Re: RAT Re dramaturgy

[brad rothbart <scrdchao@nni.com>]

>
>Of course I was suggesting a poetic distinction between wrighting and
>writing, not a literal one.  And that any writing without a reader or
>audience or production as its endgame is an act of masturbation.
>
>Which is not to cast aspersions on masturbation, an honorable solo effort
>in its own wright.
>
>--nick


  All,

  Just to bring this back to Art ( with a capital A) in  1968 
Poet-Painter Larry Rivers wrote a perfomance piece( wrighted a 
performance piece?)  called J-O in which five men sat, naked, on 
stage, with  an overhead spot on each  of them. They began to 
masturbate, and when  the first performer came, there was a blackout, 
followed by a "coronation" and celebration. Rivers's contention was 
that speed was somehow conflated with success in our society, and we 
had to unknot these issues  if we wanted to  move forward as a 
society.

  Don't know  if the piece was ever produced, but it just goes to show 
that masturbation can be theatre too. : )

  Also, on a more serious note, Nick- by using audience and production 
to discern "masturbatoryness"- are you  casting this on a relative 
scale?
  Is THE WILL ROGERS FOLLIES less masturbatory than LESSER MAGOO 
simply because it was seen by a greater number of people??

  Does the  work have to be produced/seen/consumed within the 
artist's lifetime? By that standard Van Gogh was a bigger masturbator 
(and therefore lesser artist) than Basquiat- and Emily Dickinson the 
biggest masturbator of them all.

  get up  for the down stroke (everybody get up),

brad

-brad





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The barber shaves all and only those who do not shave themselves.
  If he does, he doesn't;  If he doesn't, he does.

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