RAT looking back, short telescope

["erik ehn" <shadowtackle@worldnet.att.net>]

All-in-all:

Getting this down before I forget it all. Don't have notes on all the
sessions I attended; some spots patchier than others.

Deep thanks to Nick, Gaby and the open-hearted hosts in Philly. Every day
got deeper; summer-camp feel at goodbye.

Retrospective title: Energy - how to get it, how to spend it. Per
organizational means: union, ritual, style (personal, genre), media. And
overarching: the organization of rat. Repetition increases identity, or
sense of it. What is that sense? What is rat meant to do, how does it
achieve those goals, and how does it gather the will to move forward? Or
does it want only energy without agenda?

The form of the conference was true to its development -rat re-made locally.
An opportunity to review fundamental questions. Held in the presence of
TCG - a large, effective, evolving organization. Does our small, willfully
unstable, at-the-fringe corona of artists aspire to growth? To concentration
at the center of culture, with improved collective access to resources? Or
is TCG doing a job we don't need to? We would compliment work in the field
by accelerating outward from the core?

Intro:
Flamenco and food at a stretched Dixon-Place: Sra Shubin's theater/house.

Diversity:
Brad and crew. Whatever it is, there doesn't seem to be enough of it, and
conversations about it don't seem to be the way to get any more of it
together. For it to happen, individuals or small groups need a decided and
free relationship with capital/resources - either detachment or
independent-entrepreneurship. Rat in this case may help by being a
touchstone for reflection and an exchange of scams.
     "Diversity" as simple eclecticism is no deep solution, and in fact, may
dilute grass roots practice when exercised by larger institutions (when a
large outfit seasons its season with a little of this, little of that,
sidestepping change in the elemental power structure - they may promote the
sense that they have discovered "the" poetic-theater artist, African
American artist, etc. shutting out the rest of the field). Changes must open
avenues of access (cede a measure of programming authority, for example) to
the movement, as it exists on the ground. Meanwhile, artists/small groups
should trust self-production.
     Diversity isn't always necessary. That a classic flamenco style
continue to be practiced feels important; hopefully somebody out there is
maintaining a sense of how the hammer dulcimer was played back-when.
     Kinds of diversity: form, image, community. To effect change: money is
volatile, communities are organic and mortal (the case of rat, and how its
membership shifts). to effect the deepest changes, change the space.
Literally move your locality to another locality (tour meaningfully - with
necessity in tact); change theater architecture, theater addresses. If
people aren't coming through your door - move your door. Real estate.
     Not forgetting the dental emergency case in point - Sometimes you have
to go for the cash; sometimes you have to pay the bills. Non-violence
theory, as I understand a version of it, goes this way to. Use up every
imaginative possibility (the number of possibilities always being
underestimated) to defuse the situation. then knock the sucker out if the
knife's arc towards the throat of your loved one is relentless. Less
dramatically - pay the people when the art's right and the money-language is
all that's holding you up.

Generations:
Sweet Fordham crew. Fears and interests of a graduating class. Synthesis:
that the gaps in the theater community are more a matter of culture than of
age (narrative versus non-narrative; working styles.). One generational
issue: the increased proliferation of images over time. Art can be our
meeting ground, since performance is about pure action (what you do versus
what seems to be), and at the center of action is silence and hope.

Unions, Guilds, and Community:
Jefferey Sweet rep'd the Dramatist's Guild; Gaby has the name of the Equity
Rep. Equity and DG are interested in protecting the rights of labor. No
disagreement there. If we mix member artists with non-members, inequities
arise. You may join a union and find that there isn't enough union work to
sustain your career; even work under union guidelines can fail to provide a
living wage. [Conversation focused on Equity; DG is just that - a guild - an
alliance of independent contractors.] Members need more autonomy in moving
in and out of the union.
     As artists, we want to work at will. We believe we want to work in good
faith, according to fair principles. We want to protect labor, but on more
fluid terms (e.g. distributing resources equally, when resources are scarce,
which may mean paying everyone $25 for a six week process; which may mean
paying people in tube socks for a two-year process) because the nature of
the processes and resources is so variable.
     A concrete task arose: locally, in Philly, theaters and the artists
they want to work with need to clarify their grievances, elect spokespeople,
and meet with Equity. This model should be duplicated on a local level
nationally, and perhaps rat could be a catalyst for these meetings. Then
local groups could compare notes across the country, working the discussion
further and further up the Equity chain. If Equity can't be reformed, not
out of malice - but because the reforms would be about allowing labor to
voluntarily distance itself from safety - a practice counter to Equity's
mission - then maybe rat could propose the formation of an alternative union
or guild, and we'd lobby to have alternative contracts recognized.

Ritual:
Alfred Vitale. History and definitions. A personal history of a long-term
exploration, in a beautifully apt space (church turned museum), made
accessible through level, coherent discussion; group exercises with a game
crowd - ritual actions celebrating the cardinal directions.

Punk:
Leah Ryan. Learning to collaborate with our exhaustion, our chaos, rather
than solving it. A sense of control in dynamic dialogue with a sense of the
out-of-control.
     Means of disrupting frozen senses of order: Disorder the senses;
overlap artistic circles (hang out/collaborate across disciplines); travel;
let the pressures and opportunities of the next project(s) influence the
current project.
     Fears: Starting. Continuing. Finishing. Self-criticism shuts us down.
     Address fears by: personalizing your relationship with your audience
(create for friends, or accept that you have chosen and require strangers in
your process); think about the short form; seek out the company and support
of other artists; know that the self that censors you is not your monolithic
and definitive self - you are several; statistically, two out of every three
things you make is going to suck, so lighten up; kick innovation junk - not
everything you create has to be the first and last of its kind; when you
start writing/making, you are not necessarily starting at the beginning
(solve fear of starting and finishing by recognizing that you are always in
the middle).
     Writing exercises to music.

Alternative Media:
Eric Galatas, Free Speech TV. Do we want to use the media to appropriate the
center? To concentrate wealth and celebrity? Do we want to scam the media,
and raid our way to mass attention? Sure, sometimes. Another use of media -
take it out of the center and use it to activate and connect the fringe.
Make cheap DV movies not to audition for Sundance, but because you need a DV
movie in your community. Lean on and trust the alternative media
(micro-stations, pirate stations) the way we currently, habitually lean on
the mainstream media.

Spanish Mysticism:
1) Know yourself (what are you asking, whom are you asking, what do you
expect the one asked to do, and what do you expect to happen then?)
2) Know yourself as a writer (imitation, adaptation)
3) Know writing (mentorship, mastery of forms)
4) Intuit writing (collaborations, loss of ownership)
5) Cease "writing"
6) Be
7) Be with

Muse, Angel, Duende. Purgative, Illuminative, Unitive. We got halfway.

Wrap Up:
a) Do we need to be? Do we need to meet? There are people we would miss if
we didn't get together. there are conversations we are having here, on
subjects and in a manner that require some anarchy - some explosion of
concentration or radical simplicity of concentration - conversations that
need to happen outside the context of structured democracy and a faith in
development/improvement (anarchy is hopeful, but not necessarily
developmental). Rat needn't be effective, but may be effective beyond this
conversation.
b) Rat is a zine. Rat advertises ideas that speak to garage theaters, to
immediatist theaters (Bey). Advertises these ideas to its community, and to
other communities. To improve as a zine - operate more
sporadically/selectively? Produce an artifact (literal, paper zine)? Get out
a book that compiles some of the ideas we keep returning to?
c) To be effective beyond advertising/play-of-ideas: engage in specific and
selective (that word again) conversations locally (as per Equity plan).
Issues of selectivity and representations are clearly still forming.
d) The issue at the heart of rat is still connecting - in the flesh and in
mutual need. Fostering the exchange of workers with their work; ways of
working demonstrated through actual practice.

That's it for now. Would be good to hear reports from the other events, or
views that correct and add to mine. There are all the issues of the problems
and successes of the logistics of this conference, but I fell like those
were pretty well talked out on-site. Where/whenever the next conference is,
we can revisit technique then. I'm going to try and be quiet for a while;
probably go off list after next week. The "silence and hope" idea is from
Teresa, and I want to live with that right now.


- ehn






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