End Blog

Somethings begin, some end . . . except blogs, usually. You show up in the middle of them, and they seem to go on forever, or end without word. A nothing that nothings. Since this was meant to be a "temporary autonomous blog," and since we have attained some closure on the mystery of the Woonasquatucket Primitive, I figure this to be a good enough point to end, rather than go on and on and on. The mystery and experience is still open to you, though, dear reader. Now that it is warmer out, signs of the Primitive are more plentiful. You ain't seen nothing yet. Give nothing a break!
And now, with a slight of hand usually reserved only for higher dimensional entities, I will reverse the course of time, changing a blog into a web narrative with a beginning and an end, so that new visitors will be able to track my process of understanding the Primitive and his art during a few months in 2007. There will be a new arrow at the end of each entry, so that all you need to do is click there and move forward, rather than go back to this index.

Knot Here
Blood Lines
Snow Thing
Indian Dandy
Dump, Cosmos
Shared Metaphysic
Weekend Primitives
Shy Crystal
Chance, Necessity
Doo-Dad
Hysterical Shrines
Tabula Rasa
Under Erasure
Twisty Things
Secret Compass
Moldy Aesthetic
You, Mind
Pinch Me
Superhuman Powers
Familiar Tableaux
Alchemical Transformation
Fishing Machine

Fishing Machine

"But that one ripple on the boundless deep
Feels that the deep is boundless, and itself
For ever changing form, but evermore
One with the boundless motion of the deep."
--Tennyson

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Alchemical Transmutation

Or another show of impressive strength . . .

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Familiar Tableaux

I haven't seen these for a while.

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Superhuman Powers

The Primitive accompanies his whimsical subtlety with displays of superhuman power. Compare this rock slab with the other rock slabs along the path. To upend this stele would have taken considerable effort, with minimal outcome (like most of the Primitive's interventions, but even more so with this one; his new arrangement is barely distinguishable from the typical order of his environs). Then he goes and insouciantly hangs a plastic heart and bobber on some tree.

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Pinch Me

Salient Feature #7: The Pinch of Intentionality. The day after I met the Primitive for the first time, I noticed that, in the place where he had been resting, he left subtle markers of his presence. A piece of driftwood was moved onto the bench, and a smooth rock was wedged between the slats of the picnic bench. The latter technique is fairly common for the Primitive--simple objects are stuck, wedged, or pinched in the lattices of a bench or table. It now seems that these specific gestures may be a way for him to memorialize a moment of calm, well-being, or relaxation in the course of a rough existence. Sometimes, the intervention is unadorned--primitive, if you will--as with the smooth rock or crystal. At other times, it takes on the aspects of a drama. As with the straw-structure above, you are initially drawn to the pinch of intentionality, the sense of a prior artful presence, and you stay for the conversation between the the wiry, blackhaired red McDonald's straw and the weird, phallically-capped piece of tree.

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You, Mind

I found him.
As you can see, he keeps a more robust twisty thing attached to his army duffel bag. As I approached him, I took this picture to so I would know I was not dreaming. But perhaps he was. He appeared to be sleeping. I couldn't help but stand there, pretending to admire the twisty thing rather than outright gawking at him. He must have felt my shadow on his face, because he slowly lifted his head when it passed over him. The following was the only conversation:
"This is great. Do you mind if I take a picture of this?"
"No. That's OK."
"Do you mean you mind or you don't mind?"
"No."
"So it's not OK to take a picture?"
"No."
"You mean I can take a picture?"
"No pictures."
"Are you the person who's been doing all these?"
". . ." (nods)
"I love these. These are really great."
"Thank you."

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Moldy Aesthetic

"In the middle of the city should be a repository of objects that people don't want any more, which they would take to this giant junkyard. That would form an organization . . . a way that the city would be organized around that. I think that this center of unused objects and unwanted objects would become a center of intellectual activity. Things would grow up around it."
--Jack Smith

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