... a Borgesian dream project, a modern illuminated manuscript, a vision of Blake´s graphic poetry, Swift´s satires, the tirade of a new romantic pamphleteer, the texts of a philosophy of Radical Ecology ...a collection of discarded textbooks, dictionaries and encyclopedias reinscribed with the authors texts and interventions ...a series of objects and actions relating to the above...
Recyclopedia LIVE!!
Video de la presentación del primer volumen de la Reciclopedia en Caracteres Libreria ( Valencia) http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DLbIUefs5tY&feature=share&list=UUPl_OQIAk2YhpCbRMT49a_Q
How I discovered....(fanzine version)
It was a large room, the only furniture a mattress and a wooden chair in one corner. The walls were bare , the floor without covering but in the middle of the room a huge pile had been heaped together just like the ones he made in the Rastro. Here was the gold mine he’d left- all the relics of his life gathered together in a careering mass of magazines, records, books, pieces of junk, old photographs, costume jewellery, press clippings and articles on a wide variety of topics,including some on his recent rise to notoriety. 
But buried underneath all this detritus in a wooden box there were his texts, and here is where it became obvious that the crazy performances in the Rastro were simply the starting point for what would be the real work of overwriting because none of his writing was done on blank paper it seemed he could only write on pages already prepared and printed upon. So the text appeared superimposed on the back or underneath photographs, flyers,the pages he’d saved from the old textbooks and encyclopedias he’d loved so much so that his words mingled with the images ( and sometimes the text) of the printed pages. Some had been printed in bright blue ink, some lovingly handwritten, some typed in red ink to stand out from the words beneath. Most of the texts took the form of diatribes, slogans ,short essays or just loose phrases. But reading through them they seemed to add up to a philosophy of chaos that fascinated me
But buried underneath all this detritus in a wooden box there were his texts, and here is where it became obvious that the crazy performances in the Rastro were simply the starting point for what would be the real work of overwriting because none of his writing was done on blank paper it seemed he could only write on pages already prepared and printed upon. So the text appeared superimposed on the back or underneath photographs, flyers,the pages he’d saved from the old textbooks and encyclopedias he’d loved so much so that his words mingled with the images ( and sometimes the text) of the printed pages. Some had been printed in bright blue ink, some lovingly handwritten, some typed in red ink to stand out from the words beneath. Most of the texts took the form of diatribes, slogans ,short essays or just loose phrases. But reading through them they seemed to add up to a philosophy of chaos that fascinated me
The Globe and The Recycled Reliquary
The Globe (2009) uses discarded biblical magazines from the 1960´s and ´70´s as source material for a cosmogony of the body made using the technique of papier maché. In these magazines,there is hardly any female presence and the male body appears frequently in situations of extreme duress, either being tortured or performing feats of physical prowess.
True to the practises of the cult of the Book, the Recyclopedic Reliquary (2010) exhibits the spine of the Childrens Encyclopedic Dictionary (1965) as a sacred object similar to the bones of the saints more normally preserved in these often highly elaborated display cases.
Volume 2: Religion and Economy
Introduction
Hiding something in the least expected place gives its discovery a sense of forbiden fruit.
Often it is while I am working on transforming a book that it reveals its inner significance to me. This book of essays attributed to Pope Pio XII (1876-1958, held office between 1939 and 1958) was probably a text given by the church to every couple in Spain ( and Italy) when they got married in the period of its publication (1940s)
It detailed how they should behave in the new domestic situation they were entering and was a guide to duties ( mainly of the wife) which are now obsolete. Although I was interested to see if the values inculcated could have meaning for a contemporary non gender specific couple I ultimately found nothing of interest apart from the frontsipiece and the chapter headings.
In Spain homosexual marriage is now a fact and there is a tolerance in the society unheard of in the period when this book was written. Nevertheless the catholic church continues to exert a strong reactionary influence both here and in many parts of the world. So it seemed obvious that my intervention would necessarily subvert this book, gutting it of content and leaving in fact only its title on the spine as a reminder of its original purpose.
This became the series of texts you will see and read but as I progressed I realised that my usual tools for writing – irony and satire – were not enough to fill the void I had created. Halfway through the work I decided to reverse the book – turning it upside down and starting from the back to engrave a series of texts which were bereft of Irony. This caused a tension which remains unresolved. Interestingly I ended up with the same amount of pages in each section although as might have been expected the new text intruded into the original.
Although I often write(engrave) directly on the page- risking all sorts of orthographical mistakes and not allowing myself the privilege of rewriting or “improving” the text - I often work on a parallel text at the same time which is usually included in the finished book in some way. Unfortunately space was limitted in this volume so this text became expelled to another place and can now be read for the first time with the complete “engraved” text as it appears in the altered volume. (p10-12)
Only now after I finished did I confirm my suspicions and discover that Pius XII , in 1933 ( and whilst acting head of the vaticans “extracurricular department”) and before becoming Pope, caused the church to sign the Reichskonkordat with Germany and has since gone down in history as the Pope who (possibly) turned a blind eye to the Nazi atrocities.
A fervent anti communist after the second world war ended he threatend to ex communicate italians who voted communist in the (supposedly) “free” elections , thus leading his country into a pact which would help the emergence of the new world power: America , the land of consumer opportunity whose pattern of development is leading us towards the complete destruction of every single world ecosystem except the Concrete jungle.
RADICAL ECOLOGY (The Blue Wedding Book)
This volume of the Recyclopedia was created to accompany a performance at the Venice Biennale in 2009: "Ecosexual Blue Wedding to the Sea" of Beth Stephens and Annie Sprinkle. The accompanying text "Radical Ecology" seemed to relate to their philosophy so I decided to illustrate it and produced this volume :The Blue Wedding Book
The structure of power is based on a lack of respect not solely for those of us who fail to conform to the demands of the dominant power structure:
women, the poor, the mad, the transgender / queer but also a lack of respect for the ecosystem that supports us
.
Because the basic needs of the human food, heat, water and a decent living environment - are not considered to have a high enough value in the capitalist system, the resources of the world are being plundered at a rate which will soon convert the bio-diveristy of thousands of ecosystems into one huge Concrete jungle.
Ultimately capitalism sees the real estate value as the most important asset these ecosystems have.
And as long as we have genetic samples, a few frozen specimens and some beautiful nature documentary footage of the millions of lifeforms we have destroyed it is not important that they no longer actually exist.
We should stop fighting amongst ourselves and join together to demand that:
- the fruits of the earth and sea are bought and sold at their real value,
- an acre of rice grown in China costs the same as one grown in Europe, - and that produce flown across the globe is priced at a rate to match the ridiculuos journey it makes.
Advertising sells us the myth that we can all live like Posh, Becks or Louis xiv but where will all the gold come from? And what exactly have we done to deserve this earth?
We only enjoy our individual freedoms at the cost of others, and more importantly at the cost of the future generation (to say generations is utterly and irresponsibly optimistic)
In a capitalist society there is a constant need to create a demand, and since in the lack of lack society the basic needs of the citizens no longer have a market value - it is necessary to open new markets and find new ways to market products.
In this society obsessed with the rights of the individual, the duties we as citizens have towards each other get swamped in the search for the new.
So it is no coincidence that the centre of the debates over emerging identities, which currently seem to focus on queer and intersex as the latest sites of radical dissent, should be the largest capitalist marketplace the united states.
Each citizen should have the same rights to control the destiny of their body, free from the manipulations of doctors and society.
But these should be seen within the wider context of the world ecosystem which is being constantly degraded by the expansion of capitalism.
Carrying out a critique based solely on the ideal of the Superhuman individual is not radical!
The structure of power is based on a lack of respect not solely for those of us who fail to conform to the demands of the dominant power structure:
women, the poor, the mad, the transgender / queer but also a lack of respect for the ecosystem that supports us
.
Because the basic needs of the human food, heat, water and a decent living environment - are not considered to have a high enough value in the capitalist system, the resources of the world are being plundered at a rate which will soon convert the bio-diveristy of thousands of ecosystems into one huge Concrete jungle.
Ultimately capitalism sees the real estate value as the most important asset these ecosystems have.
And as long as we have genetic samples, a few frozen specimens and some beautiful nature documentary footage of the millions of lifeforms we have destroyed it is not important that they no longer actually exist.
We should stop fighting amongst ourselves and join together to demand that:
- the fruits of the earth and sea are bought and sold at their real value,
- an acre of rice grown in China costs the same as one grown in Europe, - and that produce flown across the globe is priced at a rate to match the ridiculuos journey it makes.
Advertising sells us the myth that we can all live like Posh, Becks or Louis xiv but where will all the gold come from? And what exactly have we done to deserve this earth?
We only enjoy our individual freedoms at the cost of others, and more importantly at the cost of the future generation (to say generations is utterly and irresponsibly optimistic)
In a capitalist society there is a constant need to create a demand, and since in the lack of lack society the basic needs of the citizens no longer have a market value - it is necessary to open new markets and find new ways to market products.
So it is no coincidence that the centre of the debates over emerging identities, which currently seem to focus on queer and intersex as the latest sites of radical dissent, should be the largest capitalist marketplace the united states.
Each citizen should have the same rights to control the destiny of their body, free from the manipulations of doctors and society.
But these should be seen within the wider context of the world ecosystem which is being constantly degraded by the expansion of capitalism.
Carrying out a critique based solely on the ideal of the Superhuman individual is not radical!
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