Message-ID: <Pine.NEB.4.64.0901190900110.6407@panix1.panix.com>
From: Alan Sondheim <sondheim@panix.com>
To: Cyb <cybermind@listserv.aol.com>, Wryting-L <WRYTING-L@listserv.wvu.edu>
Subject: Complaynte of Numbers
Date: Mon, 19 Jan 2009 09:00:38 -0500 (EST)
Complaynte of Numbers 1. There's no danger, I was about to put up images of cables inserted into rectum and vagina, a means of internal recording motion capture with a more than singular node. I decided against this, giving in to censorship and the deepest desire not to offend, not to antagonize, not to be antagonized, not to be offended, not to be under attack. Cowardice! 2. There's no danger, part-objects flying about everywhere. In the central sphere or grounded skysphere, two floor panels slide against one another and everything and everyone contributes to a story about power and body, sex and longing, death above all else. 3. There's danger. At night I think of dying, I no longer sleep. At three in the morning, now early and late for me, I erased my inbox; I no longer think clearly, the world is fuzzy and I bumble about utterly exhausted. 4. There's more than danger with somewhat blurred vision in both eyes: what am I looking at? Why am I looking. 5. There's more than anything. At night I think of dying. And I implore you, I more than implore you: download everything from my site, as soon as possible. Do this once a month once every other month. I am unsuccessful in publishing; my work is online, fragile, always close to elimination. Download and keep the texts alive after I'm gone. 6. There's more than nothing. After I'm gone someone will see images of this exhibition or other work, perhaps read a text or listen to some sound and that will begin a _process of recuperation,_ re-installation. Dead, it will do me no good, just as the mini-revival of my albums and some new ones do me no good now; it's too late, I'm too close to death or at least far too close to thinking about anything else. 7. Nineteenth century humor, for example Thackeray's writings for Punch, just doesn't seem funny - there goes the structuralist accounting for the phenomenon, as far as I'm concerned. Something else is at work, something untoward, something untoward this way comes. 8. If my work were to survive on your hard drive, then who will comprehend any of it in the future? In West Virginia, we were happy; I had a lab, we rented a small house, there were birds, I had an assistant who could program, we could explore one strange place after another, we had good and easy-going friends who made no demands, and we made none in return. Most importantly, my work had a context, people who were interested in it, the possibility of publication, public talks, a conference. Returning to New York, with everything suddenly cut off, I no longer sleep, collapse, am collapsed, wait for a _reconciliation_ with my own body of work which never comes. 9. Second Life nauseates, defuge sets in; the fact that new pieces are installed and the whole tuned almost daily doesn't help when so few people visit. I've had over 1600 over a period of months, something a website might get in half a day. I recognize the difficulty of navigating and even beginning Second Life, but there's the possibility of exploring an entire virtual and new world 'out there' and how often does that happen? 10. In sleeplessness today I thought of writing about my enemy encounters with V.A, B.M., G.S., D.G., so many others, but already I fear giving more than getting, the names reduce to initials out of a cowardice that won't let me alone. 11. So much sexuality in the Second Life installation - faces, organs, some arms and feet, no full or replete bodies, at least none that I remember. Literally I lay myself on the line, cut myself off. I want friendship without the premise or promise of death. The faces and organs spell words and murmur, the hands and feet sign themselves in and out of existence, I pretend to write through blurred vision, an experiment, through greater and greater sleep deprivation, an experiment, through double melatonins and wine, through noise-machines and temperature control. 12. Let me see, I'd say something about the Middle-East. http://www.alansondheim.org/danger2.png http://www.alansondheim.org/danger3.png http://www.alansondheim.org/danger4.png http://www.alansondheim.org/danger5.png http://www.alansondheim.org/danger8.png http://www.alansondheim.org/lockup3.jpg http://www.alansondheim.org/lockup4.jpg http://www.alansondheim.org/lockup5.jpg These things speak for themselves. (There were going to be a hundred: We're all lucky he stopped.) http://slurl.com/secondlife/Odyssey/48/12/22