Infrarealist Manifesto, Mario Santiago Papasquiaro, 1975

In 2009, I published a translation of Roberto Bolaño's "Abandon everything again: First Infrarealist manifesto," written in 1976.  Since then, I have learned that this "first" manifesto was preceded by two others, both written in 1975: one by José Vicente Anaya, and another by Mario Santiago Papasquiaro (see here and here).

What follows is a translation of Mario Santiago's manifesto.  The original can be found, for example, here.  Anaya's manifesto can also easily be found at that site; a translation may be forthcoming on this blog.

Semi-relatedly, there is a recording of Mario Santiago reading one of his poems (in Spanish) here.

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Infrarealist Manifesto

WHAT DO WE PROPOSE?

NOT MAKING A JOB OF ART

SHOWING THAT EVERYTHING IS ART AND THAT THE WHOLE WORLD CAN MAKE IT

BEING INTERESTED IN "INSIGNIFICANT" THINGS / WITHOUT INSTITUTIONAL VALUE

/ PLAYING / ART MUST BE UNLIMITED IN QUANTITY, ACCESSIBLE

TO EVERYONE, AND IF POSSIBLE CREATED FOR EVERYONE

¡!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

CONTRADICTING ART / CONTRADICTING EVERYDAY LIFE (DUCHAMP) IN A

TIME THAT SEEMS ALMOST TOTALLY BLOCKED FOR

PROFESSIONAL OPTIMISTS

TRANSFORMING ART / TRANSFORMING EVERYDAY LIFE (US)

CREATIVITY / LIFE MISALIGNED AT ALL COSTS

(MOVING OUR HIPS TO THE PRESENT WHILE BATTING OUR EYELASHES

FROM THE AIRPORTS OF THE FUTURE)

IN A TIME WHEN MURDERS HAVE BEEN DISGUISING

SUICIDES

$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$

CONVERTING CONFERENCE ROOMS INTO FIRING RANGES¹

 (FESTIVAL INSIDE A FESTIVAL / WOULD DEBRAY SAY?²

%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%

BEETHOVEN, RACINE & MIGUEL ÁNGEL STOP BEING THE MOST USEFUL

THE MOST ADDICTIVE³, THE MOST NOURISHING: THE SOUND

BARRIERS THE SPEED LABYRINTHS (OH JAMES DEAN!⁴) ARE BEING

BROKEN INTO SOMETHING ELSE

“”””””””””””””””””””””””””””””””””””””””””””””””

 TAKING PEOPLE OUT OF THEIR DEPENDENCE & PASSIVITY

SEARCHING FOR UNPRECEDENTED MODES OF INTERVENING IN & DETERMINING THE WORLD

DEMYSTIFYING / TURNING INTO AGITATORS

NOTHING HUMAN IS FOREIGN TO US (GOOD) NOTHING UTOPIAN IS FOREIGN TO US

(SUPERGOOD)

+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++

AT THIS MOMENT MORE THAN EVER BEFORE, THE PROBLEM OF ART

CANNOT BE THOUGHT OF AS AN INTERNAL STRUGGLE BETWEEN CONTINGENTS / 

BUT ABOVE ALL AS A TACIT (ALMOST DECLARED) STRUGGLE BETWEEN

THOSE WHO ARE CONSCIOUSLY OR UNCONSCIOUSLY WITH THE SYSTEM

AND TRY TO CONSERVE IT PROLONG IT / AND THOSE WHO ALSO CONSCIOUSLY

OR UNCONSCIOUSLY MAKE IT EXPLODE

…………………………………………………………

ART IN THIS COUNTRY HAS NOT GONE FURTHER THAN A CURSORY TECHNIQUE

FOR DECORATIVELY EXERCISING MEDIOCRITY

$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$

"ONLY FREE MEN OF ANY STRIPE WILL BE ABLE TO CARRY THE FLAME FAR ENOUGH" (ANDRÉ BRETON)⁵

¡!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

RETURNING TO ART THE NOTION OF A PASSIONATE AND CONVULSIVE LIFE

CULTURE IS NOT IN BOOKS OR IN PAINTINGS OR IN

STATUES IT'S IN THE NERVES / IN THE FREE FLOW OF THE NERVES

A CLEARER STATEMENT: AN EMBODIED CULTURE / A CULTURE IN

FLESH, IN SENSIBILITY (THIS OLD DREAM OF ANTONIN ARTAUD)

555555555555555555555555555555555555555555555555555555555555555555555

EVERYTHING THAT EXISTS:

THE FIELD OF OUR ACTIVITY / AND THE FRENETIC SEARCH FOR

WHAT STILL DOESN'T EXIST

…………………………………………………………………………………………………….

OUR PURPOSE IS (THE TRUTH) PRACTICAL SUBVERSION

&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&

EXAMPLE OF TOTAL ART

TOTAL SCULPTURE (AND WITH MOVEMENT): A MANIFESTATION OF 10,000

TO 20,000 PEOPLE SUPPORTING THE STRIKE OF THE DEMOCRATIC ELEMENT

OF SUTERM⁶

TOTAL MUSIC: TRIPPING MUSHROOMS IN THE SIERRA MAZTECA

TOTAL PAINTING: CLAUDIA KERIK BACKWARDS AND FORWARDS / I INSIST:

BACKWARDS AND FORWARDS

TOTAL POETRY: THIS INTERVIEW DISSEMINATED TELEPATHICALLY OR WITH

THE ONLY MOVEMENT OF MY HAIR (AN AFRICAN LION'S) AND ALL ITS

ELECTRIC DISCHARGE

3333333333333333333333333333333333333333333333333333333333333333333333

WORLDS WAVES PEOPLE WHO INTEREST ME:

NICANOR PARRA CATULLUS QUEVEDO LAUTRÉAMONT MAGRITTE CHIRICO ARTAUD

VACHÉ JARRY BRETON BORIS VIAN BURROUGHS GINSBERG KEROUAC KAFKA

BAKUNIN CHAPLIN GODARD FASSBINDER ALAIN TANNER FRANCIS BACON

DUBUFFET GEORGE SEGAL JUAN RAMÍREZ RUÍZ VALLEJO EL CHÉ GUEVARA

ENGELS "THAT MASTER OF SARCASM" THE PARIS COMMUNE THE

SITUATIONIST INTERNATIONAL THE EPIC OF THE CASTAWAYS OF THE GRANMA (THEY FORGOT ME): HEIRONYMUS BOSCH (THE UNMISSABLE)

WILHELM REICH THE APORNOGRAPHIC MYSTICISM OF CHARLES MAGNUS THE 

MULTICOLORED EROTICA OF TOM WESSELMAN JOHN CAGE JULIAN BECK JUDITH

MALINA & HER LEAVING THEATER (AND TO CONCLUDE) THE MARQUIS DE

SADE HECTOR APOLINAR ROBERTO BOLAÑO JOSÉ REVUELTAS (AND HIS

DISCOVERY THAT THE DIALECTIC SOMETIMES WALKS LIKE

A CRAB) JUDITH GARCÍA CLAUDIA SOL (AND EVEN ON CLOUDY DAYS)

CLAUDIA SOL

%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%

WE CAN SHOOT 2 GUNS AT ONCE / I MEAN MORE THAN ONCE

BUFFALO BILL

STUPIDITY IS NOT OUR STRONG SUIT

(ALFRED JARRY DIXIT)

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Notes
1.  "STANS DE TIRO"
2. Jules Régis Debray; missing close parenthesis in the original
3. "LO MÁS ANFETAMÍNICO" - something like "the most like being addicted to meth"
4. In English in the original.
5. Where is this in Breton?  I recognize it but I can't find it.
6. SUTERM was an electrical workers' union.

Chess

Having become somewhat weary of the curatorial life, I have been preparing something new.  Still, one cannot always resist the impulse to organize and to collate.

The text below comes from John Locke's Essay Concerning Human Understanding, which can be found online in its entirety here.

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A company of chess-men, standing on the same squares of the chess-board where we left them, we say they are all in the same place, or unmoved, though perhaps the chess-board hath been in the mean time carried out of one room into another; because we compared them only to the parts of the chess-board, which keep the same distance one with another. The chess-board, we also say, is in the same place it was...

Andy Warhol, Chess Player, 1954

In the chess-board, the use of the designation of the place of each chess-man being determined only within that chequered piece of wood, it would cross that purpose to measure it by anything else; but when these very chess-men are put up in a bag, if any one should ask where the black king is, it would be proper to determine the place by the part of the room it was in, and not by the chess-board.

Max Ernst and Dorothea Tanning Playing Chess, 1948 - Source unknown

So if any one should ask, in what place are the verses which report the story of Nisus and Euryalus, it would be very improper to determine this place, by saying, they were in such a part of the earth, or in Bodley's library: but the right designation of the place would be by the parts of Virgil's works; and the proper answer would be, that these verses were about the middle of the ninth book of his AEneids, and that they have been always constantly in the same place ever since Virgil was printed: which is true, though the book itself hath moved a thousand times, the use of the idea of place here being, to know in what part of the book that story is, that so, upon occasion, we may know where to find it, and have recourse to it for use.

 Dorothea Tanning, End Game, 1944

First Works

WikiPaintings allows visitors to view all works by a given artist in chronological order.  The Salvador Dalí "collection" includes paintings dating from 1910, when the artist was 6 years old.  Moving forward in time, Dalí's predecessors show their faces one after another.  This leads to the invention of a game: begin at the beginning and move forward until you come across a work in which you can perceive nothing but the artist's own style.  Call this the First Work.

Salvador Dalí, The Station at Figueras, 1926, age 22

(The shadows, the shadowy figures, the desolate landscape of unexplained shapes, the trees obviously preparing for The Persistence of Memory.  If, in the application of paint, there is not yet Dalí, neither is there anyone else in particular [so far as is evident from the picture].)

Of course, there can be no winning this game.  Disputation can only lead further discovery.  If you, readers, decide to play this game, comment here with your findings.  I will perhaps post them, and more of my own, in future posts.

Another suggestion:

René Magritte, Nocturne, 1925, age 27

The Faces of Alexei Korzukhin

Alexei Korzukhin, Russian realist painter, 1835–1894. Wikipedia styles his portraits as "generally accepted as masterpieces of Russian portrait painting." Some highlights from a timeline on rusartnet:

• Born to a family of gold panners at Uktussky Zavod near Ekaterinburg (1835).
• One of the rebellious fourteen students who refused to paint the set topic in the competition for a major gold medal and resigned from the Imperial Academy of Arts with the title of second-class artist (1863).

[It isn't clear what the "set topic" was, but it seems the group was protesting the strict guidelines and divisions between high and low art that the Imperial Academy endorsed. They wanted to make art more accessible to the masses, and after leaving the Imperial Academy of Arts founded a collective called the Peredvizhniki, or The Wanderers, which later became the Society for Travelling Art Exhibitions. Evidently Korzukhin was a member of the society but did not participate in the exhibitions. More here, and, of course, here.]

• Suffered from nervous shock and poor health after witnessing the assassination of Tsar Alexander II on the Ekaterinburg Canal in St Petersburg (1881).

Master of portraiture thought Korzukhin may be, the extent of his mastery is more clearly evident in his portrayal of faces in action. Examples below, with details. Click on the full paintings for large versions.

Separation, 1872

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Before Confession, 1877

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Peasant Girls in a Forest, 1878

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In a Monastic Hotel, 1882

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The Sunday, 1884

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There Goes Petrushka, 1888

Fragments II: Symbol

Anima Sola

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blood flight by Jenny Hval

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[The Parnassians] still treat their subjects as the old philosophers and orators did: that is, present things directly, whereas I think that they should be presented allusively. Poetry lies in the contemplation of tings, in the image emanating from the reveries which things arouse in us. They take something in its entirety and simply exhibit it; in so doing, they fall short of mystery; they fail to give our minds that exquisite joy which consists in believing that we are creating something. To name an object is largely to destroy poetic enjoyment, which comes from gradual divination. The ideal is to suggest the object. It is the perfect use of this mystery which constitutes symbol. An object must be gradually evoked in order to show a state of soul; or else, choose an object and from it elicit a state of soul by means of a series of decodings.

Attributed to Stéphane Mallarmé.

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Iamblichus:

Granting, then, that ignorance and deception are faulty and impious, it does not follow that the offerings made to the gods and divine works are invalid, for it is not pure thought that unites theurgists to the gods. Indeed, what then would hinder those who are theoretical philosophers from enjoying a theurgic union with the gods? But the situation is not so: it is the accomplishment of acts not to be divulged and beyond all conception, and the power of unutterable symbols, understood solely by the gods that establishes theurgic union. For this reason, we do not bring about these things by thinking alone. If we did, their efficacy would be intellectual, and dependent on us. But neither assumption is true. For even when we are not engaged in thinking, the symbols themselves, by themselves, perform their appropriate work, and the ineffable power of the gods, to whom these symbols relate, itself recognizes the proper images of itself, not through being aroused by our thought.

New Mario Santiago Papasquiaro translations

I have good news for fans of Mario Santiago Papasquiaro, Infrarealism, Roberto Bolaño, Mexican poetry, DIY publishing, book collecting, good poetry, and everything else under the sun:

La Ratona Cartonera, a small Mexican publishing group, has been working on several translations of poetry by Mario Santiago Papasquiaro. (See my translation of an interview with MSP here.) Their translation of the 538-line poem Advice from a disciple of Marx to a fan of Heidegger is available for $15, which includes shipping and a one-of-a-kind homemade cover:



The proceeds from these will help fund La Ratona's next MSP translation. If you want one, send me an e-mail () or comment here with your e-mail address. Then I will send you my friend Laura Darling's e-mail address, which you can use to contact her and pay for the book via PayPal.

Laura was kind enough to give me permission to post an excerpt from the translation:

Mario Santiago Papasquiaro

Advice from a disciple of Marx to a fan of Heidegger





                                           

To Roberto Bolano & Kyra Galvan comrades & poets

                                   for Claudia Kerik & my good fortune  at having known her

"...it's as well at times

To be reminded that nothing is lovely,

Not even in poetry, which is not the case."

W.H. Auden

The world comes to you in fragments / in splinters:

in a melancholy face you glimpse a brushstroke by Dürer

in someone happy the grimace of an amateur clown

in a tree: the tremble of birds sucking on its nape

in a flaming summer you catch pieces of the universe licking their faces

the moment in which an indescribable girl

                   tears her Oaxacan camisole

exactly next to the half-moon sweat of her armpits

& beyond the peel is the pulp / & like a strange gift of the eye

                                                                              the eyelash

Maybe not even carbon dating will be able to reconstruct

   the true facts

These are not the times in which a naturalist painter

ruminates on lunchtime excesses

between Swedish gymnastic movements

& without losing sight of the pinkish-blue hues of flowers he hadn't

    guessed at not even in his sweetest nightmares



We are actors of infinite acts

      & not precisely under the blue tongue

               of cinematographic lights

for instance today / you see how Antonioni passes by

                  with his customary camera

observed by those who prefer to bury their heads in the grass

to get drunk on smog or whatever / so they don't add

                                                               to the scandals

that already make public roads impassable

by those who've been born to be kissed at length by the sun

& its daily ambassadors

by those who speak of fabulous coitus /of females unbelievable

                                      in this geological age

of vibrations that would've made you a tenacious propagandist of Zen

                                                                                              Buddhism

by those who have once been saved

from the kind of accidents that the crime rags call substantial

& who by the way are not--for now--counted among the flowers of the

    Absurd