WEBVTT

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What we're going to do now
is a brief interlude of,

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looking at a collaboration
that Lucinda and I have

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been working on since last May.

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I, too, am interested
in collaboration.

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And I'll read some
poems after this chapter

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of our presentation in which I
talk about some collaborations

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between artists and scientists.

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But, Lucinda and I,
many of you know,

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we did a collaboration
some years ago

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called The Anatomy of Desire.

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Kore Press published this
beautiful artist's book

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from that collaboration.

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And Luce had an exhibit here at
the University in the Student

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Union, of related pictures.

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And that was, that collaboration
was really mostly writing.

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And the object that was
produced was a little chapbook

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that opened like French doors--
her words, my words, her words,

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my words.

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And the idea was to
challenge ourselves

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on a topic that was difficult,
allegedly, for mothers

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and daughters to talk about--

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desire.

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Which we can talk about,
and have always talked

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about quite freely for
a mother and daughter.

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And we discovered our
limitations with that, though.

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We wanted to push ourselves--

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[LAUGHTER]

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--we wanted to push
ourselves to the point

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where we got uncomfortable
with each other.

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Because everyone
would say, "Oh guys,

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you can talk about anything."

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And we always say, "All
right, where is it?

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Where you hit the
edge, where you

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can't talk about it anymore?"

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So we pushed it to that point.

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So that, we have.

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That's the only
formal collaboration

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we've done, other
than just as artists.

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I think, a wonderful deepening
dimension of our relationship

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is that I am often a first
viewer for Lucinda's art work,

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and she is often a first
reader for my writing projects.

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But do you want to talk
about the Shotpouch

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briefly, about the
Shotpouch residency?

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Because that's what kicked
up this next collaboration.

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Yes, Oregon State University
has this amazing spot--

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Shotpouch Creek
Residency Center.

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And it's essentially a
cabin in the woods, which

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is a little terrifying
because you really

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are in a cabin in the woods.

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And we could imagine all
sorts of creatures watching us

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from the jungle around.

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But we were fortunate to
be there for a week in,

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it was a week, right?

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[INTERPOSING VOICES]

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Outside of Corvallis
is the location.

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We were there for a week
and really the only charge

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for us was to engage
in a dialogue.

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There didn't need to be any
product, which was so rare

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and an incredible relief and--

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yeah.

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I mean, should I
say how we, it was

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like after this week
of being in dialogue--

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Yes.

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--which was very rich,
and we were each doing

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our independent work.

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Right.

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We ended up wanting to, at
least extend the process,

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I wouldn't say formalize it.

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But--

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And Luce has been doing a
collaboration with an artist

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friend for years, where they
send drawings back and forth,

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and they keep working on
the same piece of paper.

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And I was jealous of that
vocabulary of art, where

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you could just do anything,
and the playfulness

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that was possible in a
visual vocabulary that

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didn't seem possible
in a verbal vocabulary.

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So we've been exchanging an
artist's journal since May.

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We started it at the Shotpouch
Creek residency, one of us

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will keep the notebook for
maybe a few days or a few weeks.

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And what you're going
to see is an abstraction

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of some of the
pages, where you see

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the combination of the visual
vocabulary and the written

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vocabulary.

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And we're just messing with each
other, and the point of this,

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at this point, is to--

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I think the point
of it is for us

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to work in a way that is
partial, that is playful,

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that works with the
aesthetics of a single page.

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There are themes and motifs
that have bubbled up repeatedly.

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But basically, we're going to
show you some of those pages

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and maybe say a little bit
about the process and some

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of the dominant themes that have
come up in that work so far.

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I think that works.

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I mean, you know, we actually
thought about sharing,

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chronologically, the pages
of this book and showing them

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to you fully.

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But in a way that
would have been

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so much like presenting
a finished object.

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And it's really not about that.

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It's not a finished object.

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One of the interesting
things is how, well, there's

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so many interesting things,
but the relationship of image

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to text, and how we go
back and forth with that.

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But also as a visual artist,
I feel, not corrective

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but like I want each page to
work in a formal, visual way.

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So, I mean, we just
go through it every,

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it's not like we add to
pages, but we'll go back

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and the pages get altered in a
way that's not chronological.

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And these close up
shots, in a way,

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echo the way we see it,
I think, more accurately

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than a chronological
march would.

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So those yellow
eyes, I think, were

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the eyes of either a
gorilla or a cheetah.

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Now, I can't even remember.

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I had put a photograph in there,
Lucinda pulled the eyes out

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and put them on the next page.

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And those eyes sat on that
page, I think for two months

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all by themselves.

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We moved the journal
on, maybe 20 pages.

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One day, the notebook
came back to me

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and those little bones
were there with the eyes.

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And so, it's very
intuitive, it's very,

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let's see what works.

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And then, accidentally, this
new dimension of the project

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happened.

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Do you want to talk about
the accident of the--

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I mean, we'd started to
incorporate some collage

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and I usually, I
live in Bath, Maine.

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My studio's in Portland, so I'm
traveling back and forth a lot,

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so I usually have the art bag
with everything thrown in it.

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So I'd taken a bunch
of collage elements

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and tucked them in the
back of the journal,

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and basically forgot
they were there.

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And sent them to my
mother who thought

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that I had like hidden a
present for her in the back

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and found them--

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For me?

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--but she incorporated
them beautifully,

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and then sent it back with some
hidden collage elements for me.

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So like from that point on,
if there's nothing in there

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I'm incredibly disappointed.

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I'm shaking it and--

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Right, and we've gotten
freer and freer to mess

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with each other
stuff and cut it up.

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Like she sent me the notebook
back once in a Manila envelope

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that had this funky tape
with pictures of Jesus

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all over the tape.

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And you'll see an image in
the series, where I just

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cut the images of
Jesus in half, to make

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them the color and pattern.

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And to again, to knock
down the authority

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of the original iconography.

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One thing that's
significant is that, I

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think it was really at
Shotpouch that we realized

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the degree to which our
independent bodies of work

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had so many congruencies.

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We both were dealing
with the natural world,

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we both were thinking
about animal narratives.

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And this is giving us a vehicle
to have that conversation

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with one another, even
though those bodies of work

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were created separately.

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I think that's happened several
times in our artistic lives.

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Is that she'll
show me, where can

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I-- and I'll say, "Oh,
that's really interesting",

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and I'll show her work.

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And then suddenly,
months later, we realize,

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"hey, we're both
working with animals,

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and we have been for a year.

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What's that about?"

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And so part of the
agenda is to be

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irreverent about the inherent
hierarchy that exists

00:07:36.740 --> 00:07:39.320 align:middle line:90%
between a mother and her kids.

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And hopefully by talking
artist to artist,

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aesthetic to aesthetic,
I hope that we're

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able to mess with
each other's material

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in a way that calls up new
possibilities for relationship

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in what could be an
inherent dynamic.

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And that's what all
collaboration is about,

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I think, is trying to find a
new dynamic of relationship

00:08:02.870 --> 00:08:05.450 align:middle line:84%
between people who
might have a fixed

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way of relating to one another.

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Do you want to say something
about fairy tales or anything

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with this is sort of
a fairy tale even?

00:08:13.070 --> 00:08:15.115 align:middle line:84%
No, you can describe
this one because it

00:08:15.115 --> 00:08:18.980 align:middle line:84%
was based on that
question about the dragon.

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How we both remembered
our relationship

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to fairy tale and mythological--

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[INTERPOSING VOICES]

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We set fairy tale themes
that will come up,

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you'll see a few images that
have fairy tales in them.

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A Czech fairy tale and an
old Grimm's fairy tale.

00:08:32.240 --> 00:08:36.470 align:middle line:84%
But I get to use Lucinda
as a research subject

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because her childhood
is something

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I experienced as her mother.

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And so I can remember certain
things about her childhood,

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but I can also interrogate
her about her childhood.

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And one of the
things I asked is,

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I've been trying to think
about what do animals

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mean in the human imagination.

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At this point in our history,
where there's so much elegy

00:08:55.730 --> 00:08:57.980 align:middle line:84%
and anguish and
wounding and bandaging

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of animals and of
the natural world.

00:09:01.370 --> 00:09:03.530 align:middle line:84%
And so, I asked
her about dragons

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because I wanted to know,
did she ever really believe

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that dragons existed.

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I was trying to
get to, what did we

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feel when we were kids
about all these monsters

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that were part of our lives?

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Did we really believe it?

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And so, that last page about
the dragons came out of that,

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and we both agreed that
we believed they existed.

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Dragons and all
the other monsters.

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But they seem to exist
in a parallel world,

00:09:27.585 --> 00:09:29.210 align:middle line:84%
and that we were
afraid of them, but it

00:09:29.210 --> 00:09:31.127 align:middle line:84%
was like they would never
come in our bedroom.

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They were somewhere
else and we knew that.

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And we somehow believed them
without feeling that they lived

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in the same place that we did.

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This brings up something that
I'll just say really briefly,

00:09:43.400 --> 00:09:45.022 align:middle line:84%
because I didn't
have a chance to when

00:09:45.022 --> 00:09:46.230 align:middle line:90%
I was speaking about my work.

00:09:46.230 --> 00:09:49.620 align:middle line:84%
Which there, there are
probably some people

00:09:49.620 --> 00:09:53.030 align:middle line:84%
who are fans of Lewis Hyde and
his book, Trickster Makes This

00:09:53.030 --> 00:09:55.550 align:middle line:84%
World, was a
wonderful one for me

00:09:55.550 --> 00:09:59.120 align:middle line:84%
in terms of thinking about the
sort of artist, artist writer,

00:09:59.120 --> 00:10:00.230 align:middle line:90%
as trickster.

00:10:00.230 --> 00:10:06.830 align:middle line:84%
And again, some great unpacking
of that idea of the person

00:10:06.830 --> 00:10:11.300 align:middle line:84%
who's playing and acting, and
that trickster/jester role can

00:10:11.300 --> 00:10:13.580 align:middle line:84%
speak to the more
difficult truths,

00:10:13.580 --> 00:10:18.740 align:middle line:84%
can speak witness to issues in
a way that something, maybe,

00:10:18.740 --> 00:10:20.120 align:middle line:90%
perhaps more serious couldn't.

00:10:20.120 --> 00:10:23.843 align:middle line:90%


00:10:23.843 --> 00:10:24.510 align:middle line:90%
I like that one.

00:10:24.510 --> 00:10:27.420 align:middle line:84%
This was from the root,
the root, this story.

00:10:27.420 --> 00:10:29.973 align:middle line:90%
Is Jessie Wilson here tonight?

00:10:29.973 --> 00:10:30.863 align:middle line:90%
Uh-huh, yes.

00:10:30.863 --> 00:10:31.530 align:middle line:90%
Oh, right there.

00:10:31.530 --> 00:10:33.990 align:middle line:84%
Were you in Prague, did
you see Little Otik?

00:10:33.990 --> 00:10:35.520 align:middle line:84%
The nightmare
horror film, anybody

00:10:35.520 --> 00:10:37.620 align:middle line:84%
know the Czech
film, Little Otik?

00:10:37.620 --> 00:10:40.200 align:middle line:90%
A masterpiece of surrealism.

00:10:40.200 --> 00:10:42.480 align:middle line:84%
One of the most terrifying
films you'll ever see.

00:10:42.480 --> 00:10:44.430 align:middle line:84%
It's about this couple
that are infertile,

00:10:44.430 --> 00:10:45.540 align:middle line:90%
they can't have a baby.

00:10:45.540 --> 00:10:47.683 align:middle line:84%
And so, they go out
from the city of Prague,

00:10:47.683 --> 00:10:50.100 align:middle line:84%
out to the country to their
country place in the mountain.

00:10:50.100 --> 00:10:52.530 align:middle line:84%
And the husband takes a
root and cuts something

00:10:52.530 --> 00:10:54.030 align:middle line:84%
that looks like a
baby, and gives it

00:10:54.030 --> 00:10:56.280 align:middle line:84%
to his wife as a
sort of consolation.

00:10:56.280 --> 00:10:58.620 align:middle line:84%
Well, it turns out the
root comes to life.

00:10:58.620 --> 00:11:01.590 align:middle line:84%
And it's kind of a parable,
a surrealist parable

00:11:01.590 --> 00:11:05.820 align:middle line:84%
about the perversity of
this insatiable child

00:11:05.820 --> 00:11:08.220 align:middle line:84%
who begins to eat
everything and turns

00:11:08.220 --> 00:11:11.670 align:middle line:84%
into this enormous monster
and eats the mailman.

00:11:11.670 --> 00:11:15.570 align:middle line:84%
And it becomes,
if you ever wanted

00:11:15.570 --> 00:11:19.620 align:middle line:84%
to see parenthood turned
into a perverse enterprise,

00:11:19.620 --> 00:11:21.360 align:middle line:90%
go watch the Little Otik.

00:11:21.360 --> 00:11:22.860 align:middle line:90%
It's a masterpiece.

00:11:22.860 --> 00:11:26.700 align:middle line:84%
So here's the little root,
the beautiful image and nature

00:11:26.700 --> 00:11:27.870 align:middle line:90%
of the dancing plant.

00:11:27.870 --> 00:11:31.965 align:middle line:84%
But indeed, it is not benign at
all in this particular context.

00:11:31.965 --> 00:11:36.670 align:middle line:90%


00:11:36.670 --> 00:11:38.380 align:middle line:90%
I was, I drew this banner.

00:11:38.380 --> 00:11:41.020 align:middle line:84%
It's like a perfect place, it's
the one place she didn't write.

00:11:41.020 --> 00:11:44.105 align:middle line:84%
It's like, I kept sending
this one back to her thinking

00:11:44.105 --> 00:11:46.480 align:middle line:84%
she would write something
really important on the banner.

00:11:46.480 --> 00:11:49.480 align:middle line:84%
But no, along the
side, all around it.

00:11:49.480 --> 00:11:51.040 align:middle line:84%
I was very timid
in the early pages.

00:11:51.040 --> 00:11:52.582 align:middle line:84%
I didn't want to
mess with your stuff

00:11:52.582 --> 00:11:55.420 align:middle line:84%
and make you feel, "Oh, there
goes Mom telling me what

00:11:55.420 --> 00:11:57.010 align:middle line:90%
to do with my banner again."

00:11:57.010 --> 00:11:59.500 align:middle line:90%
[LAUGHTER]

00:11:59.500 --> 00:12:03.340 align:middle line:84%
"Could I put it over
here, would that be OK?"

00:12:03.340 --> 00:12:05.320 align:middle line:84%
This was funny
because she wanted me,

00:12:05.320 --> 00:12:07.000 align:middle line:84%
and I drew that
cabbage afterwards.

00:12:07.000 --> 00:12:10.780 align:middle line:84%
She wanted, you got really brave
with actually drawing something

00:12:10.780 --> 00:12:11.570 align:middle line:90%
if you wanted it.

00:12:11.570 --> 00:12:13.000 align:middle line:84%
But this was her
direction to me,

00:12:13.000 --> 00:12:14.890 align:middle line:90%
like, draw a leafy cabbage here.

00:12:14.890 --> 00:12:16.510 align:middle line:90%
So I did it.

00:12:16.510 --> 00:12:18.880 align:middle line:84%
For the cabbage is figured
in the Little Otik field.

00:12:18.880 --> 00:12:22.480 align:middle line:90%


00:12:22.480 --> 00:12:24.670 align:middle line:90%
There's the Jesus.

00:12:24.670 --> 00:12:27.880 align:middle line:84%
I sent her those flowers
from a seed catalog,

00:12:27.880 --> 00:12:30.862 align:middle line:84%
she turned them into
this bubbly beanstalk.

00:12:30.862 --> 00:12:33.070 align:middle line:84%
One of the fairy tales that
comes up in the narrative

00:12:33.070 --> 00:12:34.305 align:middle line:90%
was Jack and the Beanstalk.

00:12:34.305 --> 00:12:35.680 align:middle line:84%
And we're thinking,
I don't know,

00:12:35.680 --> 00:12:38.258 align:middle line:84%
we want to go there more
with Jack and the Beanstalk.

00:12:38.258 --> 00:12:40.300 align:middle line:84%
And the cow, I want to do
something with the cow.

00:12:40.300 --> 00:12:43.890 align:middle line:90%


00:12:43.890 --> 00:12:48.360 align:middle line:84%
Well, desire, of course, has
come back in because two women,

00:12:48.360 --> 00:12:51.588 align:middle line:84%
mother, daughter, cannot spend
months talking to one another

00:12:51.588 --> 00:12:53.880 align:middle line:84%
about all the issues in their
life without following up

00:12:53.880 --> 00:12:54.870 align:middle line:90%
on desire.

00:12:54.870 --> 00:13:00.510 align:middle line:84%
And so, this is perhaps a
reiteration of that theme.

00:13:00.510 --> 00:13:04.520 align:middle line:90%


00:13:04.520 --> 00:13:06.020 align:middle line:84%
A gorilla from the
Jacksonville zoo,

00:13:06.020 --> 00:13:07.130 align:middle line:90%
where I'm Poet-in-Residence.

00:13:07.130 --> 00:13:08.325 align:middle line:90%
This gorilla's name is Lash.

00:13:08.325 --> 00:13:12.500 align:middle line:90%


00:13:12.500 --> 00:13:15.120 align:middle line:84%
It's a piece of the text to the
retelling of the Little Otik

00:13:15.120 --> 00:13:15.620 align:middle line:90%
myth.

00:13:15.620 --> 00:13:18.580 align:middle line:90%


00:13:18.580 --> 00:13:20.170 align:middle line:90%
Whatever this has to do--

00:13:20.170 --> 00:13:21.160 align:middle line:90%
I don't know.

00:13:21.160 --> 00:13:22.390 align:middle line:90%
You did that, I think.

00:13:22.390 --> 00:13:24.126 align:middle line:90%
[LAUGHS]

00:13:24.126 --> 00:13:25.270 align:middle line:90%
No, I sent it to you.

00:13:25.270 --> 00:13:27.070 align:middle line:84%
You glued it on top
of your own text.

00:13:27.070 --> 00:13:29.020 align:middle line:84%
I did, I glued it on
top of my own text.

00:13:29.020 --> 00:13:30.010 align:middle line:90%
OK.

00:13:30.010 --> 00:13:30.545 align:middle line:90%
So you see--

00:13:30.545 --> 00:13:32.170 align:middle line:84%
It's so funny, we're
documenting, like,

00:13:32.170 --> 00:13:33.745 align:middle line:90%
who's messed with, you know--

00:13:33.745 --> 00:13:34.480 align:middle line:90%
Right, I know.

00:13:34.480 --> 00:13:36.397 align:middle line:84%
You messed with that, I
didn't mess with that.

00:13:36.397 --> 00:13:40.060 align:middle line:90%


00:13:40.060 --> 00:13:42.520 align:middle line:84%
One of the guiding
spirits of the project

00:13:42.520 --> 00:13:47.410 align:middle line:84%
is Myron Stout, who is a
painter, an artist that I

00:13:47.410 --> 00:13:49.980 align:middle line:84%
had the privilege to
read for in Provincetown

00:13:49.980 --> 00:13:50.980 align:middle line:90%
for a couple of winters.

00:13:50.980 --> 00:13:52.840 align:middle line:84%
He became blind in
his later years,

00:13:52.840 --> 00:13:55.780 align:middle line:84%
and he used to hire
some of the writers who

00:13:55.780 --> 00:13:58.520 align:middle line:84%
are hanging out in Provincetown
to come and read for him.

00:13:58.520 --> 00:14:01.390 align:middle line:84%
And he had this wonderful
statement in his artist

00:14:01.390 --> 00:14:03.940 align:middle line:84%
journals, the full
statement is, "The intuition

00:14:03.940 --> 00:14:08.620 align:middle line:84%
is more in harmony
with nature--"

00:14:08.620 --> 00:14:09.640 align:middle line:90%
I can't remember either.

00:14:09.640 --> 00:14:12.380 align:middle line:90%


00:14:12.380 --> 00:14:15.290 align:middle line:84%
It's something like, "--than
any system the human mind can

00:14:15.290 --> 00:14:16.610 align:middle line:90%
invent."

00:14:16.610 --> 00:14:18.740 align:middle line:84%
Which is the idea
of this project,

00:14:18.740 --> 00:14:21.020 align:middle line:84%
is to remain in a
place where we trust

00:14:21.020 --> 00:14:23.450 align:middle line:84%
the intuition, letting
it unfold by intuition.

00:14:23.450 --> 00:14:24.950 align:middle line:84%
We're not developing
a system, we're

00:14:24.950 --> 00:14:27.117 align:middle line:84%
not saying, "this is what
we're going to accomplish,

00:14:27.117 --> 00:14:28.500 align:middle line:90%
this is our goal."

00:14:28.500 --> 00:14:31.220 align:middle line:84%
We're trying to remain
as open as possible

00:14:31.220 --> 00:14:35.630 align:middle line:84%
to letting intuition be
the determining guide.

00:14:35.630 --> 00:14:37.850 align:middle line:84%
And we'll keep this up
for maybe a year or two

00:14:37.850 --> 00:14:41.420 align:middle line:90%
and see where we go with it.

00:14:41.420 --> 00:14:44.120 align:middle line:84%
I think we need to
just finish up and show

00:14:44.120 --> 00:14:45.597 align:middle line:90%
you the rest of these.

00:14:45.597 --> 00:14:47.930 align:middle line:84%
I mean, I think that one thing
that's happening formally

00:14:47.930 --> 00:14:49.672 align:middle line:90%
is this attempt at repetition.

00:14:49.672 --> 00:14:52.130 align:middle line:84%
We're starting, now that we've
been doing it for six months

00:14:52.130 --> 00:14:57.440 align:middle line:84%
or so, to really work to,
we're pulling out narratives.

00:14:57.440 --> 00:14:59.720 align:middle line:84%
We're looking for
narrative threads, but also

00:14:59.720 --> 00:15:02.090 align:middle line:84%
visual threads and
visual repetition.

00:15:02.090 --> 00:15:04.460 align:middle line:90%
So--

00:15:04.460 --> 00:15:07.160 align:middle line:84%
An animal and
vegetable, obviously

00:15:07.160 --> 00:15:11.400 align:middle line:84%
objects, become
consistent, repeats.

00:15:11.400 --> 00:15:15.790 align:middle line:90%


00:15:15.790 --> 00:15:18.040 align:middle line:90%
I have no idea what this is.

00:15:18.040 --> 00:15:19.250 align:middle line:90%
It hasn't become yet.

00:15:19.250 --> 00:15:19.750 align:middle line:90%
OK.

00:15:19.750 --> 00:15:23.989 align:middle line:90%


00:15:23.989 --> 00:15:25.570 align:middle line:90%
And this is the last image.

00:15:25.570 --> 00:15:27.190 align:middle line:84%
Again, these are
just excerpts from,

00:15:27.190 --> 00:15:31.810 align:middle line:84%
there's several other pages
that were not including here.

00:15:31.810 --> 00:15:35.020 align:middle line:84%
But again, it's the
beginning of a project.

00:15:35.020 --> 00:15:38.140 align:middle line:84%
So we hope that just a
window into showing you,

00:15:38.140 --> 00:15:39.820 align:middle line:84%
I mean, one of the
challenges to doing

00:15:39.820 --> 00:15:42.070 align:middle line:84%
a collaboration for
artists is that artists

00:15:42.070 --> 00:15:43.840 align:middle line:90%
work so individually.

00:15:43.840 --> 00:15:45.910 align:middle line:84%
It's all about
individual inventiveness

00:15:45.910 --> 00:15:46.700 align:middle line:90%
and consciousness.

00:15:46.700 --> 00:15:50.260 align:middle line:84%
So this is an
attempt to give you

00:15:50.260 --> 00:15:54.250 align:middle line:84%
a slice into a project
that's very much in motion,

00:15:54.250 --> 00:15:55.630 align:middle line:90%
and will be for some time.

00:15:55.630 --> 00:16:00.545 align:middle line:84%
So we hope it gives you a
feel for what that is like.

00:16:00.545 --> 00:16:01.420 align:middle line:90%
We're having a blast.

00:16:01.420 --> 00:16:03.880 align:middle line:90%
We're having a blast.

00:16:03.880 --> 00:16:06.030 align:middle line:90%
[APPLAUSE]

00:16:06.030 --> 00:16:08.000 align:middle line:90%