Post 903

Post 903
(title assigned automatically by an annoyingly slow WordPress (see below) and which I have neither the will nor the imagination to change to anything more interesting)

Stuff I have noted over the last few days:

1. The internet in South Africa has been even worse than usual of late. I blamed my ISP, my ISP blamed Telkom and Telkom blamed Ndujani.
It turns out (following extensive research) that Ndujani is a mongoose god, worshipped by some tribes in the Northern Cape. Any claim that Telkom is merely passing the buck is met with the standard, “Please don’t turn this into a cultural issue, Mr 6000”.
More likely is that one (or more) of their ADSL hamsters which keep the internet working by running around their little wheels in Bloemfontein has died or gone on strike or something. Probably over a cultural issue.

2. The Oscars were on. A celebration of Hollywood excess while everyone else suffers the wrath of the global credit crunch.
More salt with your wound, sir?
I’m not a big fan of the movies, but was pleased to see that Kate Winslet finally won something after so many bare-breasted cinematographic moments. Had to be worth it in the end, hey? (But please don’t stop now – you could win again!)
One thing I found shocking was that, even though winning a little gold man surely marks the pinnacle of any actor’s career, Keith Ledger couldn’t even be bothered to turn up and receive his award for Best Supporting Actor. What a snub. They should have given it to someone else. It’s just plain bad manners.

3. I’m concerned over a tectonic shift in my musical tastes of late. Away from decent Indie and Nu-metal towards irritatingly-catchy Brit-pop, hip-hop, rap and pumpin’ House.
As I write this, I have David Guetta’s Joan of Arc on the iPod. Actually, to give everyone credit, it’s actually David Guetta (featuring Thailand). It remains unclear whether everyone in Thailand (pop. 60.5 million) played their part, but if so, then they probably shouldn’t have bothered.
[Mental note to self: Check up on most ridiculous names of “featured artists” for future blog post]

4. Twitter isn’t actually that good. Either you follow too few people and nothing ever happens, you follow too many and everything happens too quickly or one person (no names, sorry) fills your screen with rubbish for the sake of putting something (usually about cooking) on twitter.
I’m left debating whether the very occasional good bits are worth the very regular daily disappointments. Le jury est out, as the French would say.

5. I saw a “collaborative project” in the Art Spot of the newspaper yesterday:

Trasi Henen curates a collaborative project [see?] called I Forget That You Exist’ at the Cape Town gallery, Blank Projects. Participants were asked to engage with the following Dialectic: Dominant culture is a victim of the Will (after Schopenhauer’s The World as Idea and Representation) and therefore perpetually oscillating between Desire and Ennui. Desire is a state of potentiality.
When the desired destination is reached, is this a tragedy?

Sometimes I forget that you exist is a collaborative research project around desire and the heterotopia. Participants are asked to engage with the above dialectic. The exhibition process is ongoing, and contingent, culminating in a closing event. In the two weeks leading up the exhibition, blank becomes the research studio which opens the project to dialogue and interventions.

Something for everyone to think about there, then.

I was once asked (in a 1992 interview for a place at Wolverhampton Poly, no less) if money spent on the Arts is a waste. I wish I’d seen stuff like this before they asked – it would have made a rather stuttered, awkward answer much simpler. (Because there’s obviously nothing more beneficial that Trasi could be doing for the world).

17 thoughts on “Post 903

  1. I have certain people on my twitter who update about once every five minutes about the biggest load of rubbish. Can you say annoying?

    Goblin´s last blog post was: Here be Oscar spoilers. (Note: 6000 miles… is not responsible for the content of external internet sites)

  2. I’ll stop twittering about what i’m cooking for dinner.

    Oh wait.. i don’t cook.

    PS – I also caught parts of the Oscars, it’s awfull stuff, i’m not particularly interested – but it’s compulsive to see.

    PPS – Did you think Hugh Jackman was great?!

    JHBPRINCESS´s last blog post was: Dealing (Note: 6000 miles… is not responsible for the content of external internet sites)

  3. Regarding point 5, above:

    If one examines submaterial deappropriation, one is faced with a choice: either accept postdialectic semantic theory or conclude that consciousness is used to entrench sexist perceptions of society. But if modernism holds, the works of Gibson are an example of self-supporting capitalism. The primary theme of Humphrey’s analysis of neosemioticist nationalism is the difference between class and reality.

    In a sense, the subject is interpolated into a that includes sexuality as a totality. The dialectic, and therefore the failure, of the modern paradigm of consensus intrinsic to Gibson’s Count Zero emerges again in Virtual Light, although in a more predeconstructivist sense.

    It could be said that the main theme of the works of Gibson is the role of the writer as participant. A number of narratives concerning postdialectic semantic theory exist.

    Therefore, Baudrillard promotes the use of submaterial deappropriation to deconstruct class divisions. Modernism suggests that the establishment is capable of significance.

    Jacques´s last blog post was: UCT: Sax Appeal and blasphemy (Note: 6000 miles… is not responsible for the content of external internet sites)

  4. I oscillate between liking twitter and hating it. I feel too bad to unfollow some random people that I followed because I didn’t know anyone, and now they bombard me with gobbledygook.

    And I often have this urge to offload misery or anger on twitter because it makes me feel better, but that is just lame cos no one actually cares, and it is not very nice to drag people down. And what is even worse is when people actually reply!

    po´s last blog post was: Strange Shores 4, or Monty Po-thon’s flying circus (Note: 6000 miles… is not responsible for the content of external internet sites)

  5. Goblin > Sure. See today’s “gmail is down” discussion. Yes, it is. Deal with it. And shut up.

    JHBP > Don’t know. Didn’t watch. (sorry)

    Jacques > I thought of you when I read that. Not your comment, the SIFTYE thing. You know, without being boastful, I consider myself to be intelligent: above average IQ, enquiring mind, half decent grasp of the English language, but I must admit that I have completely NO CLUE what she is on about or why she’s on about it, let alone what benefit (if any) it will bring to people.
    Regarding your input, I think the most telling comment I could make was that my next-door neighbour once had a cat called Humphrey.
    I’m not sure whether to be embarrassed or happy about this complete void in my knowledge. If I understood this sort of thing, would it merely take up room that could be used for more important stuff?

    EDIT: Reminded of this song:
    What I Am – Edie Brickell & New Bohemians

    “I’m not aware of too many things
    I know what I know if you know what I mean
    Philosophy is the talk on a cereal box
    Religion is the smile on a dog”

    Of course, religion goes far beyond the smile on a dog. The smile on a dog is tolerant and doesn’t hate other canine facial expressions. Equally, the talk on a cereal box goes far beyond philosophy. There’s stuff about vitamin RDAs and serving suggestions. Plato never gave us that (as far as I’m aware).

    Po > You mean the rant about the multi-channel pipette, don’t you? That was funny, to those in the know.

  6. Oscars, don’t care – it’s a stupid club where rich old farts give their friends little statues to give them validation.

    Twitter, I suspect will be forgotten about once the buzz wears off.

    Alex´s last blog post was: Breakfast In Bed (Note: 6000 miles… is not responsible for the content of external internet sites)

  7. Alex > You’re only saying that cos you got pipped at the post by Keith.

    OL > You may have missed them. It’s a TV thing. Do you have that in PE yet?

  8. Gerry > Wow. You learn something new every day.
    Quite glad they didn’t bring him up on stage then. Would have been messy, at best.
    Thanks for the info.

  9. Gerry > I am gutted. I feel terrible, empty, broken looking back on what I wrote. Poor Keith… dead… Hoodathunkitt?
    Drugs… man, they’re a killer. That and massage girls. Drugs and massage girls. And the Russian mafia. Not that they were involved at all. But Keith… dead.

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