Writings by Ron Giii aka Ron Gillespie 2

Intro
In November 2014, Ron kindly delivered to me five immaculate boxes filled with a disorderly array of manifestos, theatre scripts, philosophical asides, poetic ruminations. There are hundreds of pages, mostly unpublished, though some appeared in CEAC’s house organ Art Communication Edition. What follows is a cursory selection, I aimed to include writing that was done during his time with CEAC (1976-78), though some texts were too irresistible to leave out, and most weren’t dated. There was more than a little guess work involved, and the project was hindered by hand cramping while typing. The hope is to offer a taste of his prolific output, a sampling of his thinking and shifting styles of address.

He was Ron Gillespie then, though changed his name to Ron Giii after the CEAC project closed down. Ron was a quintessential CEAC insider, his roots stretch back to the dizzying moment when the Kensington Arts Association was morphing from a house gallery in Kensington Market to a downtown warehouse on John Street, and then to a full blown four-story extravaganza on Duncan. For the past 22 years, he has been represented by Paul Petro Contemporary Art in Toronto. Here is CEAC powerhouse Bruce Eves recalling some of their shared moments.

Bruce: “Ron Gillespie and I were school mates at the Ontario College of Art; although he was a great deal older than me — he was something like 25! — we became fast friends. In 1976 I introduced him to the Kensington Arts Association at the moment when the building on John Street was being fixed up as the new expanded performance space. It was Ron’s work, along with Lily Eng, that provided the impetus leading to the Behaviour School on Duncan Street a year later. It was during 1976 that Ron participated in the first ever performance art tour of Europe by Canadian artists. His performance “Katchabatta” launched the CEAC and its flagship headquarters at 15 Duncan Street, and as his work at the time was directly influenced by Viennese Actionism, it signaled in the clearest way that the art world in Toronto would never be the same again. Throughout this period of intense travel, Ron collaborated or contributed to CEAC events at the London Art Gallery, Franklin Furnace and Pier 52 in New York, Documenta VI, and Alternative Space in Detroit; as well as making valuable contributions from the floor during the more high profile conferences held at Duncan Street (I’m sure I’ve missed things). Through his encyclopedic knowledge of philosophy, especially Hegel, he was more than just a central member of the inner circle but one that gave weight to the theoretical formulations that developed out of John and Duncan Streets. On the more banal level, he would often act as the driver to ferry the various artists and bands to the many gigs. After le scandale, Ron was involved in some capacity with CEAC’s Lisgard Street building, but of this period I’m quite unfamiliar. It was after this period that the persona of Ron Giii appeared…”

Contents
1. Relations
2. Tongue Shavers Incorporated
3. The Meaning is the Use Dependent On Your Behaviour (November 1976)
4. Against Being Convinced
5. Different Connections
6. Radiation or Saturation of Ideology
7. A Vote For Art
8. Is Communication?
9. Letter to Canada Council
10. Douche
11. Quotes from Adorno and my own mixed together
12. Last Year 77
13. Message and Code (February 1, 1977)
14. When Your Nose Falls Apart (February 1977)
15. Letter to Jan Swidzinski (September 26, 1977)
16. Buddhist Logic
17. FAT AIR
18. Beuys (September 1977)
19. Behaviour of Artists (Is it Behaviour?) October 18, 1977
20. Hot and Cold (October 1977)
21. Behaviour Study
22. Questions
23. Real Criticism in a Cultural Vacuum (January 22, 1978)
24. The Canadian Tour: Performance Activities
25. Street Performance Activities
26. Schizophrenic Opera Dictionary (1982)
27. Lecture on Schizophrenia (1988)

Relations

There will be tea and lectures this Friday at 8pm to discuss the merits and value of paint at the Art Gallery of Capitalism at Dundas and McCaul.
There are 800,000 unemployed men and women in the country who will not be at the tea-painters party.
Some artists make $50,000 a year before applying for another $10,000 for incidental expenses, you know what we mean.
Some artists live on $3,000 a year because they do not suck the fat of the shit fields.
The Sun-Fat Life Insurance Corporation has a collection of noted fat painters in their main lobby in Montreal, you know what we mean?
The fat critics at Globular Slime parade the Saturday edition of PAINT FAT to keep their own fat thick, you know what I/we mean.
More Fat Art is surplus excess as in stable masses of nothing. The more stable you are the more fat accumulation.
Fat Artists shop at Fat Eaton’s in the Special Fat Foods outlet.
The largest Fat School in ART FAT is OCA, YORK fat factories.
Thick charcoal drawings are surplus minds as in static accumulates.
Fat dressed artists wear fat ideas in their heads as in bloated egos.
Ask your teacher how much money he makes for creating surplus needs of the Fat Establishment.
You are part of this exploitation, they depend on your static minds. You hide the fat they excrete from you, you know what we mean.
For 25 years the LIBERAL FAT MAKERS have duped the people in the streets. You are programmed as fat sheep with no questions, blank minds fill up quicker than shit as in first year entrenchment.
We support the contradiction by fighting the enemies of human freedom. Who do you support? Let me guess. The man in the street is in tears because when they fall they fall on piles of shit.
The little will struggle as always, we will never give up the fight, we will always attack the FAT IDIOTS to save the real people from extermination by the process of suffocation.

2. Tongue Shavers Incorporated

The factory shall save all scrap words for a scrap collection which shall be displayed at the end of the 20^th century. Furthermore it is of singular importance that all verbs shall be covered in green sauce with a dash of tomato smoke on the side. The adjectives will form the rear guard and shall be in charge of late shipments from overseas delivery.

Adjacent to the collection there shall be a saliva tray for speedy word and out of breath emotional language. The scrap inspectors must pay special attention to foreign languages and gestural religious ornaments that try and sneak in amongst the scrap collection. We the underlined do not wish to pressure the scrap inspectors in no way rather we hope to reflect a constant note of width to the labour and fusionist principles of glue. The parts which go their separate ways shall be holed up in narrow daylight and transfixed by increasing the temperature on the valves of many colons.

The last word to be scraped shall have the distinction of being refused so that the world at its close shall have the distinction for the study of scrap words and perhaps gives birth to ultra-expansionist pursuits. The hopeful remainder of 20^th century scrap piles shall fix the fixates for useful abuse instead of destructive functionable baby pills.

The outriders of the scrap pile shall be the participles of convenience. The front leaders shall be the invincible connective scraps and on their right shall be the members of the judicial pronouns. The branches in the middle of the pile shall arteriorize the outer and inner outers to grease the fences when necessary.

The museum for scrap ideas should fit the usual mini-mental bug and will have no forseeable problems for underexposure to the fusion. It is expected the remains of language shall do their job in fixing the problems of the first century. The funeral exhaust banks might possibly contribute to this scrap by non-negotiable returnable stamps in memory of dear departed periods. It is especially significant that we who lament the cement shall at least have known the weight of the reason divided by the length of the question. As well one might say that this collection is historically accessible in the formatting of monthly payments to grease yields and electrical futures. It is assessed at speeds of speed retraction that all energies unleashed will continue to continue.

Sincerely, Mr and Mrs. Why
Station W.X.Y.
Toronto Cantucky

3. The Meaning

“Amerigo Marras invited the key players in the Conceptual art arena to a Contextual Art Conference held at CEAC from November 10-12, 1976. Among those who participated in this conference were Anthony MacCall, a British structuralist filmmaker; Joseph Kosuth and Sarah Charlesworth, New York artists involved with the Art & Language publication The Fox; Jan Swidzinski and Anna Kutera of the Polish Contextual art movement; Hervé Fisher of the Collectif d’art sociologique; and Jo-Anne Birnie Danzker, who had worked for Flash Art and was currently working for the NDP.” Dot Tuer, “The CEAC was Banned in Canada: Program Notes for a Tragicomic Opera in Three Acts,” Mining the Media Archive (Toronto: YYZ Books, 2005).

 The Meaning is the Use Dependent On Your Behaviour (November 1976)

During the past year I had the good fortune to observe some artists from outside Canada. These are my observations. These are the artists.

1. Jan Swidzinski from Poland
He ate food. He drank water. He talked by opening mouth. He slept. He smiles. He smoked a pipe. He wrote with his left hand. He often crossed his legs in a discussion. He used his right hand to fill his pipe. He read magazines. He took notes. He walked with a pair of shoes. He walked on sidewalks. He crossed streets on green lights. He coughed. He scratched his face with his hands. He combed his hair. He climbed steps. He sat on a couch.

2. Joseph Kosuth from U.S.A.
He ate food. He drank food with hand. He smoked a cigar. He slept in a bed. He talked by opening his mouth. He smiled. He wrote notes using his hand and a pencil. He sat in a chair. He walked. He climbed stairs. He read papers with eyes open. He had on a pair of shoes. He used his hand to carry objects. He crossed the street on a green light. He shifted positions in his chair when talking in discussions. He put cigar into ashtray. He looked out a window.

3. Sarah Charlesworth from U.S.A.
She ate food. She slept in a bed. She wrote with hands. She talked by opening her mouth. She walked on pavement. She smiled. She drank beer. She walked up stairs. She sat in chairs. She placed elbows on table. She read with eyes open. She carried notes by her hands. She held out her hand for objects. She looked out a window. She went to the john. She sat on a couch. She opened her mouth to eat. She read books. She looked at her watch. She had a pair of shoes on. She wore glasses. She wore clothes. She crossed the street on a green light.

4. Hervé Fisher from France
He ate food. He slept. He smoked a cigarette. He smiled. He sat in a chair. He sat in a couch. He smiled. He drank beer. He wore shoes. He had a shirt on. He wore a pair of pants. He talked by opening mouth. He crossed legs. He put hands in pocket. He tied his shoelaces. He slept. He read magazines. He blew his nose with his right hand. He walked on the sidewalk. He crossed the street on a green light. He climbed stairs. He opened a door. He carried notes with right hand. He wrote with pencil. He folded paper with hands. He coughed.

5. Tom Puckey from England
He ate food. He slept. He smoked a cigarette. He drank water. He pissed in a toilet. He opened doors. He walked on sidewalks. He crossed the street on a green light. He climbed stairs. He talked. He sat in a couch. He smiled. He closed a door. He read magazines. He danced. He put feet on table. He wore shoes. He chewed gum. He put hands on hips. He leaned on table. He looked at photographs.

The verbal behavior of these artists is a result of their genotype working with their environment. The premise is obvious in that the genetically conditioned differences between the thoughts of this group of artists is reflected in their behavior. To exclude in advance any consideration of the genetic basis of language, and for that matter all culture, is contrary to elementary rules of scientific procedure. The modern synthesis of man regards the performance of man as the study of his psychological, cultural, behavioural and genetic activity and not just his verbal behavior for that would lead us to redundancy and extinction. We are all concerned about communication, but let’s find out what it is before we assume its function. Perhaps in a few years the behavior performance propositions will be studied by people from all over the globe to evolve a new language with linguistics as the historical part of a very complex humanity.

4. Against Being Convinced

Are you convinced of oppression?
Are you convinced you exist because you eat?
Are you convinced you breathe because you know oxygen?
Are you convinced you are you?
Are you convinced things have a material?
Are you convinced there is a spirit?
Are you convinced there is socialist freedom?
Are you convinced there is capitalist freedom?
Are there any alternatives to either of the above? Below?
Are you convinced we must eat?
Are you convinced about anything?
Are you you?
Why must we be convinced?
Why does someone want to convince you?
Why do you depend on being convinced?
Why are we living?
Why are we alive?
Why are we we?
Why are we not the same?
Who was your convincer?
Who has been responsible for convincing the greatest amount of people?
What is a convincing statement?
Why do I not wish to be convinced of anything?
What is preventing my being convinced?
Am I convinced of convincement?
Why can we not go beyond being convinced?
Who is the next convincer?
Why are some never convinced?
Why are others imprisoned by their convincings?
Why am I so convincible in one moment and gone in another?
Who convinced us about time and space?
Who is the good convincer?
Why have so many been convinced?
Why do we explore?
Why do we question anything?
What is the use of the brain?
What is the use of use?
Are you convinced we serve convincers rather than ourselves?
Yes I understand what they say but I am never convinced.
We all seem to depend on a convincer.
We are such curious fools.
Why be convinced of something you will never use? Oh! Oh!
Why am I a skeptic? Is that why I will not ever be a convincer?
Am I convinced about convincement?
Must we all have a convincing belief in something?
Do mad people convince others about their madness?
Why is there a question?

5. Different Connections

In the communication of people there is a more-or-less act rather than a yes or no answer. This idea of yes and no is somewhat of a mechanical decision in that we have invented the yes-no response to data of many sources, thus we are living in the midst of mechanical learning when there are ample facts to indicate we adjust more or less to information depending on its use in our everyday practice.

It seems to me we have invented yes-no logic and somehow we are always disconnected by this lack of connectivity by over-precision instead of yielding to a hunger for more-or-less. Many problems come because we are too attached to precision rather than the blending option of choice. By solving a more-or-less need by a precise answer we engage a built-in non-effectiveness by virtue of its own operational process. The true-false dilemma is useful more-or-less but obviously not in an absolute sense otherwise we would have no problems when in fact we have more and more instead of more and less.

The relevance factor is a double-edged blade that is notorious for some and sad for others. When are the decision makers going to look at why they make decisions and what constitutes a decision? Time and time again we see this disconnection of theory and practice, so much so that one wonders if we would be better off if we had self-government. The people who, year after year, vote for Government Behaviour and know that this Government is stupidly ineffective are themselves behaving just like a Government program. The incredible fantasy minds of Governments are dangerous to people who live under these intolerable conditions. The blindness of these politicians is their training to remove themselves from society. In fact, the more trainable the politician becomes, the more useless that individual is to society and the further removed from his/her reality. The society that votes for this form of life is more-or-less useless, it decreases reality and therefore deserves to collapse with the politicians.

This elite Government and its elite practice is suffocating to the reality we know which they never knew and do not care about. The time has come to realize this Government is inept, inefficient, and out of touch with the reality of hunger, slavery, disease, corruption, unemployment, racism, human rights, brutality, drugs and alcoholism, homosexual abuse, women’s movements, and on and on we collapse.

The most dangerous acceptance of this yes-no disease is the incredible acceptance by the rest of society. Why, for instance, do no artists criticize the Government? Is it because they are being fed by the Government to close their mouths or is it because they are trained Political Artists and come from the same school? In either case the gutlessness of Canadian Art is well known around the world because they have been bought and sold to the system they support. The manipulation goes on and on and some few remaining ARTISTS are sick and tired of this massive slaughter of HUMAN FREEDOM and constant contamination of the future of young people. As the swamp thickens and more are sucked in by the fumes, the task of redirecting any hope for mankind is pitiful. This technological absolutism is stupid, regressive, bland ignorance that serves only its own aims and no one else unless they receive the indoctrination. The disconnection implies much more than I can say in language since the tool of words is declining along with everything else and so we come to the other connection.

What is a question on a question?
When are more questions more or less convincing?
What is the meaning of a question?
Why is the brain a question?
Why must we survive as a question?
What came before the question?
Is the question the answer, how so, if so, so what?
Before the question was a blank.
Was the blank filled with questions?
Is the void an answer or a question?
Why did someone convince you of the void?
Are you convinced of the void?
If the void is one thing who are you?
If two voids get together do we get the voidettes?
How many voids in your block?
I bumped into so many voids I become one also?
The void business is profitable wouldn’t you say?
Are you being convinced of the void? Why?
The thinking void?
The voider the void, the shoe gets shorter.
I am convinced Marx was convinced.
I am convinced Mao Tse Tung was convinced especially in the results.
The prisoner of convincement.
There is only invention.
Let’s find out why we are not here before saying we are.
What other species are passing us in knowledge?
What is a mystical question?
Why do people wish to be convinced?
Is it for survival or revival?
Is suspicion a trait or an aspect or a characteristic?
The convincers seem to somehow always go to war over right and wrong.
By asking the meaning we lose the truth that isn’t there unless you see.
Truth is so precarious, that’s why it’s truth for it’s so dangerous.
Truth is never there, just the convincing.
We invented things to survive.
Why does nature exist or does it?
The brainless species is more adaptable, we are the idiots.
The less you say, the more you hear about convincing.
One of these days I’m going to stop thinking and begin to live.
I feel like such a fool for thinking so much.
The concrete will perish and the will to go.
The materialist conversion is another religious trap of some poor fool.
We are either nature’s tools and fools or foolish tools.
The spirit of man is imprisoned in his thought and so we are trapped by the rights of others.
Your right is not someone else’s but your self no matter how hard it seems.
I suspect I am a product of the twentieth century.
What else is there in any case/does anyone really care?
Each year someone convinces someone else by trapping the minds of others.
We start off so naive and beautiful and wonder what trapped us?
The worst trap is the one of belief or faith, they have killed so many.
The heretic has no beliefs and is cast out as an idiot and perhaps that’s just what the heretic wanted.

6. Radiation or Saturation of Ideology

The radiation of elements amongst an organization is in direct proportion to the receiving of those elements by virtue of the isolation factors. The isolation facts are the real case actions of the receivers or what indeed occurs in a message sent to a person who has more or less knowledge of your message. For example, if one sends a particular message x2 = 20, the message received is isolated if the receiver has his/her own x2 = 20 already understood in his/her memory. The distinction being made here is one of value and absorption of a message. A group of people may have a low tolerance for reception but display an outward need for messages for their own surgical action input. Simply put, we can only realize the work of communication by realizing the isolation factors brought about by various institutional isolating distributions. By a more or less precise communication, it is not necessarily true that your precision will be received in the same precise way it was sent out. The saturation of an area may take place over a faster period of time depending on the reception of the area itself.

The Toronto context is a reasonable study of our own isolation factors in relation to those receiving the signals. The Centre (CEAC) may grow in an inverse proportion to the size of the area’s isolating factors. It is critical to realize this formation at present, for your immediate isolation will grow in an inverse way due to the reception by the Toronto context. The highest response the CEAC has received has been in fresh areas or locations that want to receive information for their own critical group practice. While in Lecce the wide response to our work in comparison to a place like Calgary that has a greater population by at least twenty times than that of Lecce, is a remarkable example of the isolation factors for critical practice. The lesson of isolation is to realize the factors operating on those receiving signals from the Centre (CEAC) and how they are being organized and acted upon, such that we must understand the saturation of how an area operates in different ways depending on the degree of isolation.

My critical mind is at a loss to say specifically why the local response is low, however we may pay particular attention to why it is such that in other areas the response is much higher and productive. My concern for the Centre (CEAC) relates to this critical factor of radiation or simply growth. Radiation is involved with the adaptive rates of groups in an area such that many factors may be operating in ascending and/or descending orders. The closer a group is in terms of critical practice may be an indirect result of the group’s ability to adapt to new critical practices such that the size of the group may vary in proportion to the amount of freshness or response.

In the area of Toronto the response has been growing in proportion to our own critical approach to the collection of information, however the net gain over the last few years in terms of outside critical practice has been very small. We wish to emphasize the returns of the Toronto context in terms of our activities.

Case One: Canadians have a high degree of institutional learning programs to process in a one-dimensional fashion so that the students become programmed to receive in a particular institutional way. This creates isolation factors for the students when going into a non-institutional situation or simply a raw area. Their institutional saturation is then reinforcing itself upon your particular action and therefore dissolving power over your critical response needs. In the case of Joseph Kosuth, the already known institutionalization of his work created a response from those people who are institutionally familiar.

There are many things that I feel we cannot talk about. Would you please name me one? The extinction rate of Art Makers is dependent on the amount of selection made in the shortest space of time such that when decisions are made for the benefit of their kin it is usually faster in execution because of the innate sense of their being of their own kind and thus when an Art Maker has to make a non-kin selection he takes a longer period of time to do so and after a few years this act of selection takes even longer such that the power old Art Maker misses all the things going on while others are making decisions at the moment the question is asked. How would they know if indeed they were in the slow place of the decision board? The thing is they are not in real time, which is the moment, and instead are in the moments of an overall hour or what is the equivalent of 129600000000 or in my calculation one hundred and eighty seven million, six hundred thousand seconds. A lot of time is wasted on decisions of an hour’s length. These people are missing the instant man because of selections beyond his control due to his or her spring.

Questions New York/The Furnace
from the streetnotes of time

7. A Vote for Art

A VOTE FOR ART IS A VOTE FOR ARTS COUNCILS.
ART IS A TOOL OF THE ELITES.
ARTISTS ARE TOOLS FOR CONSUMPTION.
ARTISTS WHO SUPPORT INSTITUTIONS SUPPORT CONSUMPTION.
POLITICAL ARTISTS ARE THE FUTURE.
CONSERVATIVE ARTISTS ARE THE PAST.
CANCER SPREADS AS ART DISEASES.
THERE IS A CURE FOR ART CANCER.
STOP ART.
ART SELECTORS ARE PAWNS FOR OIL COMPANIES.
ART STRIKES IF IT IS A NEW DISEASE.
A NEW DISEASE HAS NO CURE.
ART ESTABLISHMENTS ARE DISEASE DOCTORS.
A NEW DISEASE THEY CANNOT CURE FOR THEY HAVE NO NEW DOCTORS.
THE INFECTION RATE OF ART DISEASE IS DEPENDANT ON HOW MANY PEOPLE YOU INFECT.
AN ARTIST IN CONSUMPTION HOUSES IS USELESS.
AN ARTIST IN THE NEW DISEASE CAN INFECT THOSE WHO HAVE NOT HAD CONTACT.
A DISEASE OF THE MOUTH IS AN OLD DISEASE BUT THE SILENT DISEASE HAS A NEW FACE. CAN YOU FEEL IT?
ARTISTS WHO TRUST THE ELITES ARE GONE SO WHY WASTE YOUR ENERGY?
YOUR ENERGY IS ONLY OF STRATEGIC USE, IF AND ONLY IF IT IS STRONG. DO NOT RELEASE UNTIL YOU ARE STRONG.
NO CURE HAS EVER BEEN FOUND FOR THE NEW DISEASE SO YOU ARE ASSURED OF INFECTING WHOM YOU WISH.
THE GREAT DISEASES IN THE PRESENT ARE SILENT DISEASES THAT SOMETIMES USE NOISE TO MISLEAD THE ELITE.

8. Is Communication? (written on CEAC letterhead 15 Duncan Street (1977-78)

Is Communication a fact placement?
The e.g. may show which of the facts are facts or non-facts.
Examples: An example is a fact.
An example is a model.
A fact is a model.
A word is a model.
A model is a model.
A place is a place.
A fact is a fact.
A word is a word.
Which is the fact.
A fact is true or false.
A truth is a model.
A model is true or false.
A spontone is neither true
or false for a spontone
makes the true or false.
A spontone fact is both
but neither in its
instant life. From the
spontaneity comes the
contradiction placement.
A fact is material placement
of true and false since the
fact has lost its spontone
or the maker of true and
false.
An example is either.
A fact is either.
Either is the fact.
Logical equation is
the analysis after
the action.
An example is either.
These above placements
are either therefore
facts only by truth
propositional logic
and any other logics
as functions or tools
for use. The trap in
trapping a dead fact
is your own death. The
life of a spontone is
its product true/false.
The more life you give
to the spontone the
more spontone work
you can accomplish.
Be the action and the
logians will trap the
fact.

The action-into-fact relationship is your spontaneous generative ability to make information.
Some actions will have created more dead weight than spontones.
Always bring the fact to its spontone.
The spontone makers are quick instant people who are here and
gone in a flash.
If you flash a slow logic formation or a real x/y bang gone.
The flash powder people are being tried by dead weight slowers.
The shortest time is no time longevity.
They places place themselves in dead forms so we can go on creating
spontone energy fields.
Spontone display fields are scientific actions encoded
for study and research.
The art historians pay lip-service to science and make great
acts of indignation towards the sciences and then turn their
backs on them after using their knowledge in terms of consumption
and return.
Is long overdue for the homage to be paid to the sciences lest
they stop work and let the rest of the world try and survive
on their own recognizance.
The real people are honest spontaneous people who do not
project their ignorance into green slime buildings.
However we expect the Artists to go on stealing instead
of criticizing the scientist’s work.
The value of communication science and art is its critical
human practice.

9. Letter to Canada Council

We are personal fuck ups created by the dominant existent social structures.
The Canada Council is an economics-based institutional hegemony.
What we the people want are own selections with our people as our critics.
We want to direct our future rather than theirs.
We want a Royal Commission on the powers of Council delegation.
We want to have a full report made on the use value of the Council and whether the Council is fulfilling the needs of all sectors of society.
We want to know who has access to our work submissions.
We want to elect the juries that rule over our lives.
We want to criticize the jury decisions handed down to you.
We want to know who uses the information we send to Council.
We want to know the criteria for selection to Council Committee.
We want to know who communicates to the communication art centres and what is their qualification in doing so.
We want to know who has the experience to criticize the following: SOCIOLOGICAL ART, LANGUAGE ART, INVESTIGATIVE ART, BEHAVIOUR ART, CONTEXTUAL ART, CRITICAL THEORETICAL ART.

We want to know the average age of these jury members.
We want to know why our work is not returned to us as criticized.
We want to know who selects the jury and what is the criteria.
We want to know how often policy changes are made.
We want to know who hires the Council members and on what accreditation this is made on.
We want to know whether the Canadian public considers the Council successful rather than the existing Council evaluation.
We want to know whether the Council is creating formulas for Communication Arts and whether the public is involved in this policy.
We want to know what criteria are used to understand Communication Art.
We want to know the ratio selection of Visual Artists to Communication Artists and the cost operation of selections for each grant applicant.
We want to criticize the action of all or any members who pass judgment on any other human being.
We want to know the costs of operating the Visual Arts Agency with a complete breakdown of expenses as we are the public paying for this service to our benefit.
We want to know the costs of a Government employee in relation to Centers who have employees.
We want to know who freezes young Art Centers and who selects those increases for other institutions.
We want to know if Council has any Future Communication Plan.
We want to know the time spent with meeting artists who have not received grants or any other form of government assistance.
We want to know who selects criteria for artistic formulation.
We want to know who formulates the policy for each Arts section and/or division.
We want to know why Language Art that started in 1965 has not been organized by Council.
We want to know the person most experienced in Communication Arts and who this person is in terms of credentials and expertise.
We want to know who is the public relations officer for Council.
We want a complete open meeting to ascertain whether the Council is communicating to all persons in the country.
We want to know whether the International Art Community has information and viewpoints on the Council.
We want to know who informs other countries about Canadian Artists and whether these artists are strictly Canadian selections.
We want to know who informs the media about Council selections.
We want to know why Council does not publish incomes of artists receiving grants and the number of grants received over a period of ten years?

10. Douche

ART ALIENATION is competition, juries, grants, endowments, back-stabbing, any way you can get it type of acts. ART ALIENATORS are lots of hype and noise in the shortest space of time. Hit and run tactics, rip-offs, in short, artists are slaves of the establishment’s excess diarrhea. The ones who support money support extermination of humanity and they are teaching how beautiful the world is slowly rotting away in sewers. All surplus ART is excess from CAPITALIST institutes for control of mankind. The raw fat scrapings of humanity are eroding at the hands of these conceptual monsters and subliminal seducers of people. Their toys are traps from pig houses and aggressive, dominant, brutal, pre-war bestiality, these ORWELLIAN HORRORS are everywhere and have been since the end of the 2^nd War except they went underground as artist and sublimely gained control of the academics and intellectuals buying them off like oil wells to find new ways to seduce the buyers. They are successful as they have bought off people like McLuhan and Levi-Strauss and all their followers, blindly following in church-like processions to the BANK OVENS to pay homage to the pious fat pope.

Each day more and more go to ARAB high priests to suck a glass of oil to control the inflationary diseases and infected products. The ARTIST who supports the SHAH’s gang are the elite trinkets of the whims of powerful men who buy their services to sell their products to the people.

The language artists have given business the final weapons to seduce and castrate humanity, they have brought 1984 into power absolutely with the last mind control needed to lure the people to buy. These pervaders of extermination of the mind are ARTISTS and their damage to people is irreversible and these manipulators of sense in an otherwise blank world of response should be laughed at as the final act of young artists not taken in by the shit.

OPPENHEIMER, KOSUTH, etc; New York disease should be closed down to the rest of the world and their media destroyed to enable the rise of the world to try and understand the social collapse via WALL “STREET.” The ART ALIENATION task force from New York is finished and has moved its dead to plague Europe and the Middle East; the people of Europe are fighting and warning young people to close their eyes to DISEASE LAND. The few minds are able to see through the slime are scattered around the world and are making the last desperate attempts to warn mankind of ARTISTS who have messages, these few artists I will not name because their vision is direct contact and nothing in between to distort their humanity.

The last humans not programmed are in AFRICA, SOUTH AMERICA, CHINA, and one place for myself. The shit piles of Brecht have come true on schedule as he predicted years ago and so the final de-humanization is on the last and final road, the glue is not quite finished and the people are coming to pay their respects to the WORD-MIND DICTATORS as a farewell present.

“new york is closed due to plague”
To Valerie from Assland.

11. Quotes from Adorno and my own mixed together

The ontological need is great.
Concepts denoting function have replaced concepts denoting substance.
Society has become the total functional context which liberalism used to think it was: HORROR.
The new nature of man rejoins the old nature as one, but how to get rid of the functionalist fools, must we regress in function when we have real substance?
Indistinctness makes a mythical cuirass.
Deficiency = Profit
What is genetic spontaneity?
By scientifically reducing to the material point, we show our own point reference and condition ourselves as material points so that soon we will be examining each other as genes.
This teleological direction was begun to uncover truth, perhaps truth is examining us.
In a state of unfreedom no one has a liberated consciousness.
Philosophy will not dispense with truth, however, but will ILLUMINATE the narrowness of scientific ‘truth.’
The direct expression of the inexpressible is the void.
The abandonment of thought to an abstraction kills the thinker and introduces the monstrosity of a flatly abstract object. e.g. cross.
The test of the power of language is that the expression and the thing will separate in reflection.
Genuine philosophical radicalism, no matter what form of its historical appearance, is a product of doubt.

Ideology lies waiting to kill your spontaneity, only theory will kill ideology.
Theory does not contain answers
Relativism is the twin of absolutism.
Thought goes to the limit.
Open thought has no protection against randomness and may slide on and on into saturation.
Relativism is a limiting form of consciousness.
Thought gets in the way of money making.
The conditioners become conditioned.
Unless resistance to the façade stirs spontaneously, heedless of its own dependencies, thought and activity are all dull copies.
Each communicative step is falsifying truth and selling out.
Only thoughts that cannot understand themselves are true.
Myth is power, power never changes.

The untruth of Identity is the fact that the concept does not exhaust the thing conceived.
The logic of Identity is structured around the principle of the excluded middle, whatever will not fit into this principle, whatever differs in quality, comes to be designated as a contradiction. Dialectics is the consistent sense of non-identity.
It does not begin by taking a standpoint.
Formalism is simply a ‘matter of indifference.’
To get rid of concept fetishism, attack its substance.
The concept of the infinite is related to function, change it.
Art thrives by remaining resistant to its meaning. Its reality is however fixed in Capitalism, and that is its meaning.
Every system is a bourgeois rational order.
The animal to be devoured must be evil, look at their creation.
There is disintegration by way of integration.
‘Analytical philosophy’ is made for robots to learn and copy.
Experience lives by consuming the standpoint.

The demand is of course a co-efficient of the resource.
The attackers have to outwit the defenders by the previous known methods and then more deviant and inventive methods must be applied.
The most normal method of attack is the method of academia.
There is a very inventive approach available.
The obvious teachings in schools are for the most part teacher-related, so that a good teacher is the one who helps you get more good teachers, which means either getting good grades by any way possible or by seducing the teacher’s response.
In any case the general notion is to get out as quickly as possible.
Average grades are equated with the average potential resource and seems to work around that particular focus until one achieves some resources.
The competition for grades involves the first maturation in adult society for the servitudes to advancement.
The escalation and provocation is as severe as you wish to obtain your particular subject.
The number of games are as diverse as they are opportunistic, and promote the beginnings of real long term attack on the resource.

If something cannot be negated all the way that something returns again to do its action as if nothing had happened.
Definitions are not the be all and end all of cognition (as popular scientism seems to beg), but neither are they to be banished.
The concept of the particular is always its negation at the same time.
The essence of the transcendental subject ever since the Critique of Pure Reason has been functionality, thus all surplus is functional to something else. eg. waste is useful????
It is not true that the object is a subject as idealism has been drilling into our heads for 2000 years, but it is true that the subject is an object. The primacy of subjectivity is a spiritualized continuation of Darwin’s struggle for existence.
The purpose of critical thought is to abolish the hierarchy.
Spontaneity breaks through an idealism whose inmost core was ‘baptized’ as spontaneity.
The mathematical point instant is the unutterable, but not according to the idealist whose spontaneous formula has a 2000 year old smell.
Balanced minds produce balanced minds. The implication of balance as given preordains all objects yet subjective balancing came as an invention upon Archimedean points, obviously we precluded the objective conditions without any mental variable being introduced for the sake of a precious formula.
Without otherness, cognition would deteriorate into tautology; what is known would be knowledge itself.
Spontaneity cannot be fixed so as to please an epistemology gauged to standards of conclusiveness.
THERE IS NO SENSATION WITHOUT A SOMATIC MOMENT. The soma action is part of a realized action. We are living and dying simultaneously.

Demythologization is division: the myth is the deceptive unity of the undivided.
Conceptual bondage orders poverty as a constant direction.
Nominalism is only a tool not the answer.
In the darkened sky of the existentialist no stars are shining anymore. Existence is sanctified without the sanctifying factor.
Dialectics is critical reflection upon that context, dialectics itself.
Practice was a theoretical concept, now theory is being relegated as a sub-practice.
To proceed dialectically means to think in contradictions, for the sake of contradiction. A contradiction in reality, it is a contradiction against reality.
Identity is the primal form of ideology. It is used as authority and arranges the adjustments always maintaining the authority.
Thinking is a force that breaks identities, which is to say alienates the pretext which authority orders society from.
When authority confronts its own contradiction it moves away from the contradiction and builds upon that contradiction, thereby increasing its own regression.
The concept’s own concept has become a problem. What is a problem? A problem is about the amount of question in a problem. How much problem is there will show the truth value of the concept itself.
Objectively dialectics means to break the compulsion to achieve identity.
Dialectics is not only an advancing process but a retrograde one at the same time.

Obscurantism entwines with the cult of absolutely ruling reason.
Determinism acts as if dehumanization, the totally unfolded merchandise character of the working capacity, were human nature pure and simple.
The new totality is in the word ‘integration,’ which implies the universal dependence of all moments on all other moments or the sum total group acts with another group. People have become bits of ideology making the unit individual extinct as a mere specimen.
The time has come to give notice to the image of a world drained of meaning, due most obviously to the order maniacs.
No man should be tortured; there should be no concentration camps, the humanity of civilization is inhumane toward the people it shamelessly brands as uncivilized.
Why has no one considered the factory camps as torture of the mind?

12. Heather

Heather Jean MacDonald: May 28, 1952-December 5, 1976
Dot Tuer: “Heather MacDonald’s environmental installation Rain Room was the focal point of the Duncan Street launch. Built by the CEAC collective, Rain Room was an 8 x 80 ft. enclosed room with white sand on the floor, white walls, a grid of copper piping on the ceiling, heat lights, and speakers. Inside the room, it rained for two days, then heat lamps switched on for two days, causing a cycle of humidity that became dry heat and initiated the rain cycle again. The accompanying audio track juxtaposed the climatic changes with opposing sounds. When MacDonald committed suicide in late 1976, Rain Room also became a symbol of tragedy for the active members of CEAC. Together with MacDonald’s friends, they viewed her suicide as related to the lack of funding for her work, and to her eviction, along with other artists, from a building at 89 Niagara Street due to land speculation. For Marras, her suicide was a political issue, emblematic of her struggle as an artist under the brutality of capitalizations with eviction from her work place without a just cause, under the weight of paralytic institutions and of armoured funding agencies’. In the aftermath of MacDonald’s death, her friends approached the Art Gallery of Ontario with a request to install Rain Room and documents leading to her action as a permanent commemoration of her death. In the ensuing and failed negotiations with the AGO, and in Marras’s criticism in Art Communication Edition of an institution that would only validate work after an artist’s death, Rain Room became a flashpoint for issues over the politics of suicide and the politics of state-funded art.” Dot Tuer, “The CEAC was Banned in Canada: Program Notes for a Tragicomic Opera in Three Acts,” Mining the Media Archive (Toronto: YYZ Books, 2005).

Last Year 77

Since Heather touched the rain it has been for me a decreasing action of outside work and more inner growth of intelligence. The waste is as oppressive as always and perhaps my cynicism is not showing in the usual way, however the same establishment struts around and you may ask me why I even worry? Simply, if they continue the education of their youth there will be a new definition of youth to be invented, for by the time a person is fifteen he/she will be trained to order a painting by computer and get the trained information.

This last year has seen Amerigo and myself looking for anything that moves, it is so bad. However we will continue on in slavery to try and cut through the garbage and see the odd diamond flash point. Basically we have the tools to say as much as possible but with so little mental spark it is becoming oppressive. Perhaps I am over reacting and I will admit I seem to shout louder than others, but it is because I primitively know so much is being wasted on so few and the monsters we create have been planning our destiny for so long they believe in their work as religion.

No one is doing anything to stop the obliteration of humanity and least of all those who should know. The streams are flooding all the minds into social cohesion and strict institutional averages. The only thing I wish to accomplish for myself is a small drop of wisdom that I can smile with at the end and anything else is trivial. Man walks into his slavery each day gone forever into a bulging factory for fat men. The bellies of these people are fat from food but slim nothings in the mind. The nerves are slowly singed at each spot and repair jobs become routine facts and regeneration. If we lose the mind as the plan goes on we will become transplant components with no evolution but extinction.

The transplanters are busy bees perfecting their stop-gap effects for the first guinea pigs. The unaware have ethical backgrounds in meaning-trained meanings by trained meanings. The slobs of New York foster the unsuspecting witnesses and cave in the eyes of ignorance. I think this last year has confirmed the growing futility of my previously known facts and my suspicions are still the same. American Art is a copy service from Russia, Europe and China and never made the boat, however it will never be said for the sake of profit and the smell they need, oh yes, there are exceptions but for that I would have to wait till I am much older. Modern American Art is simply type-hype or inkstink and little else but sell softly suckers to the curious and they will blink and be sold. If we can work to remove the American Mist in the next few years then it may be true that we have for the first time in History no Art in a nation. The Indians I do not count for they are from another civilization much older and therefore non-decipherable to us idiots.

The end of New York power is difficult because they are trapped in so many ideas it will probably not really disappear, however the New Minds are arriving and the Future will bring their work to the surface once and for all.

The last year in Toronto is one I shall remember in years to come as the year the feet saw more than the eyes. I shall struggle as I love not hate and try to fill my head with the sun of the west coast and seek new challenges from the natural minds of the last remaining species “sponectic man” who survives as always until the end.

13. Message and Code
February 1, 1977

Does the text have a life of its own or is the text defenseless in the hands of others? I can’t help but feel a certain loss of significance in a text almost as if the text is somewhat destined to die the moment it is born. Can a text fight back in the argument or dialectic between two people? Should print adapt to light and thus be read in different lights or possibly, text should give off an odour when confronted with an untruthful situation? Maybe text should operate when it is being understood so that in miscomprehension the text would be unreadable. A few messages are however quite clear in most cases and very reliable in others. For example, if I say to you, “I am well,” or “My eye is opening and closing,” you maintain a resemblance of something. But if I say, “I see you” an identification has been made that is distinct in practice since the relater is involved in the direction of meaning, and in fact responds to the mention of self-designation. Therefore the self-sense message has the shortest route to follow in message and code. In other words, you can be sure of signal response when you isolate the receiver in the message. If the behavior is directed so that the individual is the referent, the reception of the signal may be improved or at least known in a short space of time. The quickness of the signal is the ratio of the number of words to the distance of the receiver. The shorter the range the signal has to travel the less dust will gather on the actual sending.

Short distance/short words = short sense. The quicker the impact the less you have to reconsider or the longer the message takes the less the real reception. A message travels quickly, so get the message to a receptor in the moment, not in a period of time, for by then he may have gone home.

14. When Your Nose Falls Apart
February 1977

When your nose falls apart in a vacuum cleaner I would advise the following prescription on how to control your last remaining dribble:
Have you a nose drop?
Take out a nickel
Place it in the mouth
Loosen all clothing
Unloose any dirt for
long term release
Check armpit sweat
Carefully take a
breath of ammonia
Pinch leftover
nostril hairs and
spit approx. 10 in.
Repair your nose
Comb back any facial
hairs in case of fire
Try smoking a cigar
Inhale a drop of
liquid nitrogen and
check to see if a
doctor is available.
If no response call
a veterinarian man.
If no answer bleed
a small fare and
place finger in ass-
hole. Relax and try
to make a
30 min film short.
As little motion as
possible is very
crucial to the fat
end of time and is
therefore a critical
evaluation of a notion of
space bombs. After film
is over you can
be sure it is not all
bad in fact you may
do it again under
different circumstances.
Now the moment of
time over nose has
come my poor friend
and I suspect you are
in a little pain. At
best I would suggest
you turn off the
vacuum cleaner and
start looking for it.
The spot most likely
to watch is the base
of the bag. The hair
may be retrieved and
replaced by TRANSPLANT OCEAN SR. ACTS OF INDECENCY.

15. Letter to Jan Swidzinski (September 26, 1977)

CEAC’s Art and Communication Edition 2: “The November seminars of Contextual art in Toronto were intended as confrontations among Art Sociolog [sic] Collective, Jan Swidzinski (provisional), Art & Language, Joseph Kosuth, and Sarah Charlesworth, and some Toronto ‘workers’ involved in the theory and praxis of a contextual nature. The task was to find the commonalities and divergences among the parties, as a process of initiating a dialectical communication among these groups sharing similar elaborations of socio-political practice.”
(Written after CEAC’s Contextual Art Seminar Nov. 10-12, 1976)

September 26, 1977
Dear Jan Swidzinski,
I have been thinking a great deal about the text on Contextual Art and wish to ask you for these questions which I feel are difficult to answer. Primarily I also wish to make clear that I think your position in relation to social change is for me an inspiration and hope for my own dilemma. Henry discussed Art as Contextual Art at the “Free University” of Joseph Beuys and I feel they all missed the meaning as it was far too simple for their media mentality. In any case I tried to talk to others about the importance of contextual meanings but I fear I tried too hard and as usual showed too much anxiety. However I have some questions that I feel are creating a block for me, theoretically at least.
Firstly 1. Can a time context be equated with a spatial context, if so can movement in time be another context that would numerically position 3 contexts?

Secondly 2. In genetic transcription there is replication via protein messages that contain exact requests of previous responses in order to carry out the function of the transcription. This is how the DNA code was broken in 1952. My question is a concrete one in that I think we have a case of two contexts in a larger functional set of actions. If so, would this postulate a repetition of a context for functionality?

Thirdly 3. In the law of mutual exclusion in deductive logic there is a moment where the inclusion and exclusion must touch. I call this point the fusional point. Do you feel that the touching of two contexts change or alter the other positions?

Fourthly 4. Do you consider a constant change or a relative change? Does change have different rates and if that is the case does time adjust itself or the change?

Fifthly 5. Do you think the quantum context of a great many numbers would be best suited to an individual atomic component or an aggregate system?

Sixthly 6. The point shifts of contexts with the variable time, space, energy co-ordinates would seem to diminish the Heisenberg Law of Uncertainty and create a homogeneous system and therefore induce determinacy due to distinctiveness.

Question 7. The quantity of molecules in a piece of cell structure might live in distinction however they are dependent on each other for reproduction and must share precise messages to combine. My question is this. How can we evolve if our contextual history has been one of linkage such that contexts have had to interchange to produce new species, thus creating intermediate contexts as well as distinct contexts?

Question 8. The behavioural studies I wish to concentrate on are quantitative in formation and require logical contexts of positions to learn the exact knowledge of a study. I am troubled to consider the ways I may precisely show the results of a study. At this time except for laboratory perversity I can only see approximation of the information. How can I decrease the amount of de-precision with a clarity of intention?

I would also like to ask whether you have given any thought to the formation of a contextual language?

I/am I am
Iam     Am
I am I
I –         I am

The boy is tall  The boy   tall
The boy is tall  The boy is tall
The boy is                    The boy is

The blank code is behavioural and perhaps a signal of our continual preoccupation to link words, however I feel it is possible to speak without words and contact with others. Also Kosuth badly mistakes in his ART AS A DEFINITION OF ART, tautology does not state what is the definition of definition which would seem to me an interesting behavior if he could be defining definition by another definition. In any case I hope to come to Poland in March to try and stop the DREAMS OF THE EAGLE.

Take care.
Sincerely Ron Gillespie
CEAC Toronto
1/2E=1/2of-

What are you opinions on Budist LOGIC?

16. Buddhist Logic: Argument from the Ideality of Time and Space

There is no time and space without the object. Time and space cannot be separated from the things that exist in them. Every point-instant may be viewed as a particle of time and space and as a sensible quality, but this is only an imagined mental difference towards the point-instant. The point-instant itself, the ultimate reality cut loose from all imagination is quality-less, timeless, and indivisible. Can one thing exist in two places at the same time? If a thing can exist in one place at one time it cannot at the same time exist in another. To be present in another place means not to be present in the former place. If a thing exists at moment A, it cannot also exist at some moment B, for to exist really at the moment A means not to have any real existence at the moment B or at any other moment. But if it is timeless, spaceless and motionless in the sense of having no duration, no extension and no movement, it is a mathematical point-instant, the moment of an action’s efficiency.

Worm Logic
I have seen with my own eyes a worm in the centre of a certain log of wood that was alive protected and communicating signals to me. The rounded form was large in the head and then small, tapering to the end of the body. The greatest extension of the remainder of the body was thin in comparison to the head, intertwining into the wooden crevice made by the eating or digestion process.

The logic implied in the formation is of a specific kind and impact to some people who may perhaps question the deduction. The question is as follows: did the worm grow from the outside in or did it grow from the inside out? I perceive the following case. From the exterior of the log the worm started as a small cell and grew to the centre of the log by the growth rate of slowly expanding towards the centre via a process of digestion, execution, rejection, and extension always directed to the growth and survival of the motion of the worm and thereby a united existence over a period of time is built up to create the eventual home of the worm. My biological language is perhaps indiscreet because I am not a biologist. I am rather an inspector of things and would be interested in knowing the logic of the worm’s growth to see whether I was able to reach a decision of formation. From the small to the large or from the large to the small.

The structure is dependent on the operation and this is in turn called the operon, the next stage is the regulation operon called the repressor in which the activity of release and binding takes place. The necessary information for the above activity is directional, intentional, contextual, reinforcing, equipped and the living response to a co-operation of a reproduction of species. Indeed the beneficial arrangments of this beautiful relationship is estimated in terms so clearly in nature that its fragility is the most delicate of known replenishment in life. The only real decision of structure is function and is therefore irreplaceable even by the dynamic situation of the set. One without the other is neither here nor there for it is empty of resolve. The outstanding question arises whether there is a function without a structure and the answer to that lies in the concept of space. The idea of space is the equation for the future man or sponectic man as some may know it. Motion, time, act, delay, result, volume, force, mass, rest, speed, acceleration, rhythm, tone, density, irregularity, line, random, chance, are all contained by the outstanding left over space. Brain space, cell space, infusion space, active space, influx space, set space, gene space, nuclear space, sub-space, low space, short space, near space, in space, as you can see we have this space construction to solve for the new information on space to assist the exploration of functional structure removal.

A few questions recently discussed:
Does space and time evolve?
Does light evolve?
Does an atom evolve?
Does a vibration evolve?
and heat, snow, rain, oxygen?

THE RATES OF UNDERSTANDING IN THE
GROWTH OF MAN ARE SOMEWHAT CO-EXISTANT
WITH THE SEARCH FOR ALL KNOWLEDGE AND
WISDOMS TO THE LAST POINT.

17. FAT AIR

THE MOON IDIOTS MACHINE HER FEET ON MY LATRINE
I FLY DONUTS AT RUBBER BUILDINGS AND STARE AT
FUNKY UNDERWEAR. MY I LOVE BLACK TREES AND TOE
FLOWERS PINK ASPHAULT AND BANANA LEGS MY OH MY
WHAT BIG BALL POINT PENS YOU HAVE AH THE BETTER
TO CLEAN MY WINDOWS. TINY LITTLE FLOWER SHITS
PICKING UP DUST I TRUST. THE GENE GOD BAKES CAKES
IN REFRIGERATORS AND COOKS WINE FOR WOODEN HEADS.
AH THE TASTE OF RAT FUR SOAKING UP THE DOLLARS
IN MIAMI BEACH OH CADILLAC COUPS AND STRING FEET
YOU ARE LEMONIZING YOUR SALIVA SANDWICHES.

THE DAY BEFORE DAY I MET A PIECE OF DUST WHO SAID
HE SAID HE WOULD DISCUSS THE FUSS, MY MY WHY ARE
YOU SO UPSET WHEN ALL YOU ARE IS INK, DON’T BLINK
ITS TRUE SAID THE STEW YOU ALWAYS PUT YOUR SALT
IN YOUR MOUTH AND GET SO UPSET AT THE DEBT BUT
MR DUST I MUST DECLARE YOU ARE A MESS. THERE YOU
GO AGAIN ALWAYS RIGHT. I HAPPEN TO THINK INK IS
THE BEST STINK AND FURTHERMORE I LIKE SALT IN
MY BALLPOINT EYES SO SHUT UP AND LET ME LEAK

THE AIR IN BUTTER MILK IS MADE IN TINY MINES
LOCATED IN THE FAT FACTORY NEXT TO TANK DRUGSTORE.
THE FOREMAN IS WATER CRESCENT AND THE MANAGER DR.
RETRIGONIA PLAZA WHO WORKS AN 8HR. SHIFT. THE DIRECTOR
OF PLANT OPERATIONS IS ONE MR. FRANK PICKLE. THE
TOP PRESIDENT IS ETTHEL PEANUT THE THIRD. RECENTLY
THE PRICE OF AIR HAS RISEN AND THE BOARD HAS
DECIDED TO CLOSE THE MINES FOR A YEAR’S HOLIDAYS
WITH FULL PAY AND COMPLETE JOB RENEWAL IN ONE YEAR.
THE ROAR FROM THE MINES IS FAT SHAKING AND SOME
HAVE BECOME UNCONTROLLABLE WITH LAUGHTER AND ONE
IS SAD FOR SHE HAS NO PLACE TO GO ON HOLIDAY
SO MUST WAIT A YEAR FOR WORK TO START. HER NAME
IS MISS PLATE AND SHE HAS A SAD FATE. SHE CAN’T
BREATHE LIKE ALL THE REST AND HAS TO WEAR A TANK
OF FRESH AIR ALL THE TIME. POOR SAD MISS PLATE HAS
BEEN FORGOTTEN BY ALL THE REST AND SO SHE LEAVES
BY THE BACK DOOR AND GOES HOME TO BREATHE. SHE MUST
HOWEVER BE QUICK AS SHE HAS ONLY ENOUGH AIR TO GET
HOME AND WITH ALL THE FUSS SHE DIDN’T REALIZE THE
CROWDS OUTSIDE WOULD BE STAGGERING. IT WAS TOO LATE
THEY WERE ALL OVER THE PLACE TALKING AND LAUGHING
ABOUT THE VACATION. MISS PLATE WAS FRANTIC AND COULD NOT SEE ANY WAY
PAST THE CROWD BUT ALL OF A SECOND
SHE SAW A STREET OPENING AND LIKE A LASER SHE SPED
FOR THE LIGHT AND JUST MAKING IT AROUND THE CORNER
WHAT A LUCKY BREAK FOR MISS PLATE OH MY HOW MANY
MINUTES COULD SHE HAVE LASTED WITHOUT HER TANK
OF AIR THAT WAS SO CLOSE. ARRIVING HOME HER SMILE
OPENED UP AS SHE SAW HER TINY ROOM WITH HER FRIEND
THE YELLOW MAN SITTING IN HER WINDOW. QUICKLY SHE
PRESSED HER FOOT ON THE ORANGE AND FILLED HER
TANK WITH AIR. SHE WAS ON HOLIDAY NOW SO WOULD NOT
HAVE TO EVER WORRY AGAIN AT LEAST FOR ANOTHER YEAR.

18. Beuys
CEAC was invited by Joseph Beuys to participate in a week-long workshop on the theme of “Behaviour,” which would take place at a castle he had commandeered in Kassel.
“The CEAC (Centre for Experimental Art and Communication) of Toronto is realizing its Behaviour School at Documenta 6 in Kassel, Germany, during September 6-16 as a series of performances and workshops on/of behavior as a central issue with the following operators: Arnulf Rainer, Peter Dunn, Loraine Leeson, Lukasz Pyrq, Kristina Krezel, Jan Piekarczyk, Ron Gillespie, Lily End, Bruce Eves, Amerigo Marras, Stephen Eins, Tom Puckey and Dirk Larsen.” (from Art Communication Edition 7)

Beuys was dynamic, mystical and contemptuous. I tore up his poster (in my performance at Kassel) to let him know nature invented man and that we were tools of nature. Man and the media were redundant because man is the media. He was redundant via his damn media that he does not really need because he has so much effector energy about his self. Also I brought in the old man from the street to show reality and its place. The old man played “Lili Marlene” on his harmonica while I wrote on the blackboard. The old man and myself then left to have a beer and discussion. I reluctantly returned to face the static people and argued in silent gesticulations amidst some bird sounds while Beuys spoke about one thing or another. I mimicked his gestures as his words filled the room as questions. I remained silent and left the room having as usual used the energy of people as my force and strength.

19. Behaviour of Artists (Is it Behaviour?)
October 18, 1977

A few false assumptions have distorted behavior due to the previous misconceptions about behavior. The major misconception involves the act of behavior or the component act as the designation of a behavior. The second misconception is the notion of the ready-made behavior or specifically conditioning. The third misconception is the participational characteristic of behavior.

The unit performance is at once specific and falsified by the inability to show its development and inherent traits that have modified the selection. The quantitative designations are assumed in the performance and do not explain the environment which produced the selection. Therefore the main act or performance tends to be contextualized and rarified, once again leading to formal speculation rather than concrete examples of information. The ready-made behavior is partly true but again the point is we may see the designation of an act but the response is varied due to our own specific environments which play a major role in decoding the message. The ready-made is one view out of a multiple series of selection, in fact one opinion may forcibly prove the ready-made, but that is a choice and not necessarily the other people’s choice. The conditioning of acts is arbitrary and elastic, so much so that we seem to agree on the conditioning without even questioning the evolution of the various conditionings and therefore leaving out previous selections as useless text when that history is important to the choice. The participatory approach to behavior is again limited by its previous selections and developmental considerations. Participation is fine in one context but useless depending on the continuation of that participation. For example a seminar on violence may show what people say in that context but upon going home to eat the previous sayings may release new comments on violence which are more important to violence and yet these comments have been lost to others concerned.

Quite simply behaviours have histories that we cannot know in our studies and investigations and we therefore reduce the meanings of a context instead of increasing the scope of behavior. Real behavioural acts contribute but only on the surface and therefore are formalized attempts at communication. The quantitative problems of behavior have not been classified in logical terms and therefore await a future measurement that will have to consider the full inquiry to the development of the behaviours. The distortion of behavior will probably go on for many years because of its vastness and inherent meanings to the evolutionary programs that behavior implicates. The scope of future behavior analysis is just starting to be realized by philosophers and sociologists such that mathematics itself will have to undergo a major change to deal with the quantitative growth of acts and their physiological variables. Perhaps in 50 years we will have the knowledge to understand a complete behavior but I feel that is very optimistic.

The acts that we are calling behavior art performances are simply trendy distortions of opportunistic mechanisms which are of little use to reality. The contextual theorist may perhaps have made a fine beginning to show the unit meanings, however the integration with previous contexts will have to be realized to further the study of man. The recent punk acts show one situation as violent and aggressive but at home in Scarborough in the warmth of suburban living a very different act takes place. This may show the many codes that operate in reality and how easily we are seduced to place too much emphasis on one act. The roles and masks of humans are so complex that it almost seems as if the masks are changing faster than reality itself. However these masks are tools that we depend on to conduct our living actions and it is the task to decode the masks that are real and those that are false. The one sure thing about roles is an otherness that is simply a choice of masks that groups decide on in a particular context. The deviant behaviours are the simple acts whereas the common behaviours are the difficult signals because there are so many subtleties. The vast number of people we observe in reality are the products of training by quantities of signals which no one person knows and somehow that makes one feel optimistic about decoding their immensity.

The deviants of behavior are fortunate in that they have been selected to be consumed by the larger majority because they are the simplest so see, the selection for deviance can then be absorbed as fast as possible in the shortest space of time. The non-absorbable material is much subtler and will have to await a longer integration but that is what only a few are able to recognize it.

20. Hot and Cold (October 1977)

Empty streets are not cold if you are hot inside, but cold if you are cold inside. The sad notion of empty streets is at once foolish and predictable since we know only our own points of view and not someone else’s thought unless you have surrendered your mind to others so totally that you know nothing of your own self.

This idea, concept, precept, whatever, is a condition of constructions by other persons and you have to follow along with the crowd. Fools like us communicate in the communicator’s master plan, we are both losers and gainers. The peace of an empty street is for me a beautiful warm space with lights, that glance of your face and shadows that sink into the sidewalk at your fingers. You want to touch the air of removal from robots and you can smile at your winks and stare at your actions in windows between the towers. Yes the empty streets will be populated again by others who love each shadow and salted puddle and better still we can run and hide in corners and laugh. However the feelings are yours and can’t be taken by any others who are cold to your freshness and humour. The simple melting of snow or tiny drops of mud glistening off the windows, those unfinished lines by paint brushes that curve the feelings of a worker. The prints he left before washing his paint brush… try and see the hand in a pocket and lean over a shoulder and say nothing special.

You can find warmth if you are warm and open to exchange but not big warmth or micro-warmth, just your own warm mind and heart is all we need. Detroit cool is an image of people who are oppressed in feeling and perhaps they simply wanted to stay off the street and stay at home. The violence we create participates in a psycho-social retreat retreat because we adapt our violence to outside cultural controls. We lost the streets to boring acts of greedy people a long time ago when cars first came off the diversionary line they created and molded into a system of force.

So you do not see the owner in the big tree out at night? But when did that owner ever go in the streets in the first place? Can you recall that occasion, was it a political act or parade, opening, ceremony? Those are the cold makers themselves and they love to make things cold for others so that their minds are at rest in knowing everyone else is catching the cold. The basic components of rethink are: rebirth, rebite, recall, return, react, reinvent, remake, read.

The depth of mind control by passion is a returnable resource on future acts of manipulated effects. Religion saves money, revolution spends it, war eats it, love breaks it, hate fires it, all of us consume and absorb at will and no one stops to stare at all the fools who are running in the same direction away from the source of movement. The running machine is going all the time and needs but two runners to make things work. Perhaps it is futile to attempt to bring people together at this time when there are lives aimed at money. I am some sort of a freak in that I do not give a shit for money. Some even call money a religious disease and tell me I should adapt to money, well all I can say is this. Some like it hot and some eat it cold. I prefer neither of these choices and prefer my own money.

21. Behaviour Study

A behavior study does not form materials in total, rather it studies the movements of things in spontaneous linkage.

A group of people doing the same act is impossible.
A group of people moving is not the same act.
They do have only one function.
That is to move.

Spontaneous contexts are not so difficult from thought forming contexts. I feel they simply require some basic exercises.

Behaviour school spontones are prime ropes to the deeper actions of humans. Without the spontone distinction the direct takeover of traditional drift methods would be inevitable. The dependence of a few to accelerate spontaneity is negative and redundant to behavior. Instead we must all reach spontaneously together and in expansion. The members of a group who seem to withdraw from these acts should not be there in the first place. Activities such as meditation would be fine if they could work while meditating.

Spontaneous behavior can reach very quickly to many points and the responses can be varied and exciting to the receiver.

A dominant act in behavior is verifiable when no other acts occasion themselves and we are unable to withstand its force. A movement without purpose is not a behavior. It is important to signal purpose according to action. A behavioural act is not directional in all cases and in fact spontaneous behavior is the main exchange. The recognition of action is contingent to the sense formation. The initial response to behavior is a movement. The idea of concept is secondary to behavior.

The point-instant isolation context is the antithesis of concepts co-relating abilities, perhaps due to the spontaneous nature of point-instant recognition.

The outstanding feature of behavior is its movement and this I feel makes its future very healthy unless we all stop moving.

Motives are not motives?
Reasons are facts.
Motives are patterns of explanation.
Words are symbols of letters clustered to form a tool.
Words are tools.
Logic is a type of tool.
A type is a word.
A word is a group of letters.
A letter is a word.

The other thing, namely, feelings of connection, is the more or less current that flows between two people and is not true or false but real and alive (as in pain). This real connection is being in communication with other human beings and knowledge by experience or field practice. This actual confrontation requires adaptations, yielding sensual, raw abilities far beyond a precise, limiting exactitude of automatic products. The direct living process is crawling with instinct, nerve, energy, chance and quickness, agility, spontaneity, impulsiveness, irrationality, guts, love and danger as opposed to repetition, boredom, think tanks, clean nails, pretty faces, slick conversation, orderly remarks, politeness, distinctiveness.

The people not programmed by Government decree have survived for millions of years and will continue to find their own meanings in existence. Those remaining real people will also carry on picking up the mess unless they may feel it is hopeless to even try in which case it’s all yours. The work of connecting with people is simple once you feel it, but so hard to explain when people are trained not to communicate. The job of reconstructing this society will not be done by politicians but a new species that feels the needs of others. This new species is forming in our midst and trying to slowly build a damaged humanity.

22. Questions
Would you like to smell my armpit, my nose, my vomit, my shit?
Everything is a question until the next question.
Could you please move a little closer please?
Now would you kindly leave?
Would you like to see my four-hour movie on a question mark?????
Are you carrying any questions around?
Did you ever meet two questions who didn’t have an answer?
Did you have a busy day or was it a bad day all day?
Do you think the latest elected thing has any questions?
Would you lie to have another sniff of my armpit?
Tell me something, are you a closet case?
Does a long-range gene mean anything to you?
Does genetic selection of kin mean anything?
Are you hands cold, are they blistered?
How many pounds of paper did you lift today?
Are you sick in any way because of my eyes?
Did you see what Bill did to Martha?
Do you see what I see?
There it is again.
Do I sense a look of questioning on your face?
Now for the next question?
Did you hear me?

23. Real Criticism in a Cultural Vacuum
January 22, 1978

Toronto is destitute in more ways than just knowing what real critics are about, it is simply a void of interest due to either New York plagues or religious obligational duties to the right members of that bastion of social-order vows. Each Toronto critic vows upon entering the monastery to take five oaths. Do not attack. Continue mystifying. Refrain from class comments. Never discuss money or such vulgar notions as sex. Please the God.

The Toronto critics are rock bottom internationally as well as in the small villages of Toronto. Toronto critics slurp in the face of real people and run and hide in comic books when the content is alienation, aggression, deformation, slaughter, poverty, corruption, endangering of the species, extermination, punk assault, mutilation, truth, hatred, law forms. They are pretentious petit-bourgeois grovelers of slurpy jargon. They empty their class-idealism, nature-culture, kitsch instincts, abstract chatter, lip-service, celluloid packages of gluck into our lives as authenticity. Their drip mentality clunks along twenty years behind the time, still bathing their wash bins in a fifties mentality. They are redundant, washed-up ex-artists who never left Toronto because mother said bad things about life outside the church community. Those cloth-bound headaches should be removed as they continually, yearly, miss out completely on new entries and regress the art-context into libido-land circuses. They smell like nineteenth century machines and never quite realized the twentieth century, nor will they wake up to the future, quite simply they are tied to mother’s apron strings and wallow in configuration and basic relativism from BAUDELIARIAN law.

It is indeed an insult to be criticized by a Toronto paper and worse still they have stripped this underwear town of any real critical need. Thus when artists visit Europe we are faced with critical consciousness and aliveness so often that we are embarrassed to say none exists in Toronto, and recoil takes place and amazement on the looks of German, French, Italian, Polish, Spanish critics. We desperately try and make excuses but all in vain as the only truth to face up to is the reality that there are no international critics in Toronto and little hope for the future. This nauseating gas treatment by the petit-bourgeois muckers must end immediately and new minds brought in to freshen the hopes and aspirations of young people before they begin talking to the walls of despair. The blame rests exactly on the gutless mannequins who graze the coffee-table mentalities and the Canada Council who have wasted taxpayers money building an art ship with no motor intelligence to understand the needs for the growth of the mind. These two sections of society are responsible for the diseased state of regression in the minds of artists and their dream of some cultural depth have vanished with the infrastructural collapse from alienation.

This complete lack of critical knowledge from art critics has created damage beyond repair, leading to the utter futility of young people who alone can create our own critical growing and leave the idiots behind in the void they regressively pay lip service to. This abomination of class-based notoriety has crippled the youth potential and as before sent the young artist to Europe or America to find real understandings and mental challenges. The coming of Canadian intelligence is never in this context and we can only dismember our minds from regressing deeper into entrenchment and spit on the wasteland that always was and will go on until a revitalized mind arrives and that is a gross optimism on my part.

The reality of lack of critical knowledge is conspiracy, fascism, racism, irrationality, hatred, anger, despair, angst and worst of all alienation from fellow artists. This is not an empty promise and cannot be called excess when the limits were passed years ago in the context of this city. Why must this continue and worst still, why are the artists so gutless to strike the reality where it should be targeted, or are they coward, meek and closet mongers like their compatriots? Is there only one art paper in the city that will dare to scream insanity (STRIKE), is that what we can come up with? Are we lost to PULFORD, PURDIE, DAULT, ARTSCANADA? Are you dead man or dead from trying to fight?

In over two hundred events at CEAC we have had one brave critic enter the building, that person is young, alive and willing to grow. The brutal reality we had to face is that they are morons and provincial bureaucrats with false intentions and we will build our own critical actions through seminars, debates, lectures from European critics, argument, dialectics, semantics, language studies, communication experiments, information talk, and many more healthy, alive and dynamic actions. The reality is to strike out with courage and strength of mind and heart and rip the lid off the gas minds of smugness, laziness, ineptness, luring, and form together in the social context through real critical punctuation and leave them fixed in their star-gazed heads in rotting oblivion. Productive thinking and its product (thought) can only come from taking reality at face value and confronting its horrors by steady, consistent, hard, slogging factuality and confronting the social context. Distortion disease has slowly rotted the Toronto context and now is the time to rise up and scream depth of mind and face the bleak class struggle.

The old fifties mentality must be laid to rest once and for all and a new generation must repair the damage and reconstruct the social condition with complete revolution and change of the class relationships otherwise you will never get out from the same diseases they (in the fifties) failed in. If, however, the artists do not have the minds we will start from the beginning and keep starting from the base until slowly the base will know itself as real and then the problems can be faced in the future. The need for a base was never organized in Toronto and as a result the fragmentation was always mystifying until the picture of artists became itself mystification. The reason was economic traditions that few realized was to be their termination and so mystification became productive and incorporated to the upper class and elitism was the natural product of this fact. The real base must be realized upon non-economic concern so that the work of artists can go in in reality instead of illusion. The real base must resist economic gain and crate alternate forms of exchange. This alternate model must be organized by all of us and studied analytically to a clear purpose such that we may all benefit instead of just a few.

Duchampian legend was built on the archetype of the ready-made, however he missed two crucial points of knowledge: the first being the somatic exchange and the second the spontaneous action of mankind. The soma is the quality of dead matter that is accompanied in all action and therefore the ready-made itself had a higher rate of deadness inherent in its structure and thus the product value of that object was not there except in mythical formation or deadness value. The resulting configuration of Duchampian valuation was shit-money or simply the joke of the century for what people were paying for and still are is waste material. The beautiful fact is such that the bourgeois will not admit their excess and we the young people are dragged on as waste products of an earlier age, the fifties.

The reality of puns and indifference has brought about the social conditions you are now facing and until you attack those excesses the continual decline of society is assured by nature of its own built-in wastage formulas. The new base can be constructed on two major fronts: the first is the social front and the second is the spontaneous revolt from economic/materialist waste. The organization of a real base can be built on communication networks around the world to strengthen the reasoning and mental alertness and secondly the critical information of social conditions can be assimilated, sorted, analyzed, distributed and channeled to other stations in the world to further criticize the social conditions around the economic globe. The task at hand is repair and to reconstruct the future shape of human rights and freedom from economic dependence.

The new social artist has a major job to undertake in bringing the young people together with their social information and collective energy to encourage all young people to exchange the facts of their context to fuse and differ simultaneously with practical facts that can be used to show the social structures and what must be done to reconstruct the wasteland ethics of consumption methods. The truth is in sharing knowledge with the intention of receiving information so that we may hope to abolish monetary systems with information of real fact exchange. The ideas of the former regressive methods of commodity exchange can be replaced with information exchange for goods and services. This might appear as fiction at this time because we can see no way to get out of the messy past with all its wars and Auschwitz mentality but that constitutes admission of defeat which is what the class system depends on. The only solution is to abolish money systems as a weapon and replace money with knowledge of the growth of future humans.

We do not need Orwellian bourgeois mentality nor must we disintegrate in its false metaphors and circular thinking. We can get far beyond 1984 mythology by organization information to the needs of others and promoting confidence by collectively sharing in investigations, research, fact gathering, data exchange. We can lay our facts at the feet of everyone and concentrate on inspiring others to share their information. We have the youth and vigour to create a new beginning and perhaps slowly the past will take care of itself as it was wont to do. The realization of social conditions in this present context must be changed now and in a constant way to slowly build step by step the future world that at present is just a façade of historical error. The challenge of always beginning at the base problems of organization is its concrete reality rather than an illusionary model of fragmentation.

For centuries we have had to go to war due to illusions and myth and until the removal of myth takes place once and for all we will continue to regress in moralities, religion and confusion. The challenge is to open our minds to reason and facts and slowly remove the myths and bury us all.

“Without an element of cognition, no feeling and no will can be more than a fleeting moment or motion.” The jargon of alienation strips man of feeling.

“The individual who himself can no longer rely on any firm possession holds on to himself in his extreme abstractness as the last, the supposedly unlosable possession.”

“To be a fact is no predicate which can attach itself to a concept.” As intellectuals become accomplices of power they dangle in the mind and become strategists instead of thinkers against strategy. Canadian critics are for the most part bought by power of the job location and sheepishly lean on their elbows instead of heads. This country has suffered long enough intellectually due to the petit-bourgeoisie who run the country.

It is not a question as to where the money goes for the arts in Canada but rather how that money operates in a vacuum. Canadians will not be recognized for fresh thought in the international sphere till they understand the cutting edge that sharpens to a tight brittle point. The action of politicians of art is academic and purely functional such that the token real needs of growth are never understood since they were missed in the beginning. You cannot expect young people to produce theory and practice when their teachers never knew the real point difference. Lectures on art produce paycheques and boring students who also become lecturers. The usual excuse is a large home in Mississauga that has big mortgage payments.

Affected artists are stylized, slick, rhythmic, pretentious, conceited, purist, or simply acting out a role pre-designed by its social status. Canadian artists are busy fighting for guaranteed income while less fortunate people are fighting to get a job. There are artists struggling for higher consciousness while the country votes on separation. Some artists dream away in the clouds while others fight on the ground trying to wake up the vast illusion industry programming as in propaganda/your minds. Shell-shocked artists go to evening soirees of indifference to discuss the state of their bankbooks. Artists spend the taxpayer’s money but refuse to acknowledge their reality except by lip service. The 1950 art galleries sit at the telephones awaiting the news of art collectors while the country sinks into oblivion. The dumbfounded artists have traditionally stayed out of political action, that is why their art is dumbfounded and stagnant. Politically alert minds may produce live productive action rather than inaction. Some contemplate their navel while others strike the nerves of their frozen minds. Visual communication is eyeball massaging but politicians use words.

The mythical powers are in the clouds of illusion wandering aimlessly in confusion and mysticism thanks to Mr. Duchamp and as they float away on their predestined voyage they so beautifully love we are holding the base and hopefully giving them more string to fly away with. The return to reality is a wasteland our mythmakers created and we at the base have a laborious task to begin the future society. If you are not strong physically then mentally contribute and if you are both strong in mental and physical ability then help others to become strong together.

The CEAC is information and contradiction because much of its flow of data has been mythical, not from need but because many of us are working out the shit and so much of our information is false reality which we admit not from belief but from reason and dialectics. The CEAC base understanding is continuous and humble in frustration at the piles of shit to go through but that is our food for the mind and will keep us fighting as a dialectical exchange of reason. The people at the CEAC are for the future by being at the base is our constant goal so that we can take in any information for analysis and feedback. The discussions every Monday evening have been successful in contradiction value and these sessions can be anytime you or your group wish. It is your decision to try and we will do all we can to help you hit a base or target you wish to attack. You are the deciders of your future but rest assured we will go on as always at the base and be on the ground not in the clouds for then we would be a piece of dust with all the rest. If you wish to find your own cloud formation that is also your decision, we can only try and reason with you, but if you mind is made up then you are wasting our future and become a target like all the others.

The slow revolution for a new base would be the first new base of reality, not replacing mythical reality but never granting its existence thus we are the beginnings of time and space if there is such a fact. We have the challenge of saying what is continuous future as one time, we can be time itself or knowledge-time, in any case, we have the base to tell us if we need time and space, perhaps mythical time and space will vanish also, and knowledge value and knowledge sound will be our need. The vision is not in the cloud but at the base where your feet are, and that base is fact and substance and we can know it by contact with context. The next step is context, again placement and each movement in a context is grounded in that context, such that two steps are two context placements for fact. There is not fact but that fact placement such that, as Mr. Swidzinski knows, we are mythical in relation to context-fact placement. The thinking around that context is out of fact placement, and therefore mythical, till we come back to base-placed context, where your two feet are. This simple base theory of context-base is the beginning mythical disappearance but whenever we leave the base we are in the clouds and on a string. The CEAC context is one placement for facts and we can only try to place facts in our context reality, our building.

The placement of your facts from one context to another is movement of facts therefore the movement-distance operates outside that context of your facts, so we can use your facts only and not your other contexts unless you contextualize that base fact where your feet are. The recent Toronto “critical” ability missed the context but those few who recognized its reality are in reality, while the other returned to pulling strings or shall I say grasping strings. Look at where your feet are and you may see a fact you know. The base facts are always there while dream contradictions take you away from reality and into confusion. The context people are reality, the mythmakers are history strings that get longer and longer as they remove themselves from the base, where the people are at.

The CEAC can use context facts but it is up to you to make that context placement a fact. Slowly the context facts will come in and we will send those context facts to other places where the dialects can begin and we can make a base. As the accumulation of context facts comes to the centre we can also form dialectics about contexts that are similar base placements. The study of placement base is always dialectical and therefore grounded in factual analysis and context fact placement. A definition may describe definition but they are conventions and therefore entail myth, however useful they may be in dialectics. A true context is one place and no other place for that would be another context placement fact. A once only context is a once only context, not a two or three but once only. A fact is precise if it is one fact and a contradiction otherwise. It seems simple to grasp but so many miss the meaning of one, however the base fact can be known and we shall work for ones and slowly build ones till we are one reality aware and not speaking about two realities again. If I may be permitted to say why Mr. Jan Swidzinski is a real human being, it is perhaps his gentle, humble way of knowing the base and never leaving its most familiar road to knowledge. My inspiration from his humility makes my optimism bloom far from the wasteland of myth.

24. The Canadian Tour: Performance Activities

The intention of performance activities is to modify the existing time of a directly related series of events and situations. Performance brings about the real space problems and flow of choice in immediate terms of issue rather than in the traditional patterns of removal of time and facts, more commonly known as memory-isolating activity. The condition of performance allows all activities during a performance to be the experience of groups and individuals for their immediate exchange and evaluation. After the performance the exchange permits a mutually open consideration.

The performance acts of Shitbandit have been intense and variable in message. A real time art activity has surfaced in Toronto that is related to European, South American, Eastern European and many other regions in the world. This represents a very distinct feeling of belonging to the rest of the world and is indeed a new energy for the people of Shitbandit.

The main body of performance acts were originated in 1972 with a concentration on mobility, that was a major concern of ours. The sound was drawn from activities of people on the street and in houses. It was continuous and in many cases spontaneous, which has brought out many exciting moments for a great many people from all walks of life. All acts were presented whole, most of the time we were not selective in approach. The result of this activity has affected people not only in Canada and the US but around the world. In scope the activities are not dependent on a concrete world but a flexible flow of ideas and sensibilities. The time has come for performance to be shared with others in all cases and not just a select few who hold onto time instead of sharing time with others. As a group of people we have a flow of activities that is not constructed around any particular viewpoint, since that would in some cases prevent the exchange of time and thus involve a retrogressive response to the real event. As a result, work construction is open-ended and expanding to a catalytic point of embarkation to a response situation that is instantaneous in nature and constantly varied as it rolls out. When everyone is active, the Shitbandit experience is a full and rewarding interface for all concerned.

The only time we can truly sense is in the continuous present, that has the most direct impact. This letter is indirect, and of another time so that the real experience of the exchange is awaiting you in the expectant future. We therefore look forward to an open and interactive series of points of response to your situation and place of activity. The response and detonation of all will be the main hope of this tour and experience.

Sincerely, Ron Gillespie (15 Duncan)

 

25. Street Performance Activities
Lots of heavy breathing
Close your eyes
Open your mouth
Block ears
Talk to people with eyes shut
Touch people’s eyes
Stare at your hand
Your feet
Relax have a smoke
Sit on the curb of the sidewalk
Practice holding your arm up
Lift your leg up to a wall and talk to your other foot
Scratch your fingers on the brick
Rub your face on the sidewalk
Throw your shoe onto a window ledge
Toss a quarter into the air or into the previous shoe until you have no more quarters
Place a dime on your foot and go for a slow walk
Drag a brick around the block
Crawl along the pavement till you feel something tap you on the shoulder
Roll a quarter down the centre of the street<
Play with your hands or feet like a clock
Do graffiti on all the paper scraps in a large bank
Hold piece of string from teeth and attach small item to end of string and run
Tape off the local intersection
Approach cars at RED lights and show them a green circle
Spray flea powder at any signs of aggression from the shadows of buildings
Brush teeth in front of Movie Cinema
Take off underwear and hang in front of Restaurant till owner calls the cops
Comb hair in front of telephone Co.
Plug nearby toilet of Dept. Store e.g. Eatons
Cover shoes in Shit and walk into Art Gallery of Ontario and Carmen Lamanna or Kresges Art Store section
Pull your guess what in front of guess who?
Stare at your favourite horse till horse talks to you
Stand on street corner for ½ hr. and close eyes for as long as you can before screaming the word quiet
Search ways to beg money from a particular class of people and give them a receipt
Write a note to a crack on the sidewalk to be social
While walking down street look behind you every ten steps
Walk sideways down the street
Murmur at passersby
Tell people to stop whistling forever
Tell a person they are being watched by a big eye
Arrest someone you meet on the street
Pull you finger out quickly and point it at someone and fart
Blow smoke at a dog or cat
Look in a window of a Bank till you become suspicious
Keep hand in air and point at wires till you see a person stare at wire
Sit in bus stations, train, plane, gas co., gas stations, etc.
If you have false teeth hand someone your choppers and ask for a cigarette
Set off firecrackers in local cop station
Go to court till you have counted all the people in or around the washroom
Shake your leg at a cop
Ask people what country this is
Ask people their names and watch out for aggression
Burn a pack of Telephone bills

26. Schizophrenic Opera Dictionary
Produced, directed and wrote text for Schizophrenic Opera, TRY Organization Theatre Co. Joseph Workman Auditorium, Toronto

Red Nose: the man who smell planets while on vacation in Florida.
Subway Chaser: schizophrenic cocktail, with 6 spoonfuls of sugar, five mini-milk cartons, 20 valiums to get the day into top gear.
Elevator Bender: a flight where one travels up and down an elevator looking for the Parking Attendant.
Hot pants: a bulging wallet full of one dollar bills, in the back of one’s jeans.
Palm Fingers: a night of bowling strikes by using 2 balls at once
Power Legs: driving taxi 14 hours in a straight line to Quebec City without stopping for a coffee.
Drum Role: a heavy smoker, cigarette roller, lip flipper, talks to people while holding cigarette in mouth.
Baby Sitter: one who watches the back of the TV set longer than a year.
Chinzu Pop: a Chinatown trick when someone orders extra MSG for a large Coke.
Door Juice: flushing in the face from opening doors all day at the entrance to Eaton’s Dundas St. entrance
Open House: after hours parking lot, where large trucks hang out and one snoozes under the motor to relieve a headache
Crazy Ears: someone who watches the Johnny Carson show with a walkie-talkie set bought in Hong Kong during the drought.
Flat out: someone who gets up before noon
Wide awake: that state where the Subway announcer reads the last chapter from Finnegans Wake
Tight Mind: Getting a tight fitting suite from Sally Ann the night before you get married.
Lip Lifter: the side effects from leaving prints on your favourite coffee mug without washing cup for 2 years
Dreamer: one who celebrates Freud’s birthday by eating out at Ducki Soon’s Chinese Restaurant
Reader: a mind in pursuit of solving the complete works of Ingmar Bergman, John Waters and Pasolini before breakfast
Hippie: a billiard ball with dust on the surface of the ball
Four-flusher: a card shark who plays finger games during a dramatic movement of Dolly Parton’s Banjo Sonata
Dealer: a big-time user of McDonald’s washroom towels.
Floor-polisher: the custodial staff person who removes your radio power
Broken Heart: someone who leaves Hospital in an ambulance that has a flat tire three feet from the El Mocambo
Sniffer: bringing home ashtrays to the room and closing all the windows.
One Strike: one who fills out his/her income tax form with a chicken feather quill tip.
Marxist: a former patient who tips ladies with wooden nickels
Top Store: one who stares at window cleaners rubbing down doorknobs with aftershave cream
Pincher: a woman who buys paper clips at Eaton’s and sells them on Queen St.
Artist: someone who smokes paper plates during inspiration
Producer: a worker in a factory who makes machines for Boats travelling to Fore Erie.
Thinker: someone who saves the news clippings on Baseball played after midnight.
Tooth-designer: a flashy smiler who wears empty jars of beans around his/her fingers
Tennis Club: one who wears white socks on payday.
Next Waver: someone under 21 with thin glasses on a big nose
Daily Double: someone who sleeps twice a day with a rubber tire
Flag Waver: a person who mails letters to the Queen of Brazil
727 Poker: a fast game of pennies with no stops for an itch
Woody Allen: the schizophrenic’s faster than a sinking Titanic filmmaker
Home: someone with more than 20 sets of room keys over a 1 year period
Street: a fast walker who admires the shadows on the Royal Bank
Farmer: the person on the road to a night at the Opera.
Fleet Mink: a lady who collects rocks from the top floor of La Scala Hilton in Bangkok.
Aria: a draft chequing account in trips to Las Vegas.
Indigestion: signing a declaration of Independence for Bank Clerks with shirts made in Canada
Misery: Asking the phone operator for a map of Salt-Lake.
Quarters: an invention by a vacuum cleaner salesman
Platonic Touch: a cough remedy for low voices
Schizophrenic Opera: one who hears and sees voices at the same time
Plumber: someone who acts in Canadian movies during a mail strike
Hot dog: an adagio alarm system used by cheap hotels
Sandwich: an Italian shoe manufacturer who was presto on his day off.
Cheap-flirt: an oboe player who lives in a drum factory.
Veloce: the lead singer for the 20^th century.
Stiffo: a singer who has a tongue transplant
Baritone: a Southerin city in Italy with more flute collectors than Vienna
Orpheus: the postman who charges by the month, your mailbox arrangement
Obligato: the voice accentuation of a sliding stock market
Conbrio: on the market but out of stock
Sostenuto: a narrow ridge located between your right index finger and your ear
Baltiato: a former barber who went into retirement swearing he would never cut another lock.
Legato: the place where Marcus Aurelius cashed his first cheque.
Solfo: the first Black man to wear a two-piece suit
Bandurria: the instrument for measuring sound waves in a toilet
Arioso: the man who served the world with taste that no one understood till the Dark Ages.
Cremona: a kimono worn by New Guinea bird watchers.
Tretrachord: a singer who rings home to mother during the first intermission
Bacarolle: bacon cooked on Mount Vesuvius during a stormy night
Intermezzo: someone who sings at the Laundromat
Solfeggio: a place in Milan where the New York Times sells at half-price.
Concentual: when no one shows up at the Opera.
Counterpoint: two Lawyers with Bernard Shaw headwear on the cover of Sorting Weekly
Pastoral: That mass of highway from Liverpool to Liverwurst
Voce di testa: the longest day in the life of Napoleon
Diapason: the back of a piano-maker’s house.
Di Gamba: the last violin maker with a two-piece suit
Seraphina: the comical dinner topic during Regime, the most discussed Opera of the Modern Era
Theraphina: the unique motion where an act promises more and more
Intimato: a crowded voyeur-filling cabinet.
Gold Royal Seat: 3 men flushing electric soap dispensers down the Hallways of Cooper Union Girls School.
Trees: the tallest tablemaker in the Universe.
Insanity: the last colour used in creation, the last colour humanity has yet to touch.
Light Rays: those little ditties that work when you are writing
Theoretics: all matter not possible to serve during lunch.
Monsters: the principle of expansion, never allowing stops
Euphemism: Earth constructing a new design using protein fuel.
Weltanschauung: Messenger boy for delivery of text for this Opera.
Hormone Banquet: one years supply of off pills.
Department of Expression: The Cultural Council on Levels for Maturation.
Oderato: the high pitch delivery of Peking Duck.
Deputrification: usually the beginning of Acts of Love.
Damnation: Club Cubic Closet Coachs.
Totipotent: etc text used in an Opera for lost members of the land of Voyateuse.
Fasciato: the richest women in the world.
Non compos Mentis: the oldest bug collector who ever lived.
Don Quixote: the owner of a chain key store located next to the Minister of Thought.
Lethean: weapon used to arrest Drunk Drivers.
History of Nothing: the most fashionable pursuit of Financiers.
Arranger: someone who picks the right flower to wear.
Loccatus: the first song uttered in vain.
Rheinerstrausser: the tip of the top executive pant wearer.
Terino: the largest studio set in the theatre world.
Labos: a suit maker with special buttons on her desk.
Cosminitude: the inventor of mind power.
Baker’s Stew: the meal of delight when nothing is left to put in the pot.
Break: the last moment in time when life leaves forever.

_____

Hariolus: the soothsayer who predicted society would last longer than a fortnight.
Macula: the dust on a security guard’s belt buckle
Cogitaro: the man who saw through straw houses.
Larvalis: the ghost of Schizophrenia who travels with you wherever you go
Robusta: the schizophrenic Olympic runner who carried a Portrait of Nonsense to Albert Schwarzman’s Deli.
Mitigarus: the schizophrenic Lawyer who invented rubber toothpaste.
Urbano: the woman leader of new fashions at the Canadian pickle fair.
Sphaera: one whose specialty is manufacturing round dog collars
Ficta: the prima donna imbecile who wiped the windows of her husband’s car with crazy glue.
Emicaro: the fastest flower seller in the Universe
Strabo: the lady who wore three pairs of glasses at the same time.
Ischi-noona: the gentleman who awakened during the night, always at 3 a.m.
Statura: the Artist who sold popcorn to the King of France
Balbus: the lady who only learned three words in her entire life.
Stabula: the producer of cowboy films in Taiwan, who became very famous
Eatera: the part of the stage where running shoes seem out of place
Obsoleeta: the maker of Magic-marker pens
Contamino: the original singer of commercials for Honest Ed’s Department store
Immaculato: the spinach salesman who thought he was a Radion-smoker
Lautus: the Speaker of the House of Upper’s
Juvencus: a little baby who sells love on a road to Tibet
Viscido: a type of ink used on Senate Committees
Pa-tea-entia: a form of schizophrenia found in Northern Ireland
Fabula: a laundry soap that washes out brighter than bright
Mendaxo: a schizophrenic who sells stories in another world
Tibico: the finest stop watch in Lebanon
Copio: the last person to live in a tree his entire life
Puppis: a strong deodorant used in Pigeon Hunting
Avarito: the first Minister of Thought in Ontario
Noverca: the lady who walks with her belongings down the coast of Nova Scotia.
Offa: the biggest steak eater on Queen Street
Processa: a woman with so much air in her lungs she gave all her air to charity
Statim: the fastest highway in Poland
Subtilito: the subtlest ant living on the face of the Earth
Discipulus: a student who earned a living working in a donut factory
Tumero: the inventor of underground parking
Laytickula: the stretcher used for members of this audience
Fibrato: Italian over-cooked spaghetti
Scurrari: the clown-lady of Toronto who walks through Honest Ed’s with the same record under her arm each day of her life
Comico: in New York this is someone who sleeps out on New Year’s Eve without checking the weather repor.
Fodina: a small lake in Unionville that is two inches deep
Stella crinite: the maker of wooden beds for Hudson Bay Co.
Prediator: the Real-Estate agent who never sold a house
Tripedallis: a type of mount for budding photographers
Saucius: Chinese lady who buys her underwear at Shopper’s Drug Mart
Digno: the man who knew everything about digging ditches
Dryas: a man who never wears undergarments in winter
Verbosa: the lady violinist with no ears
Officina: the pottery workshop that love builds into all our hearts
Scripto: an old ball-point pen used during the Vietnam War
Naufragium: the oldest woman who ever lived in a Hospital for Schizophrenia
Candidus: the brightest eyes in the world
Capesso: the one person who never stopped trying new things
Acuto: a witty person who sleeps when most people are talking
Amplo: the Rock King of Iceland
Susurro: the whispering bird of Brazil
Obnoxio: the smallest horse in the world
Plancto: the woman who lost all her children to mental illness
Volatico: the person who stopped eating for 90 days
Calcefecero: a warm person beside you in an act of passion only two schizophrenics know
Vivacio: the dance of life not usually the life we have learned
Canora: all is quiet on the floor and weeks later one softly listens to early voices
In honore esse: the in crowd who we look at with strangeness
Vista: a possible job interview
Asitongue: too much vinegar from one’s tongue
Sententione: the day of verdict upon your life and all those you love
Adoratione: the most beautiful one
Fortis: the master who lives in all our hearts
Vallis: the deepest valley in that part of the universe we somehow see, feel and touch
Eversio: a room with no window
Futilis: the Mythical God of Rumour
Turba: a turbulent day on a floor
Inexperta: the first day of entering the wards
Immota; a woman of great conviction
Indocta: without a friend
Iniqua: the unjust act of someone unyielding
Indefenso: one without any protection
Latero: to walk by without anyone knowing you
Consenso: a joyous day when two ex-patients take their vows
Inauditus: something never seen before
Sine invidia: one who holds no grudge
Absurdo: a patient who withdraws from other patients
Infausto: one who has no luck at anything
Cisto eximero: a person who constantly unpacks bags
Perpetuuo: always thinking faster and faster
Otioso: permanently unemployed
Intactus: someone who dresses impeccably
Undaro: the lithe dancer who sparks love with every inch of one’s body
Illicito: one who deals in false voices, a wretch
Dominaro: the top of the heap
Solitus: someone who is always the same, unchanging
Turto: the lady who left the light on for her turtle
Odioso: the unacceptable one
Braca: the maker of long pant legs for men
Tripo: the women who loved her tripod
Ecstaso: ultimate luxurious ecstasy
Arbora; the man who made love to a tree
Nugari: one who talks about trifling matters
Bucina: the lady trumpet player
Mercatura: the trade off person
Trepidatio: the one who always trembles
Verminaro: a tingling in the body
Testudo: a tortoise shell
Cruciato: a person with too much torment
Patientia: the woman with unlimited tolerance
Titillatio: the buffoon of the coffee shop
Tessera: one who receives a rare free ticket to the Opera
Tegula: one who stares at floor tiles
Nodarre: a man who is always changing his ties during the day
Tritus: without a shred of clothing
Proclinaro: a former patient who tilts the head when passing by the Hospital
Pano: always looking for bread
Radio: the one with all the theories
Crassitudo: a heavy-set person
Textura: the hands of love
Sphaesristerio: an empty tennis-court in Summer
Taberna: the beer hall
Appendicula: someone who has just been given a nickname
Vexara: a constant nag
Exactor: most of us have never seen one (a tax collector)
Tempesto: when the tea is brewing and complaints on the strength of the tea are voiced
Garrulo: one who talks incessantly
Clavulo: the one who has tact
Mappa: a doodler on table napkins
Salus: a survival Artist
Amico: a newfound lover
Adusto: a real shocking sunburn
Flexibilito: one who is quite flexible in delicate moments

______

O: the last letter of the schizophrenic alphabet
Run-g: the wearer of the world’s greatest pair of running shoes
O-gee: the man who lives in Subway’s at night
Gee-o: the man who chases people out of subways at night
Passagio: the ladder carrier for window washing of tall buildings
Materia: a popular garment worn on wards
Conclavo: an apartment with more than one person
Spooner: the top cat sugar user in morning coffee
Normalo: one who is always discussing death
Insano: one who loves life to the utmost
Baldy: a person with a fresh haircut
Twiddler: the being who dances by the fingers
Fartum: an upholsterer
Blinky Palermo: the kid who became a world-class boxer
Angelina: the first female Air Pilot
Scala: a staircase full of footprints
Balbutio: talker with fast tongue, and fast eyes.
Alapa: a thigh slapper in a Schizophrenic Dance
Odorato: two-week old pair of socks
Tenuis: an anorexic lady
Nivosa grande: a sleet one is a day of clouds and sun mixed with snow and rain
Olido: the maker of fine Aspirin lids
Funda: a man with a sling on his arm
Popalucio: the bulb changer of the floor rooms
Segmentum: a small piece of pie for dinner
Politus: a very sleek person
Rubaro: someone on the slight side
Dolero: a person who is smart
Concussio: a person who shocks your ears early in the morning
Callido: a very silly person
Manica: a sleeve on a woman’s dress
Surculo: a Heavenly place for schizophrenics
Riso: the smiling one of Bloor Street
Cementione: the lady courier who stares at the street pavement when on delivery
Fractura: a volleyball spike
Sincero: the angel who was a filing cabinet
Officino: the cigar store we never enter
Infirmo: the one who is mostly sick after lunch
Lineatione: the Artist who drew a pencil line around the body of a woman
Minuisto: the sharp breathing machine used for heavy smokers
Fundero: the shower indulger who never stops taking showers even during supper time
Sorbillaro: a tea sipper
Cantolino: the cupboard where the waxmaker of Italy keeps his tools
Habilone: the most beautiful hands in the world
Bombo: the silk dress worn by Uriata the lady from Nova Dicto
Astutione: a crafty Scotsman
Submergo: the lady who washes her feet in the sink
Submarino: a suburb of Milano
Silentio: when the mind talks slowly
Frutex: a pair of ripe prudes
Detex: a detective agency
Sceletos: the last day of the month
Glosa: a sister who visits you when in Hospital
Calculuso: an old pair of shoes
Speciosus: a room with a speaker inside
Explorato: someone who visits the race-track
Radula: one who is always in scraps with the neighbours
Secessio: a long day
Remotalingua: a day without sun
Clamio: five people making coffee at the same time
Sceptico: a pill one takes to calm down
Trito: the rumour maker
Doctrino: the inventor of indigestion
Consilio: when a million people gather on a mountain to watch a hockey match
Scholastico: an elastic band used for books
Liberatori: an all night funeral home
Contentolini: very lean bean soup
S.T.P.: useful toilet-bowl cleanser
Conservato: a Philosophy of Obscurity
Satura: a Philosophy of Exposure
Matura: the oldest Philosopher of Madness
Spoleto: too much sauce on a Hamburg
Hamburg: too much itching powder in the meat
Moliro: the greatest schemer who ever lived
Moli: the first victim of Moliro
Protegero: a dirty TV screen
Scutella: a saucer flying through space that only you see
Secretos: the sweat collector of Paris
Satello: the inventor of the world’s last satellite
Crusta: someone who steals your last piece of bread
Scarfolino: someone elevated to a high position
Absolini: the forgotten lover of large ladies.
Sapo: the savior of the Bank of Canada
Purstrinko: a cabinet-maker from New Jersey
Farcimen: two sausage makers having a fight
Suco: the sap from a Dentist-teeth
Terriculo: a scarecrow in Regina who flew backwards, causing a great commotion at the Hospital
Diacito: a sarcastic stamp collector
Sanus: another toilet-bowl cleaner
Nauta: a sailor on the Humber River
Sicera: a rum made with no hop
Rectus: the moment before the stage collapse
Director: the moment after the stage collapses
Regie: someone who took the wrong pill
Jimmy Foxx: a subtle Scot who knew how to outwit the ladies
Sabbata: a famous Mexican Opera House
Cilliciio: an old city suburb of Napoli
Caupona: the last bar open on Saturday Night in Toronto
Tristo: another good window-cleaning solution
Fuco: a game played by female patients early in the morning, to see who gets the lipstick on fastest
Turbomb: a new car with laser beam driving action
Censor: a hot tip at the race track
Revivo: the Minister’s hot water bottle
Resonato: a late night movie script with one word
Rapsodium: a large soda pop
Sorapio: a small soda pop
Flumeno: a tiny river in the biotin pathway meta-world
Refugo: the father of all refugees
Mafugo: the mother of all refugees
Flugo: the son
Slugo: the girl.

27. Lecture on Schizophrenia
1988

The question of medication that is overly applied instead of therapy comes from my experience of the medical profession. For example, I can walk into the Clarke Institute in Toronto and ask for medication rather than treatment and in most cases that request will be complied with, which is to say, the belief structure in meds is quite overwhelming by medical authorities.

Dopamine problems of excess meds are something that needs to be bio-chemically understood as the brain’s adaptive process is far more advanced than is understood by the medical world which once more enforces the need for extreme caution in the use of medication in compliance with the tolerance levels of chemical evolutionary laws that operate on a natural law rather than a synthetic base change. If Darwin or Dobschansky were alive today and saw what horrors were being created by chemistry they might both be locked up for their views of science. Once again the need for a therapeutic alliance is the cornerstone that is the superior model rather than the inferior quick-action-meds formula that is attuned to an almost knee-jerk, economic thirst which is slowly eroding the medical profession.

Delusions are at the heart of schizophrenia and we all have delusions as we all have dreams, however the delusions of the schizophrenic become repressed or locked into a system that prevents their release, and once more the vicious circle of repression blocks the functional level of operation. In the myth of Catatonia, Kurton says that catatonics are fully conscious in the state but that fear is so intense that the body locks, which is like being under attack from terror, the body will not let go of the fear. The main transference of this terror comes from the past and is often a religious messianic force connected to a God power that is directly a result of the delusional terror.

The four bases of delusions are: transference of the past, an overt homosexual fear, family concepts that have not been dealt with in the real world, and finally a systematic delusional pattern that persists in a pure paranoid system. Finally in the last mentioned pattern of delusion the subject can be extremely bright in hiding the pattern and will go to great lengths to keep the pattern covered in a secret form that is used to prevent the therapeutic alliance from forming. From incest to oral or anal fantasies, many of the symptoms are unusual but in the main the best description of a schizophrenic is the balancing act between a fear of loneliness and the terror of being left alone in this world.

As a schizophrenic and artist I would say that in the main lecture by Kurton his thesis is heading into the enlightened view rather than an oppressed view and his books, after working with schizophrenics for 32 years in New York City, are at the forefront of cultural historical change.

From the Lecture on Schizophrenia to the famous Harding Report which was carried out over 32 years, the complete awe for the human beings who left the State Mental Hospital in the late 50s and survived on sheer brilliance and human toughness is once more marvelous evidence as to what consumers can do in the face of odds that few humans would ever attempt. Of the over 100 consumers that left the State Hospital in the late 50s, only 1% died and the rest are alive and leading interesting lives, mostly in Vermont. The facts of this case history show that 60% of the diagnosed schizophrenics found a way to cure themselves with the help of social rehab, friends and family, with many now heading into their 80s and still full of life, humour and courage which shows the awesome human spirit to live rather than succumbing to societal neglect. Harding herself is in my estimation one of the real human scientists who should receive the Nobel Prize in Medicine for never giving up a pursuit that others would nor could not have the vision for. Professor Harding takes the prize in my esteem as the woman who saw human potential rather than fear and stuck to a human heart that is inspiring and often brilliant as she undertook a revolutionary course. Now lecturing at Yale and active on all fronts, her fight to have these human beings understood is probably another evolutionary model that will have long term success throughout North America.

From the Harding report to the Consumers Convention at LaSalle University, the same tenacious groups of people gathered to share ideas and the results were intoxicating at every level from fundraising to practical models of self-help and making the models work with flexibility and understanding combined with a critical need to never stop nor give up creating ideas no matter how difficult the odds may be. From small towns in Georgia to places in Utah, Kentucky and Newfoundland, consumers came with ideas to make their voices heard in a fresh approach to getting through the large bureaucratic mess that has occurred on both sides of the border and around the world. In one example a Florida group was generating capital to buy their own building and renovate the place with their own skills and run the apartment as a capital base income, generating profit to pave the way for other centres owned by consumers. In other words, the model is using assets to create future assets.

The Florida model saw a collective base asset generating market potential leading away from state support towards autonomy and self-directed, future income base. The sale and support of this idea of autonomy was one more clear example of the potential ideas that are circulating at the consumer level and implies a new road away from the support system which comes as no surprise when you realize the vast potential of these people.

On the assets and resource model solution the Canadian model of the parallel gallery may have a lot of insight into this type of autonomy, but the picture of artists selling T-shirts on the street to buy a building may not appear quite fine enough for this lot, however given the nature of the rent crisis in North America it may be time to begin looking at non-profit status as an albatross that is draining away lives rather than illuminating an autonomous direction that may be seen with The Purple Institute in Toronto. The consumers want freedom from the state which is now an ongoing fact that is being faced at many levels as they know the vast resource potential of the ex-psych who has kept much of this resource within the state currency rather than the direction with others of their own kind. This movement towards autonomy and away from the state may be the threshold of a new direction that will start appearing at our own local level until some day the International Body will hold sway instead of government laws that hold back the autonomy model.