[spectre] Secretary Rallies Artists

[Oliver Grau]

US Department of Art & Technology
http://www.usdept-arttech.net
press at usdept-arttech.net
Washington, DC

Press Secretary
For Immediate Release:  March 26, 2003


Secretary Rallies Artists


10:42 A.M. EST
Washington, DC

Randall M. Packer
Secretary, US Department of Art & Technology

THE SECRETARY: Thank you, all. (Applause.) Thank you, all, very much.

I am really proud to be here with the good men and women of the USA
Exquisite Corpse, the artist's call to service. (Applause.)

We're also proud to be here today with our artist friends who have joined
Operation Artistic Freedom. (Applause.) Over the last week the world has
witnessed the skill and honor and resolve of the cultural community engaged
in passionate dialogue and acts of artistic mediation. We have seen the
character of a new generation of artists. Millions of Americans are proud
of our artists, and so am I. I am honored to be the Secretary-in-Chief.
(Applause.)

Every artist in our coalition of the willing understands the terrible
threat we face from our government-in-action. Every artist here refuses to
live in a future of fear, at the mercy of politicians and the corporate
oilgarchy. And every artist here today shares the same resolve: the only
valid experimental approach is one based on the uncompromising critique of
existing conditions and their conscious intervention.

Our artists are making good progress; yet the war on war is far from over.
We cannot predict the final day, but I can assure you, and I assure the
long-suffering people of America, there will be a day of reckoning for the
President, who has revealed the principles of arrogance, abuse of power,
personal gain and a frightening lack of charisma, through his contempt for
the opinion of the world.
Day by day, George W. Bush is losing his grip on reality; out of fear of
the unknown, pain, and death - the Gods, surfacing from the immemorial
depths of time and space - he has used his lethal weapons to bring down
fire from the heavens, death and destruction that devours us all.

In the early stages of this war, the world is getting a clearer view of a
terrible and deep anxiety resulting from self-created and deadly dangers
that are growing beyond our control.

Our enemy in this war on war is the existential darkness that has possessed
our government, that grips its soul. (Applause.) 
The goal of artistic freedom unites our coalition. And this goal comes from
the deepest convictions of the avant-garde. The artistic freedom we defend
is the right of every artist and the future of our nation.

The liberty we prize is not America's gift to the world, it is the artist's
gift to humanity.

That's what we do. That's our job.

Thank you.
(Applause.).

*******

Contact: Press Secretary of the US Department of Art & Technology
press at usdept-arttech.net

The US Department of Art & Technology
http://www.usdept-arttech.net

The US Department of Art and Technology is the United States principal
conduit for facilitating the artist's need to extend aesthetic inquiry into
the broader culture where ideas become real action. It also serves the
psychological and spiritual well-being of all Americans by supporting
cultural efforts that provide immunity from the extension of new media
technologies into the social sphere.

The Experimental Party
http://www.experimentalparty.org

The Experimental Party - the "party of experimentation" -  is an
artist-based political party that has been formed to activate citizens
across the country in an effort to bring the artists' message to center
stage of the political process. This is a political awakening,
'representation through virtualization' is the major political thrust of
the Experimental Party, it is the driving force.