Spiritofboz

The Book of Boz is neither a novel nor a poem nor a tale.  Even less is it a drama or an essay.

It is nothing except the style that inspires it and haunts it, to excess.

No points of reference here.

No beacon.

You sail wherever the wind blows.

Stories are woven, end, are reborn, with the flow, before a storm comes up to carry us further away, to the threshold of a new vision.

For, that is The Book of Boz : a work outside of norms, indefinable, created by a wanderer for other wanderers.

Translated from French by Barabara Harshav

Listen :

> The liminaire read and commented.

(pertinent works will be duly indexed and numbered)

THE SPEECH OF THE ANGELS (SA)

This speech will be conceived as a “fundamental language,” underlying the proliferation of discourse.  Constituted of 20 fundamental signs, it will be embodied in paintings in watered effects, in sculptures in primitive forms, or in monumental installations.  There will thus be a desire to promote a mystique, involving the Subject at the roots.  Confronting the proposed works, the spectator will choose his own progression: which sequence in particular; a strange configuration, discovered by chance; even a new arrangement, reconstructed on the basis of the perceived work.  In any case, the interpretation will be his own invention, determined by his own prerogatives.  At the extremes, our spectator will have a synthetic, contemplative and non-reducible vision, which will reveal his desire to him.

THE FOAM OF THE WORLD (FW)

These works aim at the ephemeral before congealing it into an icon.  To this end, they track down reality to grasp its essence.  A fleeting face during an riot; a “great man” idolized by the press; a painting buried in a museum; a pack of candid photographs; a tattoo on a clean-shaven skin; there will be many chances to determine, sublimate and transfigure reality.  In this respect, a work will be emblematic: an “E=MC3,” made of multicolored neon lights, matched by a treatise signed by a physicist.  A treatise in which the effects (atomic imbalance, climatic catastrophes, new forms of life…) due to a simple change of power (C3 instead of C2) will be described.

THE DEN OF IMAGES (DI)

This series will go through The Book of Boz from one part to another.  Often enchanted, it will translate into plastic form scenes, events, characters, even passions and fantasies coming from the text as such.  The opposite will also hold.  More than once, we witnessed this gripping spectacle: sculptures, paintings and installations suddenly returning to life.  Their protagonists then came out of their silence to plunge headlong into the narrative.  That, to the great despair of the writer, who, pressured on all sides, no longer knew which way to turn.

A fourth dimension will also be planned: “MY LIFE” (ML)

Devoted to the narrator, it will lay out enigmatic works, like anagrams.  Thus that “Self-Portrait with Gag” dated 1998.  In its own way, it will connote a lack, an inaudible word, a secret that shouldn’t be violated.

To this day, Boz remains a mystery.  Yet if we would illustrate him, we would conjure up a brand new religion instigated by artists.  Essentially monotheist, this religion would blend with other spiritualities.  Crossing the Rubicon – the three monotheisms – Boz will be concerned with the Yogis, the Boddhisattvas, the Vedas and the Brahmans.  For Boz contains them all, as well as the rabbis, the priests, the pastors or the mullahs (non-exhaustive list).

From Jerusalem to Benares, Boz will advance like a nebulous fantasy, fertile with legends.  There is something of Alice in Wonderland in Boz.  As for the officiating priests, they will be subdivided into four distinct groups: Men, Characters, Angels, and to lend spice to it all, the poorer classes of the appurtenances (dolls, scissors, frames, stuffed animals, brushes, glue, pencils, varnish, cameras, easels, suitcases, etc.).  Slaves among slaves, those will join with the Implements to fight their enemies.

For the matter is far from serious.  It will even be comical.  So funny that a pumpkin will be transformed straightaway into a carriage, to the great joy of the kiddies who will clap to beat the band.

Our article of faith will be the following: that Present Day Art finishes off and puts an end to Contemporary Art.  The aforementioned phenomenon will be identified by a reference based on Childhood.  This will sweep away artists as diverse as Maurizio Cattelan, Jeff Koons or Takash Murakami.  Or even Mike Kelley, Paul McCarthy, the Chapman brothers, Annette Messager, Alain Séchas – even a painter as out-of-date as Balthus.

Therefore, Boz will bring about this overthrow: that this appeal to childhood is at one and the same time a return to THE CHILDHOOD OF ART.  Boz will mean a pure eruption in the heart of a decadent aesthetic.  Minimalist colors, baroque sculptures, and mannerist performances are going to disintegrate, shatter and die, before being reborn differently.  For inherent in the artist is a yearning for the void.  This will spur him on, force him to go beyond himself, despite the surrounding negligence.

As such, Boz will contain all the books written in the world.  He will also contain the sum of all works of art produced since late prehistory.  Even better: possessing a prodigious memory, it will include the internal experience of all humanity.  For such is Boz: all human knowledge and experience ever since the start.

Aware of his responsibilities, he will also work on the Other Side.  For there, in the world of Men, the situation was hardly encouraging.  A falling birthrate.  Profligacy.  A weakeed nation-state.  Decline of the family.  Death of the great utopias.  Standardization of psyches.  A rise of radical Islam.  Evil taking over the whole planet.

Yet Boz won’t give up.  He will forge ahead.  He will have his temples, his heroes, his clergy, his rituals, his prayers and even his tablets of the law.  Considering his success, Boz will be sold out.  Immense crowds will follow him, singing hymns to his glory.  Multicolored flowers will mark his path.  For Boz is good!

Endowed with a thousand faces, subject to many metamorphoses, he will work especially on that colossal thing: the redemption of the Artist.

That will be his challenge.

His whim.

His ultimate wager.

That will also be the opportunity for a long narrative full of adventures and twists and turns.  It will be perceived as an initiatory journey or going through the looking glass, fated to play a joke on the horror that dwells in us.

Now, enough talking!

Let the adventure begin!

I found my first character in the bottom of a match box.

He was fast sleeping.

His name was Jack Balance and I had known him a long time.

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