1.10.10

Absence Winnower

Human –
We are nurtured by mythology.
I reject human mythology
Emotion is instinct sublimated

Hope is sublimation of
Instinct to survive

I reject my own mythology.
I will shatter my bones brutally;
I will shatter yours tenderly.

The fact of life only demonstrates existence.


© Iryna Harpy

11 comments:

Ruela said...

Instinct

yes.

doriandra said...

stunning..

Rosa Matilde Jiménez Cortés said...

Sublimated through art the most hidden and transparent to our being. Angels and demons that inhabit the same cave sharing light and shadow.

Aaron Held said...

Excellent :)

Anonymous said...

Ruela -

Indeed, I truly believe that (to our own detriment) as we became abstract thinkers we confused instinct with emotional states.

Anonymous said...

Doriandra -

Coming from you and your wonderful, wonderful mind I am truly humbled by your comment!

Anonymous said...

Dearest Rosa -

Yes, we have created states of emotion and mind that we can describe to each other via imagery that is common to all of our cultures.

One of the functions of art, to my way of thinking, is giving voice/forum in which we question and challenge ourselves and others.

There are 'angels' and 'demons' lurking in the waters of our darkest recesses, an expression of our discomfort with being corporeal beings and knowing that we are mortal. We use this lexicon to elicit response from our own 'self' and 'audience'.

The purest function of 'Art' is being the domain in we communicate with 'self' and 'other': the formulation of individuation and commonality.

Anonymous said...

Aaron -

This piece 'came into being' as a result of several long dialogues between Lee Kwo and myself.

I love the voracious appetite you have for art/creativity/analysis/et al. Don't think that I didn't notice that you'd read this on my MS blog within about a half an hour of being posted! I returned to the post because I was going to add another line but changed my mind. Lo and behold, you'd already been there!

Big hugs to you for your passion for analysis and exploration of the state of being!

Aaron Held said...

You have a lot of good thoughts in your work and in your comments to others.

I only wish I had some better things to say to them, I'm not very good with words or saying my opinion.

But just out of curiosity what did mean when you wrote "Existence is not living"? I'm sure I can think of what it could mean, just curious to know what you meant.

Keep up the good work Iryna.

You seem to know how to capture how life is in your words and you know how to do it in very few lines

Peace!

Anonymous said...

Ah, Aaron... yes, I'm not surprised that you picked up on this line (clever boy, you!).

This was the line I found myself grappling with because it lends itself to far too an open an interpretation.

Your query has reinforced the need to tighten it up. Naturally, the process of tightening won't necessarily produce/elicit the response I am after but, at the least, I'm hoping to exclude that which was not my intent to infer. I grappled with 'Existing is not life', '[Mere] life is not existence' and, probably more accurately, "The fact of life only demonstrates the notion of existence."

I'm not sure of how to deal with this line because I did want to keep it terse. KwoMan and Justin Lee Brown understood it, but that was only because we are in constant email contact and the notion was already in place between us...

Ultimately, on re-reading it (and your question), I realise that the line is wrong, wrong, WRONG. It implies a far more simplistic notion of not living ones life to the fullest. That is NOT what I wanted to ascribe as a 'conclusion' of sorts. Other responses on MySpace reinforced that this line was the most salient and could not/should not be ascribed an easy way out of interpreting the sensibilities of which I write. There are so many poems and prose that lead the reader to a simplistic conclusion: quality of life is what makes our time 'being' is the Holy Grail, therefore the daily drudge and the idiocy of the system we are inducted into are valid as long as we make the 'best' of existing within such a system (okay, I call it Capitalism for lack of a better condemnation).

We are fed on gods, masters, do’s and don'ts. Transgression as lifestyle is a difficult path to take. We are, essentially, animals born with instincts then funneled into what I believe to be truly immoral states of understanding: states of being judgmental. Renouncing such an existence; undoing/unlearning; knowing that instincts have been attributed false morality as a matter of ignorance and fear of the nothingness: these are humanity’s greatest and most brutal constraints. To comprehend that concepts such as ‘hope’ are based on basic instincts is to free oneself.

What happens after being freed is, however, an overstepping into a far more difficult existence…

Anonymous said...

PS Apologies for taking so long to respond. My husband had surgery a few weeks ago and I’ve had to look after him. I thought you deserved a decent response.

Well, I'm changing the line NOW!

Is discharge Dada? No, it is not. Influenced by and with a similar attitude to, but not Dada..

Is discharge Fluxus? No, it is not. Influenced by and with a similar attitude to, but not Fluxus.

Is discharge art for intellectuals? No, discharge is for anyone and everyone who appreciates creativity in all its myriad forms. Be it static visual, audio or moving image; the written word or the deconstructed, non-linear form. The spoken word and noise.

All creativity is the springboard for discharge. It highjack’s a multitude of genres and disciplines and transposes them onto the internet. discharge is electronically transmitted art, be it via blog, myspace or whatever format possible, it can also be produced and seen in classic formats.

The discharge Chapbook. The discharge Building by Parts book. discharge has no rules. All contributors to discharge are responsible adults. discharge has no leaders although it has an elected body of rotating editors who oversee rather than dictate the flow of the group.

The aim of discharge is to profile creative people and to do away with the pretension of the art world. Everyday people creating art everyday to an exceptional quality.

Art by barrow boys and girls. discharge is international.

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