getting it together in the country

Completed the move to a new idyll, away from Dundee's student ghetto. Here's hoping this is the dawning of a new era, one of great happiness and productivity.

redox

Another day, another Art Fair poster. Seems this is the final cut, though.

If anyone's still interested, here is the link to the Go North festival that all this is a part of.

correspondence 2

On the 26th of May 2006, the military junta ruling Myanmar officially named Naypyidaw, a new city in Mandalay Division, as the new capital. Yangon had formerly been the nation's capital.

The ban on smoking in public places such as bars and restaurants came into effect in Scotland.

The Mental Health Foundation's National Inquiry today called on the Government to launch a UK-wide initiative to develop better and more appropriate responses to young people who self-harm, starting with an awareness campaign targeted at professionals, parents and young people.

reprieve

Brilliant news today, as the Whitehouse project is announced as being still up and running.

itinerary 2

Spring/summer is now upon us, and the only footwear to be rocking the piazza this season is white loafers worn with no socks. This to be accesorised with Bernhard Willhelm sunglasses, though sadly no Peter Jensen 'hood scarf', which at £47 is just too dear for "a grey childs cardigan as a hat".

Meanwhile the hairdresser's is booked for Thursday, in anticipation of the weekend's move and subsequent festivities.

By the by, anyone with half an interest in music and/or transgressive gay literature (?) really ought to check Dennis Cooper's post on the wonderful, peerless Nico...

http://denniscooper-theweaklings.blogspot.com/2008/05/nico-10-talking-points.html

The Art Bar Art Fair

Updated poster for the coming festivities.

lurking

Poster for the forthcoming event, part of the Go North festival in Dundee.

the damned

"We were living the dream."
(Peter Risdale, Leeds United chairman 1997-2003)

Fast forward to season 2007/2008. Manchester United are crowned champions of Europe, while Leeds are condemned to spend another season languishing among the dregs of League One, the lowly third tier of English football. If this is the dream, then someone please pinch me. It must be time to wake up.

Apologies for the bad language used in yesterday’s blog. You can blame it on the booze, the booze and the bitter taste of defeat. This was a whole season spent fighting against everything and everyone, against the injustice of a 15-point deduction, against the loss of two managers, against all the constant jeers and sneers. Despite all this Leeds could still claim the best attendances in the division, indeed bigger crowds than half the Premiership, the so-called "best league in the world".

And so it came to pass. After all this, 90 minutes duly arrived when Leeds thoroughly deserved to lose. Doncaster Rovers deserved their victory and could, in all truth, have had three or four while Leeds just never showed up for their big day at Wembley. It seemed as though the players had read the morning’s papers, the profiles in the sports pages telling of triumph in the face of adversity, believing the result to be a foregone conclusion. At the Devon pub in Crossgates, sat among the replica shirts emblazoned with "Y.R.A: YORKSHIRE REPUBLICAN ARMY", supporters making plans for next season’s Championship campaign, attending away matches on the road to another big promotion push, the triumphant return to Premier League football, revenge on all the nay-sayers. A season on the road to winter matches spent stood on the freezing terraces bare-chested, singing "we are the champions of Europe". No Chamionship this year though, as another spell in League One purgatory awaits.

Still not a total dead loss, the team racked up 91 points which in any other year would be enough to seal automatic promotion. The manager promises to return with a stronger squad, and the fans will never desert their team no matter what. Marching on together, Leeds United will be back on top. We’re gonna see you win!

denied

fucking cunts.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/sport1/hi/football/eng_div_2/7418498.stm

teaser

Notice for the forthcoming event, further details and amendments still to be confirmed.

dirty

Extract from Gordon Burn, Born Yesterday: The News as a Novel:

.

'I was desperately hoping that Madeleine would be back before the Cat got washed,’ her mother told The Times on 8 August. ‘In the end Cuddle Cat smelt of sun-tan lotion and everything. I forgot what colour it was.’
Mike Kelley has often said that ‘dirt’ is what his installations, consisting of abject and orphaned cuddly toys picked up from yard sales and thrift stores, are really about: ‘Because dolls represent such an idealised notion of the child, when you see a dirty one you think of a fouled child. And so you think of a dysfunctional family… The toy begins to take on the characteristics of the child itself – it smells like the child and becomes torn and dirty like real things do. It then becomes a frightening object because it starts to represent the human in a real way and that’s when it’s taken from the child and thrown away.’
In a society fuelled by pictures of success, wrote Ralph Rugoff, these images of failure generate the anxiety which surrounds the taboo. Kelley’s creatures are not funny on account of their pitiable appearance, but because they befoul the sublime hygiene of the gallery or museum (or the double-fronted executive dream home). Examine them too closely and their lovable personalities dissolve into clumps of unwashed fabric, limp and devoid of architectural structure.

After their flight from Praia da Luz in early September, the helicopter tracking shots at that end, the crate of toys in the driveway of the white adobe Vista do Mar, the helicopter tracking shots at this end, the paparazzi riding pillion, facing backwards to get the eyes of Gerry and Kate, the figures standing in sun-roofs, Richard Bilson outside apartment 5A at the Ocean Club resort, Huw Edwards in the studio, it was repeatedly reported that the Portuguese police wanted to re-examine – ‘seize’ was always the English translation – Madeleine’s Cuddle Cat, on which the sniffer dogs had allegedly picked up ‘the scent of death’ in the summer.

couture

Trying to assemble a good look for Spring/Summer 08, and I'm certainly not short of ideas.

glory glory

On the eve of Leeds United's bid to scale the giddy heights of Championship football, it now seems all too apt that fairweather friends should crawl out of the woodwork.

"so you stopped supporting leeds until they started playing well again?

not really anything to write an article about is it"

guess

Extract from Fyodor Dostoyevsky, Crime and Punishment:

"You can't guess, then?" he asked suddenly, feeling as though he were flinging himself down from a steeple.
"N-no…" whispered Sonia.
"Take a good look."
As soon as he had said this again, the same familiar sensation froze his heart. He looked at her and all at once seemed to see in her face the face of Lizaveta. He remembered clearly the expression in Lizaveta's face, when he approached her with the axe and she stepped back to the wall, putting out her hand, with childish terror in her face, looking as little children do when they begin to be frightened of something, looking intently and uneasily at what frightens them, shrinking back and holding out their little hands on the point of crying. Almost the same thing happened now to Sonia. With the same helplessness and the same terror, she looked at him for a while and, suddenly putting out her left hand, pressed her fingers faintly against his breast and slowly began to get up from the bed, moving further from him and keeping her eyes fixed even more immovably on him. Her terror infected him. The same fear showed itself on his face. In the same way he stared at her and almost with the same childish smile.
"Have you guessed?" he whispered at last.

evidence

Photos from the Yuck 'n Yum launch event are now online at the forum for your delectation.

the voices you are not hearing today

32 Springfield

From bell-push to faucet

Think of the voices you are not hearing today

The discreet thuds of a dancer diligently rehearsing her routine, or something more malign. The player a marionette dangling by gossamer thread over the bathroom sink

Around a corner strung together memories of anonymous families illuminate an angle of the cellar. These films linger to be retrieved arbitrarily and relived again

Seascapes projected over rumpled bed sheets, whispered intimacies now lent profundity by an apt mis-en-scene

Dusk, and muslin layers shroud the here and now in a warm maternal embrace

Presence of something, allow to be alone and in

Alterations and amendments and adjustments, as if to ask is this this or rather something other? A backdrop for an event? A stage-set?

Black minimal arrangements break up a landing, lights beamed up against the ceiling

Sculpting in the garden and limbs stretched taut in the living room, legs intertwining

Allow it just this once to be, uniquely

soon

A full write-up of the show at 32 Springfield from the other week will follow tomorrow.

the unacceptable face

Very glad to report that, thanks to a combination of good fortune and sheer bloodymindedness, the mighty Leeds United are through to the final of the play-offs. Given the season we've had, it's really no more than we deserve.

companion piece

Yuck 'n Yum will be involved in a sort of mini-exhibition on the Perth Road over the weekend. Anyone who happens to be around and about for the degree show is welcome to come along.

doctrine

Depending on whether or not Leeds United reach the final of the play-offs, I may attend a talk being given at the university by Naomi Klein. Of course, I'd rather I didn't have to see the lecture.

hard times

Ever fret that we're living through a time of terrible cultural stagnation? Is it just you that's getting old, or is the music the kids are listening to really that shit? Why, what happened? These essays cover some similar ground, and the conclusions both reach are not a little depressing.

Mark Fisher's blog on the end of history and CGI spectre of the 2012 Olympics.

"Jameson and Baudrillard understood that this user-generated content, together with the concomitant retreat of the cultural elite that has enabled it, would not lead to new kinds of creativity, but to pastiche and retrospection. Just as the capitalist language of ‘diversity’ is a cover for new modes of homogeneity."

Alan Kirby's essay on pseudo-modernism.

"This pseudo-modern world, so frightening and seemingly uncontrollable, inevitably feeds a desire to return to the infantile playing with toys which also characterises the pseudo-modern cultural world. Here, the typical emotional state, radically superseding the hyper-consciousness of irony, is the trance – the state of being swallowed up by your activity. In place of the neurosis of modernism and the narcissism of postmodernism, pseudo-modernism takes the world away, by creating a new weightless nowhere of silent autism."

do

So here follows the account of Friday's events promised a few days ago. Very much a capital success for everyone involved, starting at the Generator (discussed here on the magazine forum) where Anna Orton and Alan Grieve presented a really impressive show. From there it was on to NEON at the Art Bar, extremely busy and full of revellers who'd made it over from the gallery opening. In circumstances like that DJing is a real pleasure, the crowd being genuinely responsive to the music they're hearing and coming up with all sorts of compliments and questions.

Once we'd finished up and put the records away, then it was time to head for the Function Suite and the Yuck 'n Yum launch party. By the time we'd arrived it was fairly packed with punters who'd made it the next port of call on their itinerary, all clutching their complimentary magazines and all wearing their free badges. The music was excellent and very danceable, by which point I'd had rather a lot to drink and was haranguing people about how Kiss Me Again by Dinosaur really is the best song ever, ever.

So lots of fun was had by all, and Yuck 'n Yum got off to a flyer. All that's really needed to be done now is to try and get the forum off the ground over the next few days.

that obscure object of desire

This column in the Guardian's Saturday magazine supplement is invariably the same every week. Mr Petridis will chuckle scornfully about whatever it is those oh-so-wacky menswear designers have come out with this time, accompanied by a photo of the author wearing a smug, condescending look on his face. Well sorry, but sometimes it's necessary to take some risks with your style. I for one believe these Bernhard Willhelm-for-Topman sunglasses were made to grace a good few sunny afternoons spent lounging around the DCA piazza. Nothing "unreservedly barmy" about that, surely? Well, is there?

transmission

Just on the off-chance that there's anyone reading this blog with a) a liking for football and b) able to receive a UK terrestrial TV signal: tonight's South Bank Show features an interview with the Yorkshire-born writer David Peace, discussing his excellent book The Damned United. It's an account of the legendary football manager Brian Clough's ill-fated few weeks as manager of Leeds United, and is highly recommended to anyone, whether or not they have any sort of vested sporting interests. This interview with the author is well worth a read too.

queue

... so the Yuck 'n Yum forum is now up and running. Traffic is fairly slow just now, but hopefully things might just pick up over the next few days.

apre

...so the Yuck 'n Yum launch was an unmitigated success. A fuller, more comprehensive post with tons of links is scheduled for tomorrow.

vanguard

As this article from earlier in the week reveals, Yuck 'n Yum is part of a new fiscal paradigm.

plan

Everything is just about falling into place for tomorrow night, and the schedule runs as follows:

7pm > 9pm : Exhibition opening at Generator Projects, which will be They Had Four Years. This presents the work of the best graduates from last year's degree show.

9pm > close : NEON down the road at the Art Bar, playing the finest disco, electro and acid.

11.30pm > late : Yuck 'n Yum launch at the City Function Suite, with music, games and fun.

A final few things left to sort out, but keep an eye on the Yuck 'n Yum site over the weekend for full coverage of the night's events.

picking a scab

Right, another post about football. Still bemoaning the fate of Leeds United, who nevertheless have a chance to redeem themselves by achieving promotion through the play-offs over the coming weeks.

This thread contains an interesting (to some) discussion of the 15-point penalty.

"All I ever wanted from LUFC was good football and winning trophies and thereby greatly entertaining me and millions of others. I got all that, many times and am grateful for it.

Looking back on the numerous misfortunes of the club, one cannot fail to notice that the disasters did not originate on the pitch, but always in the board room, going right back to the "illegal payments" issue in 1919. Ridsdale and his ugly shower screwed the club and is happy now, probably doing the same thing. Now Bates has come in and is shafting us, only differently.

If the Ridsdale crew hadn't been such plonkers when the "crisis" arose and had spoken to creditors about reduced repayments, or extensions, or negotiating a different payment plan, pointing out at the same time that the present squad comprised top quality players who would be capable of reaching the top-tier of the league and therefore get into Europe, where they could generate good amounts of revenue, then things may have looked vastly different.

Instead, they went into panic mode and thought that selling all the outstanding player material would solve the problem. What are you going to do with a team made up of no-names, apprentices and loan-kickers? That's where the real decline started."

(rincad)

"'Leeds fans weren't complaining when we got to the semi finals of the Champions League on borrowed money and overspend.'

No we weren't complaining - and I defy any fan of any other club to have complained in the same situation. The reason we weren't complaining was that we weren't all privy to the financial workings of our football club, and in actual fact, the massive overspend came after the champions league run. To claim that we should have known is just pathetic and flippant nonsense. Our net transfer spend at that time was around £5 million, but the Leeds haters like to gloss over facts like this.

The sense that we get everything we deserve is as laughable as it is predictable. With each new kick we receive, rival fans say we deserve more and more severe penalties for our misdemeanours. After all, we've only had to contend with selling virtually two teams of international players for pathetic fees to clubs who openly laughed at us, selling our training facilities and stadium to dodgy development companies, two relegations, the deduction of 25 points, Peter Risdale, Gerald Krasner and Ken Bates. But of course we deserve more because we are Leeds.

The one thing I can tell is starting to upset the Leeds hating mob at the moment though, is the sense that perhaps we have now bottomed out and are steadily on our way back up. And as Leeds fans we know how sick that must be making all you Leeds haters feel. 38 thousand at Elland Road for a game in league one! MOT."

jimiL

for the boys

Anyone reading this blog who likes techno or football? If so, you may find something of interest in these links:

Legendary producer Carl Craig takes The Wire magazine's Invisible Jukebox test to reveal his influences and inspirations.

Yorkshire noir writer David Peace is interviewed at Elland Road, home of the mighty Leeds United. He discusses the forthcoming film adaptation (and accompanying South Bank Show special) of his novel The Damned United.

reborn

The new look Yuck 'n Yum website is now online. Save it to your favourites, because there will be much more to come.

the Cine Salon 2007-2008

The _Black_Acrylic Cine Salon ran from November 2007 until May 2008. The idea with this project was to present a series of films that viewers would be unlikely to see anywhere else, in a relaxed environment conductive to contemplation and discussion. Films were not chosen according to any specific brief, but over time it became apparent that a few specific themes had come to dominate. The common thread in all these films is that they suggest new possibilities, and take the viewer to a place where cinematic conventions do not apply. With two exceptions (Nekromantik and Christmas Evil), I hadn’t seen any of the films myself before screening them.

The Salon came about through a happy mix of circumstances. Primarily, I found myself in a house that had a spacious living room. I was able to procure a large television set from a friend, and I’d already installed various art objects about the place. Around this time I was working a lot of overtime in my job at the bank, for which I could claim payment in Marks and Spencer’s vouchers. These were spent on what Salon listings described as “the finest wines and cheeses”. DVDs were sourced through the Amazon DVD rental service, and occasionally bought from eBay or other retailers when the titles were too obscure. Attendance for these events was usually about three or four people; often it could be many more, and once or twice it was just myself. Each week events were publicized through text message, social networking websites, and this blog.

08/11/07 LA PLANETE SAUVAGE (1973, Dir. Rene Laloux)
15/11/07 ARAKIMENTARI (2004, Dir. Travis Klose)
22/11/07 THE BEYOND (L’Aldila’) (1981, Dir. Lucio Fulci)
29/11/07 The complete WILLO THE WISP (1981, Dir. Nick Spargo)
09/12/07 HAXAN Witchcraft Through The Ages (1922, Dir. Benjamin Christensen)
13/12/07 SUCCUBUS (1968, Dir. Jess Franco)
20/12/07 CHRISTMAS EVIL (1980, Dir. Lewis Jackson)
10/01/08 964 PINOCCHIO (1991, Dir. Shozin Fukui)
17/01/08 ALICE IN WONDERLAND (1966, Dir. Jonathan Miller)
24/01/08 NEKROMANTIK (1987, Dir. Jorg Buttgereit)
31/01/08 LITTLE OTIK (2000, Dir. Jan Svankmajer)
07/02/08 BLOOD AND BLACK LACE (1964, Dir. Mario Bava)
14/02/08 PANDORA’S BOX (1929, Dir. G W Pabst)
21/02/08 LIQUID SKY (1982, Dir. Slava Tsukerman)
28/02/08 THE PHANTOM CARRIAGE (1921, Dir. Victor Sjostrom)
06/03/08 CHRISTIANE F. (1981, Dir. Uli Edel)
13/03/08 GIRL SLAVES OF MORGANA LE FAY (1971, Dir. Bruno Gantillon)
20/03/08 FAUST (1926, Dir. F W Murnau)
27/03/08 AFTERMATH (1994, Dir. Nacho Cerda)
03/04/08 DER FAN (1982, Dir. Eckhart Schmidt)
17/04/08 THE SHIVER OF THE VAMPIRES (1971, Dir. Jean Rollin)
24/04/08 15 (2003, Royston Tan)
01/05/08 LAST HOUSE ON DEAD END STREET (1977, Dir. Roger Watkins)

Despair

Notes from the DVD release of SPK – Despair:

THE WORK OF SPK COMPRISES A COMBINATION OF INDUSTRIAL SOUND, IMAGE CRITICAL THEORY, AND PERFORMANCE. THIS REFLECTS THE PAIN OF A TWISTED, BROKEN HUMANITY, WHERE THE PRICE TAGS OF HUMAN CREATIVITY ACCOMMODATE A SYSTEM OF DOMINATION, WHICH PURPOSELY FRAGMENTS THE SOCIAL WORLD.

OUR OBJECTIVE IS TO CREATE MUSIC ANALOGOUS TO A CRY OF DESPAIR, PIERCING THE CARAPACE OF A REIFIED, TOTALITARIAN SOCIETY.

WITHIN THE INTERSTICES OF THIS SOCIETY, WE HAVE SOUGHT TO LIBERATE THE IMAGINATION THROUGH THE CREATION OF ART FORMS DESIGNED TO EXPOSE THE INSTITUTIONALISATION OF VIOLENCE, THE SEAMY UNDERBELLY OF AN INCREASINGLY ‘NORMALIZED’ HUMANITY.

THIS INCLUDES ATAVISTIC ACTS (CELEBRATION OF THE PRIMORDIAL, VALORISATION OF THE ART OF THE ‘CLINICALLY’ INSANE; AND THE DOUBLE EXPOSURE OF DOCUMENTED BRUTALITY).

THIS CONTENT IS SUPERIMPOSED UPON A LANDSCAPE OF INDUSTRIAL NOISE, WHICH EXPLORES THE SENSORY AND PSYCHOLOGICAL EFFECTS OF A MODE OF PERCEPTION COMMENSURATE WITH THE DISINTEGRATION OF THE HUMAN PSYCHE AND THE DISSOLUTION OF THE PERSONALITY. A CONDITION SYMPTOMATIC OF THE GLOBALISED POSTMODERNITY OF LATE CAPITALISM. SPK SEEKS TO ARTICULATE THIS STATE OF AFFAIRS THROUGH THE USE OF RHYTHM, FREQUENCY, JUXTAPOSITION AND COLLAGE.

OUR PERFORMANCES EVOKE A CONFONTATION WITH THE LISTENER. THE AUDIENCE IS NOT ONLY FACED WITH, BUT ALSO INCORPORATED INTO THE PERFORMANCE. WE SEEK TO SHOCK THE PARTICIPANTS BY ENGENDERING WITHIN THEM A RAW AND ALIENATING AWARENESS OF THE HUMAN CONDITION.

THE PHILOSOPHER JEAN-FRANCOIS LYOTARD WOULD DESCRIBE THIS AS ‘ANESTHETICS’ OR ‘AN AESTHETICS OF SHOCK’. IT IS A REACTIVE DEFENCE AGAINST A DOMINANT CULTURE’S TREMENDOUS CAPACITY TO ABSORB OUTSIDERS AND INGEST ITS OWN DISSIDENT ELEMENTS.

IN AN ATTEMPT TO AVOID THIS PROCESS OF ABSORPTION (‘RECUPERATION’), OUR PRODUCTIONS PRESENT THEMSELVES AS RUDELY ANTITHETICAL TO THE SACCHARINE, EUROTRASH/MTV VALUES OF THE POPULAR MAINSTREAM.

WE HAVE SOUGHT TO RENDER OURSELVES AT THE VERY LEAST UNPALATABLE – AND IDEALLY, TOXIC – TO THAT ALL-CONSUMING DIGESTIVE TRACT OF THE CULTURE INDUSTRY.

here is the news

Given the recent local election results, Mark Fisher's post on Gordon Brown is looking eerily prescient.

And Leeds United failed in their bid to get the points deduction overturned. Never mind, there's still the play-offs to come in a few weeks' time.

Proxy

Extract from Peter Sotos, ‘Special’:

I know that a gay gentleman was found about a block or so from his home, passed out and near death, covered head to toe in blood that drenched and seeped through his clothes into his frozen skin. The man had been beaten in his home and had to make his way outside to find some help. He was cruelly attacked by, what police figure was, a group of more than three men.

The gentleman still exists. Still talks and walks and smiles and laughs. The 126 stitches in his head are, however, virtually unknown to him. Such is the nature of AIDS dementia. Currently at his lowest ebb, near death with rare and brief stabs at lucidity, the man either refuses to acknowledge the attack or simply to discuss it.
Police are most curious about the extensive damage done to the man’s feet which, they surmise, would suggest a certain closeness between victim and attacker. His feet- heels to toes- were chewed and bitten through. By more than one mouth. His entire fag body showed bite marks- neck to thighs- but his feet mutilation was fresh and especially vicious.
Meaning, maybe, that he liked it.
And that it went too far. And, maybe still, when he objected- or maybe not- the abusers reacted by smashing his skull again and again into a faucet- maybe- until he shut up. Screaming to stop. Liking it to begin with. Asking for it. Waiting for it to start with a hand rubbing at his middle-aged jaded sagging balls and tough hanging dick. Never liking it and wishing it had never started. Crying with all the godless power in his brain for them to please just fucking stop it now. Unable to stop it; either by that impulse that led him to such an always dangerous and mysterious situation where the groin tug is the smile on his face, rather than the slow steady whisper in his noisy personality. Or simply physically unable to bend against the pure bone gnashing pain.

Go North!

During the first week of June, Dundee will be hosting the Go North arts festival. Yuck 'n Yum is staging a number of events at the Art Bar, including an exhibition, performances, assorted live art events and a round-table discussion on the local art "scene" in Dundee.

It all looks very exciting and further information will be posted as things start to take shape.