Petrblt – Peter Eichenberger holds forth no more
Scientia aurea — Knowledge is Golden
Peter Eichenberger died Thanksgiving morning and proved well his enduring unique qualities with the breadth and nature of his mourning. Just one of those qualities was: if you were ready for it, Peter was down with it, and so he made many many friends. They have mourned the loss of his excellent company and all he might have said, but celebrated a life lived full speed and damn the torpedoes, smelling the roses and leaving no stone unturned along the way. Teasing and sarcasm was our way, as with many, and he would hate those cliches, but he was a man worthy hyberbole, since his life consisted of it.
I feel very lucky to have explored Cameron Park’s myriad of alleyways on bike with him this summer, and glad that I shared so many drinks at Sad’s with him, and I hate like the dickens I never got him together with my dad, whose stories of Depression downtown Raleigh and Southern Railroad energized him any time I touched on them. He could ably discurse on innumerable subjects, and he taught me much. He reminded me that Willie York had ditched and piped Pigeon House Branch to build the first shopping center in the Southeast when I was writing about that troubled creek, and he explained to me that the “geodesic” dome I liked so much at the Fairgrounds was actually made of hexagons (instead of pentagrams like Bucky’s). He could write in the Downtowner of dog history and at Metro of Raleigh history and in the Indy of technological history, but I loved to hear him talk of cultural history and the local media history he had lived with all these years. He was a writer, Raleigh’s own Gonzo, but he was rooted in the Earth by what he could do with his hands, which was just about anything if he wanted to.
What he wanted was for the world to be right and what he knew was that the world is very very screwed up. He was right, and when those dark spectres bothered him he would share about the Mayan prophecies or the bombed levees or some other conspiratorial tale that bothered some but seemed clearly to be metaphors: the world is very very screwed up.
Peter also gathered the best kind of vibes and lived in the harmony of many positive energies. Thus was he beloved and is honored by so many in the words that have flowed since his passing. He leaves behind many words of his own, but scattered over the town of Raleigh (and the world wide web) like raucous crows, singing a noisy chant of art, art for life, art against the controlling state and the corporate fascists, art for love. Peter love Peter.
Here are some of the many links for the outpouring online for Peter and links for his own writing:
Peter’s wonderful narrative in the Indy post accident
The Second Battle of New Orleans: notes of a bike repair warrior
remembrance by Indy’s Shirlette Ammons
Peter’s article archive at The Indy
Peter’s articles at Metro magazine
posts by Peter at Goodnight Raleigh
Peter’s articles at New Raleigh
Mark Kuykendall’s remembrance at New Raleigh
New Raleigh’s Memorial post w pics and words from many
NandO news article about Peter’s death
Lyrical Language Adventure
illustration by Christine Noad
Passejada Menerbesa / Wild Roman Byways
Miquel Decor reads his poetry
Hearing Miquèl Decòr read his poetry in Occitan, the ancient French language of the troubadours, was an amazing experience. Listening to him introduce each poem in French, than having his translator Jeannette Rogers say all of it in English, made it an amazing language experience. I went overboard at his performance in Chapel Hill and sight read my copy of Wild Roman Byways, his book, as he read his work. I continually glanced over at the French and English (a wonderful chapbook for a linguist) and nearly made myself sick. It was worth it, but when I heard him read at Meredith College I simply listened and it was just as wonderful. What an energy this man has, this retired schoolteacher from the countryside of southern France who has become a voice in his nation for the language of Oc. Wild Roman Byways describes the physical mileu of ancient Roman sites within a day’s journey of the author’s home. As he evokes the grass-bearded stone ruins and the rough bridges and grottos, he finds the imagist and musical gems in these landscapes and molds them into song. Miquèl does sing, and play, in fact has performed literally for the crown heads of Europe, and his presentation of poetry was a true performance.
Jeannette was so brave and effective as she matched up to her author with her English translations. She read them aloud beautifully and her translations read strongly – having no French, I can’t judge the actual translating, but the English poems are lovely, with such a grip on the natural world.
Below is a sample of this three language experience – Oc, French ,English.
Ma votz se vòl tamborn e resson de dalhaires,
E se pèrd dins los aires…
………..
Ma voix se veut tambour et ècho de faucheurs,
et elle se perd, dans les airs…
……..
My voice seems to throb and to echo with the sound
of reapers, then, becomes lost in the wind…
When the reading shifted away from Roman Byways to the lyrical love poetry more typical of Decòr’s work, the tone changed. Here he was even more demonstrative, and the intriguing qualities of the Occitan were more prominent. The poems were very masculine (think imagist Robert Bly) and the linguistic tones were somewhat Germanic, sometimes almost guttural. This was amazing to hear from the mouth of a Frenchman, and was one of many things about the whole experience that enlarged my perspective on the French character. Miguèl is immersed in the southern French countryside, and spoke passionately at the Chapel Hill reading about the history of Occitan in France and his own relationship to Paris and traditional French national culture. His parents forbade him to speak Oc but he learned it anyway from his godfather and has become one of its champions. There are Oc immersion schools in southern France, and Miguèl makes media appearances and participates on a national level with the preservation of the language.
Kudos to Jeannette for bringing this fascinating man to Raleigh and facilitating his poetry presentations – as well as translating and reading the poems! We will be hearing more of Jeannette as she continues her literary journey through the France of the troubadours.
To order a copy of Miguèl’s book, contact her:
jeannette.rogers(At)gmail.com
chateau en Minervois
Modern Troubadour and Local Translator Present Occitan to Triangle
In October, the Triangle will be entertained by a true modern-day troubadour. Miquèl Decòr, a prolific and original poet who carries on the ancient literary tradition of writing and performing in the Occitan (Oc) language, will be sharing his works at poetry readings in Raleigh, Chapel Hill and Pittsboro.
The poet and his translator, Raleigh resident Jeannette Rogers, will read in Occitan and English from two of his books which Rogers translated, “Wild Roman Byways” and “Heirs of the Moon.” These poetry readings, a collaboration between Meredith College and the Center for European Studies at The University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, are free and open to the public:
- Tuesday, Oct. 5 at 7 p.m., Global Fedex Center, UNC-Chapel Hill, Chapel Hill, N.C.
- Thursday, Oct. 7 at 7 p.m., The Joyful Jewel, Pittsboro, N.C.
- Thursday, Oct. 14 at 8 p.m., Carswell Concert Hall, Meredith College, Raleigh, N.C.
Decòr is a native and resident of the Languedoc region of France where the troubadours lived nearly a thousand years ago. From the 11th through the 13th centuries, 500 troubadours wrote and performed in Occitan throughout Europe. During that time they invented many forms of poetry, as well as biography and literary criticism, while they shifted the focus of literature in Western Europe from war to love. Modern Oc poets provide the connection to the significant literary heritage of the troubadours.
The author of 10 books, including poetry, drama and history, Decòr has been involved in many French cultural events and appeared on French television and radio. This is the poet’s first visit to the United States.
The information above is from Jeannette Rogers, who translates Decòr’s work and arranged for his visit to the U.S. Jeannette is a dear old friend who is fluent in French and creating a wonderful body of work as she develops historical novels set in medieval southern France and translates French and Occitan poetry.
Occitan is a Latin-sounding ancient version of the French tongue, one of the many endangered languages around the world. Miquèl Decòr and my friend Jeannette, who is learning Occitan as she translates it and works with Miquèl on trilingual presentations of poetry, are important figuress in an emerging renewal of of the language in French culture. As UNC’s press release states:
He was bathed in the culture of Occitan from his birth under the spell of his godfather, Uncle Jean, an actor. When he left home to study in Béziers, distance and longing caused him to write poetry in Occitan, his mother tongue.
Decor press release (loads pdf)
Miquèl Decòr
Ray Johnson Show a Multiple Power Play
“to make open the eyes” Josef Albers
All work of Ray Johnson on this site is used by permission of The Ray Johnson Estate
BMC to NYC: The Tutelary Years of Ray Johnson (1943-1967)
Ray Johnson was probably the most enigmatic and least appreciated artist of his importance in the 20th century. He was a man of many many layers, not so much depth, on first impression, just layers, fairly random factors that underlie and overlay his work. The show just ended at The Black Mountain College Museum and Art Center had many layers itself, over multiple valuable events, and provided a greatly needed showcase and explication for this “seminal figure of Pop Art” whose collages “influenced a generation of contemporary artists.”
The show and especially its catalogue were already reviewed here, but several subsequent events have enriched the impact of the show. Dr. Francis F. L. Beatty (quoted and seen above), a curator who works with the Ray Johnson Estate, gave a lecture at the BMCM+AC on May 21, using parallel slides to show that Ray displays elements in his collages that link him to the major artistic trends of the day. His wit, humor and intense communications of all kinds were highly stimulating but hard to classify, but his collages and the palette he created out of found and encountered material can be seen as fully in the tradition of Klee’ as well as Albers, while partaking of the humor of Dada. “I don’t make pop art. I make chop art.” Ray’s statement refers to his use of old work in new, and Dr. Beatty skillfully elucidated the way in which Ray’s “chop art” (often meticulous geometric constructions) came right out of his Black Mountain experience. She makes a point that reverberated through this show: the liberation of American education happening at Black Mountain served as well to “liberate Ray Johnson.” He found himself, and he found the principle that best illuminates the breadth of his work for me: images standing in for words, words become imagery.
ray_johnson by Rose Hartman via John Wilcock
Yet Ray remains enigmatic. Dr. Beatty spent much time on the 55 Moticos – huge intricate collages – which Ray made and destroyed, calling them “some of the earliest and most significant examples of Pop Art.” She recounted many personal interactions with Ray, such as the time he approached her and finally wanted to do a gallery display – of “Nothings.” Beyond his inscrutability, his avoidance of the commercial process, Dr. Beatty makes a simple but important point – the small scale of Ray’s visual work limited his gallery prospects and indirectly his artistic stature.
- Asheville Vaudeville performer closes Ray’s show
The scale of Ray’s imagination and willingness to live his life for art was unbounded, of course. The final night of the show, orchestrated by curator Sebastian Matthews, was a truly wild and wonderful event that did much to reflect Ray’s spirit. Music, poetry, and spoken word all filled the space.
“We have to seize the things we need to create.” These words were spoken in Picasso’s voice by Keith Flynt, one of the closing night performers (seen below).
Earl Bragg, seen above, offered a nine-eleven poem that featured number names – worthy of Ray’s glyphs and puns. His political themes and passionate phrases made for an excellent reading.
Local dramatists staged a reading of a collaged piece incorporating Ray’s play inside a play about Ray discussing a play with pink James Dean.
The final word has to go to Sebastian Matthews, who did such a magnificent job not only of putting on the show but of staying in touch with Ray’s spirit the whole time. He evoked and nurtured the image of Ray as filled with humor, energy – and a total lack of any sense of propriety. About the “chop art” and “lost art” which was so prominent in the show, he says: “Ray loved to make things up, kill them off, and resurrect them.”
The Ray show is dead, long live the Ray show.
Ray Johnson: Tracking Deep Currents
The Ray Johnson show at the Black Mountain College Museum in Asheville opened February 19th and will run through June 12, 2010. The opening was spectacular, the show is rich, varied and informative. For Ray J fans like me, the catalogue and it’s essays, assembled by show curator Sebastian Matthews, is the real treasure. Sebastian spent over a year studying Ray’s life and work, making connections with important people in Ray’s life (Ray passed in an act of suicide in 1995), and establishing his own perspective on the evolution of Ray’s art from a young art student in Detroit through a strong experience at Black Mountain College to an important role in the art scene of East Village in the 60’s and 70’s. The show displays extensive early work, including fairly typical ink doodles of 14 year old Ray, but also hilarious cards and visual puns from this period that presage his later work.
The show also reveals the aspect of Ray’s work I most needed to learn myself – that Ray came of age as an artist in the painterly traditions BMC and Josef Albers provided, and did lots of wonderful work as he evolved from painting to collage and then on to the correspondence work or “postal performances,” as Isa Bloom calls them, which made him most famous. The show focuses on Ray’s emergence out of Black Mountain College into the New York scene immersed in the ideas of his BMC mentors but prepared to follow Alber’s dictum: “to follow me, follow yourself.” As Sebastian Matthews says in his catalogue essay, “Ray was ripe for the challenges and experiences Manhattan had to offer.” He became one of the most intriguing and complex artists of the 20th century, and this show delineates many of the roots and threads that set him on his path.
The opening of the show was well attended and featured some aspects Ray might have liked very much, though he generally was quite ambivalent about exhibiting or selling or even saving his work. Poetix Vanguard offered spoken word performances during the event, and an open mike followed at a bar nearby. The BMCM+AC library, with many Ray J items prominent, provided a nice context for the highly varied show. Several of Hazel Larsen Archer’s gorgeous photos of Ray at BMC were on display. And Sebastian Matthews, collage artist himself and so clearly a Really Great Guy, presided with enthusiasm over the many energies he had gathered to celebrate the amazing career of Ray Johnson.
Ray J show window display at BMCM+AC
The catalogue contains 46 color plates, over a dozen images in the text, and several of Archer’s photographs. It also contains an interactive feature: a pair of postcards bound in as endpapers which the reader is invited to alter as desired and send off: one to a friend and one back to The Black Mountain Museum and Arts Center, whose program director Alice Sebrell is credited by Sebastian as being integral and vital to the process of creating the show. Five essays offer views of Ray that are remarkably varied and complementary.
Sebastian Matthews presents his curatorial essay as nine journal notes written while building the show. He elaborates his basic point: that Ray Johnson “used Black Mountain College as a springboard to propell himself into the Manhattan art world.” He also does a remarkable job, with his intense self-examinations, numerous concrete biographical insights, and constant awareness of Ray’s own probable intent to be inscrutable, of helping us have a “fuller sense of what Ray attempts when he sits down to make art, when he prepares to send out the work to be received, passed on, altered.” The quote is what Sebastian hopes to accomplish with the show, and I think he got there. He also truly transformed my personal sense of Ray J by portraying the intense, painterly, quite technical control Ray exerted over his collage work.
Ray Johnson’s career had many layers, and two essays by old friends of Ray offer insight into his early days in Detroit and his heyday in the East Village. Arthur Secunda contributed much material for the show and portrays in his recollection “Ray Johnson’s intelligence, mysterious youthful verve and artistic ingenuity.” William S. Wilson, the primary lender of the collage works, and one of Ray’s long-time art buddies, makes his essay a tour de force in Ray J style quirkiness and abrupt juxtapositions. He says “Ray Johnson was a student of the imaginations of other people.” He ably describes Ray’s focus not on abstract ideas but direct concrete responses, because Ray “worked to remain within immanences, eluding transcendentals.”
Two academic writers share their ideas about the inportance and significance of Ray’s work. Julie J. Thomson thoroughly documents the large and lasting influence Josef Albers had on Ray’s work. She also describes the way Ray’s work related to the “Happenings” and other art trends of the times. Kate Erin Dempsey, in “Code Word:Ray,” shared a long excerpt from her work in progress about Ray and his reaction to and use of the fad for secret codes and hidden messages raging in the 1950s. Expanding on the fascinating work she shared at the BMC conference, she convincingly demonstrates Ray’s fascination with language and its manipulation for artistic purposes. Furthermore, she follows this thread from radio show decoder rings through the Mayan hieroglyphics and glyphs revered at BMC, to Ray’s mature use of found images – giving them a “new lease on life – enhancing or altering their meaning entirely by arranging them in novel ways.” Kate’s work at the BMC conference, this essay, and hopefully her future book will all warrant future Ray J posts.
The kernel I found that connected all these essay? Nothings – empty shells of meaning – e.g. nonsense – that serve as markers and triggers for the kind of nonlinear art experience Ray Johnson wanted you to have. William S. Wilson talks of “the surface concealed only by another surface.” Julie J. Thomson finds their roots in “the gap, an element emphasized by Albers in his teaching,” and makes the valid and often repeated connection between Ray’s study of Taoism and these ideas. Kate Dempsey makes it clear Ray wanted to avoid specific meanings, sending messages in bottles to be partly constructed by the finder. Sebastian reminds us that Ray was “an autodidact student of Buddhism and a self-described disciple of John Cage’s cultivation of chance occurrence. ” Julie Thomson describes the performances Ray created entitled “Nothings:” they “interrupted the Happenings, opening up a space amidst the busy environments and experiences of the Happenings.” Ray brought Zen and his unique fusion of life and art into American art, and made his mark with great gifts and energy.
Sebastian Matthews, curator of the Ray Johnson show
Sebastian Matthews has provided an amazing set of Ray Johnson experiences to me , starting with the BMC conference, many kind and enthusiastic interactions, and now this multiple-event, long-running show. He did all the myriad tasks and jumped through all the hoops to make this show happen, but he clearly handled the situation as a working artist and remained beautifully true to the spirit of Ray Johnson with everything he did as a result. See this show and then follow Sebastian’s advice:
Don’t get too caught up in finding meaning in every little detail. You need to first catch a drift of the mood and follow it back in. Let the work show you how to see. Let Ray work his magic. Sebastian Matthews, from BMC to NYC
Graham of Poetix Vanguard offers spoken word to the Ray J crowd
The event was a blast and was just the beginning. Remember the show runs til June 12th, and there are lots of special events to help motivate the trip. A collage workshop by Krista Franklin had occurred by this post, a screening of How to Draw a Bunny, an award-winning Ray J documentary will take place on April 8, and Dr. Francis F. L. Beatty, a curator who works with the Ray Johnson Estate, will speak about Ray’s work on May 21. The show will celebrate its closing with a poetry reading on June 12th. The Black Mountain College Museum and Art Center, sponsor of all events, has just announced a fascinating weekend event at the old dining hall building on the BMC campus. Sounds fun! BMC lives!!
raleighrambles.com
portrait by Guillermo Velasco
Raleigh Rambles 
