Re: [-empyre-] pieces of history

[Alan Sondheim <sondheim@panix.com>]

Writing this on a zaurus pda with problematic keyboard of course. My
initial inspiration would probably have been the performance and media
work of Vito Acconci in the 70s - particularly his ability to place
himself on the line. There was an obsessive intensity to the work, as well
as a left politics; media was seen as means, not defining. I was also
moved incredibly by Laurie Anderson's early loft performances, which
involved what's now called 'performance' as well as slides, still image,
sound machines, films, etc., all integrated. They were incredible.

In the mid-70s, I made a number of language/poem programs for a TI-59
calculator and printer; I also wrote some programs in pascal - one would
type into the computer, and the machine would subvert what was being
written - an active editor. This was done on something called a Terak
mini-computer at UCI. I also wrote a program that would create graphics in
relation to typed input; both would appear on the screen and 'occlude'
each other.

Finally, I want to mention two other things - with Greg Johnson, building
an analog sound synthesizer (which still works) from scratch in 1968, and
a worked called Typed Glossolalia: Computer Analysis of Determinism in
(sic) Man - in which 4000 'randomly' typed characters were analyzed with
time series analyses (program by Johnson), in a search for deterministic
patterns.

That was 1971. After that, there was so much video and film, etc., as wel
as the music of Albert Ayler, writings of Bernadette Mayer and Clark
Coolidge -

more of a semeosphere than list of concrete incluences...

apologies for errors, the keyboard...

- Alan

http://www.asondheim.org/ http://www.asondheim.org/portal/.nikuko
http://www.anu.edu.au/english/internet_txt
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