Wow. I'm glad I got to the party before they ran out of candy. My apologies for excessive tardiness. First thing that comes to mind? The whole earth had one language and was of one speech. As they migrated from the east, it happened that they found a plain in the land of Shinar, and they settled there. They said one to another, "Come, let's make bricks, and bake them thoroughly."
From one of the earliest urban planning manuals, we get the total skinny on building something out of nothing. Only it's a trick, because the earth is just transformed from an abstract into a concrete entity, which multiplies and amasses towards structural, and ultimately cultural solidity. And they would have gotten away with it too, if it hadn't been for that pesky desert deity.
Pan across the boardroom table of history and Millet sits near the other end, digging at the diaspora. Here are the stragglers, abandoned by industry. This is not sentiment, it's what he sees. And he's not asking the people to move either, so he can paint some pretty haystacks. The last few mount some Great Pumpkin vigil for the next Babel. (The cities that exist now have failed them and left them behind.) And Millet doesn't worry about a god to ruin the fun; no one's been here for years. The haunting aspect for me is not that they've put something in the ground, but that they're waiting (and there's eternity in those stances) for something to emerge. And what happens when it does?
they let him lie for a very long timesalimondoJune 28 2006, 14:46:53 UTC
Always a little candy hidden somewhere or another.
I accuse the adobe cave and the desert entity of being, if not the same personage, then fraternal twins. Once our gesselschaft walled off the potato field -- and in fact dug it out of the ground to make our bricks -- the felix fall into polyvalent language was foreordained. The city was its own punishment and reward, supporting (and demanding) an ever-widening stream of new interpretation like old buildings keep the paint makers in business.
Meanwhile down in the boondocks the book really didn't need to be updated too often. So yeah, if this is the angel of history, then it's got two heads, Pan on the one side and Millet on the other. In summer, Millet is a myth -- except in the cities, where they talk about him year-round. In winter, Pan is a myth -- except for those digging for that last potato.
What I love about that Twain story is its probably unconscious Frazerian majesty: The man doesn't really die; he changes his name and vanishes; we bury a dummy, and cry over it, with all the world to help. What I hate about what's been done to Millet is that instead of being buried in the potato field he's been embalmed for the edification of the burghers, maybe they pay a young MFA a little cash to rouge him up now and then. We bury a dummy, but if we've dug up the potato fields to make our bricks, then we're living inside the potato field, that is, the premature burial -- and so there's no place to plant the dummy.
To welcome Kafka to the party, in Barbizon that baby planted in the Angelus will eventually rise to the surface again, first as a sprout and then as a vine and then (I don't know which, since I haven't seen Dali's x-rays personally) as a potato or maybe a great pumpkin in itself. But in the painting, they will wait forever, and I think this is what creeped old Dali out. Forever or at least until the painting itself is buried or, through hidden arts, empowered to breathe and whisper and sprout. And I think this is what Dali kept trying to pull off. Call the mud doctor!
The whole earth had one language and was of one speech. As they migrated from the east, it happened that they found a plain in the land of Shinar, and they settled there. They said one to another, "Come, let's make bricks, and bake them thoroughly."
From one of the earliest urban planning manuals, we get the total skinny on building something out of nothing. Only it's a trick, because the earth is just transformed from an abstract into a concrete entity, which multiplies and amasses towards structural, and ultimately cultural solidity. And they would have gotten away with it too, if it hadn't been for that pesky desert deity.
Pan across the boardroom table of history and Millet sits near the other end, digging at the diaspora. Here are the stragglers, abandoned by industry. This is not sentiment, it's what he sees. And he's not asking the people to move either, so he can paint some pretty haystacks. The last few mount some Great Pumpkin vigil for the next Babel. (The cities that exist now have failed them and left them behind.) And Millet doesn't worry about a god to ruin the fun; no one's been here for years. The haunting aspect for me is not that they've put something in the ground, but that they're waiting (and there's eternity in those stances) for something to emerge. And what happens when it does?
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I accuse the adobe cave and the desert entity of being, if not the same personage, then fraternal twins. Once our gesselschaft walled off the potato field -- and in fact dug it out of the ground to make our bricks -- the felix fall into polyvalent language was foreordained. The city was its own punishment and reward, supporting (and demanding) an ever-widening stream of new interpretation like old buildings keep the paint makers in business.
Meanwhile down in the boondocks the book really didn't need to be updated too often. So yeah, if this is the angel of history, then it's got two heads, Pan on the one side and Millet on the other. In summer, Millet is a myth -- except in the cities, where they talk about him year-round. In winter, Pan is a myth -- except for those digging for that last potato.
What I love about that Twain story is its probably unconscious Frazerian majesty: The man doesn't really die; he changes his name and vanishes; we bury a dummy, and cry over it, with all the world to help. What I hate about what's been done to Millet is that instead of being buried in the potato field he's been embalmed for the edification of the burghers, maybe they pay a young MFA a little cash to rouge him up now and then. We bury a dummy, but if we've dug up the potato fields to make our bricks, then we're living inside the potato field, that is, the premature burial -- and so there's no place to plant the dummy.
To welcome Kafka to the party, in Barbizon that baby planted in the Angelus will eventually rise to the surface again, first as a sprout and then as a vine and then (I don't know which, since I haven't seen Dali's x-rays personally) as a potato or maybe a great pumpkin in itself. But in the painting, they will wait forever, and I think this is what creeped old Dali out. Forever or at least until the painting itself is buried or, through hidden arts, empowered to breathe and whisper and sprout. And I think this is what Dali kept trying to pull off. Call the mud doctor!
Reply
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