Sonic Boom magazine cover art

 

My piece, Back To Reality, is the cover for the July issue of Sonic Boom. Read it here.

Poetry Student magazine no.1, 1975. The Bob Cobbing selection

 

A good find at the book fair on Sunday, which I only went to because Typewriter Jim found a gem there when he last attended. This copy of Poetry Student magazine was buried in piles of old poetry mags. It features Bob Cobbing as guest editor of their Centrepiece section. I did find a couple more, one with Bob Cobbing material in, which I might scan. I've got a cold though at the moment and already the effort feels to much like hard work - oh you're so lucky - really - but I made the effort! Adding titles to the pieces is too much effort though - sorry - but if you follow the guide in the Centrepiece box below you'll find out who did what since I scanned them in the correct order. Visual/Concrete Poetry might have been on its last legs by 1975. I don't know. That's just a feeling. Before the gap in which nobody did anything (ha-ha) then the revival in, um, er, 2000-and-something.

The revolution will be stencilled! Mimeography and Small Press at UCL

Typewriter Jim asked me to contribute to his demonstration at the UCL event. It was the kind of college demonstration I could get behind, you know, not the political kind, but a demonstration of the spirit duplicator machine and Gestetner mimmeo printing. So I created about a dozen pieces using the required carbon paper, then he rolled them out on the day as part of pages made by others to be collated as a magazine.

Here's the machine in action...

The UCL has a large collection of underground press, some of which was laid out on a table for visitors to look through.

This is Jeff Nuttall's My Own Mag. 

The college also took my latest production, Mind Games, for their collection.

When Conor McGregor went Ultra Instinct / Anarchy magazine cover / Collage: Almost Human / Israeli Electroacoustic Music

 

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December, 1963

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RTomens, 2023

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What do you mean you never knew there was such a thing. Neither did I until I found it in the Folkways archive. From 1981, this is a first rate compilation.

Vague Fanzines Book – Volume 1 – 1979-1984 Issues 1-15

 

A book of a fanzine might seem a bit...pretentious? Or presumptuous? Or self-aggrandising? Or what?

But OK, I'm not saying any of that. I'm glad to have the first 15 issues bound, thanks very much. Bound for glory, it was, in its lifetime and, of course, as time sprinkles dust on the Fanzine Era and its reputation grew to give it a Legendary status. 

Not that Vague is alone. It came at a time (1979) when zines had already bloomed (yes, like flowers in the dustbin of publishing) during the Punk era and since those days fanzines have become terribly....chic, dahling, so-o-o earthy...so real! Books on fanzines aside, few zines would merit a collection, or even have long enough runs to actually make one. My zine, Ego, wouldn't. Well, it would be a slim book.

I started collecting Vague in the late-80s, by which time it had grown in size and stature. Longer, deeper articles on the kind of sub-cultural topics that we were interested in, from terrorism to Situationism,  Psychic TV...even Jon Savage wrote for it. It retained a rawness, though. Or does it jut look that way compared to contemporary standards? At the time it looked very...'professional'.

Here are some of my collection from that era.

Rewind to the beginning and it's lots of handwritten headlines and even articles, some barely legible but who cares? It's as if even modern print technology cannot clarify what actually happened. In that sense, it mirrors memories of those distant days. Mine anyway.  

From the typical zine material and coverage (gigs, album reviews, opinion) to the later in-depth articles and themed issues, Vague's trip is worth (re)discovering. I look forward to the second volume. You can buy this collection here.

Print: Gallery / Magazine: Maintenant 17 / Album: Unnatural Channel by Drew McDowall

RTomens, 2023

A print I made this afternoon, made from three street photos I took.

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Since artwork by me is featured in the new edition of Maintenant magazine, along with less famous artists such as Raymond Pettibon, they asked me to perform at a launch party in London in September. I must resist the temptation to wear a Dada outfit. What I'd like to do is take along the big typewriter and create a piece 'live', with audience participation, but we'll see. 

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I was shocked this morning to hear a contemporary album that was great...no, it's not that I very rarely hear them, but few tick all the boxes as Unnatural Channel by Drew McDowall does. I like dark electronic music, which is a loose definition, I know. Oh, 'dark' has been big for years, yes, but few are as capable as McDowall when it comes to organising a limited sound palette so effectively. The whole atmosphere is spot on with its deep textures and minimal use of rhythm...imagine being chained in a cave  on a distant planet with no light bar the occasional glow from the red eyes of a beast intent on sucking out your soul. Yes, it's that good.

My Work in Explorations in Media Ecology

EME is 'an interdisciplinary and multidisciplinary publication'. You can read more about it here. 

New Vispo/Concrete Poetry Book: If You Don't Mind

OK, folks! here's my last production of the year. Perhaps not the best time to try and sell anything but what the hell, it's just back from the printers. A VERY limited edition. I felt the need to consolidate some work from this year into book form. It's A4 size, 55 pages, perfect bound. Much of it has not been shown before. It contains a variety of styles but the bulk of the work was created on the Olympia typewriter. Call it Vispo/Concrete/Typewriter art, whatever you like. 

It's been quite a year, eh? The plague aside (if it's possible to put it aside), I've produced three books, so that's a positive. But I lost my job (as did LJ) and the plague has dominated, of course. Yet, in the age of everything online, I still feel there's something special about the printed page and books generally. The permanence of a physical thing is irreplaceable. That said, I know many people can't afford such a luxury. Still, as much as the online gallery is essential I wanted some of my work to put on a shelf alongside other books. Perhaps you do too. If so, see the pay button at the bottom. 

                             

Dieter Roth On Oppressive Paintings / The Democracy of Art On Paper / Drawing

Little Tentative Recipe, Dieter Roth, 1968

'The bigger and heavier the stuff is, the more oppressing it is. I want to have paper to work on that is light, you can throw it away. The idea that you give a big painting of a huge size and heavy canvas and everything, you can give on a little piece of paper in one book (...) Books are cheap and people can throw them away. You don't oppress people too much.'
                             - Dieter Roth, quoted in In Numbers: Serial Publications by Artists Since 1955

I bet you didn't know that recipients of big paintings are another oppressed group to add to the list. But they are! Poor things. What can we do to help them? Perhaps we could offer to visit them and relieve them of those paintings. I would gladly do it if I had room to store them (having established if they're worth loads of money).

Joking aside, oh how I agree with Dieter Roth. But I would, wouldn't I, as someone whose preferred medium is paper and having produced a few books/magazines in my time. We know Roth the rebel, trasher of Fine Art rules, prolific scribbler, book-maker, print-maker etc. It makes sense that he would embrace paper over canvas. Despite token efforts (like recognising a disregarded minority and appearing to care) galleries do display works on paper but nearly always in the broader context, ie with paintings which, naturally, are promoted as the more 'serious' work. Whether drawn or printed on, paper is the poor relation.

Being relatively poor myself, paper is perfect. Because I live in a small flat, there's simply no room to store canvases, should I feel inclined to use them, which I don't. As for books, as Roth points out, they are cheap (though his certainly aren't today on the current market). Books are democratic and can be bought by anyone, assuming they're not elite Artist's books made by 'names'. 

Yes, so pity the oppressed. Also vilify those painters who oppress them! let's get a twitter mob going, hunting out painters who have oppressed other by foisting their big paintings on them. 

Turned Out Nice Again, RTomens, 2020

Drew this this morning. The sun was shining. The pen played up. No matter!

errorism - a journal of re-appropriation (Ragged Lion Press)

When Edwin Sellors, publisher of Ragged Lion Press, first posted photos of Errorism I thought it was a massive box and wildly ambitious. Turns out it's only 22 x 15.5cm and 2cm deep BUT it's still a hugely ambitious collection of collages, poetry and prints by various artists and poets; stapled, pasted and bagged up by hand. Something about the miniature focuses one's attention. Unlike small images on a smart phone, though, the wonder of paper products is that they cannot be scrolled past in a flash. Well, you don't need me to tell you the joys of paper/card products. This certainly is not a matter of quantity over quality because the level of creativity on display is extremely high. If you think the asking price of £35 is a little high too, trust me, you won't feel short changed. You'll open the box and marvel at the contents, just as I did. It's available here. There are limited copies available so don't miss out!