedoms and rights. Following Aristotle, Thomist doctrine asserts the necessity for accurate observation that underpins the scientific method.

Thomism teaches that a thing is not necessarily so just because a majority says it is. It is up to individuals to see for themselves, and to work out what is true and what is not. And Thomism teaches that not everything is knowable. Where things are not knowable through observation, Thomism teaches an intellect is sustained by faith, because faith does not end in a true or false proposition, but rather in a reality beyond knowing.

Thomism offers a model of mind as a continuum of knowing and believing, a model rejected by both modern positivism and its postmodern adversary, post structuralism. The modern positivist model of mind is a discontinuum of knowledge and ignorance in which believing depends upon knowing, and ignorance is a kind of poverty of mind, to be pitied and where possible cured. The postmodern, post structuralist position abolishes both objectivity and belief, substituting a continuum of subjective uncertainty, a phenomenological shell game of deceived and deceiving minds. Thomist thought is a handy antidote to both.

I don't care one way or another about the dispute over weather forecasts that preoccupied the Cardinal . The intrigue in the Thomist world view is, for me, the model of the individual human mind as a continuum of knowledge and belief. Classical skepticism, after Pyrrho of Elis (c360-270BCE) tried to develop methods of continually testing knowledge and belief. Old school skeptics were comfortable with what they comprehended as the limits of their knowledge, although those boundaries continuously changed, and promoted methods of suspending, rather than passing, judgement. An age later, Descartes introduced the idea of absolute certainty only after declaring he believed that God would not allow his eyes to be deceived, a leap of faith any Thomist might have taken.

The model of human mind as a continuum of knowing and believing is evident in the self-belief of Nietchze's ubermensch, in Thomist metaphysics, in the origins of the scientific method itself. There is always some tension between knowledge and belief. I believe in freedom. I believe in free speech. I can't objectively prove those exist, somewhere, as universal archetypes. But neither could Plato. Or Descartes, for whom the leap of faith - that God would not give him eyes only to cruelly deceive them - preceded rather than followed any evidential trail.

In Thomism I can see an answer to Nietzsche's call to grow long legs, to see further and to leap from peak to peak. Before I know anything else I need faith in at least myself. Faith I can survive the ordeal, belief I won't fall into the chasm between what is spoken and what is done.

Collisions: Mark McDean + Julie Clarke (24.10.2011)

2011-10-25T16:42:00.001+11:00

Mark's rationale for his response to my last artwork is as follows:

I would refer to the last work as 'anti beauty defence mechanism #11'. It began as a a humorous take on the beauty pageant sash. It diverted via protective clothing, a screen that is both pliable, and wearable. The piece is not meant only for a child. I decided to add the quasi floral element to the front cross. I also love there sense of it being slightly bedraggled, sad and definitely odd. I did have some hesitation in completing it but someone viewed it handing from a ceiling hook and was impressed by it's architectural strength.

These are my initial observations when I received the piece:

The sash/braces/garment made from fiber glass mesh, mirrors a suspended baby bouncer, however since mesh is usually fixed onto fly-wire doors it suggests a form of protection ~ porous, but strong. Using this particular fabric to construct a wearable object may be considered against fashion or unfashionable, unless of course you consider it alongside those open weave, black, fishnet t/shirts individuals wore in the 1980s. The play between interior and exterior and the sculptural aspects of this work speaks of spatiality and suggests that this work refers to Mark's present situation, a kind of self-consciousness, which broaches the philosophical and resonates strongly with Foucault's question: 'What is my actuality? What is the meaning of this actuality? And, what am I doing when I speak about this actuality? (The Politics of Truth, USA: semiotext(e), 2007:86).

Written with his blood

2011-10-25T13:52:00.007+11:00

interactive jesus (robotic installation, 1997)

Understanding Friedrich Nietzsche enough to comment on his great allegory Thus Spake Zarathustra feels to me, at times, a utopian project, the unsatisfied longing for an unreachable goal. Almost a year ago I barely mustered courage enough to begin a sometimes faltering journey through Zarathustra's strange interiors. Those I dared to wander, so far, are here.

Now I come to chapter seven, labelled Reading and Writing, and wonder if I can really write with my own blood.

OF ALL that is written, I love only what a person hath written with his blood.

There is perhaps no journey more perilous than one through a human mind. "It is no easy task to understand unfamiliar blood", observes Nietzsche, who urges readers to learn by heart, to grow long legs, and to leap from mountain peak to peak -

The atmosphere rare and pure, danger near and the spirit full of joyful wickedness.

Affecting delicacy, as Nietzsche predicts in this chapter of Zarathustra, I guess a leap from mountaintop to mountaintop will take the weight from my trembling legs. And I have engaged with the demanding and perilous chapter before, in a comment upon communication called Interactive Jesus (First Site Gallery, Melbourne, 1997). Here, in part, is Nietzsche's dancing God, communicating in blood.

Years after, and still wondering if I can, really, muster the courage and passion to write in my my blood? I put one faltering foot before the other and wonder am I there yet? Becoming, can I ever arrive?

Putting the mob in its place

2011-10-24T12:40:00.002+11:00

The brutal suppression of a peaceful protest in Melbourne City Square on October 21 by riot police using attack dogs and chemical weapons signifies a changing relationship between government and governed.

A State government clinging to power by a single vote would not normally set attack dogs upon voters. But these do not seem to be normal times.

This month Australian business heavyweight Don Argus declared war on Australian shareholders unhappy with the average five million dollar paycheck for Australian corporate executives running top 100 companies.

The corporate gravy train is threatened by laws which give Australian shareholders the right to protest against excessive corporate pay packets. Shareholders can move to reject company directors salaries at annual general meetings. But according to Mr. Argus they should not.

Shareholders unhappy with executive remuneration could, he said, sell their shares. And Australians are selling their shares, driving equity markets to historical lows, while executive pay packets soar to new heights.

The town or city square is historically a place for ordinary people to meet and to sometimes protest. Melbourne's city square is an uninviting place surrounded by businesses paying exorbitant rent to trade in a people's place. It is difficult to think of any public space in Melbourne which has not been encroached upon by commercial interests, but our city square represents, after years of mismanagement by Melbourne City Council, the biggest example of an overly commercialized public space in Melbourne.

Don Argus and Melbourne Lord Mayor Robert Doyle have turned upon the Australian public who own what they, temporarily and at great expense, control, and there is very little ordinary Australians can do about it. Except vote them out at the next opportunity.

The strange rules of Australian corporate governance guarantee that a single vote against exorbitant executive remuneration is not enough. Shareholders have to vote against corporate remuneration policies at two annual general meetings in a row, to force a change. Company directors only need to vote once to increase their pay. Strange times.

Another strangeness about these times is that freedom has become divisible, with Melbourne's Lord Mayor suddenly acquiring the right to declare a time limit on free speech. This limit exists only in the Lord Mayors mind, and that of the Federal and State political class who endorsed his actions.

The United Nations Commission on Human Rights says:

All human rights are indivisible, whether they are civil and political rights, such as the right to life, equality before the law and freedom of expression; economic, social and cultural rights, such as the rights to work, social security and education , or collective rights, such as the rights to development and self-determination, are indivisible, interrelated and interdependent. The improvement of one right facilitates advancement of the others. Likewise, the deprivation of one right adversely affects the others.

The rights of corporations to profit seem to outweigh the rights of citizens to ask questions, to discuss, to assemble, and to protest, at least two to one. It is by any reasonable standard a situation which is probably not fair. It is certainly an indication that individuals have less social gravity in modern affairs than corporations. And that will be welcomed by the political classes, always on the lookout for ways to profit, and cling to power, and to demonize and brutalize what they have called "sheep" and a "mob" opposing them.

Will for revolution...

2011-10-24T07:20:00.000+11:00

Beware Kant cautions...it is not in great events that we must look for the rememorative, demonstrative, prognostic sign of progress; it is rather, in events that are much less grandiose, much less perceptible. (Foucault, The Politics of Truth, USA: semiotext(e), 2007:89)

First Casualties

2011-10-23T13:38:00.005+11:00

Occupy Melbourne protesters October 21: We are the 99 per cent.

indymedia.org.au October 21: There is a big lie being perpetrated on the Australian people.

Police Assistant Commissioner Fontana October 21: We have concerns that state wards are hanging around.

Melbourne Mayor Robert Doyle October 21:

Traders are suffering and events planned for the square have been disrupted.

Occupy Melbourne spokesperson Nick Carson October 21: People will be arrested.

Police Assistant Commissioner Fontana October 21: They are consuming alcohol and we are concerned that will lead to violence.

Erin Buckley Occupy Melbourne legal support team

October 21: Our observers have witnessed and been told of numerous incidents of excessive force and violence against the peaceful protesters...

Melbourne Age website October 21: Hundreds of people, including school children, are now lining Swanston and Collins streets watching the drama, with some chanting "the whole world is watching".

Unnamed policeman, to Melbourne Herald Sun October 21: Now they know we mean it. No more Christine Nixon stuff.

Melbourne Mayor Robert Doyle October 22: A mindless shriek of protest.

Melbourne Herald Sun October 22: victory for the boys in blue was never in doubt.

The Australian Editorial October 22: There is no meter running on freedom of expression. The internet and social media have their place, but, historically, the town square is in part a space for public expression.

Occupy Melbourne protesters October 22: Occupy Melbourne is part of a worldwide movement against the growing disparity between rich and poor, austerity measures and corporate greed. It is a movement for economic and social justice and real democracy. The richest 20% of households in Australia have 60 times the wealth of the poorest 20% of Australians. CEOs are getting huge pay increases and banks are posting record profits. We want a fair share for all Australians. The camp where Occupy Melbourne has been for the past week has been dispersed, but the movement against inequality will continue tomorrow.

Melbourne Age Editorial October 23: Really Lord Mayor?...Peaceful gatherings of this kind shouldn't be broken up in such a heavy handed manner.

Occupy Melbourne protesters October 23: We are the 99 per cent.

One spectacle & another...

2011-10-22T10:32:00.001+11:00

Their grand cars, many shiny and new lined both sides of the street ~ some were parked in the immense driveway at the front of the flood-lit mansion next door. They arrived in their finery ~ Versace clutch and other designer apparel ~ their wealth & prestige obvious. High pitched sounds of laughter and talking filled the air, flowed from the main house and into the four large white, architecturally designed marquees pitched in the massive backyard, where they were no doubt feasting on sumptuous finger food and selected fine wines. I fell asleep listening to the sounds of Melbourne's elite who partied on last night until the wee hours of the morning. But what was in my mind apart from the fact that I'd turned off the television after beginning to watch The Devil Wears Prada, was images of those at the other end of the social strata - the early evening news report about the thousands of Melbourne's homeless who live in poverty and the Occupy Melbourne, anti-capitalist demonstrators who were preparing their meal on make-shift cookers and bedding down for the night in camping tents in Melbourne's CBD! The Mayor of Melbourne concerned about clearing OM tent city away before next Wednesday, when that other bastion of wealth and prestige, HRH will be gracing our streets. One spectacle of the people replaced by one that is condoned - the flag waving, the courtesy and bows, the people who are permitted to be seen and heard.

#occupy melbourne

2011-10-21T22:44:00.004+11:00

99% suppressed, Friday October 21 2011

Morning reflection

2011-10-21T07:49:00.000+11:00

I woke before the birds again this morning and am reflecting a little on yesterday as I listen to the soft rain. I visited Sutton Gallery and the exhibitions by Aleks Danko & Raafat Ishak were fascinating. Danko's pointless contraption was almost symphonic in its presentation (when I first saw the rackets and little white balls I thought of the slow motion, last scene in Blow Up (Michelangelo Antonioni, 1966) of a mimed tennis match ~ surreality and anticipation. Ishak's (an Egyptian born artist who lives in Northcote) small paintings were just exquisite in their complex engagement with Duchamp's Nude Descending a Staircase (1912). If you get a chance go have a look at these two exhibitions. I have to say that Brunswick Street locale is still one of my favorite places ~ it was relaxing browsing the bookshops (I purchased & started reading Michel Foucault's The Poetics of Truth (Semiotexte)) and having a coffee outside Cafe Nova during Melbourne's 29 degrees. I found a tiny kewpie doll at Scally & Trombone, not sure what I'll do with it, but I'm sure she will appear on this blog very soon in some manner. I imagine that for me today will be quieter, the rain has cooled things down, wet leaves on the trees glisten in a soft and comforting way ~ the birds nowhere to be seen in the gray cotton wool sky. A rose bud, closed for most of the past few days outside my kitchen window has opened her petals to embrace the drops that cling to her delicate pink skin. Life, like this is quiet, but full...

Escape from glare?

2011-10-20T08:08:00.000+11:00

I'm wondering if it is at all possible in the 21C to escape from glare. Some of my vertiginous migraines are triggered by computer screens and sunlight, which makes me want to avoid both. So, this morning after experiencing yet another migraine attack last night (extreme vertigo and heaviness in my limbs) I'm considering whether I can continue to write a blog, or in fact, do anything very much on the computer. How does an individual continue to stay in touch with friends and the world without a computer interface? Is it a matter of using the telephone more, writing letters and being more tactile with the art I produce? That would mean, no more using Photo shop, no more long pieces of writing on the blog, very little Face Book. But, would that be SO bad? OK, so I would loose my ability to share in the way that I have over the past few years, but that could be a positive thing. I'm still working through all of this and will keep readers posted. In the meantime you will have to be happy with this short blog. I venture out into the day with my sunglasses placed firmly over my eyes, with the hope that I will not experience any vertigo today. Keep your fingers and legs crossed for me!

Brain that changed its mind

2011-10-19T05:33:00.000+11:00

I'm currently reading ~ well, almost finished Norman Doidge's The Brain That Changes Itself. It's a compelling book that discusses neuroplasticity (brain malleability, or the ability of the brain to modify itself). The most that I've gleaned is that enriched environments and undertaking some new activity creates more neuronal connections in the brain, which results in great memory retention and instillation of old skills; that imagination is as useful to the brain as physically undertaking a task (imagining that you are exercising a part of your body has almost the same impact on brain real estate, neuronal connections and affect on muscle strength as actually doing that exercise); positive thinking is not just a New Age concept ~ it actually works in your brain to create new connections and therefore a new mind set, and that regardless of how stuck we are in our old behavioral patterns we can, with persistence, changes those habits. Meditation is a useful tool for healing and growing brain function. The maxim 'use it or loose it', applies to the brain as well as the body, so exercising your brain is an important activity of the day. Indeed, physical exercise can actually change your brain and ward off depression and anxiety and is essential if you want to retain memory. Of course, you can't change your brain or its neuronal connections unless you work at it everyday ~ repetition is the key! Think I'll end this blog here. I've been awake since 3.47 am this morning. Not sure what woke me up! Surely it could'nt have been the 3.3 quake in Adelaide that happened around about that time. My body can't be that sensitive - or is it?!

Disturbing image?

2011-10-16T08:48:00.001+11:00


Crevice. Digital image with text. Julie Clarke (2011)

I recently entered this image in an upcoming 'mail art' exhibition to be held in Western Australia. It was rejected by the curator as 'too confronting' for their audience. My intention in making this work was to set up a distinct relationship between language and the body, to use the natural formation of my skin folds as substitute for a letter; in this case the letter V. I find it difficult to comprehend how this image could confront in light of the fact that nudity is ubiquitous throughout art history and Gustave Courbet's L'Origine du mond (1866) hangs in the Musée d'Orsay (the painting was previously owned by the famous French psychoanalyst Jacques Lacan) as an example of exemplary technique, beauty and eroticism. My digital image follows from those I exhibited in Aut(o)ptics(o)ma in which landscape images of my body were photographed in order to make them look erotic (when in fact none of them were taken of parts considered so), whereas this image associated with eroticism and sexuality was modified to look like a crevice in a rocky landscape. I am interested in human perception and what acts on our mind to make us see things in particular ways. We are confronted (almost nightly) with televised images of violent death and accident (virtual and actual). We are allowed to see the open wound on an others body, cut and bleeding flesh, the torture of innocent animals, people weeping in boats not permitted to land on our shores, surgical operations that modify people's bodies, graphic open heart surgery in documentaries, animals tearing the flesh off another animal, soldier's bodies damaged and disfigured by war; images of children born deformed because of radiation fallout decades ago, and other images that disturb for various reasons; but art audiences and the general public are protected from seeing images like mine? Disturbing. I find this kind of censorship utterly disturbing!

The Hunter (2011) - short film review by Julie Clarke

2011-10-12T07:14:00.001+11:00


Photograph by Benjamin A. Sheppard. http://uninews.unimelb.edu.au/news/5354/

Yesterday I saw an amazing film at the Rivoli Cinema called The Hunter (Daniel Nettheim, 2011). If your spirit in any way needs to be uplifted this is the film for you because the dense Tasmanian landscape and the haunting soundtrack (original music by Andrew Lancaster, Michael Lira & Matteo Zingales) smoothes away any wrinkles that may be forming in the mind. This is a quiet film, one that allows you to take in the majestic environment, whilst at the same time permitting you to become involved in the psyche of the few significant characters. Apart from the overwhelming presence of the landscape, which is shot in panoramic as well as in sweeping aerial views, camerawork of moving clouds across the sky make this film truly sublime, since nature, untouched, beautiful and at times deadly in its capacity to make the human subject feel not only out of place, but totally insignificant & swallowed up, reveals that above all some things must be preserved and others must be protected from the intrusion of human hands. I felt a real emotional connection to the landscape in this film and to the small child, who said very little and just concentrated on drawing the (almost) extinct Tasmanian Tiger. This film might be read as one which proposes a 'nature versus science' paradigm, since it is about a high-tech biological firm that has commissioned a hunter to seek out bio-products (blood, skin and DNA samples) of the last Thylacine reported as being seen in a remote location in Tasmania, so that they may clone or otherwise use it for financial gain. However, the film is more than that, it manages to present us with several ways of considering the concept of uniqueness ~ what we value and what we don't, which may be found not only in the environment and the last remaining Thylacine, but in the few characters who are extraordinary in their particular solitude. Indeed, the characters in their own way reflect the last Thylacine - Martin (Willem Dafoe) who must live alone to hunt the Tiger, Jack (Sam Neill) who lives by himself but keeps an eye on Lucy (Francis O'Connor) and her children who have been living alone since their father's disappearance and of course the Tiger who finds solitude in a cave & ventures out only to find food. I would highly recommend this film. It's not only beautiful and breathtaking, but is an intelligent and thoughtful presentation, which considers our relationship to nature (there's more than a nod to the Green movement in a scene about anti-logging of Tasmanian trees) as well as to each other. Responsibility and ethics being the key components. Surprisingly, though perhaps not so, I discovered this morning that contra what occurs in the film: In a world first, researchers from the University of Melbourne, Australia, and the University of Texas, USA, have extracted genes from the extinct Tasmanian Tiger (thylacine), inserted it into a mouse and observed a biological function.

Today...

2011-10-10T19:13:00.000+11:00

I'd like to say today was good, but it wasn't! The struggle continues on so many levels & talking doesn't appear to help. I've considered retreating into a tiny little cocoon, but even that with my claustrophobic disposition would cause me grief. Surely, I say to myself, over and over again, this will pass. How will I know the good times if there are no bad, how will I know if I am joyful if there is no sadness, how will I know peace if there is no sound, I know that I should have included question marks after these sentences, but somehow it just doesn't matter, free now in this confusion to punctuate any way I like. Such a little freedom in my body determined as it is to undermine my cognitive existence by presenting symptoms that I no longer understand. I've tried saying it's out of my hands, leaving it up to the universe in all its wisdom to sort things out for me, for I no longer have the capacity, or rather, I feel that I no longer have the capacity to work this out for myself. There's the dilemma - working it out, perhaps I should just let it be and see where it goes - just so long as it goes...goes...goes!

Holocaust deniers...anti-semitic?

2011-10-08T10:43:00.001+11:00

For most of my life I've watched documentaries about the Holocaust and have over the years read articles that directly or indirectly broached the subject. I still have my copy of The Life and Death of Adolf Hitler, Robert Payne, London: Corgi, 1973 the book I read whilst I was pregnant with my son in 1977. I can't really remember why this book appealed to me except that I wanted to understand why the Holocaust occurred. I thought reading about Hitler's life would give me some insight. I still have the little pink stickers that mark the pages where I've underlined significant information. The first was about the book that was highly influential for Hitler, and I quote: 'The book was Schopenhauer's The World as Will and Idea (Die Welt als Wille und Vorstellung, 1819), which celebrates the primacy of the will, seeing it in romantic isolation, detached and inviolable' (156). The second is 'Hitler's way of dealing with a man who could out-argue him was to knock him to the floor' (215) and lastly, I marked the section about how exterminations were carried out at Auschwitz. For me, as for many others there is no doubt at all that the Holocaust occurred and a general search with the word Holocaust in the Melbourne University Library results in 137065 entries, attesting to the fact that much scholarly research has been undertaken on the subject. One of my son's main concerns was how to decipher fact from fiction, particularly when undertaking research on the Internet. I've suggested that articles that do not cite their sources are not (at least for me) read-worthy. So, this post is primarily for my son who is asking whether the Holocaust really happened amidst overwhelming historical evidence and a growing number of Holocaust revisionists (most deniers) who are considered by many to be displaying antisemitism. As the Anti-Defamation League has said:

Holocaust denial is a contemporary form of the classic anti-Semitic doctrine of the evil, manipulative and threatening world Jewish conspiracy. It was this doctrine that was instrumental in laying the groundwork for the Holocaust. What is on the surface a denial of the reality of genocide is, at its core, an appeal to genocidal hatred.

I direct him now to Michael Shermer (Author) Alex Grobman (Author), Arthur Hertzberg (Foreword) who wrote the book: Denying History: Who Says the Holocaust Never Happened and Why Do They Say It? published by University of California Press in 2009.
He asked last night about Hitler's anti-semetism and I directed him to Mein Kamf (My Struggle). Hitler's views about the Jews in Germany are described in Volume 1, Chapter 2: Years of Study and Suffering in Vienna and he outlines his ideas about the influence of the Jews and his notion of racial purity in Chapter XI: Nation and Race.
Revisionists (and conspiracy theorists) deny that Germany had any policies in place to eradicate Jews and yet evidence of Hitler's desire to annihilate Jewery is displayed in a number of instances. Here is a link to Hitler's Speech to the Reichstag in 1939. There is no doubt in my mind that Hitler engineered a total and systematic plan to exterminate Jews in Europe (the Final Solution). There is a document which gives detailed statistics of the killings in the extermination camps - Belzec, Sobibor, and Treblinka, and the Concentration Camp Lublm-Majdanek (fortnightly report - December 1942 - total 1,274, 166!
In regards to the use of lime, which dissolves a corpse ~ initially in Operation Reinhard the bodies were placed in deep pits and covered with lime, however this method was rejected in favor of cremation. Payne says that 'After the bodies were cremated, prisoners were given small hammers to break up the bones, and then the ashes and small bones were thrown into the nearby Weichsel River' (607-608).
I hope that this information helps him work through some of the issues, but really, my question is why has denial of the Holocaust happened at this moment time and what might in mean in terms of current world politics?

Vertigo (real life, not the film)

2011-10-05T08:25:00.000+11:00

http://hitchcockfilmsurvey.wordpress.com/2010/03/31/vertigo-%E2%80%94-teetering-between-chauvinism-and-psychoanalysis/

Over the past month I've been experiencing bouts of vertigo. I've suffered it to a greater or lesser degree between 2003 and the present time. Twice in that time I've been hospitalized because I just couldn't stand up or walk unaided. Sometimes the vertigo is accompanied by nausea, at other times there's none. Once I have vertigo the symptoms can continue for months. It's a debilitating condition and most people just don't understand what it is like to have a problem with an internal guidance system that we all take for granted. Recent diagnosis suggests that perhaps some of the vertigo I experience is associated with migraine, though nothing is conclusive. Strangely enough my vertigo and migraines (migraine aura without pain) are often accompanied by problems with my spine, which makes sense because when I am worried about walking I tense my body in anticipation that I might fall. All of this creates anxiety, and why wouldn't it! Anxiety is a normal response to not being able to operate in the world as you usually would. I was sitting outside a coffee shop yesterday, trying to remain calm, trying to enjoy the beautiful Melbourne sunshine, when a woman visiting Melbourne from Queensland, stopped to ask if I knew where she could print out some photographs. I directed her to the local Ted's. Whilst she was talking I asked if she could move in front of me, rather than the side because turning my head to look at her was causing me to feel dizzy. I told her about my vertigo and she told me about the fact that the classical musician Andre Rieu had to cancel his 2010 performances in Australia due to vertigo, and in his case, the vertigo had been caused by a virus. I felt strangely consoled that I was not alone, that I was not the only person experiencing the isolation and distress brought on by this disease, exacerbated I think, but the fact that I live alone. She said that she had experienced vertigo on and off during her life and described an exercise, which I identified as the Epley maneuver to treat Benign Positional Vertigo. My inner ear problems cause me grief, but as I said to her, most of us have some health issue to deal with. The vertigo doesn't stop me from doing things, but does cause me great anxiety. I'm looking forward to this episode passing so that I can get on with my life & what that really means for me, is to be able to just walk out into the day and interact with the world without too much worry. For those interested, vertigo is not the way it is depicted in Alfred Hitchcock's 1958 drama Vertigo, it's not always about how an individual reacts to heights, or about the room spinning, although it can be like that, it can cause a feeling that you are going to fall, it can cause you to adopt an unbalanced gait, it can leave you unable to lift your head because you can't find your point of gravity, it can be just a strange feeling of dizziness, it's as individual as we are. However what was interesting about Hitchcock's presentation of vertigo is it associations with personal psychology, for vertigo does indeed create psychological disturbances. The disturbing thing about the film Vertigo is we begin to associate vertigo with Madeleine's schizophrenia and as such, we might see those who experience vertigo as having some kind of mental illness, when in fact the underlying physical problem actually feeds the psychosis, not the other way around!

Q & A + Zizek

2011-10-04T09:14:00.000+11:00

Last night I watched Q & A (ABC TV) primarily because Slavoj Zizek, senior researcher at the Institute of Sociology, University of Ljubljana, Slovenia was one of the panelists. I've seen him talk before. He gave a lecture at the University of Melbourne a few years back, which I attended. He's always animated and perhaps controversial in his observations (you masturbate yourself or you use another to masturbate). Last night he was particularly twitchy, rubbing his nose and pulling his tee shirt away from his chest in between wild hand gesticulations and fast paced responses. I tried hard to concentrate on what he was saying, but all this movement only served to distract me. He came across as a person used to giving lectures, being the centre of attention and since there was a moderator and four other panelists including Mona Eltahawy, columnist and an international public speaker on Arab and Muslim issues who insisted on using the word 'fuck' at least three times in order to express herself, Zizek found it difficult not to want to take over the whole discussion. But really, I should be fair, Tony Jones (moderator) handled him quite well and at one stage said 'I'm the one in charge here'. Several times he had to explain to Zizek that questions posed relied on analogy, whereas Zizek had taken the questions quite literally! Zizek has an acute mind and this shows in the manner in which he can take a question and run with it, coming up with stories and associations that lead you into the wild labyrinth of his mind and it's a real trip that you can either go with or resist. He is humorous and thoughtful and a delight to watch. I can understand why some people don't like him. He is authoritative and very mercurial & few people could match his speed of thought. So, what did I learn from watching last night? Well, I was astonished that it was so readily accepted there are so many psychopaths in our society and that high-flying leaders and power-brokers could be labeled as such! The panel appeared to agree that capitalism was dependent upon psychopaths and that their qualities were necessary for good business! It was also good to hear that Julian Assange was not perceived anymore as some kind of hero and fascinating to hear that, apparently Bush invaded Iraq because 'God told him to' (of course this statement by Mona, was refuted by panelist, Greg Sheridan, The Australian newspaper's foreign editor). Q & A was held last night in the Sydney Opera House & part of The Festival of Dangerous Ideas, however, I don't know that anything really alarming was discussed; in fact a show which includes the words 'masturbation', 'fuck', 'polyamory', 'Qadaffi', 'Assange', 'Arab Spring', 'psychopath', 'fundamental Christianity' and the 'Muslim Brotherhood' all together has got to be perceived as pure entertainment!

Hybrid II.

2011-10-02T15:58:00.001+11:00

Beetle and Dragonfly, digital image. (Rephotographed from an A4 print). Julie Clarke (1995)

Bent and troubled by invisible hands (Postcard from Zarathustra)

2011-10-02T11:45:00.003+11:00

transphylum

2011-10-01T08:16:00.004+10:00

transphylum. Digital image. Julie Clarke (1995)

I thought I'd done something similar before and then hunting around this morning I found a digital image of mine called Transphylum, which was reproduced on the back cover of aedon journal, The University of Melbourne in 1995. I've rephotographed the image from the shinny cover. I did a whole series from scanned insects that I'd found and hybridized aspects of one insects body onto another.This image is of a dead bird I scanned. I still have it in a small, hard plastic container. I no longer have the digital image files but have slides of the work. The beautiful flowers at the bottom of the images were collected from the grounds of the University of Melbourne and scanned. This was the way some images were made prior to the availability of digital cameras, which make image collection so much easier.

Hybrid

2011-10-01T06:52:00.002+10:00

Cow/Whale Hybrid. Digital image. Julie Clarke 01.10.11

Pig/Whale Hybrid I. Digital image. Julie Clarke 01.10.11

Pig/Whale Hybrid II. Digital image. Julie Clarke 01.10.11

How to make a tinfoil hat

2011-09-30T17:55:00.003+10:00

For anyone troubled by the Australian mass media saying stuff you don't like, help is at hand. The Anything But Human Special Edition Tinfoil Hat is here, and in the great tradition of direct action, you can make it yourself.

You need:

1. Two squares of aluminum foil about 300mm a side.

2. A head.

Five-step assembly:

1. Arrange one bit of aluminum foil on the head, from front to back.

2. Pat the foil until it conforms to the head's shape and gently bend bits of the foil away from the eyes and neck.

3. Arrange the second square of foil on the head from ear to ear.

4. Pat the foil until it conforms to the head's shape and gently bend bits of the foil away from the ears.

5. Squeeze and fold the bits of foil you folded away from ears, eyes and neck into a flat shape that runs continuously around the head. Your tinfoil hat is now ready to use.

WARNING: Some media may require extra layers of tinfoil. You will know which when you see it.

Pay it forward

2011-09-30T17:02:00.002+10:00

Every time I think that the world is a cold and impersonal space, a zone in which car drivers don't give a damn that you have to get off the tram and just keep driving even though the tram has stopped or when (again) car drivers are so obsessed with trying to find a car park that they forget pedestrians attempting to negotiate the space. When single people are overlooked in favor of couples at coffee shops, who invariably get served first; when people push past you even though they can see that you are down laden with grocery bags - even with all the selfishness that we all at times experience, pockets of extreme kindness emerges. So, although these people will never know it, I want to thank the person ~ I think her name was Rosie (Education Unit at RMIT) who sat with me in the Target Centre on Wednesday afternoon until the ambulance came to take me to St. Vincents Hospital and the other women who stopped to ask if I needed help when I nearly feel over with the vertigo I had been experiencing. My son who drove me home during the extreme storm and listened to me and today, Enza (a Melbourne artist who works in the Camberwell Op Shop) was totally supportive of my emotions and the women in Mountford's Shoe shop who gave me an umbrella during the sudden downpour this afternoon so I could walk to my doctors appointment. Thank you, thank you...you will probably never see or read this, but I just wanted to put it out there. To all those souls who stop, offer help and reassurance to others, to those paying it forward ~ I hope you get an abundance of love and good luck for all you have given me over the past few days.

Eatock versus Bolt decision

2011-09-29T14:43:00.002+10:00

It seems that we are able to talk in generalizations, but not specifics!
Here is the link to the Eatock v Bolt (2011) FCA 1103 (28 September, 2011) Federal Court of Australia ruling.
Perhaps all people who have been hurt, insulted or intimated by what anyone else says should have the right to an apology. Sorry? Is that what we are all looking for, or do we want the debate to continue? I have so many issues with this case and the judgment I don't even know where to begin! Perhaps Steve said it better. Anyway, for the readers information there have been 522 views of my article 'Andrew Bolt/Bindi Cole/Indigenous Politics' and 20 comments since I posted it on this blog on 7 April 2011.

Time to rattle the chains

2011-09-28T14:38:00.009+10:00

Man is born free, and he is everywhere in chains - JJ Rousseau

There is no better time than now for us all to stand up for the rights of people everywhere to say things we don't like.

Australians ought to at least have the right to get it wrong. When we talk about freedom of speech we often mean the right to speak freely about what is true. But what about when we get it wrong? Shouldn't we have the right to get it wrong? And what about stuff we don't like? Shouldn't newspapers have the freedom to print stuff we don't like?

As I write this today Melbourne's Herald Sun website is reporting

THE assumed right of unfettered freedom of speech was trumped by laws protecting against racial vilification this morning after the Federal Court delivered its decision on the controversial "white Aborigines" case of Pat Eatock v Herald Sun columnist Andrew Bolt.

I would normally link to that, but in a kind of newspeak News Limited websites are increasingly reframing and even deleting articles. News speak, I guess. Is that unfettered freedom?

The right of unfettered freedom of speech doesn't exist in Australian law, or in Australian common law. Why on earth would the Herald Sun assume it does? I knew a Melbourne writer who was imprisoned over a book he wrote. Remanded in jail during a criminal libel trial in 1950, he was eventually found not guilty by a jury and freed. Libel trials in the state of Victoria have been in civil courts ever since. A few years before that trial Australian author Max Harris faced charges of making obscene publications in a South Australian court. He was acquitted.

I knew someone whose dad was fond of libel proceedings against the news media. The family backyard contained the Packer swimming pool, the Murdoch Tennis court, and so on, all built with damages won from the respective media organizations in libel trials. Those media organizations had committed the grave, and expensive, sin of getting it wrong.

Since the seventeenth century English, and later Australian newspapers, have claimed the privilege to publish without submitting their copy for censorship. Instead, publications carry the name and address of publishers, who bear the brunt of any private or state interventions.

There is no such privilege for other Australians.

Of course anything broadcast on radio or television is subject to retrospective moderation by the Australian Communications and Media Authority, a Federal body established to regulate those media after a campaign by, guess who, Australian newspapers.

Australian artists and film makers are expected to submit works to state censors prior to publication. My own work has been referred to censors for classification, because that's what you have to do before screening a film in Australia. An Australian senate inquiry recently recommended funding more censors, in more places, with stricter censorship guidelines affecting larger jurisdictions. The defense of artistic merit to obscenity charges has been dismantled in many jurisdictions after a campaign by newspaper columnists against Australian artist Bill Henson.

Almost everybody who works in Australian media has been affected, one way or another, by laws restricting free speech. I had to make excuses to the television regulators more times than I remember. I have been questioned by police twice, but never charged, after print and electronic media I was involved in came to the attention of authorities. Once after a conservative radio broadcaster complained long and loud.

There should be no mistaken assumptions here. Australians should have the right to speak freely, and to get it wrong. But we don't.

In the vast echo chambers that characterize Australian media websites the Australian media are doing everything right. And their constant opinion polling is telling them people want to hear exactly what they say. But clearly something is going very wrong for them, when freedom of expression is under siege at every turn.

It is time to rattle the chains. It is time for Australian newspapers to stand up for the unpopular but necessary right to get it wrong. It is time for newspapers to stand up for the rights of individuals to say unpopular things. It is time for newspapers to stand up for the rights of people to exhibit photographs some find obscene.

It is time for Australian newspapers to rattle the chains. But, gripped by populism, and conflicted about free speech, even to save themselves, will they?

Remembering Sunday...

2011-09-28T09:10:00.000+10:00

I placed this photo of friends who attended my afternoon tea party last Sunday on face book this morning, so thought I'd also place it here. Apart from my friend Shaun Harper (teacher), Kalarin Butler (sometimes painter), my lovely son (pictured second from left) his father David Powell (man with the white hair in front of the TV, occasional musician), I was so happy to be able to have the gorgeous and extremely talented Melbourne sculptor, Aliey Ball and Francesco Paolo Vitelli (Architect & current lecturer in Memory and the City course at Melbourne University (who also wrote the catalogue essay for my 'Body and the City' exhibition) to add to the dynamics of the group. Of course, with all the talent in the room there was much discussion about recent art projects & art in general. All the buzz was Aliey's recent work with a film and Francesco's upcoming involvement with one. Music and the making of it was also on the agenda. Dave and Francesco connected on so many levels and at some point in the day Francesco said that he might ask Dave to do the music for the film. Since the emphasis appeared to be on Morton Feldman (& other composers that they liked) I began to look for Domenico De Clario's CD that he sent me in 2009, since De Clario's music follows a similar vein as Feldman's. I couldn't find it, but I figured that it may be exactly the kind of music they were looking for, for inspiration. There are always interesting connections when you bring creative people together, for instance, after mentioning De Clario I remembered that Karen Casey has finally had the Global Mind Project/Spectacle of the Mind catalogue printed in Istanbul, where she's currently showing work at ISEA and on her return I'll receive multiple copies (which include my essay on the performances of De Clario, Jill Orr and Stelarc). You will notice that I still haven't managed to place hooks in the wall so that I can hang the paintings I did last year, so they'll just have to keep sitting on the mantelpiece over the heater for the present time, along with the plastic envelope, which is currently housing 'Collision' artworks by Mark McDean. I wish I had the time and energy to bring groups of creative people together once per week. It would be most inspiring! But thinking about that just makes me think that I should endeavor to arrange some kind of get together at least once every three months, if that happens it would be nice if I was well, for last Sunday I experienced a vertiginous migraine that lasted all day (it is a chronic condition I'm inflicted with) and I'm grateful that those present were understanding of my situation. This afternoon I have an appointment with my osteopath & thanks to my generous and thoughtful son, my computer is now fixed and all is well.

RIP computer

2011-09-27T10:28:00.000+10:00

My computer died yesterday. RIP. I'm currently using one at the Camberwell Library, where I'm a member. Will be back blogging when computer is fixed and when I have something significant to say. Until then, enjoy Steve's beautiful images and the gorgeous Melbourne weather. I just completed an online course: 'Workplace Discrimination and Harassment - Legal Compliance' (something I was required to do as a new staff member of Victoria University) and am happy to report that I achieved 19 out of 20. I'm sure that I did so well because I've experienced both discrimination as well as harassment in my work life. I've printed out my certificate - feel like a kid again - yet another piece of paper to add to the pieces of paper to recognize achievement. Think I'll go and have a coffee to celebrate - hope the sun has broken through the clouds because whether or not it's expected to be warm it's certainly quite chilly at the moment.

The pale criminal (Postcard from Zarathustra)

2011-09-24T16:04:00.003+10:00

'Lo! the pale criminal hath bowed his head: out of his eye speaketh the great contempt. "Mine ego is something which is to be surpassed: mine ego is to me the great contempt of man": so speaketh it out of that eye. '

Statistics...

2011-09-24T08:33:00.001+10:00

This month, apart from the thousand or so hits on the blog, these posts (some from the past) were the most popular:

Andrew Bolt/Bindi Cole/Indigenous politics - Apr 7, 2011, 18 comments
167 Page views (all time page views 495)

Prosh ~ dots and a dash! - Aug 19, 2010
78 Page views (all time page views 943)

Film review - Predators - Sep 6, 2011, 6 comments
67 Page views (all time page views 76)

Dear Professor Patrick McGorry - Aug 16, 2011, 20 comments
49 Page views (all time page views 162)

Short review of Rebecca Skloot's book 'The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks' - Jan 6, 2010
31 Page views (all time page views 219)

Prosh pranks - Aug 18, 2010, 4 comments
29 Page views (all time page views 373)

My sex robot: Gynoid revisited - Mar 19, 2011
24 Page views (all time page views 205)

Review of Murray McKeich: pzombie by Julie Clarke - Dec 30, 2009
22 Page views (all time page views 252)

Climate Change Forum Geelong 2011 - very few questions answered - Mar 26, 2011, 5 comments
20 Page views (all time 70)

Unexpected rat - Sep 19, 2011, 5 comments
19 Page views

Swimming, I love it

2011-09-23T07:42:00.000+10:00

I forgot how much I love swimming until yesterday when I had a thirty minute swim at the Kew Recreation Centre. What a fantastic venue it is. The water was warm and pool facility air-conditioned, which meant that I didn't get a rush of cold air on my body when I got out of the pool. I must admit I could have stayed a lot longer, but I was advised by pool staff to limit swimming time for the first few sessions so as to help, rather than hinder my osteoarthritis symptoms. I really feel like going every day. It's so relaxing! If I do this the blog will suffer for I'll have to be heading off to the pool rather than sitting at the computer writing. At this point in time, with the weather getting progressively warmer, it's a no brainer. On days when I don't have to go into Melbourne University, I'll probably be going for a swim.

Academic frustration

2011-09-22T07:00:00.000+10:00

In 1991 when I finished my undergraduate degree at RMIT I believed the hype that if I undertook postgraduate study I would be qualified to teach in a University, so I undertook a postgraduate diploma and then I was told I needed a higher degree to teach, so I did a Master of Arts. I was then told that there were only casual tutoring positions and those were mostly given to students undertaking a PhD, so I enrolled in a PhD and in second year began to tutor on a very casual basis. When I completed my PhD at the end of 2004 I had already applied for one postdoctoral grant and was placed in the top ten percentile of applications at my University, but was unsuccessful in receiving a research grant. I applied another three times, each time I was unsuccessful. There were very few tenured positions available in any of the Universities in Melbourne by that stage and some of the lecturers and some of the peers in my department had already left Australia to find better, more fulfilling positions at overseas universities. The article in yesterday's Australian newspaper appears to hit the nail on the head. It describes the horrible state of affairs that exists in Universities at the moment and confirms that I am not the only individual finding it frustrating that after a decade or so of study we form part of a workforce that is forced to accept the little amount of teaching work offered and are expected to be grateful for it, if you don't mind! We have become fodder, to be used and abused. There is no job security - most contracts state that the hours are not guaranteed and if you figure in the amount of administrative duties required for each hour of tutoring you are being paid at an extremely low rate for your academic qualifications and experience. However, like most workers afraid of loosing the little piece of work handed to them, most will not speak up for fear of the backlash of being overlooked next time work is being handed out. We all know that if we won't do it for that amount of money that there are 67,000 other academics who can replace us. So, the academic factory churns on and people get more and more frustrated with what appears to be a failing system.

Barbarians at the gate

2011-09-20T17:06:00.006+10:00

So it is true, there are no girls on the internet!

Internet activists The Pirate Party won 15 out of 130 seats in elections for German State Parliament yesterday, with 8.9% of the popular vote. But all fifteen are male.*

“Gender politics has not arrived for the Pirates yet, and that is not a step forward but a step backward,” Berlin Mayor and Social Democrat Party heavyweight Klaus Wowereit told German media.

The Pirate Party are anti censorship, pro file-sharing, and support transparent government by Wikileak.

The rise of the German Pirate Party represents a much larger threat to media and entertainment conglomerates than the Green-sponsored Finklestien inquiry into Australian political comment does.

The Pirate Party opposes privately owned monopolies, especially in media markets, and supports strengthened privacy statutes and civil protections. Media monopolies and the governments they influence are characterised as enemies of the people. Ordinary people are everywhere oppressed, they say, by invasions of privacy by media conglomerates with excessive influence on the State, and by the criminalisation of legitimate private activities like, for example, file sharing over a peer to peer network, by governments urged on by the same multinational media conglomerates that install them to office.

The New Zealand Government has recently legislated to restrict internet access to individuals caught file sharing by private investigators working for media corporations. Internet traffic through New Zealand dropped ten percent when the new laws took effect.

The Pirate Party wants to abolish international copyright protection for media corporations, especially those it labels monopolistic. The Australian Pirate Party is pro hactivism and anti internet regulation. It champions unhindered access to the internet, and by implication unfettered bit torrent downloads of copyright media, as a fundamental human right.

Australia has been spared, so far, the public spectacle of teenagers and broke and unemployed mums hauled into court and ordered to pay hundreds of thousands of dollars compensation to mega corporations for sharing popular music tracks on torrent trackers. But Australian Julian Assange and his wikileaks website is at the centre of international debate over corporate and State transparency issues.

Any political party strong enough to flex its muscles will, and short of a collapse in the Australian Green Party's vote we can expect the Greens to muscle up to what it thinks are their opponents more. But the emergence of organised opposition to communications monopolies in the European Green's own back yard illustrates how out of mainstream, and out of touch with grassroots sentiment, the Greens have moved since their early parliamentary successes in Europe and Australia.

I remember the late media boss Kerry Packer shaping up to a Parliamentary inquiry in the early 1990s, telling astonished parliamentarians "I don't think you have any power to regulate me". The Australian Greens might disagree, but the up and coming Pirate Party may be much more in touch with the preoccupations of mainstream internet users, and media consumers in general, and much more likely to take on media bosses about issues people actually care about.

* I was wrong - Susan Graf, a 19 year old member of Berlin's Chaos Computer Club, was elected as a Pirate Party member of Germany's Berlin State Parliament last week, along with 14 male colleagues.

Unexpected rat

2011-09-19T20:13:00.006+10:00

I've been storyboarding an apocalyptic animated short, involving mean streets and a circus train, scripted by my friend Angelo. And toying with a synthesis of pre-raph realism and traditional surrealism. This isn't a frame from the film. It is an unexpected reframing of of an unconscious unconsidered almost surrendered viewpoint, a frame from a dream. A surreality at least offers some possibility of transcending the often mundane experience of virtual reality.

Collisions: Julie Clarke + Mark Mcdean (19.09.2011)

2011-09-19T08:49:00.001+10:00

Mommy's Boy. Julie Clarke (2011) Vintage postcard with text; black satin armband with cross, stitched in black upholstery cotton.

I was immediately attracted to this Vintage 1950s B & W postcard (actual photograph) of a man sitting by a fjord in Lysefjorden, Norge (published by Enerett: Normanns Kunstforlag A.S., Oslo - photographer Arne Normann) because his back is towards the viewer and we cannot see his face. As such, he represents in my mind the loner, or any man who has turned his back on society. He gazes outwards to the distant mountains and is but another object in a landscape dominated by impenetrable and pervasive granite. The braces, which hold up his lederhosen (leather breeches, basically worn by workers for work or leisure wear) forms the letter X, the particular shape of a chromosome. I find the soft, exposed flesh on his back and shoulders fascinating since they form a contrast to the hard, jagged, mountain edge; his partial nakedness a ‘natural’ state of being within the raw environment. His voyeuristic admiration of the scenery together with our voyeuristic objectification of his figure, feminizes him, for his body in this postcard, like that of the female in society has become a commodity, something to be consumed. I discovered this postcard in an opportunity shop not long after I’d heard of the bombing of government buildings and mass shootings of young people on 22 July 2011 in Oslo, Norway by Anders Behring Breivik. Since Breivik was a loner who had withdrawn from society, the postcard, which depicted a solitary man amidst such beauty appeared incongruous to Breivik's display of terror and violence. I could not comprehend why a young man who lived in such a peaceful country could kill seventy-seven of his own people. Part of the reason was given by Breivik in his Manifesto '2083: A European Declaration of Independence'. I've placed a quote from it as text over the postcard. It reads: I do not approve of the super-liberal, matriarchal upbringing as it completely lacked discipline and has contributed to feminise me to a certain degree (Anders Behring Breivik). In his manifesto Breivik spoke of his absent father and in one newspaper article he was referred to as a mommy's body. This is my response to Mark McDean’s recent artwork in the Collisions project and his accompanying description that raises issues around the notion of the 'real man' and the 'sissy boy'.

Ah Vienna!

2011-09-18T17:38:00.003+10:00

I went to see Vienna: Art and Design at the NGV International this afternoon and I'm so glad I did. The 120 or so pieces in the show are absolutely exquisite. I must say that, although I loved seeing the Klimt, Schiele and Kokoschka paintings & drawings in the flesh, so to speak, I was thoroughly mesmerized by the poster and furniture designs, mostly by Josef Hoffman. The chairs were elegant, very Art Nouveau, indeed there was a Nouveau/Deco feel to the whole exhibition, which of course is expected since most of the artists in the show were part of the Vienna Secession - the Austrian branch of Art Nouveau style. The exhibition also included many silver tea sets and other household items. Exhibition entrance fees are a little high, but after having a glass of Viennese white wine in the sun-lit NGV courtyard prior to seeing the works, concern about the price of my ticket faded into the background as I soaked in all that decorative work laced with metallic paint. It's also, I think the quietest exhibition I've ever experienced. Although it was well attended there was an air of respect from patrons as they spent time study each of the works - barely a sound as people walked from piece to piece and formed little groups that stood quietly in front of iconic works by Klimt. I was no different. I meditated at the altar of Klimt's Emile Floge and like many, contemplated what their relationship really was. I'd recommend this exhibition, and doubly recommend trying the Viennese wine.

Saturday

2011-09-17T08:08:00.000+10:00

Just thought I'd check in briefly to the blog. I've been trying to have a rest from the computer since working on it causes so much grief to my neck muscles & pain down my spine. I'm happy for my son that Hawthorn beat the Sydney Swans last night - does this mean that they are in the AFL grand final? You can see from this comment that I am a little unfamiliar with all things football, but since I live in Hawthorn I'm happy that there will be a heady buzz for them at this time of the year. One lone Magpie visited this morning and not having any bread I was forced to crumble a soft Italian biscuit and give it to him because he was so hungry. Magpies will obviously eat anything. Since the Magpies that visited me during the week were gathering chunks of bread and flying off with it, rather than eating, I imagine that they are already feeding their new brood. Last year around the beginning of October I met the baby Magpies, I suppose the parents will introduce me to them sometime soon. I do have a more serious blog entry ready to go. I've posted my response to Mark's recent artwork and am just waiting for him to receive it before I place the image and description here. I have little to add, except that the weather bureau has forecast a beautiful warm Melbourne day and I'm looking forward to that. The sun is already shinning and that's surely got to make everyone feel better

Collisions: Mark McDean + Julie Clarke (12.09.2011)

2011-09-13T05:39:00.000+10:00

Gauntlet: Mark McDean (2011) 16 x 50 cm

In response to Julie's last instalment in our continuing collaboration of collisions I was somewhat emotional to see the poppies painted on the (wooden) gun. It automatically reminded me of the iconic 1970's image of the hippy placing a flower in the end of a soldier's gun. I realised how naive we can be relating to war and death. I chose to use camouflage material in my work. I have an issue with it being a fashion statement, the wearer wishing to be a suburban commando. Visiting the op shop I was led to the kids section and bought a pair of shorts. I deconstructed the shorts and reconfigured the patches into a flat rectangular surface. I had great difficulty with what the next step/process would be. I trimmed the fabric in the shape of a skull, cross stitched eyes an mouth but, towards the end of this stage, I realised how dumb arse and cliched it was. When I was about seven years old my mum and dad took me to join cub scouts. I was introduced to this homophobic 'society' by playing 'running the gauntlet'. Two lines of uniformed cubs (male only) stood scarves in hand, circled by the woggle, a leather clip to tie the scarf together. As the unsuspecting cub was pushed down the middle of the two lines, the group swung their scarves around their heads, attempting to flog the chosen one, hitting fiercely with the contact of leather on skin. I chose not to partake of any further cub scout activity!! Soft, limp, roughly hewn from old fabric, the Gauntlet requires a gesture, either of defeat and/or protest. (Mark McDean).

I received Mark's artwork in the mail yesterday, the day after 9/11, so I immediately thought about our Australian soldiers deployed in Afghanistan and all those men (& women) who have been involved in war. The fabric is formed into what I perceive as a severed arm, since there appears to be five finger-like protuberances at its lower most point. Overall, the sleeve, sheath or glove is constructed piece-meal from different parts of an original garment and its fragmented nature recalls flesh, which has been stripped from the bone. The fact that Mark has used military camouflage or battledress in this work is telling, for not only does it speak about a garment that allows a soldier to blend in with his environment, but refers to the disguise that homosexual males must adopt in order to 'pass' as straight in our society. Crypsis is deployed by many species and is a excellent strategy for an organism to hide from its potential prey or enemy. The human species itself also mobilizes in an attempt to avoid conflict, injury or death, and in this way it is no different to the animal species, which can be aggressive and territorial. The soft, limpness of the construct suggests that the phallic appendage usually stiff and ready to hold the equally solid gun in war is made over here into a hegemonic order deflated, lacking any real power anymore to call men to arms. (Julie Clarke)

ANDREW GARTON interview by Julie Clarke 1996

2011-09-12T06:34:00.000+10:00

I conducted an interview with Andrew Garton at his place in Fitzroy on Thursday, 24 October 1996 after I’d seen him and a friend of mine, Joe Stojsic (together with Justina Curtis) do a performance of Fierce Throat at Southbank, Melbourne. I began by asking Andrew when he had last seen and heard of Joe (which I’ve removed from this interview) and how the choir began.

I wasn’t looking for singers, I was looking for people who were interested in the project and who were interested in committing to it and had the energy to put into the pieces. The first manifestation of the choir was made up of ten people and I think there was only one actual singer in amongst them and that was a powerful sort of troop, but we only ever did one piece and well, those performances were in Brisbane for an installation, a mini festival if you like, called Transplant in a deserted powerhouse in Brisbane and there were all sorts of performances going on all over the place and they just had this one space and we did this one piece - which we still do, called God Tears Europa, which I wrote in Prague after basically my first experience of Europe where my parents come from and I think it’s sort of a cathartic experience of this place that I’d always heard about.

Why was it cathartic?

It was cathartic, because I grew up in a family that spoke German and Russian. I didn’t know there was a language such as English until I went to school and had English force-fed and we’re also a little bit of reclusive, and as I was growing up I sensed that there was a lot more to what family was about, than what was occurring in the western suburbs of Sydney. And, I started this kind of quest, if you like, not to research the family, but to identify some kind of cultural significance in this country and to attain some sort of relationship with what I thought or perceived as a European heritage, which was very strong. Though curiously I spent quite a number of years travelling around Asia, so I never got to Europe until a couple of years ago, so all my experiences of the outside world were in Asia, which really appealed to me in its own way. I was working with people and living with and associating with people who were all engaged with form some kind of cultural dislocation, if you like, all standing in the middle, between what their families have given them in terms of culture and what the contemporary world has provided them, as, something that - I can’t quite put into words, that doesn’t necessarily recognize their culture of origin, that they have to struggle to maintain some sense of what they’ve grown up with or what they feel.

Is that like a sense of place and sense of identify?

In the Philippines, it’s difficult, if you’re are a Filipino growing up in Manila in your early twenties now, many young Filipino’s I'd met don’t know much beyond their current present lives, they don’t know little of their heritage which seemed to me to be basically more about survival. Of course they'll know about the Spanish, the Japanese, the Americans, but once you get beyond that – from my experience, there’s little other than stories about getting to cities and trying to make a life there.

Do you think that your interest in language – the relationship you have…

Well, definitely because I’ve seen that through language culture is maintained in some way, that the heart of the culture is communicated through the nuances of the language, even slang. I was talking to my mother the other night, and I was saying ‘I did this great performance and I’m doing this piece now in German’, and I read the text out to her and she said ‘oh, no – no, you pronounce it like this’, I said ‘I was under the impression that you say it like this’ – ‘no, no that’s the slang’. But that has meaning to me because that’s how the language is communicated – that’s how these words are communicated to me and how they changed over time - how they have mutated and people attempting to define their own sense of place through using the language that they’ve grown up with, and adapting it to their environment.

Are you saying language situates us?

I don’t have any theories about any of this, but I do have a sense, or feeling that it can situate you or attempt to give you a sense of place, but that that sense of place changes constantly.

But it also alienates?

Oh yeah, very much so. When I was in Prague I thought great, a lot of people were (German is a second language in Prague), great, I can speak German, I can go there and I can practice my rough German, and perhaps get some of this back. But everyone wanted to speak English and a lot of the young people that I met knew German, but they wanted to speak English, they didn’t even want to speak Czech. They just wanted to practice their English, which is really boring - interesting for them, but their need to learn English is almost similar to the desire to learn English amongst young people in Asia, they are driven by this sense that the English language contains wealth, contains dreams, contains themes that the world that they live in cannot provide them.

When I was listening to you there seems to be a power in the language, I don’t know if you intended that in your performance, a certain power that allowed you to bring out power and emotion, or anxiety and aggression even, and I wonder if you are using that language that as a vehicle for certain power, for certain emotions, whereas English…

It’s a personal discovery, in that…

How do you feel about saying that?

I feel fine about that. The more we do that piece (God's Tears Europa) the stronger it becomes for me. That piece came to me very, very, quickly, and the first time we rehearsed it, it’s a very simple piece, it’s not very complicated at all, as you recognized, it has a power in it, but, I grew up speaking this language and there was also Russian spoken in the family, but as kids we never really picked it up, but we spoke German and then between six and ten I very quickly stopped speaking German and I went to school and no one prepared me for this very stressful situation, of not being able to communicate and not understanding.

You were quite old…

I was six when I started…

Grade one?

…I was four when I started kindergarten, but I was six when I started to get into English and so all that formative stuff that was going on I lost contact with; which is why I was hoping that in Prague, when I got there, it was such an extraordinary experience, of not being in Asia, not being in Australia, stepping out into the Metro off into the middle of the main square in the centre of the city and feeling this sense of something that was so overwhelming. I knew I was part of, not necessarily that city, but everything that that continent had to offer was there for me to absorb. Whereas the people I was meeting there for work, people who didn’t want any of the stuff I craved, they wanted to leave it as fast as they could, returning to America. Australia or England.

Interesting, because children start to internalize language at around two years old, so you must have been speaking some language between the age of two and six?

Well, apparently, it was German. According to my mother I spoke German fluently and I was always talking, I was always very articulate.

I think that the power in what I’ve tried to do with that piece called Ausländer und Staatenlose, translates, as ‘foreign and stateless person’ I’m actually saying in that piece that I am not the foreign and stateless person, even though that’s what was my father had stamped on travel documents, this big Austlander und Staatenlose brand from the UNHCR.

Was that in Australia?

That was in Europe.

So what were they?

Well my father was stateless. He was born in Yugoslavia in 1921 to a white Russian refugee who fled at the start of the the Russian Revolution…

So sad - because we always have a country, we have a sense of history, it’s very sad…

Well, I think it’s not necessarily sad for me because I have tools available to me to explore, I can question things, I had the opportunity occasionally to travel and meet people and talk about these things, but someone like my father who spoke seven different languages, who travelled a lot purely just to survive, ended up in Australia and literally died inside, and as far as I know left this world not having any one to talk to about it, not having anyone to really communicate the deep seated anguish that he may have felt and I feel very close to him in a lot of ways because of the travelling meme and in some ways I feel like I’m fulfilling a kind of life that he’d hoped to have lived himself, but was unable to.

So do you think some of this has been about grieving for your father?

I use to think in the mid eighties. I was doing a lot of writing, grieving for my father, he passed away on my twenty-first birthday…there’s a whole series of things associated with that.

Are you still sad?

Not anymore, I kind of went through the worst part of it during that period when I was working on a set of compositions and during that period I realized that a lot of the stories he told me were coming through and the music became parodies about the stories that I’d remembered and some of them colored and some had changed and distorted in my mind and once I got through that, I decided I wanted to know a little bit more about those stories, but I did not want to live for my father, and I don’t want to dig up the past in a lot of ways, but there’s such a fascinating cultural history or history of dislocation, but it is not unique, its everywhere, I meet people all the time that have very similar stories and they don’t have to be European or Asian, they could be of Irish decent…

I’m a sixth generation Australian. I don’t have that Europeaness…

It doesn’t have to be European, there’s a friend of mine who now lives in Melbourne as well, he’s traced his family back to the Blasket in Ireland - this island off the coast of Ireland, a very bleak harsh environment. His descendants ended up here as convicts in Tasmania. He grew up there. But he’s got no interest in Europe. He finds the stories and culture of what he’s learnt through reading and talking to people more than enough to fulfill him, but he isn’t completely fulfilled because he wants to go there, he wants to walk on the soil of his ancestors. It’s not a driving force though.

I stopped interviewing Andrew briefly and I noticed an image on a piece of paper he gave me:

Beelzebub? (I laugh)

It’s a kind of critique on Christianity, in that it looks at how Christianity has taken symbols of early forms of religion, mythological images and so forth and transformed them into creatures and myths of their own.

Yes, they incorporated them. Have you incorporated German mythology into your writing?

No probably the Russian aspect, so we speak German because my mother is Austrian, so we speak Austrian German, a kind of lighter form of German. When I was living in Byron bay I lived with Germans and picked up on their harder dialect and slang in some way and that was quite interesting.

What is Russian mythology like?

Kind of hard to explain because…

It is obviously as rich as everywhere else?

Full of magic and I can’t remember actual stories, but I remember these moods and images, sitting with my grandmother who was Russian and she would tell us these stories in German. She was multilingual as was my father, and so she’d tell us these stories, but I’ve yet to find her stories in books, Pushkin I think, but there were these colors and sombre moods that she painted and her paintings were all over her house, and that mood runs through a lot of my work, it’s a more broody feeling.

I noticed that.

Do you have any of the texts with you? The other thing I thought of when listening to you I keep thinking about Philip Glass (Einstein on the Beach), that woman’s voice, have you listened to a lot of Philip Glass?

Not a lot, but I was fortunate to attend a performance he put on in Rio a few years ago, it was absolutely stunning

Did he use that kind of overlaying voice?

Yes, he used that a far bit, but the thing that blew me away than anything was that all his music was actually played, and he had this ensemble of keyboard players sitting and doing it all and he was there playing as well and had someone else conduct and they were doing pieces from Koyaanisqatsi and Naqoyqatsi and also running scenes from those films simultaneously…

That would have been great!

…and it was great and it was also performed at an old Spanish built opera house, very beautiful building, so I really appreciated what he was doing.

Have you used those overlaying texts before, because there are a few people who do that - Warren Burt and Chris Mann do that?

I started doing stuff like that, I had a project in the early 80s called spiel das music or play that music, and it was placed around a whole bunch of songs that I’d written, which were just sort of dramatic, almost burlesque kind of pieces, but there was just nowhere to actually play it, because people were used to rock and roll singers getting up with acoustic guitar and singing ballads and I’d sing these weird kind of things (my laughter) and, so that it was sort of short lived, but I got to do a performance at a festival in Adelaide of that stuff, it was a children’s art festival of all things…

Well, they probably would have appreciated it more…

It was fantastic. Fierce Throat did a performance at Glitch a few weeks ago and the only person that came up to talk to us about it was this young guy about nineteen or twenty, he said – ‘you from Germany, Berlin, you look really sort of Teutonic’ - can’t remember what he said, ‘Arian’ and I said, ‘no, no we are all Australian’, I said, ‘well, actually Joe is Slavic, Tim’s family is Swedish and he speaks Swedish and Justina’s family’s tenth generation Welsh, English’ and so yeah – all those sort of influences were there, the coloring, we’d all bleached our hair blond…

That was interesting because I hate the word fascism, because it’s just thrown around so often, but if you do that all black thing with blond hair, with the control you are exhibiting, then you get that tag of fascism - but it worked!

But it’s also a parody; I find those pieces really, really, funny. I find it hilarious that four people, probably the other three people including Justina, coming along to rehearsals, and being these strange controlled people in these performances, but I want to create performances that are engaging, that create a kind of temporary island where we grab people’s attention for a short period of time and then let them go again, we establish trust, so, OK, we’ve got your attention, and now have to trust we can bring you back, and generally that works. Up until I started developing the idea of the choir I was doing all this stuff myself, so all these shows we were doing were one man shows but the Pan show which was called Triumph over Triumph, and Pan and Beelzebub’s and whatever, the pieces of the choir I started doing, essentially grew out of a one man opera that I wrote called Black Harlequin. When I was in Byron bay I contracted an odd strain of viral meningitis and spent three months in bed, and this friend of mine from Sydney sent me the videotape, which are the images you saw at Southgate performance, this video art that was running in the background…

I didn’t even notice it…

…he sent me three hours of the stuff and I was lying in bed and watching it and started getting ideas for Black Harlequin and was able to draw in all these parts of my personality that I’d lived through the whole sort of punk period and up to that present point in time, I realized in all of these performances I’m kind of like a clown, so the Black Harlequin became this post-industrial harlequin, that was just pissed off. I’m not going to tell you the stories, but they are funny, but at the same time, I’m not going to let go, once I’ve got you on this little raft out in the middle of the ocean, you’re here with me and I’m not going to let you go until this is over….

That did work and I thought what was happening with your control was that you were actually creating a space, and that space was not only to get people attention, you almost created this aura around you, and I thought that was interesting and I didn’t notice the visuals, which meant that you were quite compelling.

To achieve that, you need that level of control in that sense, that’s why I wanted everyone to try and sustain their focus and try and stay still, as soon as you start sort of shuffling around, moving, whatever, you lose the drama and the theatricality of what’s actually happened. I’m not trying to create a narrative; I’m trying - as you say, to create a space, like this island.

Do you have a literary background? Have you studied literature?

No, no, I left school when I was fifteen and only went back when John Bird asked me to do this Masters and he fought tooth and nail to get me in.

That’s amazing! But you’ve paid your dues in the same way as someone who has gone through an institution and presented their work – you did the work?

I’ve produced a large body of work. I’ve written stacks of stuff. From research to fiction, poems to plays. At the moment it’s becoming more and more focused. In the mid-1980s I wrote this experimental musical called, Triangle over Triumph about how Pan in transformed, over centuries, into Beelzebub, the Devil, and another before that called Thick with Muscle, which was more of a more fantasy orientated performance, that had, one, two, five different characters, all very different characters, including a young boy, and this was focused around an imaginary place - could be anywhere in the world, where an entire community grew up developing this culture isolated from the rest of the world but influenced by half a dozen characters who appeared very different to everyone else, and these characters evolved attributes of their physicality with this community, so over centuries the people in this community developed physical symptoms of their association with these strange people. Basically they evolved with a brain that grew outside their bodies – and this brain had to be – when they were born their brain was kept in this little pouch and had an umbilical cord that connected the brain to their body. So it was an external brain…

Like an external baby? (laughter)

…sort of, but they were totally emotionless and the only way they could create emotion or respond emotionally to situations was to manipulate the brain, the pouch was opened at either end and designed so that they could put their hands in and manipulate the brain - thick with muscle. So, these people didn’t know how to respond to love, to laughter, without actually manipulating the brain, until a stranger appeared and taught them how to dance, taught them how to dance without having to manipulate their brain …

That’s really beautiful…

…and it caused a revolution and he was banned or ostracized from the community. And had to leave, but while he was there he fell in love and after he left, the woman he’d fallen in love with gave birth to a young boy who was born without a brain outside his body, and they were considered totally abnormal and they were banished from the city as well. But as the kid was growing up in the forest his mother was teaching him the dances that the father taught her and the kids in the community got to hear about this strange boy, and after a period of time the kids would go into the forest and they’d meet the boy and get to know him, and we don’t have to touch this friggin little thing anymore (my laughter) this is amazing lets go back and tell the elders, and so they go back into this city called Busel and they danced for everyone without touching their brains, and the elders, which were called the Ogles, they had these sort of long single eyed heads, were completely horrified by this situation and they go out and capture the boy in the forest and bring him back to the city and basically perform a kind exorcism around him and the exorcism they perform, they basically trying to kill him and by dancing their dance around him they keep him awake for days and days to deplete him of energy and the kids realized this is really fucked, we can’t say anything or do anything about it, our parents are really freaked, let’s go out, let’s all leave the city on mass, let’s go and find his father. So all the kids leave the city, which freaks out the Ogels; because the kids are needed to replace the parents because, the parents are running all of these machines. The parents get sick and they get tired; the kids are just back up for the parents. So all the kids are gone, so the systems that they’ve develop in the community start to break apart, so there is there is this mad quest to find all these kids and bring them back, in the meanwhile there are all these kids running through the forest and the mountains, whatever, not only on the quest to find the boy’s father, but being liberated themselves more and more, discovering this world, discovering these emotions…. discovering…

So, it’s actually through the child then that change will occur?

Yeah, which kind of goes back to that whole thing about language, in those, my formative years, there’s a lot in the language I grew up in - stuff that I can’t identify with now. Up until I stopped speaking German, I was a very, very happy boy – and then up until fourteen, according to my mother, I cried at the drop of a hat. I guess, if anything, my own personal quest is to try the child within, which we all do in some way, but for me It’s through language, and I might never actually attain that space completely, but I might be able to create spaces that assist that process by bringing other people into that quest in some sense, so that we can all begin to start asking questions about place and belonging…

Blitz Street

2011-09-10T08:11:00.000+10:00

I was watching Blitz Street on SBS TV last night, a documentary about the GermanV2 bombings on England during WW2 and the narrator remarked that people can live in terror for about three weeks; after that time something happens in their brain, they simply cannot sustain fear for too long and so tend to put any apprehension they may have out of their minds. Apparently those who survived the countless V2 attacks believed that they would survive subsequent ones. This is a Wiki account of the Blitz:

The Blitz (from German, "lightning") was the sustained strategic bombing of Britain by Nazi Germany between 7 September 1940 and 10 May 1941, during the Second World War. The city of London was bombed by the Luftwaffe for 76 consecutive nights and many towns and cities across the country followed. More than one million London houses were destroyed or damaged, and more than 40,000 civilians were killed, half of them in London. The following is an account of one of the survivors:

By the end of September - in twenty four days - 5,730 people had been killed and nearly 10,000 badly injured in London. Roads were cratered, telephone systems crippled, gas mains fractured, electricity supplies destroyed. Hospitals all over Greater London were damaged, some severely. But "life" went on - we still went to work or Home Guard or Air Raid duty. We all suffered from lack of sleep, food was severely rationed, it was easy to be hungry but we persevered - but then - we had no option. Electric, telephone and gas lines were patched and repaired but few homes (especially in the "poor" East End) had telephones at that time. I shall never forget the sour and acrid smell of burning and the next morning smell of burnt material (and some still smoldering), water soaked.
Whilst I was watching the old footage of the burning, disintegrating and collapsed buildings; the subsequent search for bodies underneath the rubble & personal accounts from survivors, I was reminded of 9/11 and its aftermath. But I was left feeling that the Blitz on London was much more devastating and widespread. I'm so glad that documentaries like Blitz Street, which celebrates the 70th Anniversary of London's longest night has been made because otherwise we'd be left thinking that 9/11 really was - as recent America rhetoric explains 'the day that changed the world'! Is it just that anything to do with America has to be over-inflated? Look at the spectacle they are providing the world at the moment with their build up to the tenth anniversary of 9/11 - the influx of soldiers on the streets of New York, the tightened security, the new construction that replaces the twin towers, the 9/11 memorial. Why are some events remembered and others not? There will be no fanfare or monument erected for the nearly 1,000,000 people (soldiers and civilians - no way of verifying this figure) who have been killed in Afghanistan and Iraq through USA and coalition attacks since 2001. So, here we are, on the eve of 9/11 waiting to see if the recent terrorist threats against American is real and wondering how many more people will be injured, die or be psychologically scarred for the remainder of their lives. And the world turns and the stomach churns...

Birds and charming songstresses (Postcard from Zarathustra)

2011-09-09T16:45:00.001+10:00

Tap, tap...

2011-09-08T08:57:00.000+10:00

Every day, either morning or evening, watching the letters form on screen as my fingers skip over the smooth, black keyboard. The tap, tap and stop, time enough to think, although really it's so easy to think and type simultaneously as though the thinking and movement of the fingers is one & the same thing. Not much time lapse between cognitive activity and digital flex. We spend so much time now, don't we at the monitor, hunched over or attempting, as I do to sit up straight? This form of communication necessary because to be without a computer is to be virtually (unless you have an iPhone) out of touch. And speaking about touch, I'm sure we caress the keys more than we caress anyone else these days - the virtual arena has replaced physical contact. But perhaps I'm just talking about myself. So much time given to the computer, so much time spent in making the tap, tap, tapping sound. Anyway, the sun is streaming through my lounge-room window and only a few sounds outside as though the world and everything contained within it, is still asleep. How could that be so, it's such a beautiful day (weather-wise) already? Brushed my hand over my hair and at least twenty of them fell to the floor. Thin, silver-white threads on the gray carpet alongside tiny crumbs and other particles, which reminds me I really should get out the vacuum cleaner today. I have nothing to say really. It's spring and the flowers - bright pinks and reds & yellow decorate the abundant greenery, hang like baubles in the morning light.

Film review - Predators

2011-09-06T16:10:00.004+10:00

Predators (Twentieth Century Fox, 2010) is the latest in the film franchise featuring an eponymous heat-seeking alien race which hunts other alien life forms, including humans, for sport. The hunt has moved from a Guatemalan rain forest in Predator (1987) to decaying urban jungles in Predator 2 (1990), to a monster face-off with creatures from the Alien films under polar ice in Alien vs Predator (2004), and small town America in Alien vs Predator: Requiem.

Nimrod Antal's 2010 Predators emphatically cuts ties with the Alien v Predator films, comics, and (banned in Australia) video games, in a white knuckle opening sequence with Royce (Adrian Brody) falling helplessly from the sky into an alien rain forest. Royce is joined by a posse of six other men and a woman, all plucked in a white light from battlefields, condemned cells and other charnel houses around the Earth. We are dead, one remarks, and this is hell.

The characters are reborn but remain all too human. Betrayal stalks them as relentlessly as the expanded gallery of predatory aliens the film introduces. The humans must make uneasy alliances amongst themselves to survive, with unexpected consequences. They look for allies also amongst their alien foes. Help me, one human begs a Predator, I'm one of you.

I guess we are not the only things being hunted, another observes of distant inhuman cries.

The 1987 John McTiernan film Predator asked who are the real predators? Adrian Brody's Royce provides a ferociously physical answer as he outwits both human and alien to save the day, or at least the girl. Alice Braga's Isobel provides the film a wavering moral compass, a character ultimately paralysed by good works and unable to save herself. An amoral Royce, eventually stripped of all civilization, saves her instead, defeating the last surviving high tech alien with rat cunning and fire.

The Predator films resonate with themes developed by the ecology, deep ecology and survivalist movements looking to reconfigure the place of humanity in the universe. Human and not human compete for survival, and outcomes are far from certain for any. Humans must learn from an unfamiliar ecosystem the rules of an inhuman game. Survival depends upon abandoning civilisation, and its mores, to become a component part of an unremittingly hostile ecosystem. The only issue of importance is survival, at any cost. Civilisation, and socialisation beyond survival, are superfluous, excess, waste. As one character remarks, during a moment where civilisation is temporarily restored, what a shit hole!

Predators constantly offers its characters moral dilemmas. In one scene a member of the party yells for help.

Wound one man make him suffer make him bleed make him call out for help and set a trap. And kill those who come. I have done this, another character offers.

The green blooded alien predators seem to have a red-blooded moral code also, offering mercy to a human in one scene, and enacting some elaborately stylized Katana swordplay in another. Humanitarian gestures of all kinds are constantly challenged as inappropriate, often leading to disaster and death for those inclined to be helpful to others. Civilisation, modernity, and its technologies, are portrayed as ultimately toxic to humans and alien predators alike. An alien that assists the humans earns a grisly end. Another human becomes more alien than the Predators. As American Marxist ecologist Murray Bookchin observed the same year that the original Predator was released, the green viewpoint had become a singularly dismal prism.

Survivalisms and green philosophies notwithstanding, Predators is a good action film, with an outstanding cast, and a script that more than expands upon the original, introducing new aliens with new technologies that are eventually utterly defeated in an old fashioned knock down fight with humans.

I watched Predators on Foxtel satellite television in wide screen standard definition.

winter of discontent made glorious spring

2011-09-04T15:47:00.005+10:00

I was sorry to read radio MTR is in a bit of trouble, with its audience sinking to around a two percent share. Melbourne Talk Radio is the new kid on the radio block in Melbourne, established less than two years ago.

I don't listen to it regularly, talk radio is a little strident for me in the mornings and MTR's afternoon schedule was Sydney-centric, the last time I did. I hope MTR's format continues under new ownership because it provides an Australian voice that might otherwise go unheard.

Australian media audiences have been fragmenting for at least two decades. New entrants to a broadcast media market find themselves on a playing field that is anything but level. The broadcasters with the most channels will do best because they can deliver a diverse range of programming simultaneously. New Digital television multi-channels are revitalizing a television industry that commentators were writing off a decade ago.

Two percent is about the audience share of so-called for-and-by programming - MTR"s morning schedule is described as in your face conservative by conservative commentators - in all the Australian capital cities. The only way a single channel can make inroads into a new market is by capturing pent up demand for the type of programming it offers at the expense of other more established broadcasters' audiences.

Modern media markets offer more media, more choice, more competition for smaller audiences and more programming tailored for those smaller audiences. Smaller per schedule audiences mean smaller revenues per schedule, and perhaps MTR's failure to capture a larger market share reflects those market realities. Politics is not a favourite of Australian audiences, and media organizations must look to subsidizing news and political comment from revenues derived from other programming with greater audience appeal.

It has been a big couple of weeks for the Australian mass media. The media convergence review is finally underway, with the Australian Press Council kindly stepping up to offer to regulate blogs, and the Australian Communications and Media authority basically recommending it had failed its mission to regulate Australian broadcasters and should therefore be wound up in favour of another body with greater regulatory powers over a larger proportion of Australian media.

A relentless campaign against News Limited and its founder Rupert Murdoch continued with a ferocious attack on the Australian newspaper by Robert Manne In the latest edition of the Quarterly. I would review the essay but it cost ten bucks and an hour and a half of my time to read that I'll never get back, a price I wouldn't wish upon anyone else.

I wrote about broadcaster Alan Jones' attack on working journalists at an anti-government protest rally in Canberra a couple of weeks ago. Following up as best I could I found out that Mr Jones' friends had been delayed at the NSW/ACT border for about three minutes while they sought directions from police. The kindest comment was "Mr Jones appeared at the rally as a private citizen". Everyone else seemed rather exasperated with the eponymous broadcaster. "It was misinformation", one protest organizer offered.

Three journalists were sacked, and one resigned, from the Nine television network's Brisbane newsroom over the so-called choppergate affair. "We rightly demand accountability and high standards of others and we must meet those expectations ourselves", Nine general manager Jeffrey Brown said, adding that the newsroom had failed to meet its own standards.

Spring in Melbourne is as always a wonderful assault upon the senses. Bright sun like honey dripping from pink and white and orange-yellow blossoms, everywhere the scent of Jasmine and budding fig, olive, cherry and pear. Spring brings a promise of renewed hope, and this year's spring seems especially abundant after years of watching gardens parched by unremitting drought struggle to survive. No matter what size a plasma screen is, or how high fidelity, the media's dim glow can't compete at all with the bright promise of abundance and growth finding its way through the heaviest curtains and warming the most shadowed corners.

ANYTHING BUT HUMAN

SHAME (Rated R): short film review

Martha Marcy May Marlene - short film review

Top twenty blog posts

Applause

STELARC: Performance and sculpture at Lorne Sculpture Bienalle 2011

Collisions: Julie Clarke + Mark McDean (February 2012)

Preying mantis

Hope

Jerking to a grinding salvo...

Visit to Collected Works Bookshop

Collisions: Mark McDean + Julie Clarke (27 Jan 2012)

Horrified to see Julia Gillard fall, Australia Day 2012

Collisions: Mark McDean + Julie Clarke (December 2011)

No plan

Tinker, Tailor, Soldier, Spy: a short review

New Year

Iron Lady: a short review

A stab in the dark

Early morning

Untitled

Humanimalmachine

Statistics

Eternal return

Joy!

Suffering & the higher man (or woman)

Colors of Christmas

Life's a struggle

Human all too not human

The Mad Square - a short review

Saturday

Butterfly

The Universe...

Perception, again

Life is refuted! (Postcard from Zarathustra)

Everybody's looking for something...

Perception

Light/enlightenment/Language

Untitled doesn't really mean...

Collisions: Julie Clarke + Mark McDean (23.11.2011)

We Need to Talk about Kevin: short film review by Julie Clarke

霊気

Riddles, mysteries, enigmas

Friday...

Collisions: Mark McDean + Julie Clarke (18.11.2011)

LINGUA: Cyber-poem by Julie Clarke 1999

Drive - short film review by Julie Clarke

a post industrial post

Arachnids + a glitch in the works

Screen shot of 50,000 views on counter

Cause for celebration: 50,000 views

Bananas and aging

Australia as nuclear waste dump + nuclear power?

Life is sweet!

Eastern Rosella

Collisions: Julie Clarke + Mark McDean (03.11.2011)

joy for ever

Halloween

Nietzsche, the Cardinal, and a leap of faith

Collisions: Mark McDean + Julie Clarke (24.10.2011)

Written with his blood

Putting the mob in its place

Will for revolution...

First Casualties

One spectacle & another...

#occupy melbourne

Morning reflection

Escape from glare?

Brain that changed its mind

Disturbing image?

The Hunter (2011) - short film review by Julie Clarke

Today...

Holocaust deniers...anti-semitic?

Vertigo (real life, not the film)

Q & A + Zizek

Hybrid II.

Bent and troubled by invisible hands (Postcard from Zarathustra)

transphylum

Hybrid

How to make a tinfoil hat