NOVAD FLASHzine Volume n

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NOVADIC TRANSMISSIONS from Nodes 0 & n [Pt1]

Novadic Mandala by Angela Taylor

[A sampling of recent Novadic transmissions, dispersed in all directions, via OAS Nodes 0 & n]:

∞

[9.12.2012]

The Memory Palace Story. Fwd: [september17discuss] Explorations in the Anarchives

:

...

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..
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no one should brave the underworld alone...the words kept returning to me though I had long since given up trying to remember where I'd seen them.  Or heard them.  I repeated it aloud and heard the small sound of ALONE ricochet off a thousand walls and down various tunnels, which could only suggest one thing...I was back in the Ballroom.

Fuck.

Feeling both sides of the walls in the small tunnel open out into a wide panel that went up for who knows how many meters...feeling the empty sense of a long dark chasm just a few footsteps away...feeling the thick, dreadful depression of realizing that I'd done a whole tunnel circuit and come up with nothing again.  Nothing but the indiscernible and unmistakable smell of the Ballroom, the largest room in the tunnels so far.  I look down at the ball of twine on my belt, surprised it isn't more empty.  Hadn't I been walking for hours it seemed, maybe a whole day?  Solar cycles no longer made sense, of course, but the memory of "days" still lingered, nostalgia that made the outside world still seem possible.

The Wormhole.  It just popped into my head.  Sounds right.  I wonder what memories would be held in that circular finite tunnel...

Getting turned around and winding back into the Ballroom was hardly the worst thing that could have happened.  I know where I end and where I begin again. Walking back up along to the right side wall, I find the little stone tied with my string...wait, no that's not it...no, this ground feels different.  Gravelly, not so dusty as I recall.  Feeling around more in front of me my hands came to a suddenly very steep slope suddenly sliding down from my hands where the pebbles are shifting and sliding and it feels like there is no SOLID ground, no bottom at all, and so she frantically pushed back and back, trying to shift the center of gravity in the opposite direction to the solid rock wall...

And suddenly I was there.  Back flat against the wall, and apparently safe again.  They're certainly keeping my flight response in check. Whoever had designed this seemingly endless network of caves, whoever had left those sacred objects in a random assortment of shrines, over how much time and how many generations, had they also designed this perilous trap?  The cave appeared to once have been an underground metropolis, but how many people it could have held it was hard to say.  This planet seems to get older the longer I spend here.  And from when I'd had the batteries for my headlamp, I knew abt the drawings and writings on the walls, some inscribed, some paper flaky thin like paint, some dusty colored ash marks left against the earthy walls, and apparently in the same hand.  It was a danger to rub against too many surfaces, for fear of rubbing off the previous memories that were contained there; wasn't that the whole point to come down here?  To investigate the secret network of tunnels: they'd told me to stay away, strictly admonished by the bloodline family for even considering it, and the warning, never, EVER, to lose yr way.  How many had disappeared down here? 

The Goonies, even after they'd had their movie, all of the neighborhood kids had returned to find their way to the former grave of One-Eyed Willy, and all of them had gone missing.  Made for a hell of a newspaper story, but those bourgeois journalists had never really gone that deep in their story, and certainly none had actually gone into the tunnels to look for them...all of them knew "well" enough to stay away from the caves themselves. They rested with a meaningless fear of the absurd, of the potential eternity that lay deep in the story itself...in the people, the dark thoughts, the bold desire for adventure that had driven them into the surface of the earth.  Why...why....why..........

The words were coming from her again, echoing back to her ears, recalling herself from memory.  The Wormhole.  Strange.  I don't know why I'd thought that I was back in the Ballroom.  Encountered it several times before, always the same smell, a rich emptiness that was neither dank nor cramped.  But the spiraling path that descended from where she had entered -- how far down, how to know? -- that was certainly not here.  Stupid, to think I had just ended up back in the exact same place up and nearly ended up sinking into a gravel pit that sounded as if it descended to its own dark infinity.

I can risk a little light here, to illuminate the darkness, and briefly uncover these surroundings.  Not much paper left, but pull out the notebook anyway, and the rock & flint, that could set the paper to flame. 

[CLACK]
  
[CLACK] 

As soon as the spark took, I looked toward the wall and squinted, and it was at that moment that the Black decided to attack.

∞

Les Inrocks - Occupy Wall Street : un an après, que sont-ils devenus ?

Dear Gamers!


this is a press article featuring some gamers (Danielle, Jezzy, atchu), our school of thought #novad, and of course the collective RevGames. there is also a good mention of #Magic Mountain, the famous squatt in Wall Street.

good job and let's keep spreading alternatives.

http://www.lesinrocks.com/2012/09/12/actualite/occupy-wall-street-un-apres-que-sont-ils-devenus-11302283/#.UFC-qrLzIYE.mailto

Ale

PS Thanks Arnaud for the heads up! :-)

∞

[9.10.2012]

Rovers, #Reclaim!

;;playful revolutionaries;;

just quickly bringing to your attention the importance of the historical moment we are living, both regarding our movement and its place in the currents & counter-currents of history. it becomes increasingly clear to me that the whole modus of thought & action we have been experimenting with for the past year in #occupy has now acquired a level of maturity that is typical of a SCHOOL OF THOUGHT. yay, cheers for theoretical consistency! 

the convergence of many intellectuals and ludic practitioners gives me great joy :: this Fibonacci Arena -- a.k.a. Pluripotential Space -- :: has in its womb many complementary threads that are coming together like music.

#Reclaim, for instance - the diligent work Ted has been doing for a while now - is bringing from the London Global Summit a whole juridical framework that code the sovereignty and rights of a society based on roving communes.  

-- me, Jez and Rafa are working on the #Anarchives for a while, the foundation of time and memory of a potential new society. 

the #OAS node 1 (and n!) is the school that teaches these experiments-explorations. and of course, also a place for research,, extensions and interactions. 

#novad (#nova + #nomad = #novad) as a school of thought & publication,, spreading these ideas around the world,, etc

#Magic Mountain, #Salons, - our unleashing of TAZs.

and the #ROVER movement. 

hope that with this small letter, others are able to see the coming together of these planes of consistency. we are doing political literature my friends, we are doing #poiesis!   

Ale

∞

[9.11.2012]

Occupy Wall Street,

We are two freelance artist from Estonia who are passionate about introducing games as a form on serious journalism.

Our latest game "The Assangenist" has come to life in support of WikiLeaks and Julian Assange. In "The Assangenist" the player is set inside Julian Assange's shoes, who acts as a symbol for someone bringing sensitive information out in the open. Through the interactive experience we wish to raise awareness on the conflict between transparency and power and show the player first hand, how in this world the fight for transparency can be "rewarded".

The game can be played here: http://www.imepilt.com/assangenist/

If you feel that this game supports your cause and is in any way helpful for making the world more transparent, you can use it any way you see fit!

Best wishes,
Almondi Esco
Co-founder of Imepilt
www.imepilt.com

Spreading the interactive word!

[+]

NOVADIC TRANSMISSIONS No.01∞ [OASN1@BH]

Novadic Transmissions [09.2012]

1.

[From OASN1 embodied spirit, Ambrose Curry: artist, surf guru + poet]

[Part 1][Progression]

You mean this?

when is a participle hanging,...?

when there is wall space .

when is a participle dangling...,?

whenever ee cummings 

says So... Ho.

...ambrose...

never met

 the man.

altho I have been

 arrested.

Ambrose's shop.

SEE THE new OwA ABROSE CURRY PHOTO GALLERY HERE.

[PART 2] [I WAS SO INSPIRED BY YOUR LETTER]

i went out in the yard

and turned on the

prosthetic device...

and now having survived

 building a fire

at the blue campfire,

who builds a fire at

10:30 am,I will now                                              

set to sweating in

the tropical summer heat.

what would Gauguin do?

he certainly wouldn't have to

 look up the spelling of his name

yet he wouldn't have such a fine

prosthetic memory.

Yes he would probaly pop a bottle

of absenthe to forget how to spell

his name to free his creative mind

from worries of the world.

...ambrose...

and then I found this movie set...wow!

Ambrose's movie set.

2.

[From novadic poet & transpershamaformist Richard Machado]

Commons like rivers are hands of love, 
flow transient in the dance of new comrades


Badasses, rads and wholly new beings
emerge from the sensations of home


Amazing tchru native with a living death abated
Now has the rest of the infiniTime Nov-A-d'd


#<---<<O
The Colonized Indigenous

3.

[From Alexandre Carvalho, occupier of both Borges + Cervantes Chairs @OASN1]

Alex at his Liberty Square birthday / bon voyage novadic festival.

∞...

Have been wondering a lot about how we can start a whole new civilization.  Imagine if we started a WikiPedia entry of a mysterious people know as Rovers >>> they have a whole different Architecture, Art, (A)narchives, Ethos, Libraries, Political Frameworks, Direct Actions e.g. Rio+20 "They Don't Represent Us", Housing experiments (Magic Mountain); some crazy shit. good shit. following the flow;;; 

Eliade mentions a concept called "in ilo tempore", a mythological time for humanity where space was relative and time absolute. absent. when archetypes enacted the creation of the cosmos. The anarchical Communa:: an arquipelago-constellation of communes founded on the principles of trust, proximity and solidarity:: interdependent, autonomous and interlinked, they form a fluid network of communes:: the Communa is never static // hence the name communa mobilis. never stops asking questions or changing, acquiring history, becoming... and then it wakes up Communa Fluens:: the Sunflower of the Garden:: 

let's #playtogether with what Luis Borges suggests. Borges  was the author of "Labyrinths", a book that collects many of his short fantastic lit stories. in one of them called Tlon, Uqbar & Orbius Tertiurus, Borges have his two characters in pursuit of a disquieting truth: they must discover if this legendary place called Tlon exists or is a bad joke of a bibliotec prankster. the characters find a strange yellowish copy of a 1907 Encyclopedia Brittanica which contais this weird article about Tlon: it contains its demographics, art, architecture, music, language, history, political configuration, religion, juris, its schools (OAS, e.g.), ethical beliefs, games played, publications (Novad zine) etc etc etc. 

describing Tlon could be an elegant literary license to unleash our best radical dreams publicly; to ooze #poiesis revgamers.   

Tlon - wikipedia. crazy experiment. let me know what you think.

Me and Rafa started writing what the Rovers would probably have economically and in politik. Nicole could do geometry by hoola hooping her spirals?, mitch pour architecture/urbanist rad ideas? #jez3prez, the Anarchives a way rovers write history? 

thoughts?

A.

(#braingasm)

...∞

4.

[From anarchivist, dimensional filmmaker + metatronic mechanic, Bold Jez]:

<draft> The state of nature as a state of play

There is no pure "state of nature"... except for, perhaps, in the invitation to play.  The invitation to play is an opportunity to re-invent the World, not necessarily in its entirety, but certainly some important aspects of its specificity: in its Object(s), Purpose(s) or Rules. These aspects represent the magic circle of Play, the state of a game, and a world that is open to all agents, infinitely beyond and underneath the boundaries of the State.

When Hobbes postulates that prior to the invention of Sovereigns & States existed a natural "state of war," he is inviting us to consider the world in terms of a particular political game. This game is based in fear, power, and security; and for those of us well-educated in the history of Western states, this portrayal of politics should not seem so very strange. (This version of politics, well illustrated in Shakespeare's royal courts, could have informed Hobbes of this well if he did not learn it from his birth; born prematurely when his mother heard of the approach of the Spanish Armada, he remarked that he was born "a twin with fear."

What **IS** strange to us is the possibility of a *return* to anarchy as it were: we feel discomfort at the mere suggestion of returning to nature, the uncertainty of a world w/o governors, the insecurity of our responsibility for maintaining the environment we live in.

Update on Tuesday, August 28, 2012 at 10:44PM by admin

[From Richie]:

This sounds fantastic and ties into a conversation I've been having with Jez & Joe from occupied stories. To create a new civilization -- that's the charge right? Well what better way to do that than with play? With play defining social interactions, and a removal of economics as separate from the natural anarchical way we relate, but to reinvent the power of social currency over property, inheritance, exploitation & just plain-old bad gamesmanship (bosses are such bad gamers, they ain't got no fun in their hearts, no play and no poetry.).

And the exciting part about this venture is that we have an entire WORLD that can be shaped by even the poor, and we don't need the permissions of the bosses. We have the internet. And like myspace, youtube, google, facebook, twitter, email, world of warcraft, all MMOs, and goddamn porn sites, a new order that appears in this world has the potential to send a shockwave across the physical earth, captivating and entrancing whole populations at once. What we're talking about here is a new game. A new social networking interface that is a game at its very heart, one that incorporates reality into to, producing an augmented reality game that reinforces one's physical life, and the physical life reinforces the fun had in the game. If we can achieve this, it will be a break from the current state of MMOs which usually take people further away from the importance of the physical life, or social networks which usually just keep people away from the gaming and playing aspect of social networks because of ego.

I would like to hear back on these points to see if they are resonating. what could the game be called? It seems it's going to be a place, definitely a place, that one could post their achievements in the physical world, and have anyone on the open social network of the game be able to give you points of skill improvement based on how legitimate THEY think your claim is. Exp: I post pictures of me reading a book at different times, and I produce something in response to what I read, like a report or a poem, and someone on the game might see these forms of "proof" and believe I read the book, and possibly giving me a +1 in something like reading and intellect skills. A different person might not need pictures or a poem, they might just believe me when I say I read this book, and they might give me +1 reading and intellect points anyway. This model emphasizes the importance of relative legitimacy, of friendship and trust and also destroys the power-over structures of authentication. Furthermore, if that same person thought that my reading "How to Grow a Rooftop Garden" was beneficial to people or society as a whole in someway, each person would have the option to give some amount of social currency as reward for doing something that was desired. And, If for instance there was a food shortage, reading that book might incline that person to getting some multiple more of social currency, since they are learning to fill some need of society. This model of social currency makes us socially and economically interdependent, and smashes the hierarchy of the state's monopoly on issuing "legitimate" money, since in this game, everyone has the power to issue currency & reward the aspects of society they deem important and necessary. (Smash the philanthropist hierarchy of only the rich being able to make real the things they think should exist in the world.)

This is the preliminary idea for the social network game which has yet to be named. Think Facebook meets World of Warcraft meets the open-source, playnarchy revolution.

ideas?



Update on Wednesday, August 29, 2012 at 12:26PM by admin

Yes! Thanks for cluing me in, Richie.

So Richie and I were talking about gamification recently, of using game design and mechanics do get people to do things in the real world. One game I participated in playing that used this idea was Evoke, which is meant to encourage people to think up innovative ways to solve world problems (the game was sponsored by World Bank which had some people skeptical about the entire thing but that's beside the point--what we care about here are mechanics.)

Evoke worked similarly to what Richie mentions: each week, players would be given a "mission" which would be centered around a world problem--let's go with Richie's initial suggestion of a food shortage. What players then do is a) research this issue, b) propose, make or do an innovation that helps solve this issue; find or volunteer time with a group that is actively trying to fix this problem in the real world and c) do some visioning and imagine your absolute wildest dream of what the future will be in relation to the issue. So given this mission, I might research what the cause of a food shortage somewhere will be, etc. Let's take Richie's idea and say that I'll begin a rooftop garden, so I write my plans and can get feedback from others in the network as to how to best do this. Now let's say I go out and join a rooftop farm--or organize one in my community!

So with each part in the three-part mission, players essentially write a reportback of what they found for each part, and are rewarded with experience points given to them by other players in the network. Here are areas you could gain experience in in Evoke:

    * collaboration
    * creativity
    * knowledge share
    * resourcefulness
    * sustainability
    * courage
    * entrepreneurship
    * local insight
    * spark
    * vision

Richie made great points about an experience/social currency. If people are rewarding others, then people are encouraged to actively pay attention to what others are doing--and on the other side, it's great to see at a glance what your natural area of contribution to the community is (let's say I'm awarded points mostly in "creativity") but you can also see where you might want to improve in a new area ("how can I achieve more 'courage'?") People are assessed strictly by their contribution to the community or their own gains of knowledge that may later be used to help the community.

The Evoke system isn't without things to watch out for, though--would we run into a situation in which some people with more resources than others hold a greater influence of ideas in the community?

But how could we use these ideas in the real world? OWS is great because it essentially gives all the resources and issues Evoke prompted--we have the issues, or "missions" (stop the Spectra pipeline! End homelessness! etcetc) and we have the affinity groups and network to easily mobilize, plan actions, etc that would be ripe for "gaining experience"--we really, I think, would only need to form a system of social currency to encourage people to go out, do stuff, and collaborate where they otherwise might not feel so encouraged.

Would having a system like this help new activists better find a place to begin in the community? Let's say we don't gamify a new society for whatever reason--we can at least gamify a system that educates people what resources we have to make change.

I'm taking an online course currently in gamification, if my IRL classes don't take up all of my time. It's free! So if anyone finds any of this interesting, you might want to check it out. I'll let you guys know of any insight I gain from it if this social currency idea seems interesting.

- Joe

Update on Wednesday, August 29, 2012 at 01:11PM by admin

[From Richie]:

And the sparks of collaboration and imagination begin unstoppable #wildfires...

[From Alex]:

I just added Joe and Danny to the revgames atrium. :-) 

Also, welcome Marisa, my friend and comrade. 

Joe, this is long overdue. Danny, same. would love for us to jam not only in music -- which we already know we can have a great time -- but in poetry and theoretical imagination. RevGames has brought together a brilliant mix of people on its virtual atrium and it is great to see the fluent exchanges!... keep stealing the fire of Zeus, comrades. 

Newbies, we like strategy, play, #theory and #poiesis a lot. not to mention a undying love for literature and its cosmogonic potential. Our discussions are wild and fueled by a flirt with insanity, so please feel free to write your most raw thought, art piece, emotion, political eutopias, and of course, information and scheming in the most poetic sense of Anarchy.  

Would love to hear more about the gamefying of reality. 

Sent from my soul

Update on Wednesday, August 29, 2012 at 04:00PM by admin

Dymaxion map courtesy BFI installed at Wall Street to Main Street's Occupy Reading room (Sam Truitt) 3-17-2012

[From Jenjoy (Part 1)]

 Hi everyone,

Thanks for including me Paul. I started to read the blog and have to throw in Buckminster Fuller's World Game idea. Some people are still trying to employ it, even recently for the London Olympics. Last year some people were trying to commercialize the idea for corporate stakeholders to use as a marketing ploy (aka the IMBs of the world.) I think they're still in R&D mode, yikes! not a fan of that approach. 

Anyway, The World Game was way before it's time and hasn't been actualized in the way Bucky envisioned, primarily because technology wasn't available. However, he predicted much of the networked technology and database capacity we have today and anticipated that it could be done in real time. 

useful here: http://bfi.org/about-bucky/buckys-big-ideas/world-game

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/World_Game

The quick definition:

R. Buckminster Fuller conceived the World Game as an interactive role-playing experience that would teach participants to organize, revitalize and distribute depleted world resources. Relying on computers to provide raw data, players work non-competitively to allocate the earth's natural capital worldwide, scoring points through efficient management. If cooperation degenerates into competition, the first step towards war, the game is lost.  

There is much to mined and consider with this idea. Hope that strikes a chord. 

Best,

JenJoy

Update on Wednesday, August 29, 2012 at 04:07PM by admin

[From Jenjoy (Part 2)]:

Oh and Evoke was heavily influenced by Bucky's World Game. Anyway, in response to the game idea that you all are imagining I would throw in a rhetorical question– what tools/knowledge/technologies are available for people to participate? In this sense the Buckminster Fuller Challenge was a net that gathered some of the best on the planet. You can check out the idea index here: http://challenge.bfi.org/ideaindex

Bucky always said that there is not a manual for spaceship earth. I think the idea index and the Whole Earth Catalog are a response, or an attempt to create one. All that to say is that a really good tool box would need to accompany a game so people could 'win'. 

jj

Update on Wednesday, August 29, 2012 at 10:12PM by admin

Image by Chris Moylan for CO-OP at bj spoke

[Chris Moylan]:

A couple of responses. Love the idea of revolutionary gaming in this manifestation, as in previous. Paul and I brainstormed a game approach back in Jan.-- Google Earth plus Cadcam plus other resources (gaming code and so on) to simulate Occupy taking over a small town. Lots of angles are possible with this--if you were the mayor (Occupy mayor) what would you do? abolish the office? keep the office and do...what... Same for culture in the town, schools, etc. And then what kind of opposition would one encounter? How to respond, etc. Floated this at the school where I teach--the computer profs. loved it, the students didn't line up. Weird. Kind of instructive.

Taking off a bit from what JenJoy said, I think of this in terms of rehearsal and modeling as well as a karmic point system (love that you switched the dynamic from blood and gore to spiritual choices, for want of a better term). With that said, my experience of oppression with Occupy has me feeling conflicted. The angel of my better nature urges passive nonviolent resistance, the Boston boyo in me doesn't like getting smacked by cops and would see some good in Black Bloc strategic rehearsals and scenarios--not violent, but not inclined to back down.

In any event, what is being contemplated in this discussion is the construction of a counter-Matrix. All kinds of things are possible when we take the red pill, including using the instruments of the virtual against themselves.

in solidarity,
Chris

Update on Wednesday, August 29, 2012 at 10:17PM by admin

[AC]:

Folks, just a reminder:

When spiraling upwards, you break binaries. what we create here can serve as raw material for whatever you want. in any event, Paul MacLean is constantly documenting these moments and posting #mosaics of the ideas that ooze out of the discussion. the more the merrier.

%\\

 Dude. DUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUDE. (echo of [dudes... [dude.. [dude. 

That idea that the Direct Action Flaneurs played with, at the inauguration of #Occupational Art S School n1,,,,, that idea of //////// pluripotential spaces is very pertinent to this discussion of a global game. yellow papers with typewriters in the middle of the street. cars passing over them. tire marks, rubber anxiety on the carbon paper. all these are games, microfractures; i think that's it, games are political incisions. what was #holioccupy, if not cuts to make pus drain? or the Salons activating the principle of play?        

           (flow),

                         all these are like outdoor Salons. Shen She Chuen -- style of kung-fu named "Style of the Sacred Serpent" teaches us to "occupy empty". 

WorldGames are perfectly possible since reality is "gamefyable". 

it is not a new idea, Antonin Artaud, the french playwriter that fell to psychiatric illness mentioned in one of his pieces the allegory of the "BodyWithoutOrgans" {Deleuze and Guattari, Capitalism & Schyzophrenia}.  

The term originates from Artaud's radio play "To Have Done with the Judgment of God" (1947): 

\\\\\\\\\\\\ -- When you will have made him a body without organs, then you will have delivered him from all his automatic reactions and restored him to his true freedom. \\\\\\\\\\\\\  -- anarchy to its best

the Body Without Organs (BwO) -- is an embryonic morulla, an ovule fertilized by a spermatozoid just a couple days ago;  it has in itself all the genetic potential to generate a full human being; it is as infinite as it will ever be. the decision, then, is what differentiates. 

atchu

Update on Wednesday, August 29, 2012 at 10:46PM by admin

[From Joseph]: in re: Alex's post above^

Update on Wednesday, August 29, 2012 at 11:11PM by admin

Hey Atchu et al!

Thanks for the warm welcome, and here's the essay you're talking about, actually a playlist with an introductory essay.  I did it as part of the YouTube School of Social Politics, which some here might find interesting generally.

http://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PL28678BBA25D4A283&feature=plcp

More soon,

-m

Update on Wednesday, August 29, 2012 at 11:50PM by admin

[AC]:

Crew,

warm welcome to Mark Read, our playful rebel-illuminator!

he is also a scholar of #play, sharing lines of flight with Hakim Bey, Huizinga, etc. had some great Salons together on #Magic Mountain. Mark, feel free to enter the Fibonaci Arena. virtual atrium where you flare your most creative thought. here don't do just #theory; rather do //////#poiesis.

would love if you introduced yourself and maybe send us that amazing #play video piece you've made? relations with what you've experienced in that Salon @Magic Mountain? anyway, feel free

All the best,

Atchu



Update on Thursday, August 30, 2012 at 12:12AM by admin

Foucault, preface, The Order of Things (xvi):

The monstruous quality that runs through Borges's enumeration consists, on the contrary, in the fact that the common ground on which such meetings are possible has itself been destroyed. What is impossible is not the propinquity of the things listed, but the very site on which their propinquity would be possible. The animals '(i) frienzied, (j) innumerable, (k) drawn with a very fine camelhair brush' - where could they ever meet, except in the immaterial sound of the voice pronouncing their enumeration, or on the page transcribing it? Where else could they be juxtaposed except in the non-place of language? Yet, though language can spread them before us, it can do so only in the unthinkable space. [+]

We must occupy the unthinkable space, which is the body, the spirit, emotion. This is the habitation of art, its de-occupation. - PJM