Comments for Operating a Front for The Left in the Arts since 1991

Comment on Occupy Wall Street by mouton

mouton — Tue, 04 Oct 2011 06:39:41 +0000

occupy chicago!

http://www.ustream.tv/channel/occupychi

occupychi .org

Comment on Adam Curtis – The Rise and Fall of the TV Journalist by Mike Nissley

Mike Nissley — Sat, 18 Dec 2010 00:55:08 +0000

Adam Curtis is great. Bit, here he doesn’t get to the point which I’m sure he realizes, that journalists have not failed us as directly as the system that hires journalists. If you want a job as a journalist by today’s standards, you have to do the kind of reporting you are paid to do. It is a sad state of affairs, to be sure.

Comment on The Guantánamo “Suicides”: A Camp Delta sergeant blows the whistle by lumpenmagazine

lumpenmagazine — Tue, 15 Jun 2010 18:55:26 +0000

we take two aspirins a day..

Comment on The Guantánamo “Suicides”: A Camp Delta sergeant blows the whistle by Craig

Craig — Wed, 10 Mar 2010 12:52:00 +0000

lumpnmagazine.com, how do you do it?

Comment on Lumpen 114 coming soon by Lumpen magazine: Issue 114 « mediating the medium

Lumpen magazine: Issue 114 « mediating the medium — Wed, 03 Feb 2010 17:54:26 +0000

[...] Lumpen magazine: Issue 114, themed Crisis: Looking for Answers should be out this Friday, February 5, during the Save the Whale fundraiser at the Co-Prosperity Sphere (3219 S. Morgan). The special magazine, features swankster graphics, a globe-trotting staff, and Plural Design’s amazing creative direction. It is free upon entry so be sure to pick up a copy and check out the review of my solo exhibition Means Without End. Posted by Shannon Benine Filed in Publication, artist, review Tags: Co-Prosperity Sphere, Crisis: Looking for Answers, Lumpen, Lumpen magazine: Issue 114, Plural Design, Save the Whale fundraiser Leave a Comment » [...]

Comment on War Cries From a Defeated Man by Neil in Chicago

Neil in Chicago — Sun, 13 Dec 2009 21:33:25 +0000

Rather, a man defeated by the impossibility of salvaging anything from the wreckage of seven years of aggressive neocon fuckups in an already ravaged country.
The United States has both important strategic interests in Afghanistan (bordered by Iran, Pakistan, China, Tajikistan, Uzbekistan, and Turkmenistan; and the source of heroin) and a moral debt (for imposing the current “government”). What the country needs most desperately is a long-term reconstruction project. You can’t restore flocks, orchards, and generations old irrigation systems in a year or two.
EVERY option is ugly and likely to fail. Walking away would simply have different bad consequences from trying to accomplish something at so late a date that nothing may be possible.

Comment on Back Issues by Colin Strandberg

Colin Strandberg — Tue, 20 Oct 2009 02:52:55 +0000

Hello,

I am curious if you have any physical copies of Issue #95. I am a huge fan of the work of Justin Fines. If you have any copies, please let me know as Id be greatly appreciative. Thanks,

Colin

Comment on Required Viewing by lumpenmagazine

lumpenmagazine — Sat, 10 Oct 2009 07:33:23 +0000

awesome

Comment on Can an aesthetic be private? by TS

TS — Wed, 02 Sep 2009 00:43:44 +0000

I get your drift, and agree with you in principle. As the wise man said: “There is nothing new under the sun.”

When the OULIPO people find out someone had previously utilized one of their peculiar literary constraints, they refer to that person as an “anticipatory plagiarist”, and have done with it.

But, in my profession, we charge for our knowledge, not for work product, and we get paid C.O.D.. So professional courtesy prevents me from getting too self-righteous about how those who produce words, images and sounds fashion their business models. Hey, creative professionals have a hard enough time making a living. Who am I to question their sale of their products with strings attached?

Comment on Can an aesthetic be private? by lumpenmagazine

lumpenmagazine — Wed, 02 Sep 2009 00:06:15 +0000

Thanks for the comment. Yeah you can dis someone’s work all you want for copying or mimicking the work of another, but even that leaves you open to the same exact criticism. I’m not one to say “everything has already been done before” exactly, but originality in it’s purest, most ideal form is a false construct.

Here is the analogy I keep thinking of in regards to all this:

Visual aesthetics are to art, what geographic formations are to the earth.

If a company buys or lays claim to a swath of land somewhere and discovers oil under the ground, that oil is not the company’s oil, it is the earth’s oil and any benefits that may come of that should benefit all those who inhabit the earth not solely the company.

Yes I know the analogy is flawed and then we can start talking about well if the company pays to pump out the oil, shouldn’t they be entitled to it…yes, compensation in the amount they spent pumping it. This part does really fit into my scheme of thinking, but I thought I’d share the analogy anyhow.