[spectre] A Users Guide to (Demanding) the Impossible

[Andreas Broeckmann]

stevphen,

thanks for this - it comes timely...

however, what is weird is that the download of 
the document is restricted to people logged into 
facebook (and this through a service, scribd, 
that claims it helps to "liberate the word" ... 
;-). maybe it is is the guide for the 
Insurrectionary Imagination only of the facebook 
generation?

with an understanding of a "liberation" like that 
- which only happens _within_ the world of 
facebook (WOF), it's no wonder that the old 
western ideals are going down the drain...

ach, altes Europa...

regards,
-a


>New booklet on art and activismŠ
>
>A Users Guide to (Demanding) the Impossible
>Laboratory of Insurrectionary Imagination
>
>This guide is not a road map or instruction 
>manual. It's a match struck in the dark, a 
>homemade multi-tool to help you carve out your 
>own path through the ruins of the present, 
>warmed by the stories and strategies of those 
>who took Bertolt Brecht's words to heart: "Art 
>is not a mirror held up to reality, but a hammer 
>with which to shape it."
>
>It was written in a whirlwind of three days in 
>December 2010, between the first and second days 
>of action by UK students against the government 
>cuts, and intended to reflect on the possibility 
>of new creative forms of action in the current 
>movements.
>
>--
>
>"Art is useless, so they tell us, as soon as it 
>truly affects the world it loses its status as 
>art. (You never know, it might slide down the 
>slippery slope, becoming instrumental, 
>propaganda, or even worse craft!) The strange 
>thing is that those who tell us this are often 
>the same people who put art to the crudest 
>instrumental use - the art market. Maybe what 
>they mean is that - art is useless when its not 
>ultimately used to make a profit. Perhaps it's 
>the same logic as that which argues that 
>education has no use outside slotting us into 
>the mutilated world of work and consumption. 
>This guide is for those of us who suspect that 
>art has other uses and who are prepared to seek 
>them."
>
>PDF available freely online 
>(<http://www.minorcompositions.info/usersguide.html>http://www.minorcompositions.info/usersguide.html), 
>discounts for ordering multiple copies.
>
>64 pages, A6 size (4.134 x 5.827)
>
>To be released June 1st, 2011
>
>Released by Minor Compositions, London / New York / Port Watson
>Minor Compositions is a series of interventions 
>& provocations drawing from autonomous politics, 
>avant-garde aesthetics, and the revolutions of 
>everyday life.
>
>Minor Compositions is an imprint of Autonomedia
><http://www.minorcompositions.info>www.minorcompositions.info 
>|<mailto:info at minorcompositions.info>info at minorcompositions.info
>
>--
>Stevphen Shukaitis
>Autonomedia Editorial Collective
><http://www.autonomedia.org>http://www.autonomedia.org
><http://www.minorcompositions.info>http://www.minorcompositions.info
>
>"Autonomy is not a fixed, essential state. Like 
>gender, autonomy is created through its 
>performance, by doing/becoming; it is a 
>political practice. To become autonomous is to 
>refuse authoritarian and compulsory cultures of 
>separation and hierarchy through embodied 
>practices of welcoming difference... Becoming 
>autonomous is a political position for it 
>thwarts the exclusions of proprietary knowledge 
>and jealous hoarding of resources, and replaces 
>the social and economic hierarchies on which 
>these depend with a politics of skill exchange, 
>welcome, and collaboration. Freely sharing these 
>with others creates a common wealth of knowledge 
>and power that subverts the domination and 
>hegemony of the master's rule." - subRosa 
>Collective
>
>
>
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