St. Phlegmon

Ubu with a Camera: Self Portrait

 

Jeff and Lawrence

Jeff de Nattewindzak, artist, poet and stuationist, invites Laurence Stephen Lowry, artist and rent collector, on a walk.

“Where to?” asks Laurence.

“Nowhere in mind, we shall be flâneurs”.

“Ah, something foreign and unseen in Salford”.

“Tell me, Laurence, was Wordsworth a flâneur? All that stuff about wandering lonely as a cloud”.

“Probably”.

“Going anywhere this summer?”

“Berwick-upon-Tweed”.

Ubu with a Camera: 3 Americans

 

To Whom The Nation Owes Old Age Pensions

The grave of Frederick Rogers (27 April 1846 – 16 November 1915) in Nunhead Cemetery, South-East London. Rogers was an autodidact, having left school at ten years old, and was described in his mature years by a colleague as "the most scholarly man I know in the Labour movement". He was the first Chair of the Labour Representation Committee from which the UK Labour Party traces its origins. As a Trades Unionist, an advocate of adult education and his position as Chair of the Labour Representation Committee, he was appointed Secretary to the "National Committee of Organised Labour for Promoting the Old Age Pension for All". For ten years he spoke around the country promoting the creation of a state pensions provision.

The Rev. Francis Herbert Stead, also an advocate of Old Age Pensions, said of him, "He was indefatigable. He passed to and fro throughout the country like a flame of fire, kindling everywhere an enthusiasm responsive to his own. Wherever men asked to hear about pensions, there Mr Rogers went, eloquent, stimulating, conclusive." Eventually the work promoting pensions was successful and the Old Age Pensions Act 1908 was passed by government.

The Bloggist tips his hat to Mr Rogers and thanks him for all he achieved.

Wands understand the causes of injustice.

 

Midsummer By The Meadow, What Unpalatable Truths Might You Be Evading?

Four Instructions for a Dérive in an Urban Setting

Number One, also called Les Lèvres Nues et Les Lapins

Take a line, north to south, on a map. The line should be between 1.5 and 3 kilometers or between 2 and 4 miles long. Select the appropriate roads so that the route adheres as far as possible to the line drawn. Make a list of how often you have to turn left or right onto another road to maintain a proximity to the north/south line, then rotate the map by 90 degrees, but not the line. Go to where the line starts and walk using the list of turns recorded when the map was in a north/south alignment. After an hour and a half, stop and drink coffee. Congratulations, you have completed a dérive.

Number Two, also called Je Suis Une Souris Brune.

Walk to a bus stop. Take the first bus that arrives and stay on for four stops. At the fourth stop leave the bus. Take the next bus that arrives unless it is on the same route/has the same number as the bus you’ve just dismounted from. Remain on this second bus for four stops before dismounting at the fourth stop. Repeat this process ad infinitum or for an hour and a half, whichever is shorter. It is permissible to substitute two stops for four randomly. If the bus route you are on is not intersected by other bus routes then dismount. After an hour and a half, stop and drink coffee. Congratulations, you have completed a dérive.

Number Three, also called La Taupe Aveugle Voit Dans L'Obscurité

Choose a street that runs east/west or is close to that axis. Walk towards the east. Take the first turn to the right and walk onwards until there is another opportunity to take a right turn – take it. Repeat. If, by taking a right turn you are in danger of completing a circle, do not turn but walk on. Take the next left and then resume taking right turns. If in doubt, turn left. After an hour and a half, stop and drink coffee. Congratulations, you have completed a dérive.

Number Four, also called La Chauve-souris Connaît le Chemin Vers le Fruit

Walk in any direction along a road. Where there is a turning off the road you are on speak to a passerby. Explain you are conducting a Dérive and ask which way you should go. Take the passerby’s advice, unless they are rude or aggressive. In that case continue walking until the next opportunity to take a turn. Speak to a passerby, explain you are conducting a Dérive and ask which way you should go. Take the passerby’s advice, unless they are rude or aggressive. In that case continue walking until etc., etc., etc. After an hour and a half, stop and drink coffee. Congratulations, you have completed a dérive.

Dai Greatcoat's last resting place.

The greatest of the British modernists? 

David Jones's grave in Brockley Cemetery, London. Headstone carved by  Eric Gill and a circular inscription stone carved by John Skelton. Headstone commemorates his parents, Alice Ann and James Jones, while the roundel commemorates David Jones, artist and author of "In Parenthesis" (1937) and "Anathemata" (1952).

Barna Found Art 2016

Boomgaardweg, Middleharnis

On the Boomgaardweg there should be an avenue of Alder trees as painted by Meindert Hobbema. Those trees painted by Hobbema would have been taken down at some point as they were planted before 1689. However, hasn’t the Middleharnis Gemeenteraad thought of replacing them?

Who Would Worry

 

Days Like This

 

Fun

 

Sol LeWitt on the Move

 

Further to our post on 15th Axis 152 (17th November 2024 (vulg.)), the Sol LeWitt structure has been moved to a more secure storage facility in the basement of the National Gallery of Ireland in Merrion Square, Dublin. Once restored by the conservation team at the gallery it is hoped to reconstruct the structure in the main Sculpture Hall. 

Please contact the gallery for updates.

The Unilateral Declaration of the Independence of Belgiumium

When in the course of events it becomes necessary to dissolve the bonds which have connected an individual with a nation due to that nation dissolving access to a polity in which the individual is a citizen, and thus reduces that individual’s breadth of citizenship from its former diversity and privileges, then the Laws of ‘Pataphysics entitles that person to assume an independence from that nation. In decent respect to the opinions of others it requires that the individual should also declare the causes which impel the individual to the separation.

It is an indisputable and accepted historic fact that government by those called Prime Ministers in the government of Great Britain, and certain of their Ministers of State, between the years 2010 and 2024 have been responsible for the reversal of progress, development and welfare of the people of Great Britain.

It is an indisputable and accepted historic fact that the people of Great Britain have witnessed a political process under successive Prime Ministers, and certain of their Ministers of State, between the years 2010 and 2024 which is destructive of the precepts upon which the culture and politics of that nation has been built.

It is an indisputable and accepted historic fact that the principles of democracy, responsible government and moral standards, crumble through falsehoods, personal aggrandisement and blatant disregard of truth, as our system of government has rewarded those who are hypocrites, those who lie, cheat, abuse power and engage in misconduct, misbehaviour and dishonesty.

It is an indisputable and accepted historic fact that by the creation of the fear of non-existent threats through misinformation, disinformation, the use of ‘alternative-facts’, through a lack of social and ethical standards, a resulting state of depersonalization, alienation and distrust has arisen in the populus.

I therefore affirm my natural rights as outlined in John Locke's 'Second Treatise on Government' where it is stated:- "...wherever the legislators endeavour to reduce (the people) to slavery ... they put themselves in a state of war with the people, who are thereupon absolved from any further obedience and are left to the common refuge (of) resistance."

I do hereby seek to exercise my ‘Pataphysic right to withdraw my consent to the notion of the nation of Great Britain. To this end I declare I am an independent nation known as Belgiumium. It is my belief that citizenship of Belgiumium is a right and not a privilege and should be freely available to all. The borders of Belgiumium are circular with a diameter of 15 feet (4.572 meters) centred on the core of each citizen. In this way multiple islands of Belgiumium exist. Borders are not static but dynamic and move to maintain the appropriate distance around the core of each citizen.

This Act is done by my own desire, plagiarised and perfected to please my own senses, almost a manifestation of my very thoughts and accomplished by my own collaged imagination, dated Wednesday 4^th Décervelage 152

                           Vivat Belgiumium

Ten Belgian Artists

 Berlinde De Bruyckere: Decomposing blankets, horsehides, timber – remnants of Eden.

 Marthe Donas: Abstract and Cubist and invisible – so it goes.

 Adele Renault: Phytophiliac for xerophytes, musaceae and poaceae.

 Anne-Mie van Kerckhoven: Reposition popular imagery to challenge objectification.

Constant Permeke: Greenstone, mudstone, sandstone , shale, earth colours.

James Ensor: The painting, "Entry of Christ into Brussels", sacrificed to Moloch and the Canaanites.

 Thierry De Cordier : “God bestaat niet en toch zit hij in mij. Hoe absurd.”

 Panamarenko: Hardly probable visionary flying machines, Icarus or Daedalus?

 Françoise Taylor: Liège, Bolton, weavers’ ghosts, artists’ hands, “la plus grande distinction”.

 Jakob Smits: Achterbos, light and the inner life, poetic with Calvinist simplicity.

Sol LeWitt in Ireland

 The Bloggist and his friend, Alfred Jarry, come across a Sol LeWitt structure, a description he preferred to sculpture, in storage in Galway, Ireland. These elements combine to form a rectangle, a form he decided that was not as satisfactory as a cube. The structure was intended for exhibition at the Irish Museum of Modern Art in 2001 but was set aside by him as incompatible with the Wall Drawings he installed. Since his death in 2007 it has been undisturbed in it's present location.

At the Museum of 'Pataphysics

 A new exhibition of Invisible Objects opens at the Museum of 'Pataphysics. 

These items, rarely seen in public, are on loan from the Estate of Dr. Faustroll, 'Pataphysician. 

A Connemara

 

Walk through a legible remnant,
A repository of archaic knowledge,
A stratum of linguistic culture,
Inscriptions on monuments,
Fragments of statuary,
Chambered cairns inscribed with ciphers,
Orphaned and broken tomb pediments,
A text of gesture, line and ornament,
A great book ripped out by time
Written in moss and Ogham script
Saying care, closeness, protectiveness, affection.
Traveling in the rain and the sun,
Past famine grounds, sepulchres and silent walls,
A landscape strewn with memory.
See Sheela Na Gig in a green lichen,
Vegetation’s biotic motions
Breathing human passion in verdure.
Walk the Atlantic coastline,
Erosion, granite cliffs and bog pits,
Fragmentary, unfinished nature, utopian promise,
The murmur of history, of green ruins,
Bays, inlets, peninsulas, islands and headlands,
Millennia of decaying plant matter,
Waterlogged soil erasing field walls,
Passage, portal, court and wedge tombs
Announce I was here, I am here,
An intangible presence in granite,
Speech emanates from the stones.