* (restored)

Post-rock first appeared in inverted commas and it might have been better if it’d stayed there. But it didn’t, and it looks as though we’re stuck with it. Still, never mind:

 

1. Bark Psychosis, “Scum”

As usually happens with genres, the label has provoked no end of anguish among artists and audiences, all understandably protective of their identities, keen not to be cashed out for the convenience of lazy journalist slags.

 

2. Slint, “Breadcrumb Trail”

I think post-rock is a label in the same way punk is a label: “Never Mind The Bollocks” sounds nothing like “Horses”, which sounds nothing like “Ramones Leave Home”, which sounds nothing like “The Feeding of the Five Thousand”, which sounds nothing like “Double Nickels On The Dime”, which sounds nothing like “Bad Brains”, which sounds nothing like “The Scream”, which … yet, when we talk about punk, we kind of understand what we mean. We understand that we’re talking about an attitude, a discipline, moreso than about how loud the guitars are and whether you can hear the words.

 

3. Mogwai, “Rollerball”

What I’m saying, then, is that post-rock was a useful label during a phase in pop music when the fabric of what a band / performance / recording could be was getting playfully tailored into new shapes. Of course, this goes on all the time, often un-apprehended. The cyclic view of history as applied to pop music doesn’t sell any significant number of inky newspapers, which used to be considered an important thing. But more importantly, a label could be a license to create.

 

4. Disco Inferno, “Footprints In Snow”

It probably isn’t important to point out where this stuff comes from, exactly, its precedents. They’re well documented. More important than any one figure, I think, is access to technology. I’m pretty sure about this: throughout the 80s and into the 90s, a bunch of affordable, viable studio technology emerged, meaning that it was no longer absolutely necessary to be Brian Eno or Trevor Horn before you could spend days playing around with samplers or synthesizers to see what happened. Conventional wisdom has it that this is part of how acid house happened; I think the same forces were at work here, too.

 

5. Godspeed You Black Emperor!, “Moya”

It’s also tempting to consider a lot of this music as oppositional, or at least pointedly individual. To take one example: for a long time I didn’t care for Godspeed, for exhaustively thought-out reasons I won’t bore you with. But, as I’ve realised, what happens in Godspeed’s music is defiantly their own thing. The reverent, solemn pacing of their music is as purposeful as the presentation of their records and live performances. That I used to bridle at this, then, was my problem.

 

6. Stereolab, “Super-Electric”

A drone can be a powerful thing. It says things like “I persist,” and “I contain multitudes”. Anyone who’s had the chance to hear Charlemagne Palestine’s “Strumming Music” or Antonio Carlos Jobim’s “One Note Samba” will have heard how a simple group of notes repeated over and over again can reveal animation and interest in a way that seems simultaneously magical, irresistible and defiant. In isolation, like in the Palestine performance, a drone can be beatific. Forced to exist among other musical events, a drone can feel inconvenient, itchy, destabilising. It can be, particularly in Stereolab’s music, the presence of an active resistance.

 

7. Tortoise, “Glass Museum”

I find it interesting to think about the relations between a lot of this music and vocals. In an earlier draft of this piece, I wrote that if there was any unifying concern of the music considered under this label, it might be that it desires deep reflection in the listener. That’s not quite sufficient, but I think there’s something to it. Somewhere and often, speech seems to have become a problem.

 

8. Bowery Electric, “Fear Of Flying”

Then again, words might only get in the way. The songs on Slint’s album Spiderland are sinister, elliptical stories set to measured, pacing music that feels disconcertingly like what brooding on deep hurts actually feels like. As the gathering storm of the last song on the record finally breaks, the narration becomes inaudible for a few crucial seconds, and the thread of exactly what awful thing was going on becomes forever lost to the listener. But the scariest song on this frightening record is still the instrumental.

 

9. Gastr del Sol, “Every Five Miles”

If we want to think about the practice of making music like one or another of these examples, we might start by thinking about manipulating context, as a director and editor manipulate the context of a shot in a film. For Don Caballero and Labradford, song titles become super-verbose, turned against their function, (“In the Absence of Strong Evidence to the Contrary, One May Step Out of the Way of the Charging Bull”) or otherwise disappear altogether (“S”, “Recorded and mixed at Sound of Music, Richmond, VA.”). Meanwhile, GYBE’s records materialise in editions that combine the haphazard and inscrutable with the painstakingly deliberate.

 

10. Miles Davis, “He Loved Him Madly” (part 1)

“Haphazard and inscrutable and painstakingly deliberate” would also be a fair description of Miles Davis’ “He Loved Him Madly”, a funereal elegy for Duke Ellington that sprawls like a luminescent jellyfish in a deep dark sea. The animation in this limpid music is animation in space, in timbre, and in utterance. Spliced and mixed down from hours of improv, it drifts, seemingly motionless, but under the surface it teems with meaning.

 

11. Labradford, “Lake Speed”

Portentous brooding isn’t the only permissible mode, even if some people seem to think otherwise. If this practice of music is truly open, after all, that means it must also being open to being upbeat, melodic, even charming. It might be an unlikely prospect that the Jonas Brothers will get together with Jim O’Rourke to do an album of faith-crisis-themed tropicalia with extra VCS3, but it doesn’t feel altogether impossible.

 

12. Do Make Say Think, “Classic Noodlanding”

There is something that I find particularly satisfying about any sort of music or theatre or cinema that attempts to engage with these concerns of space, context and utterance. I have some fussy, half-formed notion that doing so enables these artforms to access the audience’s imagination in the same way that fiction does, but I don’t have the theory chops to back these sorts of assertions up. Ultimately all I know is that it involves me in ways other music, including some of my favourite music, does not, and I like that.

 

13. Mono, “Follow The Map”

I know that I respond to recognising that people are trying to achieve something. It doesn’t have to be something brand new. I think there is a unique thrill that comes with witnessing a particular quality – I originally wrote ‘tangible effort’, but I might as well write ‘daring’ – that doesn’t come with anything else.

 

14. Pluramon, “Time (catharsia mix)”

It’s also a question of faith: willingness on the part of the listener to hear “He Loved Him Madly” as a drifting elegy is pretty much all that keeps it from sounding like a guttering jam session by a band that can’t remember how to play “Mood Indigo”. The listener has to be daring too.

But given the choice between someone who’s precisely in control of his utterance, and someone who might well fuck it up but is absolutely committed nonetheless, I’ll always opt for the latter. When we’re asked to bring something of ourselves to a performance or a film, we’re asked to do work. It’s always easier and more pleasurable to work with people who take care with what they do.

 

15. Fridge, “Five Four Child Voice”

I think the post-rock label identifies a phase in musical history where this sort of experimental play was something people became excited about. But I think that some of the music from this time remains so rewarding because of its interplay with more familiar forms and aesthetics. I think that experimentation for experimentation’s sake can often be valuable or remarkable, but I don’t think it’s often as daring or rewarding as expression is.

Critical theory or this or that other baggage isn’t necessary to either understand or justify wanting this sort of discovering-experience with music, because when you get ahold of it you feel a sensation that’s completely immediate. It’s a sea of possibilities, as P. Smith puts it, and we can walk into the waves any time we like.

 

16. Xinlisupreme, “All You Need Is Love Was Not True”

 

Music credits:

1. “Scum” by Bark Psychosis is on the compilations “Independency” and “Game Over”

2. “Breadcrumb Trail” by Slint is the first track on their album “Spiderland”

3. “Rollerball” by Mogwai is on the compilation “EP + 6”

4. “Footprints In Snow” by Disco Inferno is the last track on “D.I. Go Pop”

5. “Moya” by Godspeed You Black Emperor is on “Slow Riot For New Zerø Kanada”

6. “Super-Electric” by Stereolab is from “Switched On”.

7. “Glass Museum” by Tortoise is from “Millions Now Living Will Never Die”

8. “Fear of Flying” by Bowery Electric is on “Beat”

9. “Every Five Miles” by Gastr del Sol is from “Crookt, Crackt or Fly”.

10. “He Loved Him Madly” by Miles Davis is on “Get Up With It”

11. “Lake Speed” by Labradford is on their 1996 self-titled album.

12. “Classic Noodlanding” by Do Make Say Think is from “& Yet & Yet”

13. “Follow The Map” by Mono is on “Hymn To The Immortal Wind”

14. “Time (catharsia mix)” by Pluramon, featuring Julee Cruise & Keith Rowe, is on “Dreams Top Rock”

15. “Five Four Child Voice” by Fridge is on “Happiness”

16. “All You Need Is Love Was Not True” by Xinlisupreme is from “Tomorrow Never Comes”

 

 

*

p.s. Hey. ** Charalampos, Still say, apparently. Instagram seems ok so far. I haven’t looked at your page yet, but I will. I’m still figuring the place out. Meat = yikes at the very least, true. ** Dominik, Hi!!! Yes, we’re writing the new film. I’m waiting for Zac’s feedback on the latest draft right now. I was thinking and hoping you’d say Orbán. Mine? I guess I would have to say Trump, but the bullet would need to then ricochet and pass through the skulls of Vance, Stephen Miller, Rubio, Hegseth, Bondi, and at least 10 or so other Trump minions. I’m down with love’s directive of yesterday. Love wondering whatever happened to The Dreadful Flying Glove, G. ** James, You remain the ideal post reader and responder. I salute you! And it’s a salty salute to boot. I’m almost cogent enough to begin my initial exploration of your substack. My body is twiddling its fingers. I’m sure your voice is singular and bears no traces of mine. Those are very elegant paper cranes. Nice. I didn’t expect such mastery of the crane anatomy. I don’t know what I expected though. They’re meaty too. Oh, so you’re off to the north today. Gosh, I hope you’re dazzled up there. When are you back? Be yourself. ** Poecilia, Oh, wow, those PGL inspired things are beautiful and poignant and, gosh, so nice. Thank you for doing them and letting me see them. I’m going to click and drag them onto my screen so Zac can see them if that’s okay. Or I guess even if not. Conspiratorially mean … ooh, I’m going to look for that. Anyway, that’s amazing. And I’m not easy to please actually. xo. ** Steeqhen, Always happy to bolster. Nice: the questioning yourself angle. Good prying. Awesome re: the planning. Thanks, pal, and apologies for this hazy-ish response. But I think my mind is starting to break through. ** jay, Hey. Guns aren’t really a powerful symbol for me either, I don’t know why. I’ve never been drawn to ‘the phallic’, but again I don’t know why. I fired a gun once at a shooting range when I was teen. I did not expect firing it to make my shooting arm fly wildly in the air as a result of the firing’s impact, and I did not like that, and I left guns to others ever since. Watching ‘Martyrs’ seems like a solid Easter plan. I didn’t even do that. I planned to go out on Saturday to investigate what fancy, imaginative Easter-themed chocolates that the patisseries might have cooked up, but I didn’t do that either. I just tried to stay awake basically. Anything exciting this week? xo, me. ** _Black_Acrylic, I like staple guns too. Who doesn’t, I would imagine? Yay re: and to your brother Nick. What a good dude. ** Tyler Ookami, Oh, I thought ‘TTA’ was new. I can’t remember what I read. What’s his name plays the Toxic Avenger, I think … I’m spacing on his name. From ‘Game of Thrones’ and all that. Oh, that’s a great painting! Maybe it kind of works with today’s post? I’m happy to have your imgur now available and bookmarked too, surely needless to say. Everyone, Go check out Tyler Ookami’s really swell new large painting at his imgur right here What do you do at the pizza store? It’s a pizza ‘store’ as opposed to ‘restaurant’? I like the idea of a pizza store. ** Nicholas., My body’s less jet lagged, but my brain is still pretty fuzzy. I’m close to being fully returned, I think. I’ve never used ChatGBT. I don’t even know how. I suppose it’s easy to figure out. I guess I’m still a little wary of it, but I don’t really have a reason to feel wary. Strange. That I didn’t realise until now? Hm, I don’t know. I think I realised everything that was great at the time? I ate really, really good vegan Persian food at some newish place on Sunset Blvd in Echo Park whose name I can’t remember and that was fun. Say more about your newly birthed brand. That’s exciting. ** Bill, Hey! It got through. It’s not just you. I don’t know about the Burroughs reference. I’ll have to scroll back up and investigate. So you’re home now. And hopefully you’re not as jet lagged as I have been and remain to some degree, ugh. Hoo Mojong … not off the top of my head. I’ll go look. Solar Return … no, I don’t think I know them, but they’re from Nantes?! Then I should. Off to the races or their race or whatever, cool. Safe and suitably in-flight entertainment-packed flight, I hope. ** Steve, Cool, I need some sonic input badly. Everyone, The new edition of Steve’s radio show is now up and fully listenable here. I’m going to head over there in a short while. How about you? We wanted to submit ‘RT’ to Prismatic Ground, but we missed the deadline, drat. I’ll definitely go use their site to watch stuff. Thanks! ** scunnard, Hi. I’ve resisted doing a crowdfunding thing, even when our film was in desperate need, but I do have colleagues who’ve made that work well for them and their projects. The ‘getting the word out’ part is really the part I don’t feel confident I could do. But it’s probably easier than it seems. Right, that Christ guy I’ve heard so much about. Welcome back to him, I guess? ** rene, Hi! No problem on the timing of the comments. Time is kind of relative around here. Your novel description sounds neither pretentious nor stupid whatsoever. Quite the opposite. So no worries as far as I’m concerned anyway. Keep at it. When I write novels, I always try to do something that would seem to be slightly (at least) out of my talent’s range, and so far I’ve managed to pull it off albeit sometimes not in the way or to the degree that I planned. If that makes sense. Bristol … I think I went to a gig in Bristol, but it was a long time ago, and I don’t remember much of anything about the gig’s context. Next time I’m in the UK, I’ll try to go wander about in Bristol attentively. Thanks! Luck with the novel. Let me know how it’s going, if you like. ** Malik, Hey, hey. I have to say that sounds really fun, the one day only aspect, now that you mention the collaborative nature. I love collaborating. It’s exhilarating when you normally just sit at a computer tapping. Right, getting your feet wet that way makes sense. Awesome! ** catachrestic, Well, I wouldn’t mind, but I kind of hate parties, so no sweat if it’s logistically nonsensical. The FN P90 is pretty attractive. I like guns that aren’t phallic. Revolutions are bad for art because artists make agit prop, political art that both isn’t very persuasive and dates horribly? ‘Napoleon’ will put you right to sleep. Swear to god. Okay, Lamartine makes me curious. Maybe I’ll look into that. Maybe I’ll even make a Lamartine post, who knows, whoa. I … don’t believe I’ve read Tocqueville. Sounds pretty interesting. I’m going to ask my literate and trustworthy French friends what they think about him. My guess is they’ll say they read him in school and don’t remember. Week starting appropriately? ** Misanthrope, Hi. Leeds: that’s where Ben lives, I think? I do remember Rigby grew up in New Zealand. I’m glad you’re connected with Angela. Yeah, that must really help. And I remember that you guys were hoping to come to Paris. I hope you still can. With Alex maybe? Hugs, man. ** Måns BT Hej, Måns! Cool, thank you a lot about contacting Zits about RT! You’ve gotten the GbV bug! Congratulations! They’ll eat you alive if you let them. Hard to pick my fave GbV albums given the volume and constant greatness, but … ‘Under the Bushes, Under the Stars’, ‘Universal Truths and Cycles’, ‘Bee Thousand’ of course, ‘Let’s Go Eat the Factory’ maybe, … actually their new one, ‘Universe Room’ is my favorite among their recent output. Favorite songs is too hard. I’d have to really think, and my brain is still kind of jet lag-clouded. I recently read a book I really liked called ‘Plants Don’t Drink Coffee’ by Unai Elloriaga, who’s a Basque writer. Haven’t seen any films of amazement recently. I watched Ulrich Seidel’s documentary ‘In the Basement’, which was quite interesting but not amazing. xo. ** Uday, I like stapling guns, but not guns themselves so much. I’ve twice had guns pointed at me, once by a kidnapper when I was young and once by a guy who was robbing the 7-11 I was shopping at. No pleasure there for sure. Congrats on the prize/voucher. There’s something by me in The Thing book but I don’t remember what it is. It might be an interview, or I might’ve written something? No idea when ‘RT’ will be streaming. It’ll be a while. We’re still in the phase of showing it at festivals. I’d like a foamy shower. I don’t think my current soap can provide that, but I hope yours does. ** Darbz, Hi! Gosh, I don’t remember which gig I was referring to. Shit, sorry. My mind is really hazy from jet lag. The trip was very good. Mostly I ate bean and cheese burritos. I had them at Poquito Mas, Mixto, Del Taco, El Coyote, and a food truck whose name I can’t remember. I didn’t get your package, no. I will check again with my LA roommate just in case he stored it somewhere and forgot to tell me. Sorry. If it is there, I’ll get it when I go back there in June. Honestly, I think you still communicate very interestingly and complexly and inspiringly. Maybe you just do it differently now, or I know you well enough to read between the lines maybe? Anyway, no worries, you’re being very interesting as ever. Seriously. No question. How did your week start? Afreshly to your mind, I hope? Love, me. ** HaRpEr, Hey. Oh, my email is [email protected]. Huh, I’ve been wanting to watch ‘Megalopolis’, of course, but I keep wondering if I should. Strange. You make it sound doable. 400 pages, so … big enough. I have to prepare for that. I haven’t read a novel over 200-ish pages in a long time. Exciting. Thanks, pal. ** nat, Easter is a holiday that should be fun given the bunnies aspect but kind of isn’t unless you’re under 12 years old? ‘Targets’ is good, right? Bogdanovich was an interesting director when he first started out. I wonder what happened. Once you’ve mentally upended your project to your satisfaction it starts getting exciting again, as I guess you probably know. ** Arno, Hi, Arno. That Frank & Robert work looks cool. I’ll investigate it. Thank you. We’ve only had the premiere screening so far, so we’ll see. The response and critical stuff has been very, very good. That’s interesting: my friend the American writer Jeff Jackson just wrote a trilogy of novels all at the same time too. You’re lucky to have that publisher, and, you know, they’re the really lucky ones. Anyway, thanks! ** Right. Sorry, my lagged brain kind of started dying out partway through the p.s. Let’s see … Today you get a revival of quite old post made by the legendary, long lost commenter and distinguished local The Dreadful Flying Glove that I certainly hope will be of interest to you. See you with hopefully more wakefulness tomorrow.

 

 

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Robert Lazzarini Guns (2008)
Robert Lazzarini’s artwork springs from a desire to understand the perceivable limits of the material world. Conceptually and formally rigorous, he pushes ordinary objects to their limits by mining the twined threads of distortion and material veracity. By fully devoting himself to these indispensable characteristics, Lazzarini negotiates a place between two and three dimensions that challenges his viewers’ understanding of the physical world and their visual perception. Though often mistaken for mere anamorphism, Lazzarini’s work is in fact affected by multiple mathematical distortions so that his pieces elude finite conclusions and deny normative reads. In Lazzarini’s most recent exhibition, guns and knives at the Aldrich Museum of Art, he has turned his attention forward in two significant ways. The first is a shift within the sculptures, which for the first time conflate multiple objects to further complicate and abstract the forms. The second is an alteration of the actual gallery itself, whose walls are canted at varying angles to subtly disrupt the viewer’s apprehension of the physical space and further offset the distortions of the works themselves.

 

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Ravi Zupa Mightier Than (2016)
“The main components are typewriter components,” Zupa said. “I’ll take apart a typewriter and paw through that pile and find pieces that seem appropriate.” He uses typewriter rollers as the barrels and stapler guns for the triggers and the grips on his mock assault rifles and machine guns. Zupa said he has fired the gun several times.

 

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Joana Vasconcelos Call Center (2014-2016)
Call Center presents itself under the form of an enormous Beretta revolver built with recourse to the accumulation of 168 black landline telephones, each of the same exact model. The title, associated to the referenced objects, appears to report to the manipulation and dehumanized excess that is characteristic of many call centers. Musician Jonas Runa composed an electroacoustic symphony for the telephone rings. Each ring was slightly altered in order to produce different notes, transforming the work into a musical instrument. Some of the suspended receivers and, most of all, the powerful speaker installed in the interior of the revolver cannon work as the vehicles for the electronics that integrate this singular and intense electroacoustic symphony.

 

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Phillip Toledano Hope & Fear (2015)

 

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Pedro Reyes Disarm (2014)
Pedro Reyes creates second generation instruments from dismantled guns. With a team of musicians and new media studio, Cocolab, Reyes has made mechanized instruments from these one-time harmful weapons.

 

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Claes Oldenburg Ray Gun Wing (1977)
In Claes Oldenburg’s numerous Ray Gun works, he has an obsession with the right angle. In addition to creating several Ray Gun sculptures in a variety of materials (plaster, paper-mache, vacuum formed commercial plastics, etc.etc.), he amassed an even larger collection of found ray guns. “All one has to do is stoop to gather them from sidewalks,” wrote Yve-Alain Bois, “he did not even need to collect them himself: he could ask his friends to bring them to him (he accepted or refused a find, based on purely subjective criteria).” Ray Gun Wing, published by the Museum of Contemporary Art, Chicago, in 1977, documents his collection, and proposal for a museum.

 

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David Černý Guns (1994)
By far the most famous contemporary Czech artist, David Cerny has snagged a name for himself as the “bad boy” of Czech art. In ‘Guns’ (1994), four gigantic “Guns” are aimed at each other while suspended in mid-air. Every now and then, a blast rings out from the guns to the sound of slamming doors, flushing toilets, and car brakes.

 

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Constantine Zlatev THE CANDY MACHINE (2013 – 2016)
‘The installation uses a crankshaft system with a small stepper motor to automate the Winchester ’94 receiver mechanism, which has been modified to work with specially designed candy capsules. The gun magazine can store 7 ‘candies’ and each time a token is dropped in, the mechanical receiver dispenses a candy in lieu of a bullet shell. The installation is programmed and controlled through a Raspberry Pi board. The price of each candy is linked to a weapons stock index* and it is readjusted for each purchase based on the most current index value**. Once a coin is fed into the slot, the installation recalculates the new value in real time before ejecting a piece of candy. During regular trading hours, the index value changes constantly in accordance with the movement of the 5 stocks that it contains.’

 

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Vija Celmins Various (1964 – 2010)
‘I think I felt that these images belonged to all of us. they were our images. However, I must have been interested in Freudian, phallic imagery of some sort, right? There is a photograph of me taken in 1966. I had been working on a large sculpture of a pencil stub, which is sitting beside me, along with a nude mannequin that someone had brought over for me to decorate for a show. that photo would have inspired Freud! I think many young artists have sex on their minds, and I think I did too. The drawing of the gun [Clipping with Pistol 1968] came from the fact that a friend of mine had been attacked and her boyfriend gave her a gun, so I wanted to do a picture of it. I did some paintings, and then got interested in gun magazines, tore out some clippings, did this one drawing and then lost interest.’ — Vija Celmins

“Pistol” (1964)

“Gun with Hand #1” (1964)

“Hand Holding a Firing Gun” (1964)

“Hand holding a firing gun (study)” (1964)

“Table With Gun” (2009-2010)

 

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Felix Gonzalez-Torres Untitled (Death by Gun) (1990)
While González-Torres dealt with gay rights, AIDS, and a variety of governmental abuses in his own work and as a member of the collective Group Material, the subject of “Untitled” (Death by Gun), and its treatment, is unusually specific for him. Appropriating imagery from Time magazine, it presents 460 individuals killed by gunshot in one week in the United States, and includes the name, age, and circumstances of death for each person depicted. No opinion about gun control is added by the artist. Here an issue of public debate engages anyone who follows the artist’s intention and takes away one of his sheets. Dissemination, an age-old function of printed art, is ongoing since “Untitled” (Death by Gun) is reprinted as the stack is depleted.

 

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Mel Chin HOME y SEW 9 (1994)
“HOME y SEW 9” features a Glock-17 9 mm handgun that Chin transformed into a working first-aid kit. “HOME y SEW 9,” Chin said, came about when he “started thinking about how weapons in our culture, especially guns, have such a tremendous aura — a tremendous presence — in the minds of individuals across the country.” The idea of hollowing out the gun to make room for a first-aid kit struck him as “a better way of understanding our gun culture. The more you deconstructed this weapon, the more you could get closer to saving your life, or someone else’s.”

 

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Charles Gitnick Various (2015-2016)
He’s not your average artist. For starters, Charles Gitnick is 11 years old. But age doesn’t mean a thing when you have New York, Miami and L.A. gallerists approaching you about your work. Doing art since age five, Gitnick started his ‘career’ by mixing colors, visiting art museums and learning about artists. His most famous work involves the splattering of paint and color over guns–all sizes, too, from petite pistols to heavy machine guns.

 

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::vtol:: GBG-8 (2015)
Russian artist ::vtol:: recently created an 8-bit instant photo gun by combining a Game Boy, gun, camera, and a thermal printer with an Arduino.

 

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Joachim Koester The Place of Dead Roads (2013)
The Place of Dead Roads is a video that follows four androgynous cowboys as they enact a choreographed duel. Staged in a subterranean maze, each subject motions at their invisible opponents with actions characteristic of the Western genre—drawing their guns, shooting, and shifting their bodies to survey their surroundings. Instead of being driven by story, their actions seem motivated by hidden messages transmitted from a world deep within their bodies, a notion that evokes Wilhelm Reich’s idea that “every muscular contraction contains the history and meaning of its origin.” Watch an excerpt.

 

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Francis Alÿs Camguns (2008)
Francis Alÿs’ series of cam guns: a group of wooden rifles that incorporate found film reels instead of bullet chambers, evoking the artist’s confrontational nature, attacking subjects through film but in this case allowing visitors to pick up the “weapons,” making them active participants.

 

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Karen Kilimnik I Don’t Like Mondays, the Boomtown Rats, Shooting Spree, or Schoolyard Massacre (1991)
Banal, degraded, abject, or seemingly inconsequential, the objects of Karen Kilimnik’s installations together create jarring associations and hybrid perspectives on the issues of her day. In I Don’t Like Mondays, the Boomtown Rats, Shooting Spree, or Schoolyard Massacre, 1991, Kilimnick hung, drilled, and painted some components onto the wall, and scattered others, standing and sitting on the floor. These components–including shooting targets, chicken wire, a cassette player and cassette, clothing, photocopies, a whiffle ball and bat, a badminton racket, baton, mechanical toy dog, toy guns, lunchbox, jump rope, rubber ball, pencils, notebooks, gravel, pushpins–together comprise an aggressive, unsettling scene that presents by turns as a shooting range, magazine spread, classroom, child’s bedroom, and crime scene.

 

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John Baldessari Kiss/ Panic (1984)
Kiss/ Panic (1984) celebrates the banality of gun-culture evil in a rectilinear mandala that combines black and white images of firearms with a full-color close-up of mouths colliding in a kiss. The picture’s possible meanings ripple out from its ambiguous center in a way that is typical of Baldessari’s taste for paradox.

 

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Burt Barr Dolly Shot Twice (1997)
In the work, an attractive blonde woman (ostensibly named “Dolly”) is seen slumped over in a vintage Cadillac convertible parked in a wooded area. The scene is captured twice, first by a camera slowly moving to the left from a few yards away—in a “dolly shot”—and then again, but close-up, allowing us to take notice of the two bullet wounds in her head, as the camera slowly pans to the right.

 

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Laurie Simmons Lying Gun (1990), Walking Gun (1991)

 

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Niki de Saint Phalle Untitled from Edition MAT 64 (1964)
Solicited by Swiss artist Daniel Spoerri to provide instructions for how her multiples should be executed, she responded with a letter written to Spoerri’s collaborator Karl Gerstner enumerating a set of “operating instructions.” Though unequivocally direct, her instructions point to an unusual (though signature for the artist) creative act, one to be explicitly followed by amateur marksmen, museum professionals, art patrons, and other interested parties. They read, in full:

Lean picture against a wall.
Put a strong board behind it (if required, in order to protect the wall).
Take a .22 long rifle and load with short ammunition.
Shoot the color pouches which are embedded in the plaster until they have “bled” (or until you like the picture).
Attention! Leave the picture in the same position until well dried. Then still be careful, as remains of color not yet dry might run over the picture.

The emphasis Saint Phalle gives here to the procedures for producing the work—the precision implied in choice of gun, ammunition, and effects of drying paint—is noteworthy, though rarely discussed in the Saint Phalle literature, both for its level of detail and for its relative flexibility. The identity of the shooter is not classified by gender or any other parameters, nor does Saint Phalle indicate any specified location for the shooting event. Rather, the “instructions” ultimately remain open-ended: aim and shoot until “you like the picture.” As a result, Saint Phalle’s premise for the edition was fascinatingly simple. Her “pop gun” method ensured that the monochromatic white could instantly transform into a polychromatic field of intensity; while the multiplication of the blank plaster canvases provided under the Edition MAT portfolio could offer the experience to unknown others.

 

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Amir Mobed Come Caress Me (2010)
It was performed in September 2010 at Azad Art Gallery, Tehran. Mobed stood in front of a target, wearing a bodysuit with a protective metal box over his head, and invited gallery visitors to shoot at him with a pellet gun. It was, he says, a symbolic execution with a message about freedom of speech and the hopes of artists of his generation being silenced. Each time 15 visitor were allowed to enter to the gallery and shoot him. Visiors should stand behind one of the three lines that were painted on the floor and then shoot.

 

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Antony Gormley Silence (2012)

 

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Luz María Sánchez V.F(i) n_1 (2013)
Luz María Sánchez’s work V.F(i) n_1 is a multichannel sound sculpture/installation. The title is a sort of acronym in Spanish; it means Vis. (un) necessary force. It is the first of the series, hence the number 1. V.F(i) n_1 addresses the subject of violence from the citizen’s perspective. Since media is not covering everyday experiences of violence, people flock to the arena offered by social networks, and share their own sounds and images –the ones that communicate their particular experiences within this context of explicit violence.V.F(i) n_1 is assembled using 74 audio players gun-shaped, that build a large format sound-texture composed of the same number of acoustic logs: shootings recorded by citizens caught in confrontations between law enforcement and organized crime in Mexico. V.F(i) n_1 consists of 74 independent audio channels, and the sound tracks are played individually on each of these speakers. At the end of the day and as the batteries run out of charge, speakers/guns go off gradually so the circle of operation/sound non-operation/silence is restarted. The audio tracks that integrate this sound installation/sculpture were taken from different videos available at the YouTube site.

 

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Dread Scott Blue Wall of Violence (1999)
targets, coffin, police batons, motors, steel pipe, Styrofoam cast arms, wallet, candy bar, squirt gun, squeegee, house keys

 

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Jonathan Fletcher Moore Artificial Killing Machine (2015)
The installation is made up of an array of 15 digitally actuated toy cap guns dangling from the ceiling. A small receiver unit controls the guns autonomously. The toy guns sit dormant until a message comes over the wire from The Bureau of Investigative Journalism, which collects data on drone strikes. When a strike occurs, the guns abruptly pop into action, and a thermal printer clinically records the strike onto a ledger that dangles to the floor.

 

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Skylar Fein Kurt Cobong (2014)
I really couldn’t think of anything to do with the gun. Months went by and I started to experience a light, effervescent panic over the deadline. I made regular work of sketching. Nothing. At one point, I did acid with a friend, and while tripping came up with a piece! Brilliant and devastating, it would galvanize the entire world of conceptual art. It would be called “Loaded Mossberg 500” and consist of that model of shotgun, sitting on a table. That’s it. There would be special protocols: the gun would be loaded with 7 shells — in full view — by an assistant IMMEDIATELY after the gallery opened each day, so the public could verify that it was live ammunition. The same assistant would unload the weapon at the close of each day should all the shells be left. And therein lies the excitement of the whole enterprise. Low odds, but high consequences. There were two problems with this: one, the idea sounded way, WAY better when I was tripping — hilariously, it seemed like MacArthur Grant material — and two, the gallery’s lawyer would not allow it. I doubt the lawyer had anything to do with it. My suspicion is that it was the gallery owner who nixed it. This seems fair enough. It’s not like I can’t imagine his concerns. I tried to rent a room in a downtown office building to do the piece but once I explained the purpose the offer was quickly withdrawn. I offered to maintain an armed security guard next to the piece at all times. No dice. The next day, I went to some other dump in the CBD to check out an office space, planning to be obscure about my purpose, but they had already heard about me and sent me away. One day some stoner kid was in my studio and on his way out the door, said, “You should make a bong out of it.” He said it, but when he said it, it wasn’t arch — he tossed it off, it fell from his lips like a Japanese cherry blossom. Once he’d left, I realized it was the best idea yet. After I made it, this gun became the house bong for a few weeks. It works great, though I haven’t exactly gotten used to putting the muzzle of a shotgun in my mouth. It’s still exciting every time.

 

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Federico Mauro Famous Guns (2013)

 

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Mark Bain Acoustic Space Gun (2004)
Acoustic Space Gun (ASG) is a linear sound shifter, which couples a metre-long directional microphone with a parabolic sound emitter pointed in the opposite direction. Used in public space, it collects live sounds and conversations at long distances from one side, then amplifies and presents them far out to the other. Looking like a shoulder mounted sonic weapon of sorts, slightly space age and designed for functionality, it operates as an absurd spatial megaphone, which monitors the crowd in spaces to re-project and shift the natural dynamics of acoustic location. Coupled to the microphone input is an electronic circuit that can add up to 900 metres of delay to the signal. This adjustable delay line allows you to shift the sonic footprint of a certain space, producing a forced echo or canyon effect, which adds to the spatial feedback. Acting as a live mixing instrument, shifting the natural sounds and provoking other levels of hearing, the device is played at a level comparable to the surrounding ambiance. This subtlety added to the confusion, suddenly people can hear their voices coming from alternate directions and in other time frames, echoing off of building façades and twisting the normalcy of public sound.

 

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Chris Burden Shoot (1971)

 

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Lee Seung Koo Compromise Between Me and Me (2017)
‘Lee Seung Koo installed a sculpture called Compromise Between Me and Me that looked like a dystopian Jeff Koons inflatable, with a huge gun firing gas-filled balloons shaped like hearts and oversized blood corpuscles across the gallery.’

 

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‘This self-acting, field clock gun was patented in England by William Maund and Charles Millichamp on May 3, 1888. It is essentially a giant revolver that holds eight 16 gauge pinfire shotshells. The clockwork mechanism inside it can be set to fire the cartridges intermittently at intervals of as often as every 15 minutes up to every 1.5 hours. It can also be set to fire a single shot at a chosen time.

‘It was sold in two variations. One option had a handle on the top allowing it to be suspended from a tree or a barn. This is the example that I have and is shown in the pictures. There was also a variation that was sold at a 25% premium with a figurine of a person holding a gun as shown in the advertisement below.’

 

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Sarah Blesener Toy Soldiers (2016)
‘In 2015, the Russian government proposed a program—the Patriotic Education of Russian Citizens in 2016-2020—that called for an eight percent increase in patriotic youth and a ten percent increase in recruits for the Russian army by the year 2020. The agenda is heavily weighted towards militaristic training and disseminating patriotic ideologies. Over 200,000 youth are currently enrolled in patriotic educational clubs—10,000 in Moscow alone. Every club functions independently, each with their own structure and philosophy. According to one source, the program will cost somewhere around 1.7 billion rubles for its first two years (around 30 million USD). My project, “Toy Soldiers,” explores the subject of intergenerational war for adolescents in Russia. It focuses on non-governmental organizations—such as military-patriotic clubs, military sports associations, and the patriotic clubs formed under the umbrella of the Russian Orthodox Church.’

 

*

p.s. Hey. ** PL, Hi. I don’t remember the ending, which probably says something. We’ve connected on Instagram. I was kind of coerced into joining there to promote our film, but it seems ok. Although it doesn’t accept gifs, which makes things hard for me. No, I’ve never been to Brazil. Just Argentina, Chile and Peru, as far as SA goes. I’d like to. It’s a great drawing, for sure. That one. Um, my favorite of my novels is ‘The Marbled Swarm’. Happy Easter if you do it (I don’t). ** Sypha, Haha, I’m just trying to enjoy the fact that my tongue is less bored now. ** Corey, Hey! Can’t say I have. That coffee thing is very funny. Wish I’d found it for the post. Fare thee well newsletter writing. Understandable nixing on your part. Sorry about the film festival no’s, but festivals are unfairly tough nuts, as we well know. Nice that you’re still dancing. Oh, well, Paris is fairly friendly in those months, so … nice target. And to have you around, natch. ** scunnard, Hi. Uh, I was coerced/forced to join Instagram by our producer to give our film presence there. But I also share the blog there like I do on Facebook. It’s alright. A lot more of my friends are there. Startup funds, best of luck. And do share the crowdfunding link when you launch it. Fake food! That would be a nice ghost, so I sure hope no one else wants that spot. My plans … mostly trying to get distribution and more festival screenings for the film. It looks promising that the film could get a theater release in France, but we’ll see. That would be amazing. Pretty much just that and writing the next film. ** _Black_Acrylic, ‘GR’ is a time-consumer, it’s true, but obviously worth it. I wonder if the new Pynchon is a biggie? ** Steve, Numbness is probably a saving grace. I suppose that was my mode too when dealing with my parents’ loss. The actual effect filters in forever in occasional ways. So sorry. Extremely plot heavy, ugh theoretically. But I’ll see it. Have fun getting the new radio episode together. ** James Bennett, Hi, James! Thanks a lot, man! Fantastic news about Ssnake Press! That’s so soon. You will give a heads up when the first book is imminent or alive, yes? Congrats! That’s really exciting. And the first book obviously sounds really good. Wow. I’m anxious to read it. Thanks re: my lag, which is taking its unsweet time to depart, as always, and lovely to see you! ** Dominik, Hi!!! Yes, my body is a bitch. I’m already chasing film stuff, but I’ll be better at it in a few days. Somehow we’ll get ‘RT’ to Vienna. ‘PGL’ showed there, and presumably the new one will be more appealing to show. I, of course, will give you a heads up when/if that’s in the cards. I will seek that book as soon as wakefulness returns. I’m happy that love found that saxophone line. I honestly think I’m going to swipe it for something. Love letting you point a gun (loaded or not, your choice) at whomsoever you wish, G. ** jay, Okay, I’ll stop daydreaming about the unavailable game. Its 124 hour length makes its reclusiveness even more tragic for some reason. ‘Very fractured and tonally incoherent’: yum! You doing Easter in any respect? Beaucoup chocolate eggs, if so. ** James, What would constitute an Easter-y gif? Perhaps that firing gun at the top of today? Well, since you read ‘The Marbled Swarm’, perhaps you’ll be proud to know that I hereby declare you to be an honorary flatso. Thanks, yay, for your substack location. Bookmarked. Everyone. The mighty James has shared his substack, and, if you know him or know his comments at least, you know that said substack is kind of a must. So join me in going over there and even subscribing. Do that here. As soon as my brain cells returns, I will read you and read you. America is in an absolutely massive pickle. Any chance of getting a peek at your paper cranes or receiving a detailed description, eh? No, GbV is definitely my favorite band. Strange if I said Sebadoh. I do really like Sebadoh up through ‘Bubble and Scrape’ and am ok with ‘Bakesale’ but not really after that. I do love 90s lo-fi. But I love Pavement more than Sebadoh. Blahblah. Assuming you’re in Edinburgh now, return safely and tell me everything. ** Steeqhen, We’re sort of pleasantly clear and crisp here. Nice after almost too warm LA. Thank you, thank you! Dude, there’s no way your thing stinks. I mean, seriously. Cool, about the Cork screening. We’ll sort it out. Awesome. I did see the Switch 2 stuff, yes. I think my LA roommate will get it first thing because he’s an extreme Mario Kart addict. So I’ll check it out when I’m there again in a coupla months. Great about the lit journal acceptance. Do you like reading your work, I forget? Since it’s Easter, I’m guessing there’ll be pretty much squat to do here this weekend, which will suit my low-wattage brain very well, Enjoy yours. ** Misanthrope, Really beautiful words about Rigby. I was going to ask you what happened. I knew he’d been unhealthy for a while, but my impression was that he was doing much better. But I guess the damage was already there. Anyway, words fail, but I guess enjoy your memories, and I wish I’d gotten a chance to see him again. It had been ages since you guys were over here and I did. Happy anniversary! See, there’s some way upbeat news. If you do Easter, do it up. xo, me. ** Tyler Ookami, Hi, Tyler. Yes, the Las Vegas thing is most enticing too. I guess Universal totally fucked up their attempt to relaunch their monsters with those shitty movie remakes, so hopefully it’s a more appropriate restart. Nice about the Troma fest. I saw they’ve remade ‘Toxic Avenger’, which seems like a probably bad idea, but … ** Uday, Hey there! I saw Kylie Minogue on this TV show ‘The Residence’ when I was in LA. She was funny. I’m hoping my lag will be like it never happened by Monday — not impossible — so catch me up as properly as you like then. Really good to see you! ** catachrestic, Hi, Jared! Cool, you meant it. Well, I hope you’ll actually invite me to that party, won’t you? Gosh I think you’re right that my geography knowledge is vastly enhanced thanks to the escorts. They’re so handy! Never been to the Philippines. I too would like to go when it’s not boiling hot there if it ever is. Asia too. I’ve only been to Japan and Hong Kong myself. I’m still too hazy to make a judgement call about Paris, but it looks pretty much like it did when I left it, at which time it was lovely. No, can’t say I think much about 1848. Maybe I’ll make that a mission. I did watch that movie ‘Napoleon’ on my flight back, and it is highly not recommended, btw. Awesome to have you back. Let me wake up a little more so I can be a proper host/confab pal. ** HaRpEr, Great! A couple of days is completely A-okay, of course. Thank you so much! I haven’t heard the new Jane Remover, no, but I definitely will thanks to you. Yep, about DFW’s sentences. As always, you characterise them definitively. No, those ruffian, aesthetically challenged ex-schoolmates of yours are clearly the pathetic ones. Clearly. ** Malik, Ah, lucky you. Meaning I can only really write in the mornings and early afternoons and then my brain starts only wanting input. Yay! Pride highly warranted. So, if you’re a director next time, will you only have a super brief time to figure out how to direct whatever insta-play you’re given? I’ll give you my words about ‘BI’ as soon as I get my eyes and ears on it. Happy … Easter? Or weekend at least. ** Okay. This weekend you get the third entry in my blog’s ongoing but very occasional Guns franchise. See you on Monday.