"[A] 10 minute short . . . contain[ing] 23 episodes of exactly 25 seconds each." O'Reilly's "TAGS: 30 Second Breakneck Heartbreak Uncut Turbodrama. Fatfree Ultraviolent Freezedried Shrinkwrapped Antiballet Timeline Easyopen Modern Unpunctuated Crass Clean Crisp High Definition Subversive Absurd Arrogant Loud Pretentious Sugarcoated Sincere Authentic Stories. Please Say Something, any answer will do." It's brilliant.
Please Say Something by David OReilly.
(Thanks again, Video Association!)
(Dallas), Sat., Aug. 7. The second exhibition organized by artist Mary Benedicto under the "X20+" rubric. I'll be presenting a recent video/interactive piece, probably some time after 8:30PM. (The piece at right is not mine, but I like it -- ripped it off the invite; not certain whose it is.)
More info on the exhibition here.
"I refuse to acknowledge this as anything like an accident. I think that this is the result of gross negligence. Not just B.P. B.P. operated very sloppily and very recklessly because they could. And they were allowed to do so because of the absolute failure of oversight of the government that's supposed to be our government, protecting us. It turns out that -- you see this sign on almost every commercial vessel in the United States -- you know, if you spilled a couple of gallons of oil, you would be in big trouble. And you have to really wonder who are the laws made for, and who has gotten above the laws. Now there are things that we can do in the future. We could have the kinds of equipment that we would really need. It would not take an awful lot to anticipate that after making 30,000 holes in the sea floor of the Gulf of Mexico looking for oil, oil might start coming out of one of them. And you'd have some idea of what to do. . . .
"But I think we have to understand where this leak really started from. It really started from the destruction of the idea that the government is there because it's our government, meant to protect the larger public interest. So I think that the oil blowout, the bank bailout, the mortgage crisis and all these things are absolutely symptoms of the same cause. We still seem to understand that at least we need the police to protect us from a few bad people. And even though the police can be a little annoying at times -- giving us tickets and stuff like that -- nobody says that we should just get rid of them. But in the entire rest of government right now and for the last at least 30 years, there has been a culture of deregulation that is caused directly by the people who we need to be protected from, buying the government out from under us.
"Now this has been a problem for a very, very long time. You can see that corporations were illegal at the founding of America. And even Thomas Jefferson complained that they were already bidding defiance to the laws of our country. Okay, people who say they're conservative, if they really wanted to be really conservative and really patriotic, they would tell these corporations to go to hell. That's what it would really mean to be conservative. So what we really need to do is regain the idea that it's our government safeguarding our interests and regain a sense of unity and common cause in our country that really has been lost. I think there are signs of hope."
Below is an interview of Wikileaks' founder, Julian Assange, from shortly before Wikileaks' recent publication of "secret" US military docs re- Afgahanistan. First, a condensed version of a few of the speakers' remarks:
JA: . . . . So information that organizations are spending economic effort into concealing, that's a really good signal that when the information gets out, there's a hope of it doing some good. Because the organizations that know it best, that know it from the inside out, are spending work to conceal it. And that's what we've found in practice. And that's what the history of journalism is.
[Interviewer]: But are there risks with that, either to the individuals concerned or indeed to society at large, where leaking can actually have an unintended consequence?
JA: Not that we have seen with anything we have released. I mean, we have a harm immunization policy. We have a way of dealing with information that has sort of personal -- personally identifying information in it. But there are legitimate secrets -- you know, your records with your doctor; that's a legitimate secret. But we deal with whistleblowers that are coming forward that are really sort of well-motivated.
[Interviewer]: So they are well-motivated. And what would you say to, for example, the, you know, the parent of someone -- whose son is out serving the U.S. military, and he says, "You know what, you've put up something that someone had an incentive to put out. It shows a U.S. soldier laughing at people dying. That gives the impression -- has given the impression to millions of people around the world that U.S. soldiers are inhuman people. Actually, they're not. My son isn't. How dare you?" What would you say to that?
JA: Yeah, we do get a lot of that. But remember, the people in Baghdad, the people in Iraq, the people in Afghanistan -- they don't need to see the video; they see it every day. So it's not going to change their opinion. It's not going to change their perception. That's what they see every day. It will change the perception and opinion of the people who are paying for it all. And that's our hope.* * * * *
[Assange's "core values":] . . . well, capable, generous men do not create victims; they nurture victims.
UPDATE: I don't quite get how the secret US docs re- Afghanistan recently released by Wikileaks tell us nothing that wasn't already a matter of public knowledge, AND at the same time, the release was an irresponsible act likely to endanger hundreds of lives.
Got a gig to review the L. Gaga concert in Dallas. I'll probably also do a post on it/her; but 'til then, here are some vizis. (Sorry for the audio distortion; it was v. loud.)
One of her more interesting statements was along the lines of,
There's something heroic about the way my fans operate their cameras. So precisely, so intricately, and so proudly. Like Kings writing the history of their people. Its their prolific nature that both creates and procures what will later be perceived as the "kingdom." So, the real truth about Lady Gaga fans, my little monsters, lies in this sentiment: They are the kings. They are the queens. They write the history of the kingdom, and I am something of a devoted Jester. It is in the theory of perception that we have established our bond. Or, the lie, I should say, for which we kill. We are nothing without our image. Without our projection. Without the spiritual hologram of who we perceive ourselves to be, or to become rather, in the future.(Text from Gagapedia.)
When you're lonely, I'll be lonely too. And this is The Fame.
As usual, short of hoofing it to multiple venues in NY and LA, this will probably be your best if not only chance to see these exciting new works. Here are the details:
I've been really excited to see all the Second Program events; but this week I got asked to review Lady GaGa's concert tomorrow night, so unfortunately, I'll have to miss the first screening. (Not that I'm trying to be a music reviewer; but I can't resist this chance to see GaGa live and maybe meet her.)THURS. 7/22, 7:30PM, Dallas Museum of Art, Horchow Auditorium
Brent Green's feature film premieres, Gravity Was Everywhere Back Then (some of you may recall Green's Hadecol Christmas, shown at the 2007 Dallas Video Festival). "The film, which belongs firmly to the American Eccentric School, tells the true story of Leonard Wood, a hardware store clerk in Kentucky who built a crazy-quilt house in the 1970s as a healing machine for his wife, Mary, hoping to save her from cancer. . . . [Green] shot Gravity in stop-motion animation – much of it in his backyard, where he rebuilt Leonard’s house – giving [the film] a dreamlike quality that carries over to the narrative." Q&A with the artist via iChat after the screening; one night only.
SAT., 7/31, 6 - 8:30PM, Conduit Gallery
An exhibition of installations curated by Charles Dee Mitchell opens, featuring work by David Askevold, Jon Gitelson, Matthew Day Jackson, Luke Murphy, Jason Rhoades, Erin Shirreff, and Bill Viola. This exhibition runs through August 28.SAT., 8/4, 7:30PM, Angelika Dallas
Dallas premiere of Rape of the Sabine Women by Eve Sussman & the Rufus Corporation. Presented by Creative Time at the 2007 Armory Show; shot with a cast of hundreds in Greece and Germany and scored by Jonathan Bepler (Matthew Barney's collaborator). The piece is "a re-interpretation of the Roman myth, updated and set in the idealistic 1960's." One night only; made possible by a donation from Karen Weiner.SAT., 8/7, 7 - 8:30PM, Conduit Gallery
A program of shorts curated by Bart Weiss: New York Night Scenes by Jem Cohen, Second Nature by Guy Ben-Ner, Vienna In The Desert by Wago Kreider (of The Yes Men), Below Sea Level by Pawel Wojtasik, Happy Am I by Erin Cosgrove, In G.O.D. We Trust by Kenneth Tin-Kin Hung, Afterimage: A Flicker of Life by Kerry Laitala, and My Voice Would Reach You by Meiro Koizumi. (Some of you may recall other works by Cohen, Ben-Ner, Hung, or Koizumi screened at the first The Program or the Dallas Video Festival.) One night only.
WED., 8/18, 7:30PM, Angelika Dallas
Double Take by Johan Grimonprez. Described by the NYT as "the most intellectually agile of this year's films"; it also made John Waters' Top Ten list in Artforum. One night only; made possible by support from Half Price Books, Records, and Magazines.
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For more info about how your tax dollars are allocated, see the National Priorities Project.
Coalition military deaths in Iraq since March, 2003: 4,766 (as of April 22, 2011; click here to update). At least 467 contractors have also died, based on only partial information. Total U.S. military wounded as of as of January 14, 2010: 31,882.
Coalition military deaths in Afghanistan since October, 2001: 2,416 (as of April 22, 2011; click here to update.
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