 “Inverted Index” by Anna Gritz |
AMPUTATIONSMACHINE – The practices of John Fare have been, in German-speaking academic discourse, often mentioned in relation to the term amputationsmachine. The legendary figure of John Fare was first introduced to academic discourse in a 1972 article by Tim Craig in Studio International. Fare’s practices had become famous because of the radicalism of his physical performances, for which he invented and constructed machines that would amputate body parts in a random manner. A magician made John Fare’s box disappear before the exhibition opened in San Francisco, and its whereabouts are still unknown. BARTLEBY – Bartleby, the disobedient character in Herman Melville’s 1853 story Bartleby the Scrivener: A Story of Wall Street, is an employee at a law office. One day he refuses to obey the orders of his employer with the words “I would prefer not to.” Through this extreme form of passive resistance, he gradually reduces his activities to a state of pure existence, which comes to a bitter end in prison when he refuses to eat. A puppet version of Bartleby can be found in Amy Robinson’s box. BLACK SOAP – A type of soap produced in Africa. Leaves and bark from banana trees, palm trees, cocoa pods, and shea trees are burned and the ashes mixed with shea butter, coconut oil, and palm oil. The soap is then stirred and set out to cure for two weeks. For a sample please reference Tris Vonna-Michell’s box. Black Soap can be purchased at www.eclecticlady.com. BEAR ISLAND, MAINE – A privately owned island near Penobscot Bay, Maine, purchased by Matilda Walcott Andrews, Buckminster Fuller’s grandmother, as a family summer residence. CAVA, ROMA – An Italian clothing manufacturer. TONY CLIFTON’S JACKET – A jacket worn by John Fare’s avatar Gabriel Lester during his performative gallery tours at GB Agency in Paris in 2007. Tony Clifton was one of the many fictional characters created by Andy Kaufman in the late 1970s. Clifton “performed” as Kaufman’s opening act: a scruffy, untalented lounge singer with an unbearably annoying singing voice. Besides forgetting lyrics, insulting his audience, and delivering unfunny jokes, Clifton often fell into random rhyming patterns in the middle of a monologue and was frequently booed offstage. The nature of his existence was contested for a while; some people thought he was an actual person. To further the confusion, Kaufman sometimes hired his brother or his friend Bob Zmuda to appear with him onstage as Tony Clifton. KEFAUVER HEARINGS – A series of televised hearings in 1950–51 headed by Senator Estes Kefauver of Tennessee, which set out to investigate and expose organized crime. During Frank Costello’s testimony, the television networks agreed to broadcast only his hands, and not his face. More information on Frank Costello and the Kefauver Hearings can be found in Andrew Tosiello’s box. CYANIDE CLOUD – A purple cloud that covers the world and extinguishes almost all existence. Please refer to Marie Jager’s box. DESERT – Location where Ryan Gander’s box is to be buried. DEAN, JANE – Typist. DOUGHNUT – Recipe follows.
3 ½ teaspoons baking powder ½ teaspoon cinnamon ½ teaspoon nutmeg ½ teaspoon salt 4 cups all-purpose flour 2 eggs 1 cup milk 3 tablespoons melted butter Fat (for frying) Sift together sugar, baking powder, cinnamon, nutmeg, salt, and flour. Beat eggs thoroughly, then stir into dry ingredients. Add the milk and melted butter. Roll about ½-inch thick on a floured board and cut with a doughnut cutter. Fry several at a time in the fat at 375 degrees until nicely browned. Drain on paper towels. Dust with granulated or confectioners’ sugar. Makes 24. Two doughnuts can be found in T.D.’s box. HAIR PARTING THEORY – A theory originally developed by John Walter proposing a relationship between one’s character and the way one parts his or her hair. According to Walter, the part draws unconscious attention to one side of the brain, either the masculine (left) or the feminine (right). A change in the part can therefore propel a life change. What one might look like with a changed hair part is best viewed in a true, or nonreversing, mirror. The true mirror was invented by John Walter in 1887. More information can be found in Dexter Sinister’s box or by visiting www.truemirror.com. HOUDINI, HARRY – Harry Houdini visited the Winchester Mansion in 1924 as part of his mission to expose fraudulent spiritual practices. In a newspaper article published after his visit, he warned the public not to trust self-proclaimed mediums. For a tour of the Winchester Mystery House please see the Winchester box. FLY ON THE WINDSCREEN – A song from the 1985 Depeche Mode album Catching Up with Depeche Mode. Lyrics follow. A version on cassette tape can be found in Lisi Raskin’s box.
Come here Death is everywhere The more I look The more I see The more I feel A sense of urgency Tonight Come here Touch me Kiss me Touch me Now Touch me Touch me There are flies on the windscreen There are lambs for the slaughter There are flies on the windscreen
JOSIE – Josie’s phone number can be found scribbled on a piece of paper in Ryan Gander’s box. LONG BETS – “Downtown American cities in 200 years will look pretty much as they do now.” —Prediction by Kevin Kelly as part of the Long Now Foundation’s long-term thinking project. Place your bet at www.longbets.org. KIDNAPPING – In 1969 Chip Lord, Doug Michels, and Curtis Schreier of Ant Farm kidnapped Buckminster Fuller from a lecture he was supposed to give at Rice University. Posing as Fuller’s assistant, one of them called the school and reported that his flight had been cancelled and that he would be on a later plane. When Fuller arrived at the airport on schedule, the three met him in a rented Cadillac limousine. They took him to an exhibition that featured his futuristic three-wheeled Dymaxion car and then released him. LE MERIDIEN, OPERNRING 13-15, 1010, WIEN, AUSTRIA – Letterhead on the stationery that can be found in Ryan Gander’s box. MAVERICKS – Tokens of unknown origin bearing text or other printing. Samples can be found in Micah Lexier’s box. PACIFICO – The beer of choice at Tom Marioni’s ongoing conceptual-performance piece entitled The Act of Drinking Beer with Friends Is the Highest Form of Art. TRIM TAB – “Something hit me very hard once, thinking about what one little man could do. Think of the Queen Mary—the whole ship goes by and then comes the rudder. And there’s a tiny thing at the edge of the rudder called a trim tab. It’s a miniature rudder. Just moving the little trim tab builds a low pressure that pulls the rudder around. Takes almost no effort at all. So I said that the little individual can be a trim tab. Society thinks it’s going right by you, that it’s left you altogether. But if you’re doing dynamic things mentally, the fact is that you can just put your foot out like that and the whole big ship of state is going to go. So I said, ‘Call me Trim Tab.’” —Buckminster Fuller in the February 1972 issue of Playboy. STREET CORNER – The location where Dexter Sinister’s box is to be abandoned. To be continued . . . |