We're trying something new this week, having the provocation student-initiated. We want both students and people outside our class to feel free to contribute. Clive posed the idea of the Exquisite Corpse exercise, and some of us decided it sounded like fun. So, here's a description of the game and the initial sentence. In the spirit of the game, try to read JUST the LAST response given and write your sentence based on that. Have fun!
Exquisite Corpse is a Surrealist technique of collective collage of words or images. Based on an old parlor game where each person writes a phrase on a sheet of paper, folds the paper to conceal part of it, and passes it on to the next player for his/her contribution.
In our version, we'll write a phrase based on just the last blog entry sentence. Hopefully, if you don't scroll down, you'll only be able to see the last phrase. At the end, we'll have what Nicolas Calas characterized as the "unconscious reality in the personality of the group."
FIRST PHRASE:
It was hard to believe, but there it stood.
WTF?
ReplyDeleteIt was nearly ten meters, if you measured its shadow.
ReplyDeleteOf course, in the waning hours of the evening, shadows were known to be deceiving.
ReplyDeleteDeceiving it might be, but I ponder what lies in the shadows. Is it worthwhile to pause?
ReplyDeleteA moment passed, then the clock struck noon. Perhaps it was summer, some place close to Iceland's blue lagoon.
ReplyDeleteMost visitors never notice the diminutive stone bridge that stretches its tired granite limbs across the abyss.
ReplyDeleteI live in the abyss and this is my home, somewhere familiar where only the inconspicuous pay attention.
ReplyDeleteUnder the sea, under the sea
ReplyDeleteDarling it's better down where it's wetter
Take it from me.
dark is not the opposite of light
ReplyDeleteIt's the absence of light
Up on the shore they work all day
ReplyDeleteOut in the sun they slave away.
there is no more originality, just different interpretations of what has already come
ReplyDelete“Originality is the art of concealing your sources”
ReplyDeleteBrick by brick I build a wall
ReplyDeleteAnd if you think of Brick, for instance,
ReplyDeleteand you say to Brick,
"What do you want Brick?"
And Brick says to you
"I like an Arch."
And if you say to Brick
"Look, arches are expensive,
and I can use a concrete lentil over you.
What do you think of that?"
"Brick?"
Brick says:
"... I like an Arch"”
compression if you lay flat
ReplyDeletecompression if you stand tall
compression if you become walking mat
compression if you become curved wall
nothing matters to brick who just wants the weight of the worlds all
Mm ba ba de
ReplyDeleteUm bum ba de
Um bu bu bum da de
Pressure pushing down on me
Pressing down on you no man ask for
Under pressure - that burns a building down
which came first the brick or the mortar
ReplyDeleteHumpty Dumpty sat on a wall,
ReplyDeleteHumpty Dumpty had a great fall.
All the king's horses and all the king's men
Couldn't put Humpty together again.
this wall of which Humpty sat was constructed from a scientific match made in heaven
ReplyDeleteA perfection of means, and confusion of aims, seems to be our main problem.
ReplyDeleteProblems? How about an opportunity to create new form out of the pieces?
ReplyDeleteThe problems is: the world is so empty with full of walls built up by bricks
ReplyDeleteBefore you embark on a journey of revenge, dig two graves.
ReplyDeleteA journey, from point A to B
ReplyDeleteIt does not matter how slowly you go so long as you do not stop.
ReplyDelete....at the edge of the abyss, near the stone bridge that nobody notices.
ReplyDeletestands a stone figure-head as a mark of human's extinction...
ReplyDeletehow does man document his own extinction?
ReplyDeleteWhat better place than standing atop the smoldering mass of jagged destruction, searching in utter despair for a fragment of hope.
ReplyDeletehope? there is no hope for humanity. as long as men make buildings there will be men who blow them down.
ReplyDeleteOur salvation, then, lies in the rigorous pursuit of habitation of structures existing only in our minds.
ReplyDeletetherein lies why man seeks spiritual enlightenment
ReplyDeleteIt was at that moment that the epiphany occurred. Since our future is bound for extinction, religion builds the architecture of a possible alternate universe - one in which the problems of our current reality are shed like fried eggs in a Teflon pan. Mmmm...fried eggs.
ReplyDeleteThe ability to smoothly digest the amount of information in which a work of architecture presents to you as it catches you by suprise. Take in all of the splender that makes it such an enriched piece of work, down to ever last detail.
ReplyDelete“He that prefers the beautiful to the useful in life will, undoubtedly, like children who prefer sweetmeats to bread, destroy his digestion and acquire a very fretful outlook on the world.”
ReplyDeleteTo be captured by place is only a temporary experience of the present moment. To individually engage with place will be last permanently.
ReplyDelete"It is the logic of consumerism that undermines the values of loyalty and permanence and promotes a different set of values that is destructive of family life."
ReplyDeleteFamily values are based on political, social, and moral believes that are expected to be fallowed by all; but my morals are my morals and your morals are your morals. Keep them to yourself.
ReplyDelete"The hottest place in Hell is reserved for those who remain neutral in times of great moral conflict."
ReplyDeletethere is no right or wrong, there are no morals. these things around us are important because we give them importance. when we move to another dimension, what possessions would you like to bring with you? what pieces of the built environment you create can transcend to the other side?
ReplyDelete“Life is pleasant. Death is peaceful. It's the transition that's troublesome.”
ReplyDeleteJust at the moment this thought arrived, he was startled by a loud crash to which he wheeled around...only to be confronted by what might have been the strangest scene he had been privileged to witness.
ReplyDelete"They're here! They're here! They've landed! Over on the mall! They've landed! "
ReplyDeleteThey've landed...on junk space.
ReplyDelete"It's a weird city because the uglier the weather, the more beautiful the city. And the uglier the buildings, the more coherent the city."
ReplyDeleteIf this is coherent, the city is crazy, then coherency is madness, if we act coherent, no one is sane.
ReplyDeleteWho can be the judge on sanity? Whose perspective is correct or clear than an others? Rational cities have led to loss of uniqueness through their multiplication of coherency. I say the world needs a surge of crazy.
ReplyDeleteJust wait quietly and be patient, for it’s the darkest moment before the dawn.
ReplyDeletethe cold seeps deep into my bones, I cannot warm myself against the concrete that sucks my soul
ReplyDeleteCurl up under the sun, feel the raindrop coming down. Then listen, nothing around.
ReplyDeleteThe nothingness grows dense, as the clamor rises; chaos is on the horizon, dawn approaches.
ReplyDeleteI see the chaos but now I understand, as the city of ugly buildings, I begin to see the beauty behind.
ReplyDeleteI moved forward, determined to reach a void in the dense city allocated for a park.
ReplyDeleteI kept bump into the solid wall and lost in the concrete forest
ReplyDeleteThings stopped making sense in the unnatural place.
ReplyDeleteSo I laid my body gingerly upon the vacuous surface and pleaded with the gods of redemption that my dreams, at least, would be real.
ReplyDeletemy stream of consciousness is an illusion and my dreams are the reality to which I want reprieve
ReplyDeleteThat being said, I may never wake up.
ReplyDelete