Casa synesthetica

The Rio de la Plata group suggested a synesthetic investigation of a sound they recorded which was at present the only clue to the surrealist house. Easily triggered by synesthetic as well as epistemological questions, the Stockholm group found this game an exciting one.

MF:

Une maison peu solide

Before I’ve taken the time to listen to the Rio de la Plata group’s audio contribution, I dream of the surrealist house. It is a place where you arrive late at night, after a long journey. There are three wings surrounding a yard, like the farms in some parts of sweden; but the yard is covered by an artificial mountain, and several people are exercising climbing the mountain in the light of strong headlights. Possibly, this is the Mont analogue. Indoors, we rapidly climb up to the second storey, some kind of loft, but with a space between each floor tile, so that you not only can see what goes on downstairs, but actually fall down if not careful. As the rooms downstairs are built upon early situationist psychogeographical notions and the principle one room one ambiance, and the borders between rooms are not obvious, you never now into which ambiance you’re falling. It is called Un maison peu solide(in french), which as far as I remember is a part of Les Champs magnetiques.

Then we listen to the sound together.

Discussing the experience, we agree that the notion from MFs dream of strict but invisible borders between ambiances appears relevant. Two players, EL and CA, focus on the house breaking physical laws and surpassing euclidic spatial determinations. The other players, JE and MF, denounce that kind of ”metaphysics” because they feel it makes the vision less concrete, and focus on the sensory aspects. Then again, EL and CA insist that this is merely an acceptance of the ”reality police” which the Rio de la Plata group’s text warned about.

JE and MF agree that it is a huge industrial-type hall; JE identifies it with the Desintegrator, a fantasy launched by Gösta Kriland and elaborated by the rest of the Stockholm group with him and after his death (published in Mannen på gatan #1 1991), about a huge machine devouring all misery.

CA:s final words on the subject: ”If the game should be reported, I think our defeat is relevant to report, that we are reality police. That we went into repeating this world instead of transforming it (which might however possibly be the same thing).”

Individual descriptions:

JE:

VAD FÖR SLAGS HUS ÄR DET?

Ett tresnärjat, med utrymmen för plantage och besvärjelser. Den olidlige kan ges besök, endast i mån av plats vilket alltid finns. Stämningarna alstras okänt för de delaktiga men av deras vilja. Entrén sker utåt.

BYGGNADSMATERIAL: Självkorrigerande cement, som söker upp avskilda delar och för dem i kontakt med varandra för att störa de inneboendes frukostvanor.

LJUD: Anti-ljud, fortplantas genom ritualiserad anti-dramaturgi i form av små nålar man ger till varandra. Tryckeffekten från nålarna internaliserar ljudet.

DOFT: Väggarna besprutas alltid vagt av vatten för att dofter ska transporteras och förstärkas. Dofternas utbredning anger också dansrytmen.

Skuggorna öppnar upp för optiska villor, objekt som inte finns etc

_______

WHAT KIND OF HOUSE IS IT?

A three-tangled, with space for plantage and incantations. The unbearable one could be given visits, only as long as there is place, which there always is. Ambiances are generated unknown to the participants but based on their will. Entry takes place outwards bound.

BUILDING MATERIALS:

Self-correcting cement, searching out separate parts and bringing them in contact with each other in order to disturb the inhabitants’ breakfast habits.

SOUNDS:

Anti-sounds, resonating by means of ritualised anti-dramathurgy in the shape of small pins given to each other. The pressure effect from the needles internalises the sound.

SMELL:

The walls are constantly poured over vaguely with water in order to diffuse and strengthen smells.

The distribution of the smells also defines the rhythm of the dance.

The shadows allow for optical illusions, non-existent objects etc.

EL:

stilla rullar mattor – som vatten

trappors tång

vattenytans tyngd mot väggarna

vidden

suddig men skarp (i luften ström åt alla håll)

att vända tid till stämning

falla in (som grenarna vrider sig)

tystnad som ström

väggarna viks/rasar ständigt/ sträcker ut sig

doften mörk – som skuggor

släpper armarna som dansar in sig

runt stämningar/ rummen

utifrån liten plattform -> enorm yta

tak väggar golv går ihop sig

kan falla in i våningar

under/ över/ runt

_______

Quietly carpets are rolling – like water

seawrack of stairs

the weight of the water surface against the walls

the width

blurred but sharp (in the air currents in all directions)

turning time into ambiance

falling inwards (like the branches turn)

silence like currents

walls are folded/ always tumbling down/ stretching out

fragrance dark – like shadows

the arms that dance let themselves in

around ambiances/ rooms

from a little platform -> huge surface

celing walls floor converge themselves

can fall in into floors

under/ over/ around

MF:

ett jättestort hus

minusgrader

är gult

rummen är inte fysiskt avgränsade

utan består bara i hur stämningar

är distribuerade i den stora hallen

lejdare

ingenting hörs

det smakar

inte marsipan

varje rörelse är dramatisk

minusgrader

allvarligt damm

gul som vaniljcrème

overklig vaniljcrème

_______

a huge house

temperature below zero

is yellow

rooms are not physically delineated

only consists of how the ambiances

are distributed in thye great hall

ladders

nothing can be heard

it tastes

not of marzipan

every movement is dramatic

temperature below zero

serious dust

yellow as vanilla cream

unreal vanilla cream

CA:

Huset jag var inne i var stort, många rum o korridorer, mörkt, ljuset kommer bara från olika akvarierör, och bubblande, turbulenta vätskor i rören, små processer överallt.

Dramatisk kanske, men all kommunikation o alltings platser var självklara på ett implicit, underförstått sätt, oartikulerat. ingen talade utan allt var underförstått, vilket accentuerade stämmningarna MF talade om. huset var betydligt mkt större än en själv och jag såg bara en liten del. stora delar av huset var organiska.

huset låg inbäddat i, eller var, urslemmet haeckel grävde efter.

huset var en processor.

lovecraftianskt: en process mkt större än en själv som förhäller sig indifferent till sina delar och vad annat som kryper omkring i dess korridorer

dvs husets arkitektur var i konstant förvandling. trots det var allt underförstått, eller alla vet självklart sakers plats o betydelse (kafkas byråkrati?)

som ett mkt större star trek fartyg under havsbotten där ingen behöver tala för att alla är i tyst samförstånd om stundens allvar o sakers propotioner

det huset i en john andersson serie där det simmar omkring en val. både pga vattnet, turbulensen (bolzmann), i akvarierör, och tystnaden och den enhetliga stämningen.

något väldigt meditativt med tystnaden o något kittlande med det organiska o bubblandet o korridorerna. en dunkel undermynning

______

The house that I was inside was big, many rooms and corridors, dark, the light only comes from different aquarium pipes, bubbling, turbulent fluids in the rubes, small processes everywhere.

Dramatic perhaps, but all communication and the places of everything were selfevident in an implicit way, unarticulated, no one spoke, everything was implicit, which accentuated the ambiances MF talked about.

the house was much bigger than oneself and I only saw a small part. large parts of the house were organic.

the house was embedded in, or was, the primeval slime that Haeckel was digging for.

the house was a processor.

lovecraftian: a process much larger than oneself which is indifferent to its parts and whatever else is crawling in its corridors

that is: the architecture of the hpouse was in a state of constant metamorphosis, inspite of it being implicit, or everybody knows the place and meaning of things (Kafka’s bureacracy?)

like a much larger star trek ship under the sea where no one needs to talk since everybody are in silent agreement about the seriousness of the moment and of the proportions of things

that house in a comic byb John Andersson where a whale is swimming around. because of the water, the turbulence (Bolzmann), in aquarium pipes, and the silence and the uniform ambiance.

something very meditative about the silence and something titillating with the organic and the bubbling and the corridors. a dark underorifice.