rioters bloc
8th September 2005, 14:36
this is from "chaos: the broadsheets of ontological terrorism"
how you read it is completely up to you. in fact id be interested to hear people's interpretations :)
peace
POETIC TERRORISM
weird dancing in all-night computer banking lobbies. unauthorised pyrotechnic displays. land-art, earthworks as bizarre alien artefacts strewn in state parks. burglarise houses but instead of stealing, leave poetic-terrorist objects. kidnap someone and make them happy.
pick someone at random and convince them they're the heir to an enormous, useless, and amazing fortune -say 5000 square miles of antarctica, or an aging circus elephant, or an orphanage in bombay, or a collection of alchemical mass. later they will come to realise that for a few moments they believed in something extraordinary, and will perhaps be driven as a result to seek out some more intense mode of existence.
bolt up brass commemorative plaques in places [public or private] where you have experienced a revelation or had a particularly fulfilling sexual experience etc.
go naked for a sign.
organise a strike in your school or workplace on the grounds that it does not satisfy your need for indolence and spiritual beauty.
graffiti-art loaned some grace to ugly subways and rigid public monuments - PTart can also be created for public places: poems scrawled in courthouse lavatories, small fetishes abandoned in parks and restaurants, xerox-art under windshield-wipers of parked cars, big character slogans pasted on playground walls, anonymous letters mailed to random or chosen recipients [mail fraud], pirate radio transmissions, wet cement...
the audience reaction or aesthetic shock produced by PT ought to at least be as strong as the emotion of terror - powerful disgust, sexual arousal, superstitious awe, sudden intuitive breakthrough, dada-esque angst - no matter whether the PT is aimed at one person or many, no matter whether it is 'signed' or anonymous, if it does not change someone's life [aside from the artist] it has failed.
PT is an act in a theatre of cruelty which has no stage, no row of seats, no tickets and no walls. in order to work at all, PT must categorically be divorced from all conventional structures for art consumption [galleries, publications, media]. even the guerilla situationist tactics of street theatre are perhaps too well known and expected now.
an exquisite seduction carried out not only in the cause of mutual satisfaction but also as a conscious act in a deliberately beautiful life - may be the ultimate PT. the PTerrorist behaves like a confidence trickster whose aim is not money but CHANGE.
don't do PT for other artists, do it for people who won't realise [at least for a few moments] that what you have done is art. avoid recognisable art categories, avoid politics, don't stick around to argue, don't be sentimental; be ruthless, take risks, vandalise only what MUST be defaced, do something children will remember all their lives - but don't be spontaneous unless the PT muse has possessed you.
dress up. leave a false name. be legendary. the best PT art is against the law, but don't get caught. art as crime; crime as art.
how you read it is completely up to you. in fact id be interested to hear people's interpretations :)
peace
POETIC TERRORISM
weird dancing in all-night computer banking lobbies. unauthorised pyrotechnic displays. land-art, earthworks as bizarre alien artefacts strewn in state parks. burglarise houses but instead of stealing, leave poetic-terrorist objects. kidnap someone and make them happy.
pick someone at random and convince them they're the heir to an enormous, useless, and amazing fortune -say 5000 square miles of antarctica, or an aging circus elephant, or an orphanage in bombay, or a collection of alchemical mass. later they will come to realise that for a few moments they believed in something extraordinary, and will perhaps be driven as a result to seek out some more intense mode of existence.
bolt up brass commemorative plaques in places [public or private] where you have experienced a revelation or had a particularly fulfilling sexual experience etc.
go naked for a sign.
organise a strike in your school or workplace on the grounds that it does not satisfy your need for indolence and spiritual beauty.
graffiti-art loaned some grace to ugly subways and rigid public monuments - PTart can also be created for public places: poems scrawled in courthouse lavatories, small fetishes abandoned in parks and restaurants, xerox-art under windshield-wipers of parked cars, big character slogans pasted on playground walls, anonymous letters mailed to random or chosen recipients [mail fraud], pirate radio transmissions, wet cement...
the audience reaction or aesthetic shock produced by PT ought to at least be as strong as the emotion of terror - powerful disgust, sexual arousal, superstitious awe, sudden intuitive breakthrough, dada-esque angst - no matter whether the PT is aimed at one person or many, no matter whether it is 'signed' or anonymous, if it does not change someone's life [aside from the artist] it has failed.
PT is an act in a theatre of cruelty which has no stage, no row of seats, no tickets and no walls. in order to work at all, PT must categorically be divorced from all conventional structures for art consumption [galleries, publications, media]. even the guerilla situationist tactics of street theatre are perhaps too well known and expected now.
an exquisite seduction carried out not only in the cause of mutual satisfaction but also as a conscious act in a deliberately beautiful life - may be the ultimate PT. the PTerrorist behaves like a confidence trickster whose aim is not money but CHANGE.
don't do PT for other artists, do it for people who won't realise [at least for a few moments] that what you have done is art. avoid recognisable art categories, avoid politics, don't stick around to argue, don't be sentimental; be ruthless, take risks, vandalise only what MUST be defaced, do something children will remember all their lives - but don't be spontaneous unless the PT muse has possessed you.
dress up. leave a false name. be legendary. the best PT art is against the law, but don't get caught. art as crime; crime as art.