Dillan Marsh
Index:
Tags /
Files /
Images
Links:
New /
Random /
Contact
sun:
research /
work /
exhibition /
recent_work /
stage /
documentation /
photograph /
product /
facade /
text /
collaboration /
repeat /
loop /
system /
fair /
box /
arena /
temporary /
vehicle /
transport /
belief /
cycle /
movement /
driving /
car /
energy /
video /
drive /
ritual /
desire /
light /
circle /
darkness /
space /
installation /
quote /
fake /
artificial /
model /
empty /
Norway /
booth /
sun /
collapse /
studio /
escape /
2013 /
time /
orbit /
publication /
action /
body /
podium /
Eleanor_Clare /
Entree /
noise /
universe /
New_Age /
training /
religion /
black /
costume /
scenery /
death /
screen /
lights /
creation /
cabinate /
plastic /
order /
solar /
course /
2015 /
simulation /
edition /
June_Twenty_First /
landscape /
sound /
orange /
hippie /
map /
geometry /
music /
dance /
archetype /
carnival /
double /
mask /
magic /
wheel /
view /
fire /
custom /
therapy /
film /
dysfunctional /
camp /
2014 /
disguise /
motion /
astronomy /
residue /
machismo /
field /
dizzy /
crowd /
midsummer /
audio /
collage /
circus /
burn /
hole /
chamber /
helmet /
rubber /
dome /
skin /
chaos /
panoramic /
dvd /
summer /
solstice /
set /
Edinburgh_Sculpture_Workshop /
accumulator /
cosmos /
spinning /
matter /
club /
dissolve /
Burnout /
speaker /
pod /
road /
speed /
wave /
earth /
determination /
trick /
etheric /
nature /
rave /
rainbow /
water /
seek /
cruise /
Yorkshire_Sculpture_Park /
theatre /
press_release /
nature /
sound_system /
constellation /
Randi_Grov_Berger /
camera /
colour /
acoustic /
spectrum /
magnetic_field /
Apis_Press /
touch /
festival /
Francois_Hugo /
isolation /
pool /
phenomena /
Adventure_Island /
ride /
viewpoint /
feet /
sick /
planets /
Rush /
Nestle /
Mathijs_van_Geest /
hard /
pagan /
Skjoenne_Sjeler /
feel /
2016 /
longing /
Seljord /
star /
tank /
Appendix /
free-party /
gold /
decay /
fibreglass /
edge /
heliotherapy /
god /
march /
hands /
cruising /
Anond_Versto /
Archipelago /
excitement /
1617 /
M25 /
storm /
Toucher /
Accidie /
Oystein_Wyller_Odden /
chacras /
Peter Cailler /
melancholy /
Ellen_H_Suhrke /
Robert_Fludd /
river /
Hugo_and_the_Cosmos /
rubbing /
will /
room /
Jonas_Mekas /
Gimpo /
Helios /
meridian /
nitrogen /
Hugo_and_the_Planets /
fair ground /
sea /
low_tide /
chord /
insulation /
1978 /
chariot /
tide /
Metal /
mud_flats /
Southend /
1998 /
Rhine /
unconscious /
Hordaland_Kunstsenter /
jumping /
St._Hansbal /
Bill_Drummond /
weather /
free_party /
estuary /
pier /
1928 /
infinity /
R_Murray_Schafer /
1618 /
Olaus_Magnus /
Josef_Gabriel_Frey /
car_park /
sunrise /
Oslo /
Nikolai_Astrup /
Michael_Maier /
Finnmark /
atmosphere /
midnight_sun /
I_Ching /
russ /
techno /
sin /
aurora /
moon /
tornado /
Evelyn-White /
Okeanos /
yin_yang /
concert /
1905 /
1555 /
earthquake /
Freddie_Mercury /
C.G._Jung /
Homer /
tunnel /
eclipse /
Adventure Island, 22nd April - 8th May 2016-04-22
Hordaland Kunstsenter, Archipelago: Eleanor Clare & Dillan Marsh
Hendene famler
Kloden roterer
Tidevannet stiger
Stadig å fortsette framover; å søke etter
Solen, som slynger sine slående stråler; som forsvinner
Under Brygga, et vesen lever; forråtner
Ved enden av Landet; Sjøen
Det finnes en innside og en utside, et mørkt indre og et lyst ytre. Under huden, inni kroppen, er mye flytende. Dette er stedet hvor det underbevisste virker, fordøyer og prosesserer og samler og skiller substanser.
De lette etter selve begynnelsene av mening og skapelse: for å sammenføye tusener av år tilbake med idag. De ville finne det, men da de ankom, visste de fortsatt ikke hva de skulle gjøre.
I dypene av himmelen fantes ingen speil, og i solens sted gapte et stort blødende hull der kanskje en jeksel hadde blitt vridd ut. Sjøen hadde sannsynligvis blitt tømt, og etterlot seg hulrommet av sin beholder omsluttet av et svimlende stup. Kloden selv hadde forsvunnet, hadde opphørt å være solid.
– Le Clezio, J.M.G., The Book of Flights.
Eleanor Clare og Dillan Marsh bor i Bergen, og har lagd arbeider sammen siden 2013, et samarbeid som begynte som en utforskning av hvordan det å lage kunstverk og å skrive gjensidig kan påvirke hverandre i å forstå mening og utviklingen av form og struktur. Clare har en mastergrad i kunst fra Central Saint Martins, London (2011), og Marsh en mastergrad fra Kunst- og designhøgskolen i Bergen (2011). Sammen har de produsert verk for følgende aktører: Parabol Bergen, Assembly House Leeds, Edinburgh Sculpture Workshop, Yorkshire Sculpture Park, ASC Gallery London, Deuxpiece/Büro für Problem Basel og Apis Press Bergen.
Prosjektet er støttet av Yorkshire Sculpture Park, Edinburgh Sculpture Workshop, Assembly House Leeds, Metal Arts, Bergen Kommune og Norsk Kulturråd.
www.fossilsandstars.blogspot.no
Archipelago er et lite, fleksibelt visningsrom for å vise enkeltverk og installasjoner i et fokusert, men åpent miljø. Siden rommet ligger i førsteetasje på Hordaland kunstsenter, like ved siden av et større, mer formelt utstillingsrom, åpner Archipelago opp for å undersøke de skiftende egenskapene ved et kunstverk med begrensningene av et lite, fysisk rom, i en tidsalder med virtuelle rom.
Programmet til Archipelago planlegges kort tid i forveien for hvert nye prosjekt, med den hensikt å gjeninnsette kuratorisk smidighet og nåtidig engasjement i institusjonen. Disse utstillingene følger en annen tidsplan enn Hordaland kunstsenters hovedprogram for utstillinger, og er tenkt som en gruppe av «tenkeøyer» som oppstår i tiden.
Hordaland Kunstsenter, Archipelago: Eleanor Clare & Dillan Marsh
The hands are scrabbling
The earth is turning
The tide is rising
Constantly forging onwards; seeking
The Sun, casting its glorious rays; disappearing
Under the Pier, a creature lives; decaying
At the end of the Land; the Sea
There is an inside and an outside, a dark interior and a light exterior. Under the skin, in the body, much is fluid. This is where the unconscious is at work, digesting and processing and merging and separating matter.
They were looking for the very beginnings of meaning and making: to connect thousands of years ago with today. They wanted to find it, but when they arrived, they still didn't know what to do.
In the depths of the sky, there were no mirrors, and in place of the sun a great bleeding hole gaped where perhaps a molar had been wrenched out. The sea had probably emptied, leaving the hollow of its basin rimmed by a dizzy precipice. The earth itself had disappeared, had ceased to be solid.
Le Clezio, J.M.G., The Book of Flights.
Eleanor Clare and Dillan Marsh live in Bergen, and have been producing works together since 2013, a collaboration which began as an investigation into how making artwork and writing can mutually influence one another in the understanding of meaning, development of form and structure. Clare received MA Fine Art from Central Saint Martins in 2011, and Marsh MA Visual Art from Bergen Academy of Art and Design, 2011. They have produced collaborative work for the following organisations: Parabol Bergen, Assembly House Leeds, Edinburgh Sculpture Workshop, Yorkshire Sculpture Park, ASC Gallery London, Deuxpiece/Buro fur Problem Basel and Apis Press Bergen.
Research and development has been supported by Yorkshire Sculpture Park, Edinburgh Sculpture Workshop, Assembly House Leeds, Metal Arts, Bergen Kommune and Norwegian Arts Council.
Fossils and Stars
Archipelago is a small, flexible platform for showing individual works and installations in a focused but open environment. Located on the ground floor of Hordaland kunstsenter, adjacent to a larger, more formal exhibition space, archipelago works with the constraint of limited physical space in order to explore the changing modalities of artworks in the age of virtual space. Archipelago is programmed with short lead times for each new project, with the intention of reinserting curatorial agility and real-time engagement into the institution. This initiative follows a different schedule to Hordaland kunstsenter's main exhibition programme, and is conceived as a group of 'thought islands' appearing in time.
"Click to view Adventure Island, 22nd April - 8th May"
Tags:
work /
exhibition /
recent_work /
stage /
facade /
text /
collaboration /
repeat /
loop /
fair /
movement /
energy /
video /
light /
darkness /
installation /
fake /
artificial /
sun /
time /
publication /
body /
action /
Eleanor_Clare /
scenery /
simulation /
landscape /
carnival /
film /
wheel /
view /
motion /
residue /
dizzy /
hole /
circus /
panoramic /
skin /
Edinburgh_Sculpture_Workshop /
rubber /
set /
spinning /
speed /
wave /
matter /
nature /
Yorkshire_Sculpture_Park /
nature /
water /
press_release /
Adventure_Island /
ride /
camera /
pool /
viewpoint /
sick /
touch /
feet /
decay /
edge /
2016 /
feel /
hands /
Mathijs_van_Geest /
fibreglass /
Archipelago /
river /
excitement /
Toucher /
Metal /
unconscious /
low_tide /
estuary /
mud_flats /
sea /
Hordaland_Kunstsenter /
tide /
Southend /
fair ground /
pier /
jumping /
Adventure Island, Hordaland Kunstsenter 2016-04-22
Tags:
work /
exhibition /
recent_work /
stage /
facade /
text /
collaboration /
repeat /
loop /
fair /
vehicle /
movement /
energy /
video /
darkness /
light /
fake /
installation /
artificial /
sun /
time /
publication /
action /
body /
Eleanor_Clare /
scenery /
simulation /
landscape /
carnival /
view /
wheel /
film /
residue /
motion /
hole /
circus /
dizzy /
rubber /
Edinburgh_Sculpture_Workshop /
spinning /
set /
panoramic /
skin /
speed /
wave /
matter /
earth /
nature /
water /
seek /
press_release /
Yorkshire_Sculpture_Park /
camera /
ride /
viewpoint /
feet /
touch /
Adventure_Island /
pool /
sick /
2016 /
edge /
decay /
feel /
Rush /
fibreglass /
hands /
Mathijs_van_Geest /
Toucher /
Archipelago /
excitement /
rubbing /
fair ground /
mud_flats /
Metal /
tide /
low_tide /
sea /
estuary /
Hordaland_Kunstsenter /
pier /
unconscious /
jumping /
Southend /
Cash & Carry, Entree 2015-12-10
Entree
Cash & Carry
05.12 – 09.01
Markeveien 4b
5012 Bergen
Tue 12- 6pm
Wed 12- 6pm
Thu 12- 8pm
Fri 12- 6pm
Sat 12- 6pm
Sun 14- 7pm
Marthe Elise Stramrud, Sveinung Rudjord Unneland, Tom Kosmo, Azar Alsharif, Lasse Arikstad, Dillan Marsh, Magnhild oen Nordahl, Cato Loland, Bjorn Mortensen, Toril Johannessen, Heidi Bjorgan, Stian Adlandsvik, Lars Korff Lofthus, Bjorn-Henrik Lybeck, Johanna Lettmayer, Anngjerd Rustand, Julie Lillelien Porter, Anne Marthe Dyvi, Borghild Rudjord Unneland, Malin Lennstrom-Ortwall, Kay Arne Kirkebo, Randi Nygard, Tatiana Lozano, Klara Sofie Ludvigsen, Lisa Him-Jensen, Torgrim Sund, Kirsti van Hoegee, Sif Ankergard, Gabriel Johann Kvendseth, Terence Koh, Scott Elliott, Trollkrem, Linn Pedersen, Tag Andersson, Kristin Tarnesvik, Vilde Salhus Roed.
Tags:
work /
exhibition /
documentation /
system /
cycle /
light /
studio /
sun /
orbit /
Entree /
costume /
order /
solar /
2015 /
double /
archetype /
mask /
disguise /
collage /
cosmos /
constellation /
press_release /
Randi_Grov_Berger /
Francois_Hugo /
spectrum /
star /
gold /
planets /
Nestle /
Peter Cailler /
Hugo_and_the_Cosmos /
Hugo_and_the_Planets /
Aldous Huxley, Accidie 2015-07-14
On the Margin, Notes and Essays, 1923
He would lie in wait for monks grown weary with working in the oppressive heat, seizing a moment of weakness to force an entrance into their hearts. And once installed there, what havoc he wrought! For suddenly it would seem to the poor victim that the day was intolerably long and life desolatingly empty. He would go to the door of his cell and look up at the sun and ask himself if a new Joshua had arrested it midway up the heavens. Then he would go back into the shade and wonder what good he was doing in that cell or if there was any object in existence. Then he would look at the sun again and find it indubitably stationary, and the hour of the communal repast of the evening as remote as ever. And he would go back to his meditations, to sink, sink through disgust and lassitude into the black depths of despair and hopeless unbelief. When that happened the demon smiled and took his departure, conscious that he had done a good morning’s work.
Tags:
cycle /
energy /
desire /
darkness /
quote /
empty /
collapse /
sun /
escape /
religion /
death /
archetype /
dysfunctional /
dizzy /
determination /
dissolve /
god /
hard /
longing /
melancholy /
will /
Accidie /
Eclipse of the sun 2015-03-15
Tags:
work /
photograph /
Norway /
sun /
orbit /
2015 /
nature /
eclipse /
Oslo /
untitled installation, Skjoenne Sjeler 2014-07-13
Tags:
work /
exhibition /
recent_work /
stage /
documentation /
repeat /
loop /
fair /
arena /
temporary /
vehicle /
transport /
movement /
car /
cycle /
energy /
video /
drive /
ritual /
desire /
light /
circle /
darkness /
installation /
Norway /
sun /
time /
action /
noise /
universe /
lights /
solar /
landscape /
archetype /
carnival /
view /
custom /
camp /
2014 /
motion /
machismo /
field /
crowd /
dizzy /
burn /
chaos /
dvd /
spinning /
panoramic /
speed /
Burnout /
speaker /
trick /
rave /
cruise /
theatre /
sound_system /
constellation /
camera /
festival /
pool /
Skjoenne_Sjeler /
Seljord /
free-party /
Rush /
cruising /
Oystein_Wyller_Odden /
Ellen_H_Suhrke /
river /
Anond_Versto /
free_party /
Rhine /
nitrogen /
russ /
techno /
concert /
tunnel /
car_park /
sunrise /
Helios (text by Eleanor CLare) 2013-08-14
As he rides his chariot, he shines upon men and deathless gods, and piercingly he gazes
with his eyes from his golden helmet. Bright rays beam dazzlingly from him, and his
bright locks streaming from the temples of his head gracefully enclose his far-seen face: a rich,
fine-spun garment glows upon his body and flutters in the wind: and stallions carry him.
Then, when he has stayed his golden-yoked chariot and horses, he rests there upon the
highest point of heaven, until he marvellously drives them down again through heaven to Okeanos."
Homeric Hymn 31 to Helios (trans. Evelyn-White) (Greek epic C7th - 4th B.C.)
*
I lived to dance all night. A surging energy created a new and unprecedented confidence:
that it was possible to cheat time. I felt invincible - transcendent. Life was light, without fear
of death; at least not in this state of being. I sensed in my body vibrations of sound.
The closer I got to the source, the more it enveloped me, becoming a physical entwinement with
music and space. I felt one with it. But as the years passed, inevitably my heart began to
beat out of time. The breath did not come so easily. I held it at the top for a few seconds,
afraid to exhale. In these moments, the perceived syncopation that was once such a joy had
started to become a dissonance.
*
I feel alive, and the world - it's turning inside out Yeah!
I'm floating around in ecstasy
So don't stop me now,
I'm a shooting star leaping through the skies
Like a tiger, defying the laws of gravity
I'm a racing car passing by like Lady Godiva
I'm gonna go! go! go!
There's no stopping me!
I'm a rocket ship on my way to Mars
On a collision course
I am a satellite, I'm out of control
I am a sex machine ready to reload
Like an atom bomb about to
Oh -oh-oh-oh-oh explode!
(Extracts from 'Don't Stop Me Now' lyrics by Freddie Mercury, 1978)
Tags:
work /
recent_work /
stage /
text /
collaboration /
vehicle /
belief /
car /
energy /
light /
darkness /
space /
sun /
2013 /
publication /
time /
action /
Entree /
Eleanor_Clare /
death /
solar /
edition /
June_Twenty_First /
music /
dance /
wheel /
midsummer /
solstice /
helmet /
cosmos /
summer /
Apis_Press /
god /
march /
planets /
chariot /
Helios /
1978 /
Freddie_Mercury /
Homer /
Evelyn-White /
Okeanos /
Appendix 1 (text by Eleanor Clare) 2013-08-14
Appendix 1: Extracts from C.G. Jung, Commentary on the Secret of the Golden Flower
The wise Chinese would say in the words of the I Ching: When yang has reached its
greatest strength, the dark power of yin is born within its depths, for night begins at midday
when yang breaks up and begins to change into yin.
...
The ‘enclosure’, or circumambulation, is expressed in our text by the idea of a ‘circulation’.
The ‘circulation is not merely motion in a circle, but means, on the one hand, the marking off
of a sacred precinct, and, on the other, fixation and concentration. The sun wheel begins to run;
that is to say, the sun is animated and begins to take its course, or in other words, the Tao begins
to work and to take over the leadership. Action is reversed into non-action; all that is peripheral is
subjected to the command of what is central. [...]
Thus the circular movement also has the moral significance of activating all the light and all
the dark forces of human nature, and with them, all the psychological opposites of whatever
kind they may be.
...
If viewed correctly in the psychological sense, death is not an end but a goal, and therefore
life towards death begins as soon as the meridian is passed.
Tags:
work /
recent_work /
text /
collaboration /
repeat /
loop /
darkness /
circle /
2013 /
sun /
publication /
orbit /
time /
Eleanor_Clare /
order /
June_Twenty_First /
wheel /
midsummer /
solstice /
Appendix /
meridian /
I_Ching /
C.G._Jung /
yin_yang /
Phenomenons Below and Above the Earth 2013-07-03
Phämomen über, und unter Erden (Ansichten von atmosphärischen u. a. Phänomenen), Jos. Gabriel Frey, 1878
Tags:
research /
system /
cycle /
darkness /
sun /
solar /
astronomy /
solstice /
rainbow /
phenomena /
magnetic_field /
storm /
weather /
moon /
atmosphere /
earthquake /
Josef_Gabriel_Frey /
aurora /
midnight_sun /
tornado /
Chakras 2013-07-02
Tags:
research /
circle /
light /
sun /
body /
New_Age /
universe /
religion /
solar /
hippie /
spectrum /
colour /
heliotherapy /
chacras /
Gimpos M25 25 Hour Spin 2013-06-23
Gimpo's 25
Bill Drummond
21 March 1998
'Fuckin' brilliant idea Gimpo. Can I do it with you?'
That was about three months ago. Today is 21 March. I've just arrived at the agreed rendezvous point, South Mims Service Station, parked up my truck and I'm looking for Gimpo's white transit van. I'm late. But Gimpo is later. A van pulls up beside me. On the side is daubed, 'Gimpo's Non Stop, 25 hour, M25 Spin'.
'You're late. Get in,' shouts Gimpo.
This is Gimpo's plan. For the next 25 hours, a certain Mr Green and I are going to drive around the M25. For those that don't know, the M25 is an orbital motorway that circumnavigates the nation's capital. You have to drive 124.5 miles to get all the way round. Gimpo has a notion that if we keep driving for the allotted time, he will find out where the M25 leads. It is best not to rationalise Gimpo's notions. Gimpo loves the M25. Gimpo loves to drive. He loves to view the rest of the world through the windscreen and, when he is too far gone to drive, to take the film back home and watch it again and again and again.
We make it to the Queen Elizabeth Suspension Bridge by twelve noon, the official starting point and time. When you experience things like the Queen Elizabeth Suspension Bridge, you fall in love with the modern world all over again. All that engineering. All that wonder. All that height and breadth, and 'aren't we just like ants'. There's a high blue sky. The Thames shines, snakes up to London in the west and slides down into its estuary on the east. Below us are the pylons and power stations, industrial estates and entertainment complexes of the Essex wastelands. And I love that too. On a sunny spring day, you can love almost anything. Gimpo is already raging and we have only just begun. We are heading clockwise. Gimpo tells me to drive the first two laps, then we will fill the tank, have a slash and change drivers. Gimpo is in the back, checking his boxes of films, cleaning his lenses, packing and repacking his kit bag. It's Gimpo's army training. He was a gunner in the Falklands War. They taught him how to concentrate his mind on the details of packing and cleaning, repacking and polishing, taking to bits and putting back together, again and again and again. Now, more of Gimpo's orders are being barked down his mobile. His mobile is held together with Gaffa tape. Gimpo loves Gaffa. But not white Gaffa. He hates white Gaffa. It has to be black or silver. His mobile is almost permanently shoved up against his right ear, the less deaf of the two. Gimpo is a pit bull of energy, unfocused rage and terminal paranoia. The only thing that Gimpo can do to sooth his seething is unpack and pack, check and re-check, spit and polish. Gimpo is both a man of our time and a man of any time. The history of England has been built on men like Gimpo. He is the bulldog spirit, the 'never say die', the original Tommy. The only reason why Harold lost the Battle of Hastings was 'cause Gimpo was not there (he was fighting the rearguard action against the Vikings). But Gimpo was at Agincourt. He was with Oliver in his New Model Army. He was Napoleon's Waterloo. He survived the Somme. Was the toughest desert rat Monty never knew. He is the true embodiment of the nation. I'm just glad I'm not English.
Gimpo starts to reveal his vision. He wants this thing, this Gimpo M25 spin, to become an annual event. The closest Saturday night/Sunday morning to 21 March each year, to mark the opening of the rave/festival/drug-taking/banging/techno/hippie thing that Gimpo and his weird mates know all about. He wants loads of other people to join in, come out in their cars, vans, trucks, loaded up. A non-stop 25 hour party, road to nowhere sort of thing; car stereos cranked up, people screaming, pumping horns, blowing whistles. Hundreds, thousands, pouring out of Clacky services. Not a race, but a celebration of this broken down modern world, where the M25 would get clogged up, grind to a standstill, the authorities could do nothing - and Gimpo would be king.
Mr Green is an artist from Warrington. He keeps his counsel. This is not the place to tell you about his twisted, ego-driven visions. I'm sure in time he will let you know all about them himself.
I'm driving as fast as I can, hogging the outside lane when the inner would do. Headlights flash me as I am forced to move over. One circumference is 125 miles. The second is only 124.5. Everything looks normal. I've seen it all before. The North Downs, the Surrey Woods, the Plains of Heathrow, up round the top M1 junctions, St Albans Cathedral in the distance, back down through Essex. All boringly familiar. But we know the further we go, the less familiar it will all become. We will begin to see things not seen before, discover new meaning in the signposts. The lie of the land. Lost tribes. The tank is almost empty. We pull in at Clacky Service Station, fill the tank, buy trash food, have a slash. Gimpo has a stop watch. The pit stop has taken us 9 minutes and thirty-seven seconds. He is not happy with this. Mr Green takes the wheel. We move back out into the flow. The eternal. The around and around. the headlights are coming on. The light is failing. The football results are coming through. End of the season is in sight and things are hotting up. And Mr Green is a dangerous driver. The weirdness is kicking in. It's a drug-free zone; even though Gimpo has invested heavily in all-night chemicals, Mr Green and I just say No. Mr Green cuts another artic. up, slams the brakes, ploughs through a dozen cones in the contraflow. Oncoming headlights blind, jumbo jets climb into the shepherd's delight sky. It's getting good. Gimpo is swimming in his hammock, mobile pressed to his ear, laughing and screaming at some London low-life friend.
'Yeah, it's me, Bill and Mr Green, 25-hour spin around the M25. Do you want to come and give us a wave? Bring us a cake? Toss us off?' It must be a woman. I hear, 'Look, wear that black leather miniskirt with no knickers. Stand on the bridge so we can look up as we go under'
Mr Green and I get talking about the Union Jack. How brilliant, the Labor Party move to use a Union Jack logo in their election campaign. Real carpet-pulling from under the Tories' feet. Such a loaded icon. It gives so many weird signals. Jimmy and I saw Damon Hill do his lap of honour at Silverstone, flying the flag and we thought, 'Far fuckin' out Damon. Let's liberate the flag for the common man.' You can't help but be jealous of the Yanks, who rally around the Stars and Stripes, from ghetto nigger to southern white trash from New York yid to mid-west WASP. To burn the Stars and Stripes is one powerful political statement, saved only for moments of national self-doubt. To burn the Union Jack is just a waste of a good tea towel. You don't agree with me? I don't know if I agree with myself.
Once, Jimmy and I had this idea we should reform The KLF. Massive campaign for the comeback single. Billboard posters, full-page ads, prime-time TV commercials, all with the words 'God Save the Queen' - The KLF'. Nobody would hear it until the moment of release. Everybody else would be thinking the track would be some postmodern update on the Pistol's classic, mashed with our national anthem, the Queen's Christmas speech, some monster beat and a pumping, sub-sonic bass riff. Wrong. It would be just a straight rendition of our national anthem, the one they used to play at the end of the main feature, and which when I was a kid you still stood up for. And the video would be the royal standard fluttering in the wind. For three and a half minutes, no edits. Thankfully, the idea remains unrealised. But as for Union Jacks, Jimmy and me, there is a job there yet to be done. And Marc Wellenger hasn't done it.
Of course, we try to keep to toll gate twenty-three on each lap. Some habits you can't break, like wanking and picking your nose. Gimpo hits me with a concept that he tries to convince me my mate and fellow literary arsehole Z has already agreed to. A 25-day non-stop M25 journey. Just me, Gimpo and Z, the idea being that Z and I could finish our journey-up-the-Congo book while we spin round the 25. I'm filled with dread at the idea and hope it doesn't become a reality.
Darkness. Gimpo lights candles in the back of the van. Lap five, and a buzz is tingling my body like some strange and untried chemical. Talking of which, Mr Green has put on a Chemical Brothers cassette. A live performance, where they bang into 'Sergeant Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band', The Beatles' version with some added beats and noise. I'm out there. I'm hanging in the hammock. The candles flicker, the night shimmers ahead, my mind slips its moorings. For some reason, the three of us and this van are an old-fashioned tin-opener going around the equator, opening the world up, and the worms are getting out. the fact that Tony Blair is younger than me is somehow connected. No drink, no drugs, just the hypnotic effect of the sodium lights. I love it.
My shift. Midnight to 4 a.m. Me and Gimpo up front. 'Sailing By' brings the closedown of Radio Four. Somewhere up near the St Albans turn-off, we can see a huge bonfire and a daisychain of people silhouetted against the flames, dancing around and around. The rain is falling but they keep going. I explain to Gimpo that like us they are celebrating the equinox, but with a Beltane fire. A bunch of hippies in a dark, wet field and us on a miserable motorway, each going round and round. The rites of spring. Pagan roots. Nailed to the cross and risen on the third day. My biblical leanings grasp at a walls-of-Jericho analogy. Round and round we go, and the walls will crumble. On Monday morning, 2,300 points will have been wiped by the Footsie 11, and nobody will know why except for us. The mother of Parliament's bastard son will have burned down the palace, raped Harry in the tower and taken a shit in your girlfriend's handbag.
Stop stop stop.
Calm down Bill.
Hale Bopp streaks the northern sky. The World Service informs us that Buddhist monks are rampaging on the road to Mandalay. Kinshasa is falling and Mobutu is on the run. Channels are changed. Melody FM. Abba's 'Fernando' - mariachi trumpets, a tale of war, death, love and loss. Sodium lights like a ten-mile serpent, heading for the estuary. Downriver like Iain Sinclair. What would Sinclair make of the psychogeographical possibilities of this, our mindless journey? I am hoping to uncover some psychogeographical facts about both the ancient and modern roads and routes that radiate out of the unseen metropolis, around which we are winding and tightening our strange spell. I may be sliding in and out of reality, but Gimpo's intensity is scaling to new heights. He is still raging into his mobile. It seems the support team have not once been at the right place at the right time to capture on video this transit van hurtling by. I'm thinking, how long is this new girlfriend going to take Gimpo on full throttle? The novelty value of the man soon wears thin. Added to this is the fact that two cameras in the van keep jamming. As far as Gimpo is concerned, the whole thing is a disaster. He was planning on having a complete 25 hour film, every cat's eye of the way. Not a moment missed. Real time to the max. But it is not to be. He bangs out some more numbers on his mobile and takes it out on whoever answers. The film of this journey (I think) is to be a follow up to his first major movie, Watch The K Foundation Burn a Million Quid. I can't stress strongly enough how important this 25 hours is for the man. He has talked of nothing else since first revealing his plan to me back in Cardiff three months ago. Mr Green is saying very little as the hours skid by. He observes. I try to ask him, why Mr Green and not just Dave? People will think it's some sort of corny reference to Reservoir Dogs. Then he tells me if I write up anything about this journey, he just wants to be known as Dave. But the contrary side of my nature gets the best of me, and Mr Green it is, Tarantino or not.
Gimpo is at the wheel. Light is streaking the eastern sky ... and all that descriptive stuff about breaking dawns. Lap eight. Through toll-gate twenty-three and back up into ancient Kent. The waking Weald. The garden of England. Cockney hop-pickers, the turning for Canterbury. Gimpo's Tale - now that would be good. The Carpenters' 'For All We Know' is cranking through the three-inch speakers, compressed to fuck and sounding like one of the best records ever made. A green hill covered by a sprawling car boot sale. Above, the clouds break and massive sun beams shaft down, illuminating the hill, already crawling with Sunday morning seekers one bargain away from happiness. It's like a neo-classical canvas depicting the smallness of man in all his little ways, and the power and glory of the Almighty as he looks down on his wayward creation.
The turning for Brand's Hatch, and my mind turns from the biblical to Damon's bad career move in signing to Arrows. For me and Gimpo, Johnny Herbert is our man. No glamour, no chance, born loser, but at times, for some unknown reason, gets to the chequered flag before the others. A small clump of primroses brings morning gold. Will they spread like they do down the Devon stretch of the M5? Or like the wild lupins on the M6 as it cuts through Birmingham? Gimpo's rage at the universe has found a new avenue as he hurls his beloved mobile phone out the window. I momentarily hear a female voice plead 'but Gimpo' before it smashes into the side of a passing artic. Gimpo then turns the video camera on himself. It's set up on the dashboard. I'm in the hammock. Mr Green's asleep on the passenger seat. Gimpo's voice is shot through, but he starts to bark, scream, glare at the unblinking lens. His madness, his psychosis, his vanity, his vulgarity pour from his scarred soul as he tries to explain this journey of his. His inarticulate genius. His excuse for living. His sordid reality. (For those interested in such facts, I've heard from various reliable sources that Gimpo can fuck harder, faster and for longer than any other man in London.) He starts to get maudlin, he starts to apologise to the camera for being a cunt to his girlfriend. It's like I'm eavesdropping on some last confession before Mme Guillotine drops. He must assume I'm asleep. Some of the stuff he is coming out with is pretty embarrassing, and I won't embarrass my mate by documenting it here. He falls silent, and my paranoia tells me that this whole M25 thing is some sort of elaborate suicide plot.
I drift into sleep for a while. I dream a dream where Gimpo tells me that in the future the crusties, the ravers without hope, the ferel underclasses, will live on the M25 in broken down buses, discarded containers, packing cases and anything else that can be procured for nowt and provide shelter against the rains. The M25 will be taken over, clogged up, no longer used as a thoroughfare to nowhere. It will be like one of those forgotten canals behind backstreets in Brum, stagnant and dank, fit only for dead cats and stolen shopping trolleys, until it is ripe for future heritage culturalists to proclaim its worth as a site of historic interest. It will be a place where Gimpo will be king. The dream shifts, and I see Gimpo robed in purple trimmed with ermine held shoulder-high by a pack of Swampy's wayward grandchildren. They are carrying him to a throne built from a distant forklift truck and broken pallets, decorated with hub caps and liberated crown jewels.
'Last lap,' Gimpo shouts, and I awake from my dreams of his coronation. I clamber into the front. The three of us peer out the truck screen at our fellow Sunday travelers. Mr Green seems disappointed; he was hoping for something to happen, something to be revealed, for some sort of breakthrough. Gimpo says, 'It might yet happen.' I say, 'Maybe it already has. we just don't know it yet. These things take some time.' We are passing by Heathrow pylons, J.G. Ballard Crashlands. M40 westbound. Blackthorn blossom, catkins and gorse gold. Wild cherry, hovering kestrel. Not one dead fox, dead badger, dead rabbit, even dead hedgehog, but lots of dead pheasants. I notice these things. So does Gimpo, and he notices so much more, but I'll wait till the Congo book is written before revealing the true essence of Gimpo and the awfulness of his vision of our land.
Back into Herts, St Albans cathedral on the horizon. Two minutes to one. The pips. Gimpo goes berserk. The job has been done. We pull up on the hard shoulder. Trucks plough by. Gimpo is out. Down the embankment. Hammering in a wooden stake with a huge wooden mallet that I gave him as a wedding present. Mr Green has prepared a Wedgewood-blue plaque. These are the words printed on it:
On March 22nd/23rd 1997 Dave Green, Bill Drummond and Gimpo drove around the M25 for 25 hours non-stop. This plaque marks the point where the journey was finished.
This is nailed to the stake. Mr Green has also got a camera. He takes our pictures. We smile. A job well done.
Postscript: The Truth Will Out
If you are the type to remember such things as when Halley's Comet last visited our corner of the Solar System, you may have reckoned that my 'Gimpo's 25' story to be mis-dated by at least 365 days. Well if you did, your reckoning would have been right. The story was written a month or so before I made it to my forty-fifth year, but because I wanted it included I lied about the date and added a year on to it.
Tags:
research /
text /
repeat /
loop /
vehicle /
cycle /
movement /
car /
driving /
drive /
circle /
quote /
sun /
orbit /
course /
road /
M25 /
1998 /
Bill_Drummond /
Gimpo /
Olaus Magnus, on Finnmark and its Inhabitants 2013-06-23
Olaus Magnus, Historia de gentibus septentrionalibus, book 1, On Finnmark and its Inhabitants, Published 1555
Illustrating that the year in the far North consist of one day and one night only.
Tags:
research /
cycle /
darkness /
Norway /
sun /
solar /
astronomy /
1555 /
Olaus_Magnus /
Finnmark /
Look at the Sun 2013-01-18
YOU LOOK AT THE SUN. THEN YOU RETURN HOME AND YOU CAN'T WORK, YOU'RE IMPREGNATED WITH ALL THAT LIGHT
from Jonas Mekas, To New York with Love, 2007
Tags:
research /
text /
darkness /
light /
quote /
sun /
Jonas_Mekas /
Jonas Mekes Quote 2013-01-03
Let's record the dying century and the birth of another man... Nothing should be left unshown or unseen, dirty or clean: Let us see and go further, out of the swamps and into the sun.
Jonas Mekas, Movie Journal: The Rise of a New American Cinema, 1959-1971, Macmillan, New York, 1972, p. 236 (April 21, 1966)
Tags:
research /
text /
light /
quote /
sun /
film /
camera /
Jonas_Mekas /
solar system chart 6938 2012-12-02
Tags:
research /
system /
light /
circle /
model /
2013 /
sun /
orbit /
universe /
order /
solar /
course /
midsummer /
solstice /
cosmos /
star /
St._Hansbal /
Michael Maier Atalanta Fugiens 2012-12-02
ATALANTA FUGIENS, THE FLEEING ATALANTA - NEW CHYMICAL EMBLEMS OF THE SECRETS OF NATURE
MICHAEL MAIER, Count of the Imperial Consistory M.D., Eq. ex. &c
1618
Tags:
research /
darkness /
light /
sun /
solar /
astronomy /
solstice /
1618 /
Michael_Maier /
Robert Fludd The Primordial Darknes 2012-11-02
Et sic in infinitum (and like this to infinity)
Utriusque Cosmi Maioris scilicet et Minoris Metaphysica, Physica, atque Technica Historia (The Metaphysical, Physical, and Technical History of the Two Worlds, Namely the Greater and the Lesser)
The primordial darkness of the universe at the moment before creation.
Tags:
research /
darkness /
space /
sun /
black /
creation /
Robert_Fludd /
1617 /
infinity /
Robert Fludd The Tuning of the World 2012-11-02
R. Murray Schafer … the earth forms the body of an instrument across which strings are stretched and are tuned by a divine hand. We must try once again to find the secret of that tuning.”
Tags:
research /
energy /
space /
sun /
noise /
religion /
black /
order /
sound /
geometry /
music /
audio /
acoustic /
Robert_Fludd /
1617 /
chord /
R_Murray_Schafer /
Robert Fludd 2012-11-02
Tags:
research /
darkness /
light /
circle /
space /
sun /
black /
map /
astronomy /
cosmos /
Robert_Fludd /
1617 /
sun pod 2012-08-26
Tags:
research /
photograph /
product /
box /
belief /
energy /
light /
booth /
artificial /
sun /
body /
podium /
training /
screen /
cabinate /
solar /
plastic /
orange /
therapy /
view /
accumulator /
skin /
chamber /
dome /
summer /
pod /
isolation /
tank /
insulation /
light therapy 2012-08-26
Tags:
research /
photograph /
arena /
belief /
circle /
light /
space /
empty /
sun /
studio /
New_Age /
religion /
screen /
lights /
hippie /
therapy /
accumulator /
chamber /
dome /
etheric /
club /
colour /
spectrum /
heliotherapy /
chacras /
room /
Nikolai Astrup, St. Hansbal 2012-01-11
Nikolai Astrup, St. Hansbal.
Astrup sitt eige notat, udatert brev til borgermester Aslaksen , Arendal, etter 1905 / Kunst og kultur 1928, s. 227-230.
"Hun matte slik som jeg selv og mange andre barn her pa Vestlandet lide under den fanatiske religiositet som en tid herjet blant de eldre her. Alt var synd - like til det a renne pa kjelke. Og St. Hansnatten, nar balene brente rundt i fjellene og menneskene myldret som sorte punkter oppover fjellsidene og de rodkledde jenter med de hvite skjorteermerne ringet seg som lyse prikker og gnister om blussene, da var det synd for kristne folk a vaere med, da matte den lille jentungen og jeg sta pa avstand bak gjerdet og se og hore, hvordan de andre danset om balet og hujede av glede. Den siste rest av urreligion som ubevisst blusset opp.
Jeg fikk en forestilling om at dette med balet var noe syndig, noe stygt, som ble bedrevet i det gronne halvmorket – noe hedensk. Og dette ble enda mer forsterket ved sjalusien som grov i brystet nar de andre barna fikk vaere med, og jeg matte sta utenfor. Og slik sa jeg min lille lidelsesfell e – og den stygge, gule ilden, som ikke lyste i sommernatten, men som lokket og drog meg nettopp fordi den var omgitt med mystikk, ugudelighet, og ra hedenskap. Og til sist turte jeg meg inn blant de ugudelige. Men den lille piken stod igjen og sa pa med det bleke ansiktet og de store, sorte oynene som suget ilden i seg.
Slik er det jeg opprinnelig har bildet inne i meg."
Tags:
research /
text /
belief /
desire /
light /
quote /
Norway /
sun /
religion /
landscape /
magic /
fire /
midsummer /
summer /
pagan /
St._Hansbal /
1905 /
1928 /
Nikolai_Astrup /
sin /
top of page