Drakabygget 1-11 [1962-1984]

Bauhaus Situationiste. Drakabygget 1-11. Örkelljunga (Sweden): Bauhaus Situationiste, 1962-1984. 64-98-96-192-192 p.; ill.; 18 x 25 cm. Profusely illustrated covers.

Drakabygget was the organ of the Bauhaus Situationiste  group. Following an internal strife which led to his exclusion (and that of several other members of the Internationale Situationniste, including the entire SPUR  group), Jorgen Nash grew a movement that also came to be known as the Second Situationist International out of Skane, Sweden.  The title of the magazine was directly borrowed from the name of Nash’s farm, which by then had been turned into a kind of artists’ commune. It was subtitled Tidskrift for konst mot atombomber, påvar och politiker (“Magazine for art against atomic bombs, popes and politicians”), with contents just as sulfurous as one may expect. In one of their best-known scandals, Nash with other members of Bauhaus Situationniste allegedly decapitated the statue of the Little Mermaid in the Copenhagen harbor.

Texts in Drakabygget  are primarily written in Swedish, though many have recently been translated (see: Mikkel Bolt Rasmussen and Jakob Jakobsen, “Cosmonauts of the Future: Texts from the Situationist Movement in Scandinavia and Elswhere”, Autonomedia 2015) with some success.

Our copies of issues 6-7-8 and 9-10-11 are both dedication copies, one by Nash and the other by Nash and the other by Zwick and Nash

Full sets are scarce, as issues were published as much as 10+ years apart. About a dozen copies on OCLC, with 5 in North America.

[INTERLUDE] Video Tributes to less-known members of the Internationale Situationniste

This post is a little different. I would like to pay a tribute to lesser-known members of the SI (i.e., figures beyond Debord and Vaneigem) by sharing some videos that showcases their works and lives:

Ralph Rumney:

Ralph Rumney, artiste situationniste méconnu (Marseille). 

Brief video account of the Rumney exhibit at the Centre International de Poesie in Marseille a few years ago. A rare chance to glimpse at some of Rumney’s works: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tmfQwMdAvbw

Derive Gallizio

A short video tribute to Giuseppe Pinot-Gallizio, a most original artist (“l’artiste libre est un amateur professionnel”) and short-lived member of the SI. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FphPUHG0NCs

Michele Bernstein – “Tous les Chevaux du Roi”

A fabulous interview of Michele Bernstein who speaks to Pierre Dumayet in 1960. Beautiful, charming, and witty, Bernstein is an oft-overlooked member of the SI. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PlIc_1cjCdg

The Society of the Spectacle [VHS Tape] [La Cavalera]

Debord, Guy. The Society of the Spectacle [FILM]. n.p. [New York, NY?], Ediciones La Cavalera, n.d. [1990s]. 1 VHS tape (89 min.): sd., b&w, 1/2 in. French with English subtitles.

The film version of the Society of the Spectacle was released in 1973, six years after the eponymous book and a year after the dissolution of the SI. Following Gerard Lebovici’s assassination in 1984, and in response to the press’ accusations that he may have murdered his friend and publisher, Debord took his films out of circulation until after his death. While his films were shown on French television immediately following Debord’s suicide in 1994, it wasn’t until 2005 that they were officially re-released to the public in a DVD box set titled Guy Debord: Oeuvres cinématographiques complètes.

Between 1984 and 2005 – when Debord’s films were difficult to get a hold off – bootleg VHS tapes and DVDs flourished. Keith Sanborn produced the first subtitled version of the French film; Peggy Ahwesh is credited as “project coordinator”

The OCLC entry reads as follows: “This essayistic film is both an adaptation of Debord’s book and a provocative example of a favored situationist tactic, détournement, which is a reuse of existing artistic elements in a new ensemble. Neither an ivory tower “philosophical” discourse nor a helplessly impulsive “protest,” this is a ruthlessly lucid examination of the most fundamental tendencies and contradictions of the society we live in.” (OCLC)

Not found in the trade, with only three OCLC holdings (Michigan, Berkeley SUNY Buffalo)

Un moment d’eternite dans le passage du temps [2012]

Vaneigem, Raoul;  Kozakis, Nicolas (Photos). Un moment d’eternite dans le passage du temps. Crisnee (Belgium): Yellow Now, April 2012. n.p. [78 p.]; ill.; 14 x 19 cm.; ill. White cover with text in black. 1 DVD single face (4’33) with B&W images from the book.

Beautiful collaboration project between Raoul Vaneigem and visual artist Nicolas Kozakis. We borrow heavily from Katerina Gregos’ thorough and accurate review:

“The work was shot in Mount Athos, a remote mountain and peninsula in northern Greece, which is home to a number of Greek Orthodox monasteries […] Apart from being a holy place, it is also one of escape and meditation for those who manage to gain access. The video unfolds in an undisclosed location, by the sea. A sad-faced, lone immigrant construction worker goes about the task of building a traditional stone house, at his own pace, stopping now and then to smoke a cigarette and contemplate the magnificent, totally still sea view. His task is facilitated by a few donkeys, ancient labourers which have now become all but obsolete from the modern workforce. Time seems almost to have stood still.

Vaneigem’s existential, poetic text builds on the quiet, contemplative pace of the images, reflecting on the nature of contemporary life, and its obsession with work, productivity and success, at the expense of the true experience of life itself. The text muses on the current impasse and the predatory nature of capitalism, which has reduced life to its « mere shadows», the lonely figure of the worker recalls the myriad of migrants exploited as cheap labour all over the planet. Critical and utopian at once, it argues for the need to reinvent a new, more humane vision of the world, closer to nature”

2 copies on OCLC (BnF, Paris VIII) and scarce in the trade

Cahiers de l’Encyclopedie du Monde Actuel: Les Marxismes – Ideologies et Revolution [1970] & Le Golfe Persique [1974]

Anonymous [Khayati, Mustapha]. Les Cahiers de l’Encyclopedie du Monde Actuel 51. Les Marxismes: Ideologies et Revolution. Lausanne: Rencontres, January 1970. 32 p.; ill.; 14 x 20 cm.; ill. B&W wrappers with picture of an aging Marx.

Anonymous [Khayati, Mustapha]. Les Cahiers de l’Encyclopedie du Monde Actuel 107. Le Golfe Persique. Lausanne: Rencontres, October 1970. 32 p.; ill.; 14 x 20 cm.; ill. B&W wrappers with picture of an oil platform.

Texts now firmly attributed to Mustapha Khayati, which includes a brief review and discussion of Marxist and related movements (including two and a half pages on the SI) for the first one, and a brief historical overview of the the middle east and the role of oil for the other.

Gerard Berreby, who spoke to Donald Nicholson-Smith, Mustapha Khayati, and a few others explains the genesis of the Situationists’ participation to the Encyclopedie du Monde Actuel: “The participation of the ‘situationist group’ in the Encyclopedie du Monde Actuel wasn’t official. There were a few subsistence jobs to which some members of the SI devoted themselves. The work consisted in writing “EDMA cards” and, eventually, monthly booklets […] At first, likely around 1966, my wife, Cathy Pozzo di Borgo, and I began to produce, on a freelance basis, this type of card under the supervision of André Fougerousse – Cathy’s stepfather – for publication by Editions Rencontre in Lausanne. Along with Charles-Henri Favrod, Fougerousse had been (in 1962) one of the founders of this editorial project. Later on, we passed on some “card jobs” to our buddies, including Mustapha and Raoul […] The members of the SI – and Raoul first and foremost – continued to make contributions to EDMA more or less until 1974. As such, many of the booklets were written by situationists or ex-situs – even after the dissolution of the movement in 1972″ (Rien n’est fini, tout commence, p. 157. Translation is my own)

Gerard Berreby notes that “Following discussions with Mustapha Khayati, and upon inspecting the various documents involved, it appears as if Mustapha Khayati himself wrote the cards entitled Situationnisme (17 May 1967, card #1775), Guy Debord (23 September 1970, card #3875) and La Société du Spectacle (25 August 1972, card #5076). He also authored booklet #51, Les Marxismes, ideologies et révolution (January 1970).” In recent correspondence with Mustapha Khayati, he further confirms that booklet #174 – Le Golfe Persique (October 1974) is indeed his work as well.

10 Jaar Experimentele Kunst: Jorn en zijn rol in de theoretische inventie (in Museumjournaal 4.4) [1958]

Debord, Guy. 10 Jaar Experimentele Kunst: Jorn en zijn rol in de theoretische inventie. Jorn, Asger. Uit “Pour la Forme”.  Museumjournaal  tijdschrift van het Stedelijk Van Abbe museum te Eindhoven, Rijksmuseum Kröller Müller te Otterlo en het Stedelijk Museum te Amsterdam, series 4, no.4. Otterlo (Netherlands): Stedelijk Museum, October 1958. 22 p. [pp.61-83]; 20 x 29 cm. Ill. wrappers with a Jorn etching.

Rare and important issue of Museumjournaal, the journal of of Stedelijk Museum, devoted to the Internationale Situationniste and more specifically to Asger Jorn’s Pour la Forme. Debord’s article, 10 Jaar Experimentele Kunst: Jorn en zijn rol in de theoretische inventie (which can be translated as 10 years of experimental art: Jorn and his role in theoretical invention) briefly explains Jorn’s trajectory from Cobra to the Imaginist Bauhaus and the origins of Pour la Forme. This is a followed by a Uit “Pour la Forme” (On Pour la Forme), a series of excerpts from Jorn’s book, which had been published in Paris by the SI just a few months earlier. Black and white illustrations of Jorn’s art throughout.

A rare Debord contribution to a more “traditional” art journal, and one of the very first times the Internationale Situationniste is discussed (and for over 20 pages), a year or so after its foundation. The scarce text has been translated into French (Archives Situationnistes: Volume 1: Documents traduits 1958-1970.) and into English (http://www.notbored.org/ten-years.html)

Raspaud & Voyer 108. Gonzalvez 91. Not particularly scarce on OCLC (as many librairies subscribed to this important journal), but difficult to find in the trade.

THE NAKED CITY – Illustration de l’hypothèse des plaques tournantes en psychogeographique (sic) [1957]

Debord, Guy. THE NAKED CITY – Illustration de l’hypothèse des plaques tournantes en psychogeographique (sic). Copenhagen: Permild & Rosengreen, n.d. [May 1957]. 1 p. litographed sheet in black and red, 47 x 33 cm.

Original edition of this iconic map that slightly predates the foundation of the Internationale Situationniste in July 1957. Released on the occasion of the Fourth Congress of the Mouvement International pour un Bauhaus Imaginiste (M.I.B.I) as an illustration of the theory of the derive. The title is borrowed from Jules Dassin’s eponymous film noir, released in 1948, which was itself a reference to Weegee’s first book of photographs on New York city (1945).

“One of the first results to come out of the collaboration between Debord and Jorn…Illustrating the notion of psychogeography. Each preserved part of the city had some sort of sentimental value attached to them. The maps also worked as a guide to the forgotten or overlooked parts of Paris, that were yet awaiting to be hit by the forces of capitalism.” (Christian Nolle). “On the Paris’ map edited in May 1957 by the MI.B.I., the arrows represent the links between the different units of ambiance; that is to say, the spontaneous guiding tendencies of a subject that crosses through this milieu without practical considerations (such as work or leisure) that usually guide his behavior” (Quatrieme Experience du M.I.B.I in Documents Relatifs a la Fondation de l’Internationale Situationniste, translation is mine)

The map is reprinted in Pour la Forme (Paris: Internationale Situationniste, 1958; Paris: Allia, 2001), in Documents Relatifs a la Fondation de l’Internationale Situationniste (Paris: Allia, 1985) and in Situacionistas: arte, politica, urbanismo (Barcelona: Museu d’art contemporani de Barcelona/Actar, 1996), among others.

The print run is unknown, but surviving copies in sheets are extremely scarce since most had their margins significantly trimmed to be inserted in Asger Jorn’s Pour la Forme in 1958. We find only two copies on OCLC (Columbia and Yale).

Die Zeitschrift SPUR [1960-62]

Gruppe SPUR. Die Zeitschrift SPUR. Munich, Germany: n.p., 1962. n.p. [7 volumes bound in one, ca. 250 p. total]; ill.; 29 x 30 cm. Cover consists of an original lithograph. One of 270 numbered copies (ours no. 81)

The volumes includes all 6 issues of group’s journal (released separately in Munich between August 1960 and January 1962, in printings of 1,000-1,600), a not-previously-released seventh issue, and the four most important manifestos. All this original material is assembled together and bound in a thick, luxurious square-shaped volume that appears destined for art collectors.

Gruppe SPUR was comprised of Lothar Fischer (1933-2004), Heimrad Prem (1934-1978), H.-.P Zimmer (1936-1992), Helmut Sturm (1932-2008), Dieter Kunzelmann (1939-), Erwin Eisch (1927-), Eva Renée Nele Bode (1932-), Margarete “Gretel” Stadler (1937-) and, briefly, Heinz Höfl (1934-). Fischer, Prem, Zimmer, Sturm and Kunzelmann were also members of the Internationale Situationniste from 1959 until their formal exclusion on February 10, 1962. During those years, SPUR basically functioned as the German section of the SI. While the split was the result of a complex series of events, it was driven by a fundamental disagreement on the role art should play in a revolutionary avant-garde organization like the SI.

Following its exclusion from the SI, Gruppe SPUR, which had been under the scrutiny of the German government, faced legal trouble. In the first trial of artists in Germany since the Third Reich, issue 6 of the group’s journal was seized by the police and its authors prosecuted for “blasphemy” and “pornography”. In a tract dated 25 June 1962 (“Déclaration sur les procès contre l’Internationale situationniste en Allemagne fédérale”) Michèle Bernstein, J.V. Martin, Alexander Trocchi and Raoul Vaneigem expressed their support to the group on behalf of the SI.

A legendary item of the European political and artistic avant-garde.

Scarce, with 10 copies on OCLC.

Critique européenne des Corps académiques des Universités, Collèges et Instituts de recherche de la métropole de New York et de l’aire de Cambridge-Boston [1962]

Internationale Situationniste. Critique européenne des Corps académiques des Universités, Collèges et Instituts de recherche de la métropole de New York et de l’aire de Cambridge-Boston; à propos du programme inadéquat que les susdits viennent de soumettre au président Kennedy et au gouverneur Rockefeller, dans le but de renverser l’absurde processus de la «défense civile» aux États Unis.  Paris: Mutant, n.d. [1962]. single sheet [2 p.]; 32 x 12 cm.; red ink on cream stock.

Bilingual leaflet in French (recto) and English (verso). The English title is “European critique of the inadequate programme which has just been presented to President Kennedy and Governor Rockefeller by the academic staff of Universities, Colleges, and Research Institutes for New York City and the Cambridge-Boston Area”

The leaflet serves two purposes. First, it condemns an announcement regarding fallout shelters made by the Civil Defense Letter Committee that appeared in the international edition of The New York Times on 30 December 1961. Further, it announces the publication of  a new review entitled “MUTANT”, to “appear in the Spring” of 1962 (and residing at the same address as the Situationist International, at the Montagne-Ste-Genevieve in Paris). The text is attributed to Debord and Jorn, the latter having been formally excluded from the SI just months prior but with whom Debord maintained a strong rapport. MUTANT never came to be, and this leaflet is the sole remaining printed evidence of this project.

The leaflet was reproduced on back the cover of Situationist Times no. 1 (May 1962) in both French and English, as well as in Situationist Times no.2 (September 1962) in English only.

The full text in both French and English can be found here: http://debordiana.noblogs.org/2011/06/critique-europeenne-des-corps-academiques%E2%80%A6-janvier-1962/

Scarce, with only a single copy in the trade and 3 copies on OCLC (Yale, Michigan, Bibliotheque Nordique), though we strongly suspect the Bibliotheque Nationale de France in Paris also owns one.

Adresse de l’Internationale situationniste a l’assemblée générale de l’Association internationale des critiques d’art [1958]

Internationale Situationniste. Adresse de l’Internationale situationniste a l’assemblée générale de l’Association internationale des critiques d’art. n.p. [Bruxelles, Belgium]: Internationale Situationniste, n.d. [12 April 1958]. 1 sheet [2 p.]; ill.; 32 x 23 cm. Black text on white stock

This incendiary leaftlet constitutes a violent attack against art critics. Released on April 12, 1958 – only two days prior to an international gathering of art critics at the world’s fair in Brussels, it is signed by A[bdelhafid] Khatib, H[ans] Platschek, W[alter] Korun, G[uy]-E[rnest] Debord, G[iuseppe] Pinot-Gallizio, and A[sger] Jorn on behalf of the Algerian, German, Belgian, French, Italian and Scandinavian sections of the Situationist International. The back of the leaflet states: “La Société sans classe a trouvé ses artistes – Vive l’Internationale Situationniste” (“Classless society has found its artists – Long live the Situationist International!”)

The content of the leaflet is partially reproduced in the first issue of Internationale Situationniste (1958), and further context on the “action in Belgium”, as it is referred to, is provided. We learn that the text of the Situationist proclamation was distributed on various ways: about 30 copies were mailed to art critics, while others were handed in personally. Some critics were reached by telephone and read all or part of the text. Finally, and perhaps most spectacularly, a group forced its way into the Press Club where the critics were being received and threw the leaflets among the audience. Another 1,000 copies of the leaflets were tossed onto sidewalks from a fifth floor window. As a result of this action, SI members were threatened with prosecution. Korun, in particular, faced some legal issues as a result. In spite (or perhaps because) of this, Debord viewed what he referred to as “the battle of Brussells” (Letter to Pinot-Gallizio, 19 April 1958) as a great success

The text of the leaflet, as well as some more detail on its history, can be found at http://debordiana.chez.com/francais/aica.htm and http://debordiana.chez.com/francais/is1.htm#action . For an English translation, see Knabb’s at http://www.bopsecrets.org/SI/1.critics.htm

Scarce, with only one copy in the trade and 3 OCLC copies (Yale, the Getty Institute, and the Tate Museum), though we know an additional copy is kept at the Bibliotheque Nationale de France, for a total of four known copies.