Wednesday, 30 September 2015
Tuesday, 29 September 2015
Wednesday, 23 September 2015
Tuesday, 22 September 2015
Sunday, 20 September 2015
Equus Box: Old Favourites
Saturday, 19 September 2015
Friday, 18 September 2015
Thursday, 17 September 2015
Wednesday, 16 September 2015
Interview Room
Describe the history of the Oz Oz Alice blog.
In 2009 I was working on a recording project which didn't seem to want to restrain itself to just sonic concepts. I'd seen a few image blogs and wondered if a new kind of language and expression could be created through ciphers and coded references. At the time I had recently turned 40 and reacted badly to it, was struggling in my life and kept getting arrested and in trouble and was generally atrociously behaved. For the first couple of years it was very primitive and amateurish, but around late 2011 and into 2012 I discovered some techniques and it became something I'm proud of - I left all those early entries up anyway and resisted the temptation to rewrite history. You use a different part of your imagination when dealing with juxtaposed images. It stretches the faculties in new directions which you can't reach via performance art, music or writing. I wound it up in 2013 as I felt it had gone as far as it could go. Following a series of bereavements and extraordinary events in the three months it was offline I started it up again in February 2014 and it feels more intense and relevant than ever before.
What similar projects have you done in the past?
I've juxtaposed sound sources on records and made sleeve art and collages, but beyond the obvious cut-up aesthetic, underpinning OOA is the concept of sigil magic, to which I was introduced by a chapter in Colin Wilson's The Occult in my mid-teens, and had reinforced by TOPY. The most successful entries here will prefigure future events, either in public life or my private life. I would describe the mental condition in which I put together the posts as trance states. Time and again I've found resonances in previous entries which help me see the next one, and a history of talking to shrinks aside I can't believe otherwise than that the networks to which I've become privy through the exercises are real, outside human control, elsewhere.
What do you think viewers make of this blog?
I've never had any takedown notices despite clearly using copyrighted images, and it's had many many thousands of hits, sometimes in single months. I know it has a few fans, but as there isn't a comments section or contact address given I have no idea what the average person who chances on OOA thinks about it. I always liked Terry Eagleton's maxim that "all interpretations are equally valid". People can use reverse image search for many of the images, and discover easily enough where some of the texts and headers are from if they want. This is for a small audience and most of us came from the underground of experimental music and art. I'm aware in a world of emojis rapidly becoming the new hieroglyphics and often excellent tumblr image blogs made by moody teenagers that I'm far from the only person attempting to transcend language and point to things that cannot be said. I am someone who brings thirty extra years of life experience and an over-developed sense of aesthetics to this.
In 2009 I was working on a recording project which didn't seem to want to restrain itself to just sonic concepts. I'd seen a few image blogs and wondered if a new kind of language and expression could be created through ciphers and coded references. At the time I had recently turned 40 and reacted badly to it, was struggling in my life and kept getting arrested and in trouble and was generally atrociously behaved. For the first couple of years it was very primitive and amateurish, but around late 2011 and into 2012 I discovered some techniques and it became something I'm proud of - I left all those early entries up anyway and resisted the temptation to rewrite history. You use a different part of your imagination when dealing with juxtaposed images. It stretches the faculties in new directions which you can't reach via performance art, music or writing. I wound it up in 2013 as I felt it had gone as far as it could go. Following a series of bereavements and extraordinary events in the three months it was offline I started it up again in February 2014 and it feels more intense and relevant than ever before.
What similar projects have you done in the past?
I've juxtaposed sound sources on records and made sleeve art and collages, but beyond the obvious cut-up aesthetic, underpinning OOA is the concept of sigil magic, to which I was introduced by a chapter in Colin Wilson's The Occult in my mid-teens, and had reinforced by TOPY. The most successful entries here will prefigure future events, either in public life or my private life. I would describe the mental condition in which I put together the posts as trance states. Time and again I've found resonances in previous entries which help me see the next one, and a history of talking to shrinks aside I can't believe otherwise than that the networks to which I've become privy through the exercises are real, outside human control, elsewhere.
What do you think viewers make of this blog?
I've never had any takedown notices despite clearly using copyrighted images, and it's had many many thousands of hits, sometimes in single months. I know it has a few fans, but as there isn't a comments section or contact address given I have no idea what the average person who chances on OOA thinks about it. I always liked Terry Eagleton's maxim that "all interpretations are equally valid". People can use reverse image search for many of the images, and discover easily enough where some of the texts and headers are from if they want. This is for a small audience and most of us came from the underground of experimental music and art. I'm aware in a world of emojis rapidly becoming the new hieroglyphics and often excellent tumblr image blogs made by moody teenagers that I'm far from the only person attempting to transcend language and point to things that cannot be said. I am someone who brings thirty extra years of life experience and an over-developed sense of aesthetics to this.
Tuesday, 15 September 2015
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