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January 2002

Glassed-in Labs Invade Žižkov Quarter of Prague

(top) Equestrian bronze of Jan Žižka, dominating a promontory overlooking the Žižkov quarter of Prague. (inset) Lloyd Dunn in the new Glassed-in Labs (East); arrow shows his window. (below) Žižka again, with Czech flag in the background.

2002-01-24 / New Digs, Again. When you carefully read the entire communiqué that follows, an epiphany will occur. You will, for the first time in your life, know how to control all that affects you. You will discover, for example, that The Tape-beatles have left behind their old Glassed-in Laboratory (East) in favor of comely mortar-encrusted reinforced den.

The new work space in Prague, located in the quarter called Žižkov, is supplied with just enough of the kind of amenities to fuel their search for Tomorrow’s Golden World: sparse furnishings, an easy-going ambience, two desks and a cardboard-tubed ‘Rollpa’ shelving unit made of surprisingly rigid rolled paper (as the name suggests). These spartan furnishings are already stacked up with boxes to the ceiling in one corner, and the desks enjoy the patina of one week’s worth of activities.

The Locale. Žižkov is a stimulating, flavorful part of the city, and ‘our’ street, Koněvova, is its main artery where restaurants, pubs, shops, traffic and parked cars provide the pulse. The street lies at the foot of a rocky outcropping where the monument of Jan Žižka on horseback stands watch over the city. It can be seen easily from anywhere within Prague, and is locally claimed to be the largest bronze statue of a man on horseback anywhere in the world. Žižka was a 15th-century defender against anti-Hussite, Holy Roman crusaders who utilized an army of peasant fighters and an arsenal of tricks and farm implements, including putting their steeds’ horseshoes on backwards, to confuse any enemies who might be tracking them.

Duties Beckon. Projects slated for the next months include formatting a decade of films for release on some variety of shiny disk, lining up appearances in Czech Republic and various European cities, attending screenings that form part of FebioFest 2002, a Prague film festival, and tying up loose ends and unfurling knitted works. Oh, yeah, and Lloyd has enrolled in Czech language classes, where he enjoys the company of an international group of polyglot wanna-bes.

The highlight of the holidays was a visit by former Tape-beatle Linda Morgan Brown who came to Prague during the coldest, deepest winter snow in the last 20 years. That snow and our friend Linda have now since left us, and with a sniffle, we can now get back to work.

Photostatic Magazine 1983-1998

The Content May Be Old,
But the Site is New

2002-01-20 / Background. Photostatic Magazine was a regular fixture and active proponent of the zine, audio art and DIY (do it yourself) counterculture that emerged during the 1980s. As a journal of so-called ‘machine art,’ Photostatic managed to bring together artists working across the spectrum of contemporary disciplines, including photocopy art, collage, correspondence or mail art, concrete poetry, experimental works, graphic design, photography, sound and video art, humor, essays, reviews, journalism, and more.

In addition to this wide range of subject matter, Photostatic’s contributors came from around the world; Japan, Australia, North and South America, and most nations of Europe, including many artists from the then-Warsaw Pact countries. Photostatic worked within a self-proclaimed ‘Eternal Network,’ which made use of photocopy, typewriters, rubber stamps, glue sticks, handwriting and the international postal system; in perhaps much the same spirit as people blog, surf, chat, email and code web pages today.

Announcement. Photostatic’s editor, Lloyd Dunn, is pleased to announce a new website devoted to historifying and archiving the project called Photostatic. This new site is intended to serve as a repository for a complete collection of Photostatic Magazine in electronic form (including its variant titles Retrofuturism and Psrf).

We further announce the immediate availability of the first issue in the PDF series, Psrf 49 (October 1998), which was the final issue in the printed series. New postings will follow at approximately one-month intervals.

We post these versions, one at a time, in like manner to how they first appeared, in deference to the print publication’s bimonthly schedule. We post them in reverse chronological order to form a mirror image in time of the original series. People entirely new to this content will therefore have the opportunity to see the work sequentially with its origins gradually unveiled, as opposed to how its creators saw it, inevitably in terms of an unfolding and surprising future.

Please visit the new site:

• http://psrf.detritus.net/

If you are a former Photostatic or Retrofuturism contributor, please take a moment to stop by and …

• Leave your comments

2002-01-13

JUAN GARCIA ESQUIVEL 1918-2002

Here’s What We’ve Got To Start the New Year

2002-01-10 / Another spin around the sun, and we find we have little news about Public Works and The Tape-beatles to add emphasis to the occasion. We’ve taken the cusp of the year and relaxed with it, spending time in rustic surroundings, decompressing, as no doubt many of you have done.

However, it is with some small feeling of vindication that we take note of the many voices that are being raised in the ongoing debate over intellectual ‘property,’ which seems to be fast approaching a rolling boil. Vindication, since it was so long ago that we took firmly hold of the issue, and placed it at the core of our corps. Small, because we could not see from our late-eighties vantage point the many petals held inside this cultural rosebud. The voices on the various sides of the debate add lustre and contour to what, it’s now clear, is a gordian knot that will likely take decades to untangle.

Intellectual ‘property’ is correlative to intellectual poverty, the free exchange of ideas being vital to a vibrant intellectual commons, as Thomas Jefferson pointed out. At the same time, we are sympathetic to the notion that cultural producers ought to be able to live from their efforts. Where the middle ground lies in all of this is a difficult question, and one that we as a culture are only beginning to explore and debate in earnest. So it is particularly vital that we inform ourselves, to shoot the flimsy arguments down, and bolster the strong ones. We all have a stake the outcome.

Pursuant to all this, listed here are some readings we’ve come across recently that may interest you.

Readings

EFF member John Gilmore asks, then answers the question What’s Wrong with Copy Protection?

• Nine points to ponder.

Tidbits completes its series of four essays by Dan Kohn entitled Steal this Essay. An attempt to lay out the more interesting and subtle issues in the debate.

• Read “Steal this Essay”

The New York Times reviews law scholar Lawrence Lessig’s new book The Future of Ideas, which itself is very likely worth reading.

• Read the review

Congressman Rick Boucher (VA) writes a letter to Hilary Rosen (RIAA) and Jay Berman (IFPI) with his questions about the legality of CD copy protection, in light of the fact that these agencies are already compensated for home copying through royalties levied under the Audio Home Recording Act of 1992.

• Read Boucher’s letter