ears are burning

Two of Three things I know about her

meumenino — Sun, 14 Mar 2010 09:54:43 +0000

Jean Luc Godard Two of Three things I know about her [1967]

More more more sophie calle…

meumenino — Thu, 11 Mar 2010 20:15:33 +0000

Sophie Calle’s beautiful North Pole Expedition Blog yum yum -> [here]

Maria’s chromatic diet – seven day plan

meumenino — Thu, 11 Mar 2010 16:04:31 +0000

In Levianthan by Paul Auster, the character Maria leads a life almost parallel to Sophie Calle’s, although Auster combined fiction with fact to bring Maria to life. In Double Game, Calle attempted to bring her life closer together with Maria’s by adapting to her quirky routines, such as the chromatic seven day diet:

MONDAY: ORANGE

(puree of carrots, boiled prawns, cantaloupe melon, orange juice)

TUESDAY: RED

(tomatoes, steak tartare, pomegranates, roasted red peppers, lalande de pomerol, domaine de viaud 1990)

WEDNESDAY: WHITE

(flounder, rice, fromage blanc, milk)

THURSDAY: GREEN

(cucumber, broccoli, spinnach, green basil pasta, mint cordial)

FRIDAY: YELLOW

(afghan omelette, potato salad, banana&mango icecream, fizzy lemon drink)

SATURDAY: PINK

(ham, taramasalata, strawberry ice cream, rose wine from provence)

- Sophie Calle, Double Game, p14-19

‘Me, Me, Me, Me’

meumenino — Wed, 10 Mar 2010 10:39:31 +0000

Tracey Emin Everyone I ever slept with: 1963-1995

Tracey Emin at 2007 Vennice Biennale

“‘Me, Me, Me, Me’ – If as an artist, Tracey Emin courts failure and revels in it, as a storyteller she’s superb. She lets us rummage through her life and aspirations, and into corners most of us keep well away from the public gaze. Is Emin an artist or an autobiographer? Either way, her only invention, and only subject, is herself.”

- Adrian Searle, The Guardian, 22 April 1997

Four.

meumenino — Tue, 09 Mar 2010 11:37:42 +0000

I sent out so many emails in a professional tone regarding my concerns over our colleague with no joy, no luck, they paid no attention. I was so frustrated, I mean, I had suspicions it had become so terrible she might to kill herself and these people..! So, I sent out an email being totally emotional, lost my professional head, just screamed for attention to be raised on the matter – I was sure I had come across so irrational I would never be taken seriously and was embarrassed, but that was the one they responded to, I had loads of positive responses. It’s ridiculous, as a woman, to get anyone, any man of importance, to consider emotional matters as valid you have to come across as having particularly violent PMT, you know, I suppose its a case of s/he who shouts loudest…

- a phone conversation overheard on the train, first week of March2010, reassembled from memory

Possibly confirming men’s views of irrational women and their feelings, ‘isn’t this what men always thought women were like?’ [Miller] but I feel people, not divided by sex but united, respond best to emotion, international language that knows no boundaries.

public-private dichotomy

meumenino — Tue, 09 Mar 2010 11:20:18 +0000

Carolee Schneemann Interior Scroll [1975]

Janet Cardiff

meumenino — Mon, 08 Mar 2010 21:37:59 +0000

Sometimes you fall into a story, but sometimes you have to take steps to unravel it.

- Janet Cardiff, exerpt from Munster Walk 1 [1997]

John Updike & Sappho

meumenino — Sun, 07 Mar 2010 18:23:28 +0000

What I have written strains to be true but nevertheless never true enough. Truth is anecdotes, narrative, the snug opaque quotidian.

- John Updike Self-Consciousness

There are those who say

an array of horsemen,

and others of marching men,

and others of ships, is

the most beautiful thing on the dark earth.

But I say it is whatever one loves.

- Sappho, 16 On Helen

Paul Valery

meumenino — Sun, 07 Mar 2010 18:20:33 +0000

There is no theory that is not a fragment, carefully preserved, of some autobiography.

- Paul Valery

La double vie de Véronique

meumenino — Fri, 05 Mar 2010 23:12:04 +0000

Krzysztof Kieslowski La double vie de Véronique [1991]

My favourite scene in this film is when Veronique finds the picture of Weronika and is overcome with emotion at the realisation that her suspicions of being split in two in someway could be more than her imagination. This theory is later played upon and perhaps given some confirmation by the marianette maker (puppeteer) in the film’s final scene, with the eerily accurate echo of the two character’s lives – leaving the audience, who is able to read/see only what Veronique does, wondering what authority/knowledge this man has.

What I find most relevant to my research in this case however, is the fact that so much importance is placed upon small details by the protagonists (particularly the second – Veronique) that act microcosmically or have symbolic value to the realms acted within the narrative of their parallel lives. For example,

1) the twin puppets

2) When Veronique sees the photograph of Weronika she exclaims ‘thats not me…thats not my coat’

Here, there is a definite idea of an outside, omnipresent party having some kind of control over the two girl’s lives; either a godlike or puppeteer character, or the force of fate. The film plays with notions of familiarity and deja vu in an insightful manner that reminded me of the interconnectivity of the world, how all people share innate qualities that somehow bind individual lives together and of the possibility of fated lives. In La double vie de Veronique, Veronique manages to changes her fate through her shared insight and forewarning of the example of Weronika’s life, who acts as a kind of self-sacrificial martyr, and Veronique decides to give up singing choosing instead to share her gift by teaching.

In these instances, fate is both cruel and kind, evidently embedded in every material and immaterial thing/concept/feeling in the film, everything holds the potentiality for becoming very significant or vital to saving Veronique’s life (eg: the treasure trail made by the puppeteer) and it is this becoming potentiality that I am interested in.

If, everything that falls across my path by chance or as obstacle contains the potential of relevance, either directly to me or on diversion, I should at least attempt to unlock its potential and secure it’s purpose.