Thursday, November 6, 2008

a cosmic interview: art in the void

the spaced shuttle
or a void in need of a brain

These climbers of Zero G ladders through nothingness to nothing. In the great blackness they come up against too much wonder. Too little earth to compensate for how much nothing they've seen.

Not much wind in the void. Not much air. Not much time to measure in nothing. It bends like light past mysterious supermasses.

So little to get in your way in the void. Nothing moves at a crawl til there's gravity and friction.

-Here we are with renowned Cosmonaut Viktor ... umm... I dont think I can say your last name on television without a fine from the FCC. Viktor, like certain Spacemen before him has turned to art as well as science to explain the universe.
Cosmonaut: You must think bigger to maintain your human strength in zero gravity. You move and imagine much larger things breaking down psychical cobwebs and expanding the breadth of your movements. To justify these large earthly muscles and bones. You become more attuned to gravity. Where do you think angels came from? They lived in the void before there was a firmament or any kind of separations.
-How does this relate to your art Mr. Cosmonaut?
Cosmonaut: It is all drawn from larger thinking. The larger being of the void. The great big bigness.
-I'm sure it makes more sense in Russian.
Cosmonaut: I doubt it. Only Pushkin & Mayakovsky make any sense in Russian.
-Why do you use space junk?
Cosmonaut: I can't seem to get my hands on a comet.
-Really?
Cosmonaut: Also, I am a very firm believer in recycling… repurposing. Space junk is special to me. I am so close to it. Closer than but the tiniest percent of a percentile of all humanity. It really is a great sensation to make art of things discarded. So expensively transported to space and flung aside to spin in irregular orbits.
-Is it dangerous?
Cosmonaut: Is what dangerous?
-Is sculpting space junk dangerous?
Cosmonaut: Of course it is. Spacewalking hour after hour with tools and adhesives.
-Could it be dangerous to others?
Cosmonaut: Others? No. Never. If something has a descending orbit it eventually falls out of; it burns, burns up in the atmosphere. A flicker in the heavenly host. A falling star. A meteor.
-so, yr a romantic?
Cosmonaut: No, I am a pragmatist. The great ancient slavistanian poet padbunnyghozin said many unintelligible things about love, perky and ponderous breasts and the heavens. Most importantly, stars, he said, are best viewed from the field of numbers. The meadow of mathematics. The orchard of ordinates. The grove of geometry. Lest you climb the spiral ladder into the void.
-Wow. I wonder if that's better in Russian.
Cosmonaut: You should see it from up there. It comes from the original slavistani. It is no mere Russian.
-I’ve seen space in all the vids.
Cosmonaut: vids is not same. Is not entire cosmos whirling through infinity. It’s mere pickles. Ones and zeroes stacked nexto each other in endless briny barrels.

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