Jan 23, 2013
Arthur Ganson's Machine with Artichoke Petal #1
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Arthur Ganson's Machine with Artichoke Petal #1
At a party (fiction)
“I’m writing a book.”
“Really? What’s your book about?”
“Well, it’s a sort of fictional non-fiction, a collection of essays about optiphonal wonder machines.”
“About what?”
“Optiphonal wonder machines, which are imaginary inventions. I’m part of a multimedia project called Optiphonal Wonder Machine and the book deals with all the ideas we use in our music and performance.”
“Oh! What kind of ideas?”
“Well, there are five main sections of the book. The first is about quantum theory, the idea of multidimensional space and the multiverse. The second section deals with Jungian theory: the Collective Unconscious, Archetypes, and the animate world. The third section is on time. The fourth is about Cabinets of Curiosities and Alchemy and the final section is about how to engineer optiphonal wonder machines.”
“Wow. That’s a lot.”
“Yes, it is, but it’s not academic. There are a lot of little stories and the information is presented almost as science fiction. You might at first think you are reading a collection of non-fiction essays on a topic you don’t know anything about, but eventually realize you are reading something made up: stories, fantastical ideas, and misinformation.”
“So, is there music?”
“Yes, there is music as well as visuals—we have videos, photography, illustrations, and the full stage set-up is quite theatrical with props and video. We also have a website where there are more visuals, you can listen to the music, and where there is a forum for collective myth-making.”
“Collective myth-making?”
“Part of the story is about constellations. In the universe of optiphonal wonder machines, the constellations are alive and their stories are made up of all the myths from around the world humans have ever told about them as well as the stories we are making now. People can submit the stories they know about constellations or make up their own to become part of the collective myth. There’s also a place for people to submit their own optiphonal wonder machine, be it a visual illustration or a written description.”
“And what is an optiphonal wonder machine again?”
“Well, optiphonal is a word my partner and I made up: opti means visual and phonal means sound. An optiphonal wonder machine is an imaginary invention which facilitates imagination. For instance, the o.w.m. 5b is a “seeing machine” that allows the viewer to see the constellations through any weather. It also frames the constellations and draws lines between the stars so the viewer can understand what they’re seeing more clearly. Of course, the lines and the framing change depending on which story a viewer thinks belongs to a constellation. Another is a tuning machine that identifies resonant frequencies for multi-dimensional spaces such as hypercubes.”
“Hypercubes?”
“Yes. A hypercube is what a cube would be in four dimensional space. In the o.w.m. multiverse, any dimensionality is possible, so you can choose how many dimensions make up your world. Our first project has a main character who is divided into three selves: one lives in our world, one lives in a watery world, and one lives in a sky/weather world. The two imaginary worlds have their own sets of physical laws and don’t exist in the same dimensionalities we do. Hypercubes exist in the watery world and one needs a machine to identify its resonant frequencies.”
“What are resonant frequencies?”
“Um, do you know what a frequency is? Actually, a friend of mine just came in and I’d like to go say hello. It was nice talking with you.”
“You too, although you talk a lot.”
“I know.”
Faster
If it's this vast then
No matter
How fast
I am moving
Like moving through
Centuries
If it's this vast then
By the time
No matter how fast
I get to you
You're gone again
So we dream you
And by the time
(No matter how hard)
We dream you
You wake up
We are gone again
You'll have to be faster
faster
faster faster faster
My Love
(©2012)
Charon
Once, you were unconscious, closer to death, less solid, more knowing. I carried you back when the time came and you knew me.
Then, you turned your attention to worldly matters, your affairs of the mind. Death became something you no longer remembered. You created a story and I became what you needed me to be. I carried you back when the time came and you recognized me.
In time, you made your rituals to remind you, but they were an abstraction; your grottoes a metaphor; your return required payment. I took your coins and carried you back when the time came.
Now, you do not remember. There is only longing between us. I watch you as you unknowingly repeat the motions of a previous millennia. I watch you give your coins, climb down the stairwells to underground rooms, pulsing and writhing, but not finding your way back to me.
(© 2012)