This ongoing discussion re who is the more flux, the real flux,
the true flux, the public, the private--
after a while becomes very sad.
There is too much to be done to be lost in personal quarrels,
which are presented to others as though every one is to take sides in a
battle which is not theirs. It reminds me of the military draft, political
speeches, campaign mudslinging, negative advertising and the lot.
It also reminds me of a period in which I was living in an
abandoned house in Cambridge, MA. At first it was just myself and one
other fellow--I have written to fluxlist a bit about it in a letter re AM
Fine.
What I but briefly mentioned in the letter is that after a period
of time
the place was full of runaways, punk rockers, skin heads, hardcore kids,
various comers and goers dropping by for a party.
Often the discussion would turn to such topics as--"I was a punk
before you were a punk", "I was going to shows before you were". "you
didn't meet so and so man, and I did", "I forgot more than you'll ever
know
about being a punk", "I've been part of more scenes than you have" and the
like. "rich suburban kids are punk and hardcore is the people's music".
Often nasty fights would break out, first verbal, then physical.
These were always followed by prolonged rumour assaults, the making
public of private grievances and "secrets" and so on. In moments of anger
or drunkness or desperation, friend sold out friend and made matters
worse. The spiral of division made for the break up of a community
spirit, the breakup of several bands and the eventual arrival of the
police, summoned it was often thought by some punks who had the money to
just move out to an apartment and let the others take the punishment they
deserved.
Since I was the oldest person living there, one night I was asked
what I thought was a kind of historical figure for punk.
I said they had always been around.
Someone asked for an historical example--the first person that
came into my head was Francois Villon--I noted he was from the 1400s and
so not one of the earliest punks, but a good fellow for some punk rock
lyrics--and proceeded to spray paint some on the wall, and give an
impromptu lecture re maitre Francois.
Happily, within days there were borrowed, stolen and second hand
copies of Villon floating around. A bunch of us started composing some
ballads in the Villon style & subject matter to be performed as hard core
songs--and making xerox collages again--making use of the life we were
leading there instead of worrying about who is more this than someone
else, or more that than someone.
One of the best parts of fluxlist is that there are so many
projects going on--Roger brought out a book, there's the timepiece
projects, the alterations of the Josh story, the cookbook, the box,
the stationary bicycle event, the Boulez and other projects--
There have also been many good historical postings and much
research and documentation done by many--I think of Owen and Reed
especially for example--and many
others--Alan Bowman's projects, ideas from Alex, Devon, Patricia, Allen
Bukoff, Carol, Melissa, Heiko, Erik S.--everyone ones comes across--
It's more constructive to focus on this than on personal quarrels
which will only lead to divisions and name calling and decisions on what
is
more or less "flux", on anger colored opinions, and a Rashoman drama of
what really
happened according to whom. All this does is involve people in disputes
which lead away from work being done, ideas exchanged and a sense of
coummunity.
Is better to focus on and exchange ideas and information
re the historical development of flux, or the actual
fluxus works, documentations, events and so on--the scholarly work & the
constructive work to be done, and the new work to be done building
from/with that--
of course it will not be the historical fluxus, it is now
something other--yet that is as it is--there is no need to quarrel over
the relation of one to the other in the sense of who owns what proportion
of the property, as though fighting over the interpretations of a will--
as the saying goes: "Two maggots were fighting in dead
ernest/Ernest".
It is better to recall the idea of Robert Filliou: "the Eternal
Network"--
--dbc
