| Projects |
| Every once in a while the opportunity will arise to do something a little unique, a little dicey, a little closer to getting me arrested. I try to put aside my qualms about do-me-in-the-ass prisons and take these opportunities. So far, nothing interesting (if you think jail is interesting) has happened. There is definitely a lot of fun to be had with these sort of projects. I don't always hold with the Overturn Police Cars/Smash Shop Windows/Paint Over Stop Signs deal, since I find them hard to pull off successfully. I have therefore developed a system of activist and performace-art style pieces, which are passive-aggressive and can give you that sneaky, accomplished feeling... Without the do-me-in-the-ass-feeling. |
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| 1. Mist Crop Circles |
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| Requirements: 1. A drizzly day when the mist has condensed thickly on the ground 2. A large public field 3. You Admittedly, it is hard to find the perfect day for this in some climates, and it's not a project you can just pull out of your ass and leave somewhere when you feel like it. However, if you take the time to do it when the day is perfect, the effect can be stunning. Start at the outer edge of the misty field. Start shuffling in a huge circle (or other shape, but circles are easiest to keep even). You should make a double track about ten inches wide as you scoot through the grass. Spiral inward, keeping a track-width of untouched grass between the previous circle and the current one you're making. |
| As you spiral inward, try to keep a steady pace. This will regulate your spiral and keep it even. Eventually you'll meet the center. To get out, hop onto your tracks. Viewed from a distance, mist crop circles are very bizarre, because most people can't figure out how the hell they were made. When I tried this experiment, a few people said aloud they wished they had cameras. Effect: Nobody notices a field, and nobody wants to look up when it's misting. But a huge crop circle (ellipse, figure-8, parallelogram, celtic knot, etc) ALWAYS gets attention. In the artistic sense, people are made to notice a huge field and the dizzying effect of perfect concentric circles. In a terrorist/activist sense, people stand around in the mist and look confused. You can't lose with this one. |
| 2. Return to Sender |
| Requirements: 1. Old junk mail; "Get Your Degree" and "You Could WIN!!" mail works best, but any paper trash will do 2. Credit-card offers by mail You would be amazed how many credit cards will try to get you to take one. Or maybe you know and you aren't surprised. In any case, Do NOT throw away that fat envelope from Discover/Amex/Visa/Mastercard! It contains a postage-paid envelope addressed to the credit card company. The concept is simple but beautiful. Just find the postage-paid envelope in the huge fucking mess of advertisements and legal blather. Take some of your other inevitable junk mail and send it to the credit card company. I usually cut out my personal information, but I don't think it matters, because they have my address anyway. Effect: Since they don't care about stuffing your mailbox with unwanted shit, why should you care about stuffing theirs? There's usually some stamp on the envelope about "Priority, Rush, Time-sensitive documents inside"--just think, they're hurriedly opening the envelope THEY paid 37 cents (or whatever the hell it is now) for to get a notice that they could win the Publisher's Clearing House if they just choose 8 magazine titles with these little sticky stamps! Somebody has to open it, and somebody will be aggravated by having to throw it away. Of course, it's not going to get to the higher-ups/conglomerate bastards, but at least you're pissing somebody off, right? |
| 3. Guerilla Poetry |
| Requirements: 1. Index cards 2. Poetry If you enjoy poetry, you know that the day-to-day life of humans doesn't really come in contact with anything stronger than "beans, beans, they're good for your heart". There was a time in the days of yore when poetry was song and as important as food. These days you have to LOOK for poetry. Time to perform a service to humanity! Or, perhaps, confuse them to the point of annoyance. The choice is yours. Grab a pack of index cards, or, if you're fancy, some cardstock in whatever color you prefer. I suggested index cards because they're cheap and plentiful and hard to trace. Find some well-known poetry. The best is Dickinson or Poe, Whitman, and English and American writers of the last century. Contemporary stuff just doesn't have the bite of the great authors, though you may beg to differ. Some poetry of Emily Dickinson may be found here: The Poetry of Emily Dickinson English Ballads May be found Here The Poetry of Walt Whitman |
| Find a set of lines you like. Some poems, particularly Dickinson's, are quite short (8 lines or less) and can fit comfortably on an index card. I usually write two to four lines on each card. Now remember what you learned in school and cite your source. It's fine just to write the author's initials on the bottom of the card-- E.D. looks particularly mysterious, doesn't it? Once you have a stack of index cards saying something like: The present now and here, America's busy, teeming, intricate whirl, Of aggregate and segregate for only thence releasing, To-day's eidolons. W.W. Start placing them. This is the fun part. I've tended to have a stack of poetry in one coat pocket and a roll of masking tape in the other. Excellent sites for Guerilla Poetry: Under windshield wipers, ticket style Inside bathroom stalls In stairwells On light fixtures Everywhere! Effect: Somebody will read them. They may rip them down and throw them away, but they'll read them first. There's nothing like a couplet for getting someone's attention, unless it's a mist crop circle. Remember, every couplet put into someone's brain is a little finger of justice/art/inspiration worming into the core of fascism! |
| More projects will be added as I think of them. Until then, go read rtmark... your source for terrorist art. |
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