Mayakovsky, Printing Bernstein, Avant-Teaching, & Poetry Hate

Masha & I went to MOMA to see/hear readings of Mayakovsky. The best readings were delivered by  Ethan Hawke & Clement Joseph. They both aspired toward Vladimir's BOOMING Vox Populi. 

He was a romantic poet politico, a loving fighter. He was not an anti-war poet. Sometimes liberal, sometimes libertine, but also responsible, situating his poems beneath the weight of the revolution (sometimes crushed by it). I don't know any revolutionary poets today. I don't know any revolutionaries today. There won't be any revolt today. Go home. 

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I'm designing a complicated broadside for a new Charles Bernstein poem. I've employed five collaborators: poets who've aggressively annotated the poem &/or its parts. The broadside will be largely comprised of these annotations, surrounding the poem. 

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I'll be teaching (Print)making the Avant-Garde at The Center for Book Arts in just a few weeks. (Though it is in danger of cancellation if there aren't enough students in the class). This weekend course is a modified & extended version of the workshop(s) I taught as a Fellow at Mills College. 

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In somewhat local news, Stan Apps links to a piece of "poetry hateration" from the Brooklyn Rail, followed by his own remarks. I'll spin it for you thus: the article basically suggests that the old avant-garde IS the only avant-garde, & everyone else is wasting everyone's time. 

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Recent Discoveries on The Internet

1. Noah Cicero's poetic politics

In a recent post, I mentioned Cicero along side Tao Lin and Zachary German. Actually, all I did was mention Cicero, focusing my comments on German and Lin. Since, I've been frequently reading Cicero's blog, which he updates often. Reading his broad generalizing posts about current politics/ economics has been cathartic. He writes in a frenzied way: quick, spasmodic, sincere. Witness some Cicero insights I've recently enjoyed:

-Another problem in the American economy is that are not enough jobs, but with our technological resources we can still make plenty of shit.

-There are so many design problems in capitalism, I'm not even sure how they did it.

-We are using a lot of our fields to feed animals. Which I think is fucking stupid.

-There are fields [in] every [state ?] in America that could grow shit. 

Also see his Capitalism Video Blog.

2. Geof Huth's Fidgetglyphs & found text on Vacation

Geof Huth is a visual poetics guru. As Autotypographer, I am excited by search for word shapes in the world, and his creation of text shapes within his immediate environments. Recently, he's travelled south, waxing his own brand of poetics (Fidgetglyphs) in the sands of Floridian beaches, and archiving textual events (graffiti, ephemera) on the walls and floors of Louisiana. Witness a Fidgetglyph: 

“searead,” Blind Pass Park, Manasota Key, Englewood, Florida (18 April 2008)

Allegedly, there is only one recorded incident of Jesus Christ writing anything down. We don't know what he wrote, but he wrote it in the sand, and it made the Pharasies run off. Christ made a Fidgetglyph.

3.Stan Apps on the upcoming Conference on Conceptual Poetry at the University of Arizona

I first learned about Stan Apps through William Moor, a poet whose work & opinion I respect very much. William respects Stan & his work. So I read Stan's work, starting with "info ration," a book which I now feel should be a staple in graduate poetics workshops. Stan Apps' blog leaves little room for frivolity; his posts range from the occasional to poem, to the more frequent lengthy critique or investigation of an author, text or event. A lot of poets just putz around on their blogs. He doesn't putz around. A recent post of his, The Purity Racket, investigates the possible reasonings behind & ramifications of the upcoming Conference on Conceptual Poetry at U of A. This is of particular interest to me, as I've recently written several posts in regard to the issue(s) of Conceptual Poetics as they pertain to Kenneth Goldsmith. His posts also brought comments from Mark Wallace, and the exchange that follows between Apps and Wallace is as on topic and valuable as the post itself. Witness excerpts:

-Now, I have many faults, both aesthetically and personally, but I draw the line at any involvement in the pure poetry racket, which is the ultimate ivory tower scam as far as poetry goes. -Apps

-Apart the purity rhetoric, Uncreative Writing is a fascinating thing. -Apps

-Is this conference just a big joke (i.e. a poker-faced provocation) that Goldsmith and a few others are playing on a group of academics? -Apps

-The con-artist has a long lineage in literature. -Wallace

4. Other Notable Notes

- Blake Butler writes and reads thousands of words regularly. How?

- Linh Dinh's blog is a DOOMSDAY news reel with poems for comic relief. Nerve-wracking to read. Hard to stop reading.

- Angela Genusa uses free internet tools in unlikely & improved ways.

Movietelling on the Internet: a query

Goooaaalll!!! (part 1) by Mathew Timmons and Stan Apps is something like Movietelling Flarf. At first I was disappointed by what seemed to be a tone of sarcasm, delivered as commercials segue into a soccer match (channel surfing). I was bracing myself for a line-up of punchlines. The humor is certainly there, but the repetition and re-working of lines, the constant reapplication of 'products' being misrepresented, finally gets to me. I'm sucked in. It's also the first instance I've seen of multiple speakers providing the narrative and character voices, which is further complicated by something I read about Stan Apps contribution being played as a recording while Mathew Timmons performed live at their performance at Betalevel for Da Benshi Code in Los Angeles. (Though I think this had more to do with Stan Apps being out of town). 

Since there isn't much ambient sound on the recording, I'm guessing they made this performance privately, primarily intending, I assume, to post it online. Currently, there are no youTube listings for "Movietelling." For "Neo-Benshi," there are two excerpts of David Larsen's  performance "Paris of Troy." For "Benshi," there are some postings in Spanish which I don't believe have any relevance here, as well as one old news broadcast explaining the function of 'katsubenshi," and the performances of Stan Apps and Mathew Timmons. 

That's it. I find this surprising considering how many folks I know of who've performed in this medium, and how many times a video recorder was present. 

There are a variety of Movietelling performances I've heard or read about that I would very much like to see, but may never have the chance unless someone were to post them online. 

Walter Lew's shadoWord productions, who I continue to perform with, is planning an online release, of one kind or another, this summer. At the very least, I know it will involve the digital publication of many of our scripts, as well as vidcaps and photographs from the performances. 

(EDIT): As I was making the links for this post, I stumbled upon Da Benshi Code's website, where one can find no less than 8 video recordings of live Movietelling.