Letter to Dan (RIP)

Well. Dan

“Lethargy is simply frozen violence”

What else? I sit in the middle of the Arctic Night (The middle always remains the same, no matter how long the night is). Waiting for sleep to fill my head, looking at a CRT screen. Eyes are getting crippled by the stress of focusing. Goodnight.

The next day late morning. All is gray. When I develop film here I notice the lack of contrast, especially after Colorado. The Light is different. I have taken to capitalizing the first letter of Light, and I have also quit using the Lord’s name in vain you know? Two changes from my previous life. You can look forward to wonderful things like this happening when you finish graduate school.

The work you sent arrived a bit worse for wear, and surely to the perplexity of the customs/postal people. They keep a close monitor on my post here, almost all packages are checked… A bit disturbing, but also amusing…

It is ‘work’ that is more than ‘about’ something. I will recall those instances in seminar when that superfluous question is asked “Well, what is it about?” “Well, it’s about time…” Silence. No humor allowed when we are talking about Meaning! And so on. To be spontaneous in the execution of highly intellectual and complicated ‘work’ is cool.

Yep. Answering letters. Communication-at-a-distance.

And then some. I start on this communication many days later. Many. I guess long onto a week or so. Trying to get thoughts together, but there is so little occasion to write like this. I find that there is a hidden block that governs these letter things. Whywherefor. I begin some work that I will call Self Analysis. For it is based in the concepts outlined by one Karen Horney, a psychologist. Recall, filling disks with the confessions and rememberings of the past. The darkness of the winter is conducive to this, and I must take some advantage in the lack of complete demand for my time. Although there is always plenty to do. To do To do To do To do.

Manifestations, Observations, trends, rememberings.

Hey man. Let me ask you this, why is it that most of my (self-proclaimed) artist friends always send postcards that they buy at the big museums? Huh? What is it all about? I just can’t understand the way people avoid communicating their ideas except “In Exhibio”, that is, in the Holiness of the Gallery. Doesn’t anyone want to talk about ideas?

Enclosed you will find (the first!) another invitation to contribute to a Xerox Book. Hope you will have something. I am a bit nervous about starting something like this again, but, I have weeded through my contacts and added a good number, and feel that there is a more ‘serious’ (ach!) group represented. That is, well, what I am trying to say, well, uh, I think this effort will be some evolution over the last one. Materially, at least I know now what to expect. I will be asking people to put together work that is more ‘thought-out’, or coherent or, uh, meaningful (or dada). You know, and I trust you. The pass-it-along part is serious, too, try some recruiting if’n you have the energy. This could very well be a great book. Note the possibilities of tape/disk.

Yep. Another day. I paint the floor of the attic, and a bird flies down the chimney to hang out in the toxic-fume-filled place. I can’t walk across the floor and open up the window to let it free. I watch the neighbors’ cat in a tree in the backyard as he watches the birds. The old guy downstairs sweeps the snow away from part of the yard and sprinkles bread crumbs, attracting the starlings that have taken residence here on this island. The sun is out all day, with strange streamers coming across the whole sky from South to North of high thin clouds. I wonder if the Ozone Hole is up there somewhere. I have not been visibly affected by the toxicity of this Modern World except to get a headache when I use Modern Paints to paint the floor. I wonder how it will be to Die? I impatiently turn on the raydeeoh to BBC SW. But have to turn it off. The noise is deafening. I make a 45 minute tape of peeing. On off on off on off. For days, weeks, just to fill the tape. Anal tendencies overlie/underlie existence.

Your letter, already buried by incoming. 1.Nov. I listen to “Stukas over Disneyland“. Evidence of a previous life in SoCal. You eat Pizza. You are finished with the SEMINAR. Yes, too long. Since I have left, I guess there have been so many changes that I have hardly noticed the differences. Uh. Well, what I mean. I find the things that are missing, like the films that I was able to see in Boulder (Thanks to Stan B.). Here I get excited when the French Embassy puts on a small Festival from the ARGOS production company. From The Sacrifice and Paris Texas, to obscure documentaries on Paris… I have seen them all in one week. A friend at the Embassy gave M____ and I passes for the whole thing. Yeah, some of the things of Boulder are okay. I think I already said how I miss NORLIN. But. Yes, the Institution. Well, what can I say…

Yep, Theories. You’ll find that they dissipate quickly as does the “power” of the Authorities that spoke them. Cause out here is the World. Theories are against life. Synthesis is for Life. It is good to try different mediums, too. I hope to make the time here to get involved in some print-making, also. There are some talented people here working in that medium. It does become something of a panic to have to learn a new process, though, I know how you feel. In school there is the time pressure, as well, now, as expression doesn’t have the patience for learning. (It should!!!).

To some of your questions. Weeellllll, it looks like I am here for the see-able future. Although my prognosticative talents are changing form and scope these days. Yes, here in Iceland. HERE. This is the only PLACE in the World (I find myself having difficulty imagining any other Place right now. This is one of the effects of This Place.) For the duration as they say. I can’t imagine returning to someplace in the US, thought there are some small measures of Desire and Imagining for that. I have work enough here, and as I meet more and more people, there are more opportunities (Like, I will be teaching printing workshops to the members of the National Photographic Union…). Uh, so, survival is possible despite the hardships. It is possible to live on the brink here with the social net below. And, uh, I have residency for the next year or so. It will be no problem to stay. And, of course, there is M____. She has a contract for another couple years, so she is not free to travel so much. I have resigned myself to be Here and take full advantage of the possibilities. There are enough for now. My contacts in Europe are healthy and evolving. Although I won’t be going over there until late Spring. But plans are jelling for more time in Italy with friends, and possibly even teaching a workshop at the Int’l Photo Festival in Arles in July. We’ll see. I am having many thoughts going down about Self and Kunst. Freedom of expression and mental blockages. And am looking closely at some internal problems. In order to free up energies that have, in the past, been wasted in useless speculation and resistance.

Working in other countries is possible. There are opportunities in Europe without doubt. But it requires some dedication, and some luck/energy. Uh. It IS Possible! As for my class, well, I just teach small groups of students for short periods. The system is set up that instead a handful of classes for a long time, it is one class full time for one, two, four weeks… Then it is over. I worked with four different groups off and on this fall for six weeks, with another three groups in the spring for five weeks. That is 1/2-time teaching. Not bad, especially that I can sleep in the depths of winter and not deal with the problem of getting up in the darkness… But I have been quite satisfied with the situation despite the lack of facilities. Again, there are possibilities, and the students overall are energetic and ready to interact.

I mean, art school, what’s the difference anywhere?

Ugh. C____ F______. Moving on from that state of mind is indeed moving up! Yes, people’s work tended to get very stagnant-looking after two or three years. I am not sure if it is an absolute stagnation or a relative stagnation. I think there are some defective concepts within our learned understanding of change and appearance. Like, What constitutes change or evolution? I think on the way that people flit from form to form without allowing the seed that is inside to ever germinate in a particular physical form. I think it is essential for the concept to comfortably inhabit the form. (Well, dada would oppose the idea of ‘comfortably’, but…) There does seem to be an overall lack of physical mastery (ouch, there is a loaded Po-Mo (postmodern) word) of a medium. And, actually, mastery is not the correct word, really. More like understanding of the process that brings an idea into physical manifestation. Something like that.

Europe is not so far away. (Do you remember what you wrote to me?, I am just commenting here on your letter as I review it…)

No, it is not so far away, although I would say that it is drawing further and further away every moment. Trade wars loom, culturally, Europe is concentrating more and more on it’s true (and extraordinarily rich!) Eastern roots. For instance, some of the old Hungarian photographic companies are coming back on line. In Budapest you can buy film for about a dollar a roll that is better than TriX! I have used some, and also their papers are now being exported as far as NYC. They have returned quickly to the quality that they had before the War. Of course, the prices will go up, but still,…

Yes, I feel the same about how difficult it is to be in contact with people in school. The way time is limited. However, it is essential to counter this trend. Essential! I see here in Iceland that there are strong vestiges of the extended family structures intact. These form closed community groups. I was speaking with a friend (a teacher at school, she is the head of the printmaking dept, and studied in the US), she was describing how her extended family dissolved after the recent death of her mother. Most of the destruction is caused by the encroachment of US-style economic/social structures. Her husband, a Dane, surprises her by how little contact he has with his family. Also, it is uncommon, yet, to have much artistic collaboration here, except amongst artists that have lived significant times outside the country. There is no need yet for the creation of the artistic community of the type that exists in Europe and the USA, at least until now… Follow?

Anyway. You know my feelings about contact. If we have lost our family-communities, then we must structure another. I suppose another solution is to quit art altogether and make babies, huh. Hmmm. I might have something with that…

Hahahaha. Preee-Thesis. Uh, you didn’t enclose the letter that you said was enclosed, so I missed the complete story, but… none-the-less… Barbara takes offense to anything and everything that shows her to be the person that she is… Yes. Hahahaha. Academic DoubleSpeak. Funny how that works, but depressing when you have to deal with it. I can only chuckle about the whole thing. Good luck. I am sure that you will confuse them so much that they will be obliged to ‘let you pass…’ How nice of them… I think that They consistently miss the point of school. Like making your parking passes. AAAAhhhahahahahah. THAT IS ART! DADA SIEG!

Send me the letter, expostfacto. Bitte? Don’t worry so much about time intervals between letters. Just keep contact anyway. In Mind, in detail, in Spirit, IN FACT. In time… Whatever. P.S. Who did you contract out for the slides. They were, well. You know that part of me that has to do everything perfectly… I am ridding myself of the worst parts of that neurosis. The slides were… interesting. Like how all your work is. The level is working all the time. Which points to a, uh, brilliance, uh. Really. You will continue to baffle THEM. And make discoveries that only a few will be priviledged to comprehend. Yep. Go for it! You will survive. And move ahead. That I am sure about. Your honesty will carry you onward.

Okay, pretty much got to the end of the letter. You ask if there is anything that you can send. Well, anything of printed material that is of interest to you, or you might deem interesting to me. Uh, and of course, the XEROX BOOK II. Look over the letter carefully, pass it along, uh, you know the rest. The people that I am sending this one out to tend to be more strong in their opinions and work, and the places where they are coming from than the last one… It will be good when it finally gets done… (God, how can I even think of finishing when I have just begun…). I am also in the process of arranging for some shows of European photography to be brought up here, and… blah blah blah…

I can see that I am gabbing anyway. Close for now. Thoughts to you and Stephanie. Have a Berry Goo Year. And so on.

ciao amigo,
jh