Remember

Franciscan monastery in Salzburg's old city; Gestapo headquarters 1938 – 1945.

Wide open

Must have been in another lifetime that I said: "You have to be in flat lands, not Salzburg, to really see wide open skies".

Darkness and vision

Is it money that I want?

Euros dancing in the street?

Street painting man?

More songs about buildings & food?

Can I get a witness?

Bring on the juice!

Thanks to various performing artists for the material to this piece of 'concrete poetry' ;–)

Recommended soundtrack: James Brown, Funky drummer, from:

In the Jungle Groove. Dig it!

2009/07/29

Everybody

Everybody wants 2 find Graffiti Bridge
Everybody's looking 4, everybody's looking 4
Everybody's looking 4 love

Idylle?

It is one of the traditional café- and restaurant gardens in the old city of Salzburg, Posthof. Just recently re-designed, see also below, label pink sun screens. Now Salzburgers are discussing the move: should it simply have been wooden beer garden benches and tables, or rather cast iron 'art deco' furniture from a DIY superstore? Should the hedges have been left higher to block the views to adjacent Kajetanerplatz and Schanzlgasse? Should a commission have been employed to decide what to do with this prominent place?

Every once in a while somebody will mention Prince Archbishop Wolf Dietrich; he was the guy who was responsible among others for the layout of the large squares around Salzburg Cathedral. As a renaissance prince he did not ask, he would not have accepted petitions from concerned citizens, he would not have installed a Gestaltungsbeirat to assist his very own Altstadtkommission. He had taste, he knew about arts and architecture, and he simply had power and money. Good or bad – or just different? Should we have an opinion poll on the issue – or rather install a commission of experts?

The only way is up?

Ring dem bells!

a.k.a. A streetlamp named desire

Your Chill-out-Coach

ohmygawd; please see for yourself: Bernd das Brot is your chill-out-coach on KiKa (Kinderkanal) or Youtube! Thanks to derStandard.at for the hint.

Chillout

Hot again! So, before I start complaining (see below ;–)) a very cool early morning picture from Salzach just around sunrise; and one favourite piece of morning music: Carl Maria von Weber, Aufforderung zum Tanz in an extremely laid back interpretation by Stephen Hough on Radio Ö1. Have a nice day and don't get too hot!

Gaisberg, revisited

Met a chamois buck this morning, pretty much right here, blocking the trail; adressed him 'hallo, Rehlein' / 'hi, Bambi', saw some very dark clouds rising between his antlers that would translate into "Sch**ss-Stadtinger, verreckter! Eh ka Ahnung, oba groß reden!" – after which he left for the steep forest. Good deal for both of us; he got his required adrenaline kick (no natural enemies, wolves or bears!), and I got the assurance that it's not one of those seemingly tame animals that let you come close to finally attack you.

Further reading and listening:

Adalbert Stifter: Der Hochwald. – Incl. directions how to communicate with the beasts of the mountain forest, and how to talk back to a supposedly voiceless, black mountain lake; not written for, but partly applicable to Alpine forests.

The Red Krayola with Art & Language: no idea, why they ended up here; please, try to find some recordings, maybe you can make it up for yourself!

"Azurro"

'il treno del desiderio ...' – Just heard that old Adriano Celentano-Song on the radio, this time sung by its writer, the great Paolo Conte. Well, one of the songs to spend your life with; you don't even have to have it recorded, every once in while you will hear it on any kind of radio station; always around, it may sound different every time you hear it. And to me, it will never be drowned in that endless, sometimes annoying flow of pop format radio.

Shaded

Do the horses know that they are being shaded by the nave and the transept of one of the finest early baroque cathedrals north of the Alps? Is there a different feel to this particular shade?

Freude

Kajetanerkirche, Salzburg, reflected through a poetic inn window; it was different in Karajan's years at the Salzburg Festival: photos of Karajan and his dramatic hairstyle, and mostly of other performing artists were to be found in between the red and golden Mozarts of the various 'Mozartkugel'-manufacturers – these real, original, most unique, etc. sweet balls came to be associated with Salzburg as much as those soufflé triple mountains that served as a dessert are intended to give innocent tourists heart attacks from overeating: Salzburger Nockerl!

Revolution?

I wonder, what happened here: did somebody try to cover old graffiti with black paint – to give new ones a black ground? Interesting effect anyway.

Whoever is trying to keep track – this is the third Salzburg city bridge appearing under this label.

Stolpersteine / Memory Stones

A "Stolperstein", ready to be set into the pavement in front of a residential house in Salzburg city. The plaque carries the name and life data of a woman who, supposedly mentally ill was deported to Hartheim, an institution that was to become a center for the eradication of human life in the Nazis' 'euthanasia' program.

German artist Günter Demnig together with local historians, Dachverband Salzburger Kulturstätten, the Jewish community in Salzburg, and supported by the city of Salzburg is responsible for this act of public remembering: Stolpersteine.

I'm just a soul

whose intentions are good, oh Lord, please don't let me be misunderstood!

Just to remind myself that this was not meant to be a blog just for theatre experts and literary scholars; I just love those LYNX and discussions about 'Idylle'.

Misunderstood: I would take a long lost live version by Elvis Costello and the Attractions, with a horn section for the tour, with a politically incorrect introduction for background singer Caron Wheeler (not quoted here, mind you! this is a serious blog; no political or genderwise incorrectness; wo kämen wir denn da hin!), and a groove that still haunts me after about 20 years.

Handke / Beckett revisited

Thanks to mikerol69 for yet another link! Have a look there http://begleitschreiben.twoday.net/stories/5872998/#5876718

You might want to give parsley at the market a second look and think about the aesthetic concept of 'Idylle'. But you needn't, if you don't like to. That's one good thing about the arts, especially if you are not Samuel Beckett (luckily, otherwise you wouldn't read this!) or his publishers and theatre rights-holders.

Der Zuschauer genießt die Freiheit, die Dinge etwas bedeuten zu lassen. So oder ähnlich (wer war das noch mal? jedenfalls Französisch, poststrukturalistisch und ganz kantianisch, falls das heutzutage noch jemanden interessiert); jedenfalls 'etwas' bedeuten lassen, und auch etwas ganz anderes, und dann vielleicht noch was. Und jedenfalls nicht teleologisch und schon gar nicht so, dass wir am Ende keine Kunst mehr brauchen, weil wir ja 'befreit' sind, halbtags arbeiten und am Nachmittag jagen und fischen gehen; das wäre ja auch in Ordnung (soll ich hier vielleicht das altmodische Wort 'Revolution' einbringen, oder wird der Blog dann automatisch gesperrt?), dass wir aber auch dann noch idyllisch in der Nase bohren, 'romantisch glotzen' und aus den Gedichten Heines erst Zigaretten drehen, wenn wir sie auswendig können, darauf lege ich schon Wert.

Oops, slipped into German there; well 'Kraut' as well as 'goethen sprachen'. It's okay ...

Oops again, with 'Heine' and 'revolution' some more German is breaking loose; could be a lynx on the leap:

Wir hatten doch mit Heine 'ausgefunden, dass die Erde gross genug' für alle ist; da stand auch was von 'Rosen und Zuckererbsen' nicht minder, und selbstverständlich Heine-Gedichte und 'Idylle' – und gottverdammt, das klappt immer noch nicht!

Sorry for the language; should be a little more uptight as an academic from Salzburg city.

Seattle, Washington

Received some LYNX last night, found them connected to Seattle, Washington, home of so much great music, even long before Grunge became ready for the top forty – which annoyed some high-brow listeners to 'independent' music like myself ... Well, remembering that great movie, Last Days, let's not be arrogant, let's simply listen.

And here's my hello to Seattle, Washington, where I imagine there may be great, cold winters ;–). Here it was late in spring, on the way back from rainy Venice, and yours truly just did not want to take those long tunnels from Carinthia back to Salzburg province. So, it's about 1,650m/ 5,000 ft. above sea level close to the ski resort of Obertauern, a cigarette break on a long transfer.

May the LYNX LEAP to Handke on the web

May the FOGGY DEW be live with clicks and not carrying any 'fear' – let it be the Dubliners, or Van Morrison or whoever else sang this song and let it be James Joyce, and let it be Handke and let it blossom, let it grow (sorry, I'm too moved to know now what song bore those blossoms).

Thanks for the LYNX by

MICHAEL ROLOFF
Member Seattle Psychoanalytic Institute and Society
this LYNX will LEAP you to all my HANDKE project sites and BLOGS:

http://www.roloff.freehosting.net/index.html

Handke echoing Beckett – can you dig it?

Samuel Beckett's Krapp is coming to a close; the last tape on the reel to reel tape recorder has hit the ground; the actor is crouching at the table over his machine, for him it definitely is a male machine (© Marc Feigen Fasteau), one that helped him control his male, his artist's life; drawing a balance of his life not a lot has remained of male, of artistic success.

What is to happen next? The Salzburg Festival has announced a monologue by Peter Handke to echo, maybe to counter Beckett's great drama; would it be better to leave during the intermission, the mind of a male audience member is so caught up in thoughts and emotions that nothing really interesting can possibly follow; or can it?

Well, director Jossi Wieler may have expected just that reaction: the stage, actually something like an open cage, Krapp's recording studio revolves, screens are drawn, the stage widens and deepens, and enter Nina Kunzendorf. A slim, tall lady in beige slacks and an orange sweater, radiating – and starting her attack on Krapp. She turns out to be the nameless woman from Krapp's tape some 30 years ago.

The male machine in the audience is getting the creeps; will he, will Krapp be stomped to the ground by this woman who is delivering her 'monologue' in an almost party-like, almost relaxed tone, a speech that turns out to not just carry bitterness, aggression & resignation, but also the remains of love for a male human being. Love for a man whose every single stop in his speech was a calculated one, whose emotions were set for effect, whose hatred for life turns out to have been a birth-mark?

Handke's 'female' monologue is definitely set for effect, but listen, from a certain point the only laughs in the audience seem to rise from some older women's voices; what is happening?

Is this pathetic, or is there some wisdom, some understanding happening in between the stage and the audience? Understanding for a male existence that has had its Stunde der wahren Empfindung, has signed it, and thrown it away (see below in the blog: 'Sign')? – Yes.

An uncertain silence at the end of the show, some boos at Kunzendorf's first bow – don't let that f***ing happen!

Yours truly is not ashamed to express his emotion in very audible clapping and in bravos and bravas that are definitely set for effect so it doesn't happen; long grateful applause, some weak boos for the leading team, but finally Kunzendorf and Krapp André Jung are exiting stage in a youthful, dance-like embrace. Good.

Look, listen, learn ;–):

Bernhard Flieher in Salzburger Nachrichten on the premiere.

Peter Handke: take all of him and read; it may be pathetic at times, but Handke is always in search for truth in life and in the arts, and now, finally he may be reaching out for wisdom.

Neil Young: Helpless

Klaus Theweleit: Männerphantasien (in German: 1977). Buch der Könige. Various volumes in various years.

Thanks to Hans Höller, he knows why.

Café & Terrace Salzburg Museum

The new Salzburg Museum is a place to visit anyway; but the coffee break at the terrace of the self service cafeteria is yet another experience; one need not have strange hobbies, like photographing tourists photographing – it's just about the different angles from slightly above.

Summer in the city

So, here it is, shiny and new: the Residence Fountain after long renovation work. And yours truly had time to look; he actually felt a bit like a tourist who has seen Sound of Music a hundred times and now actually gets to see the real place: it's even nicer than in the movie!

Well, all the facades are a lot more colourful than in 1964; there simply are more people around, thanks to tourism. And people have become a lot more open-minded, mostly thanks to tourism.

And there are new places you could not have shot a photograph from back then.

Werner Otte, 1922 – 1996

"Sägewerk bei Kuchl", Werner Otte, 1977.

Found at http://www.askart.com/askart/o/werner_otte/werner_otte.aspx

Hoping for kind permission to use the reproduction in loving memory of a great artist.

It's a saw-mill near a small village in the lime stone range of the Northern Alps, Kuchl, some 25 miles south of Salzburg city. But the light in this almost sketch-like water colour, the light could be the light of the Mediterranean that Otte loved so much. There are drawings of a quarry near Baska, Krk, Croatia that give you the same feeling.

Otte was not just a painter, he was a craftsman; he knew how to handle wood, stone, and metal: in order to not just design huge concrete glass windows but to actually make them he taught himself to weld the steel reinforcements; he learned how to split rather than cut the heavy coloured glass panes.

So, when he did a sketch of a quarry or a saw-mill it was not what a still life might be for many an artist; Otte could have worked there, he did not mind hard physical labour, he loved to use his hands.

At the moment, 13 years after his death, his work may not be very present in the market, but it is in the hearts of all those who knew him.

Eclipse / Finsternis

Bonnie Tyler's Total eclipse of the heart – to me it always was 'grand opera'. Maybe it's something different; I've tried this in German:

Oper – oder die Geburt der Tragödie aus dem Geist des Schmachtfetzens

„Every now and then I get a little bit lonely“

Die Geburt der Tragödie: eine Schauspielerin tritt aus dem Chor, diesem gegenüber.

Ein Ich wendet sich an ein Größeres. Und beide sind Teil des einen Weltgeistes Herz und Schmerz.

Tylers Spiel geht weiter: Wie eine zweite Leadstimme, mal vor, mal hinter Tyler gemischt, vielleicht sie selbst: das „turn around, bright eyes“. Also: Schauspielerin, Chor, eine zweite ‚innere’ Stimme – und die Sehnsucht nach dem Blick…

Wissen wir, ob die Augen strahlen, bevor der Blick uns trifft? Aber wenn, und wenn vielleicht ein erlösendes Wort gesprochen würde: „Here’s looking at you, kid“, dann…

Lassen wir die großen Worte:

„Every now and then I fall apart“

Black.

Friedrich Nietzsche: Die Geburt der Tragödie aus dem Geist der Musik ist in diversen Re-releases im gutsortierten Handel erhältlich.

Bonnie Tyler: Total eclipse of the heart 1983; Lyrics Jim Steinman; auf zahlreichen Greatest-Hits-Compilations

What is quoted here is copyrighted material; don't copy, rip or download without paying the dues to artists, producers and distributers!

Camouflage?

Now, are we meant to look or what?

Isn't that matt black used for military planes to help make them undetectable by radar? – Ah, maybe this is the idea with the Lamborghini ...