Although a continuation
indicates a certain level of repetition,
the stubborn temperature
at minus six degrees celsius
has taught me to identify
subtle shifts in my surrounding nature
When known cycles disappear,
new patterns appear
I’m still adjusting even though I know
I wouldn’t need to
I could leave this place
and seek for clues and comfort elsewhere,
just like everyone else
But I’m staying here
I’ve found purpose in this place
I’ve been given a purpose to stay
One of the strangest part-time jobs I ever had was surveilling an art installation in a blue-chip gallery in the western parts of the city. I would arrive there at 10.45 and get dressed in my full black suit. The gallerist was obsessed with lookalikes and I’d been hired because I looked just like someone else. She wouldn’t tell me who. It was ridiculous. She’d just unfavorably look over at me whenever I’d arrive. “Get dressed darling”, she’d say and I’d slide into the straitjacket of the day.
You can always tell when affirmative language has been hijacked. It’s like the vowels have gotten drunk in some outcast place of the city, and then crawled back to the bright light, asking for permission to never go stray again. That’s how you become robotic. You ask for permission to never fuck up again. In order to receive that permission you need to sacrifice. I’m not sure what was with this woman but she paid my bills and she enjoyed dressing me up like her little mannequin. She never asked any personal questions, took absolutely no interest in me as a person, and smiled mechanically whenever I answered a question of hers with more than a syllable. For three months I guarded an installation in her gallery. It wasn’t like I was her gallerina, or assistant of any kind, I was profoundly remote from any kind of intellectual property the gallery solicited. I was just there, in the white cube corner locale with its wide windows exposed to the side-street of the fanciest high-street there possibly was, at least in my bank of knowledge.
For a solid 8 hours I would walk around the art installation in the middle of the space. It was a mini-version of the gallery, with glass windows and with a plush-sculpture of another janitor overseeing the space. The plush-janitor had been squeezed into the same uniform I’d been made to wear but wore a bunny head and angel-wings. So much for the lookalike. In hindsight I find my own role in the piece ultimately perturbing. But at that time I just didn’t care. When you’re part of a crew - I mean whatever that means to you - like you know your place – wherever that is for you – all other places just come off as obsolete. Like being in love. Your sight gets smudged for better or worse.
People would enter and I would greet them, tell them some words about the exhibition, and ask them to step into the simulation once they felt ready. Within the cube they received some VR-helmets that kept them occupied for approximately 40 minutes. During that time I would just stand at some place in the gallery, often with my hands interlaced, lightly resting on my sacrum bone, looking at the people walking by on the outside.
She writes portraits
Or rather
she has found someone
who writes them for her
She considers herself a compiler of assets
Her collaborator could be
compared to an archivist
Someone who analyses content
It was no easy task to find someone
suitable
for the extent of her documentation
Sometimes she asks herself,
why recompose something so compostable
as the memory of someone?
When you miss someone,
what is it, you miss about them?
An image, a picture?
Where in your presence do they reside
when you forget about them?
The way they look at you when they ask;
should I get you a coffee?
Their voice on the other line,
breaking up through a weak connection,
telling you they are on their way,
and the way they smell
when they come pick you up from your work
Waiting outside,
the way they look
at the people passing by
and the passers by
gaze on them
How they speak
to someone over the counter
You lock eyes,
for the first time
How did they feel the first time you touched?
The way they get dressed,
asking for your opinion,
what color suits them the best?
The way they undress
How they fold their clothes
after they’ve been washed
Open the fridge, open a window,
ask for a lighter, gaze at something odd,
in the periphery of your shared frame
Is it the way they touch you
when they try to reach you,
reach through you,
that stays
when everything else has departed?
When I was a child
my mother lived
just by the edge of our country
After the edge there was water,
and on very clear days,
a silhouette of something
past the horizon
could be seen
We gave it cryptic names
Turned it into a kingdom
of dysfunctional
royal family members
In our shared fabrications
the royal family were fantastical,
crooked beings, they wore
rag-like clothes,
really ill-fitting cycling shorts
and moth-eaten t-shirts
Their make-up couldn’t stick
to their face
so an eye shadow would easily
become a tear
North of our house
were ice sheets
that formed their own
sovereignty
all that is called world is ungraspable
you cannot retouch it
you need to erase it
to rebuild it
<3 - 2023-12-29 13:36:28 - <3<333333
adolphus50@moneysquad.org - 2022-10-06 00:56:37 -
- 2022-10-06 00:56:37 -
adolphus50@moneysquad.org - 2022-10-06 00:56:35 -
joan14 - 2022-10-06 00:56:35 -
Developer - 2022-10-06 00:56:33 -
Developer - 2022-10-06 00:56:25 -
shannon_boyer@moneysquad.org - 2022-10-06 00:56:09 -
- 2022-10-06 00:56:08 -
shannon_boyer@moneysquad.org - 2022-10-06 00:56:06 -
joan14 - 2022-10-06 00:56:05 -
shannon_boyer@moneysquad.org - 2022-10-06 00:56:03 -
joan14 - 2022-10-06 00:55:57 -
118 Yundt Burg - 2022-10-06 00:51:14 -
- 2022-10-06 00:51:14 -
118 Yundt Burg - 2022-10-06 00:51:13 -
Suite 574 - 2022-10-06 00:51:12 -
118 Yundt Burg - 2022-10-06 00:51:11 -
Suite 574 - 2022-10-06 00:51:03 -
lonnie46 - 2022-10-06 00:50:45 -
- 2022-10-06 00:50:44 -
lonnie46 - 2022-10-06 00:50:43 -
nico.franecki@bdcimail.com - 2022-10-06 00:50:42 -
nico.franecki@bdcimail.com - 2022-10-06 00:50:40 -
lonnie46 - 2022-10-06 00:50:38 -
lonnie46 - 2022-10-06 00:50:21 -
- 2022-10-06 00:50:19 -
lonnie46 - 2022-10-06 00:50:17 -
baylee_harris@bdcimail.com - 2022-10-06 00:50:15 -
baylee_harris@bdcimail.com - 2022-10-06 00:50:13 -
lonnie46 - 2022-10-06 00:50:08 -
E - 2022-04-11 00:22:06 - so beautiful
- 2022-04-11 00:21:49 -
- 2022-04-11 00:20:38 -
*_* - 2022-03-31 12:01:05 - I love it!!