Snipe Revealed! Well sorta.... (images don't work)

[Azonthus]

Kami5476
Frumious Bandersnatch
Posts: 200
(12/6/00 11:33 pm)
204.30.222.254
Reply | Edit | Del All Snipe Revealed! Well sorta.....
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About three years ago a good friend called me up to say that he was
currating a show and really wanted me to put something in it. I was about to
politely refuse when he mentioned the theme of the show- Mask. He had been
over to my house a week earlier and saw that
the piece I was finishing up was a mask/helmet piece with a neck stand.
Every few years I make a self-portrait piece and this was my latest,
entitled "Spiritual Self Portrait." If you look at Mask image #1 you can see
that I was exploring darker aspects of my self at the time.
So I didn't have an out (Oh, I don't have anything that would fit the show)
and he knew it; and he was a friend so I agreed. I then sat down with the
piece and tried to decide how I was going to present it. I hate group shows,
especially if you don't know the work of the other showing artists. Your
work is only as strong as the weakest piece in a group show and I try to
avoid them if at all possible. I decided upon
a performance; a public unveiling of the mask. I wrote the following poem as
an outline to the performance. The poem was never read or presented to the
audience in any way, but it was running through my head as I went through
the performance. Let me set the stage... On a pedestal is a very large box
shaped object wrapped in rice paper(silkscreened with antique clock gears)
and tied with yards of red cord. A single spot light hangs overhead, the
rest of the gallery is dark. Within the wrapped paper is a metal cage I made
that sat over the mask. My intention was to enter, prowl around the box,
moving in to cut the red cord at strategic moments (following the poem in my
head) using a pair of bonsai trimming scissors, (The most beautiful scissors
known) until all the cord was off the box. I would then slowly peel the
paper off the cage to reveal the mask in the cage. A moment for the audience
to pause on the image, and then I would lift the cage off the mask. Except;
that ain't how it happened- everything up to that point was dead on- when I
went to lift the cage- it collapsed around the mask; raining steel rods all
over the floor. I spent three days spot welding that cage. I was delighted.
At the moment of Mask image #2, I held it for about thirty seconds, then
said (out loud this time) "I have begun." I put the mask down on it's rest
and the performance was over. This was the last public performance I've had,
and the last gallery show I've been in. I am currently putting together a
submission package for a gallery that I've had my eye on for some time now.
I was just waiting for the right moment, and have recently been dropped a
not so subtle hint. As part of the package I'll be shooting a new
self-portrait. I'll post it here when it's done.(With the kind assistance of
either Kami or Levka) This new self portrait will be my first done with
photography, which should be interesting for me.
And now, the poem.

Trail of the Mask

Time builds up
one sedimentary layer
then another
one history
atop another

Bound tightly in place
by traditions controlling interest
Empty
Hollow
Motions
Cycling repetition

All the while
Slowly
Crushing and Erasing
all who oppose

Waiting
Watching
Waiting again
for the cycle to complete
for the gears to mesh
and windows to sync

For time to start again.
(scissors)

Hands practiced
through eons of experience
trace timelines

All confidence
and grace
Fluid flesh and bone
Driven by instinct
and internal codes

Wait and
Strike (cut)

Pull back
and
Monitor

Feel the patterns
timing and balance
and
Strike (cut)
rhythm and motion
and
Strike (cut)

(all ropes off)






The facade

Snipe





Edited by: kidsplateusa at: 12/7/00 9:28:55 pm

Kami5476
Frumious Bandersnatch
Posts: 203
(12/7/00 11:25 pm)
63.11.53.89
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Re: Snipe Revealed! Well sorta.....
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Maybe more than "sorta"... thanks, Snipe.

Snipe
Unregistered User
(12/8/00 2:09 am)
12.72.102.48
Reply | Edit | Del Thanks Kami and Levka!
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The images loaded well; 'cept they pasted over the last bits of the poem (maybe it does need editing) The following is the last parts:

The facade falls
revealing histories unseen
concealing
lying tradition
smothering intention
masking a truth
peeling back Denial
stripping away the Hypocrisy

And time speeds up
tearing through beliefs and systems
that control and constrict

Down to unexplored motion
(last layer of paper)
Ancient
and
Seductive
purely physical

and time waits
Temptation so strong
to stay here forever
and the Self screams Stay
but something
Deeper
burns on
and time burns also

Tear past the veil
right down to the Self
and time watches amused
the Self trapped by Self

barred by Fear
locked by Doubt
imprisoned by Denial
the Fear slams first
Hard Shocks
as reference points fade

This is not me the Denial cries
while Doubt searches in vain
for any scraps of Self
time is delighted

with realization
the three slowly subside
to a dull ache and are gone
(remove cage)

The Silence is Absolute
and at the center the Self waits-
I have begun.


Time packs up
Realization and
Responsibility
dictate the removal
of any Final Time.









Kami5476
Frumious Bandersnatch
Posts: 206
(12/8/00 8:16 am)
204.30.222.50
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I prefer the long version to the edited one
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...your words touch me in a personal way, Snipe. Thanks for letting us see behind the mask a bit more, to the person that you are .

Houkan
Registered User
Posts: 44
(12/16/00 3:29 am)
139.134.27.67
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Re: Snipe Revealed! Well sorta.....
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Intriguing mask, Snipe. The poem is very touching and trueful as well.