John Kraska's "Under Offer" Arch installation at the Demarco
European Art Foundation, Edinburgh, 1997. photo - J Kraska
"Now in the current era of mass marketing those creative few
who can capture what is new and vital as it flies past them often fall
foul of the funding bodies bent on business plan projections for three
years hence. There is nothing more poignant to be seen in Edinburgh today
than the art work now shrouding the once busy entrance of Richard Demarco's
Gallery in York Lane/ Albany Street, foreclosed by Edinburgh Council in
the cultural clearances of our time."
Murray Grigor: ArtWork magazine, Nov/Dec 1997
INDEX
1. Demarco European Art Foundation
- Crisis!............John Kraska ....imminent
loss of theatre/gallery/archive/office.
2. "Has Edinburgh gone
mad ?" ............................Ariel
Dorfman
- 3. "Demarco Arch doings"........................................Jim Holden
-
- 4. Richard Demarco: 55 Statements
of Support
- ....plus references to newspaper and magazine
articles.
5. "UNDER OFFER"
Albany Street Arch ...................John Kraska
-
- 6. "The Mystery School"
Dec 1 - 14 1997, DEAF, Edinburgh
-
- 7. "IN THE GALLERY" .........................Lilian Kennedy Brzoska
-
- 8. "The Idiosyncratic
Focus Of Conflicts....................John
Kraska
To navigate, click when arrow cursor becomes a hand
For more Scottish (Etc.) arts and reports, visit Art
States base site at
Thanks to John Giles for his advice and help in creating Art States Web
site. Updated 20 April 1998. Established December 1997
Art States © John Kraska 1998
JOHN KRASKA, 104 Hill Street, Glasgow G3 6UA, Scotland,
U.K.
Tel: 0141 332 5257. Tel: 0141 332 0565
Banlieues d'Europe e-mail :- banlieues.deurope@wanadoo.fr
INDEX
ART STATES
Art News From Scotland, Etc.
The Demarco European Art Foundation-Crisis!
Imminent loss of theatre/ gallery/archive...
John Kraska
I was invited to exhibit four works in one of Richard Demarco's
1997 Edinburgh Festival exhibitions in his old school of St Mary's. In
making these new works (a kind of inverse 'cast painting'), I looked at
those aspects of Polish art brought to Scotland by Richard Demarco over
the years, particularly at the Polish avant-garde investigation of documentation
and archives. In this period I became aware of the severity of Richard
Demarco's predicament - the imminent loss of his theatre/ gallery/archive/office
premises with no evident alternative in sight. I therefore decided to make
another piece of work that would be highly visible outside the building
in Albany Street - an archway of flowers at the building's entrance - a
signal of support, a comment on the situation, a seasonal harvest gesture,
a reminder of what would be lost. Richard Demarco described it as the "creation
of a sort of shrine and a gentle form of protest". The siting of the
sculpture was to coincide with the coming into effect of Edinburgh City
Council's formal Notice of Eviction on the 30 th September, 1997. The Demarco
European Art Foundation is now continuing with weekly extensions with a
period of notice. Richard Demarco can perhaps mount one last flourish before
the proposed development into luxury flats is granted planning permission
and he is displaced. As yet he has no established place to secure his considerable
archive. Many avenues are being explored but everything is uncertain.
In response to an appeal large numbers of supportive statements from
all over Europe and further afield have been collected. Articles have been
written in local newspapers - the Scotsman, the Herald. Evening News, some
TV - but Richard Demarco's work goes far beyond localised concern - his
outlook and his influence has been truly international. From the many statements
received, a number are reproduced here.
Glasgow, December 1997
INDEX
"Has Edinburgh gone mad ?"
A letter from Ariel Dorfman (October
16 1997)
"Richard Demarco is a saint of art.
Those who exile the saints condemn themselves to hell. That is where they
belong, even if they apparently thrive and feel good about themselves.
When I heard about this eviction from St. Mary's, only one thing went through
my mind: Has Edinburgh gone mad ? "
And for you, thanks for defending such a marvellous human being, one of
the best and most creative it has been my privilege to meet in this life.
Ariel Dorfman
Duke University, Durham, North Carolina.
Ariel Dorfman is Distinguished Research Professor of Literature and Latin
American Studies at Duke University, Durham North Carolina. He has taught
at the Universidad de Chile, Santiago, the Sorbonne, Paris, and the University
of Amsterdam. His major publications include the essays How to Read Donald
Duck (in collaboration with Armand Mattlelart, 1971), The Empire's Old
Clothes (1983),and Someone Writes to the Future: Essays on Contemporary
Latin American Fiction (1991); a collection of poetry, Last Waltz in Santiago,
and a book of stories, My House is On Fire (1990). Among his novels are
Mascara (1988), The Last Song of Manuel Sendero (1987) and Widows (1983).
His works have been performed around the world including the Traverse Theatre
in Edinburgh, ("Reader" in 1995). Ariel Dorfman is a fellow of
The James B Duke Society which extends formal invitations to outside speakers
of repute including Dr. Peter Kramer (author of Listening to Prozac), and
is a member of the international think-tank, the Academie Universelle des
Cultures.
He is working on two books: one on North American and Latin American contemporary
mass culture called Missing Continents and another on exile and borderlands.
His play Death and the Maiden is in production world wide and has been
made into a Roman Polanski film. His latest novel is Konfidenz.
In an interview with Katharine Butt of the Cape Times, Ariel Dorfman said,
"The main point of liberty is that many people who have been excluded
now become part of history - that's the central event. They have responsibilities
of expression they never had before. The priority, the popular cultural
and social task, has to be to attend to the disenfranchised. Having said
that, there is a tendency to misunderstand the many varieties of freedom.
We have to contribute to the good. We have to create the spaces not only
for the vast majority, but for ourselves, to transgress the way we habitually
think, to explore the complicated topics. Where and how this happens depends
on the breadth with which each person is able to see their country".
"If you have a home inside of you, communities and cultures flow into
you. If not, they disperse you."
INDEX
"Demarco Arch Doings"
(a letter from Jim Holden to John Kraska)
Jim Holden
Calderstone. Thursday, (Splendid October Day)
John/
Tena showed me photographs of the Demarco Arch doings; she also gave me
the Caroline Tisdall/Joseph Beuys catalogue and the 20 th anniversary "Strategy
Get Arts" catalogue by G. Necker (1990). You can imagine how my memory
has been stimulated.
The arch will have a great effect upon Demarco at this time. The last time
I saw him was at a meeting of senior academic scientists; all had good
addresses, but collectively they were "lost". It was touching
to see this great teacher and impresario present and speaking (at the end)
of what he called "the big questions". He was "big"
in his Edinburgh work; it is ironic that alongside him in that city in
the 70's were biologists Waddington and Jantsch who knew they had to try
and describe an entire "epigenetic landscape" to avoid bios-logos
being reduced to tinkering with genes.
Sam's generation (mid-teens of today) will accept Demarco and Jantsch as
big citizens who went about the same task with contrasting style. Although
the 1976 report to he European Economic Community on the founding of a
"Free International University for Creativity and Research" was
written by Caroline Tisdall with a view to solid buildings in Dublin, I
never had a doubt that even to imagine such a thing made us
all active members, at our own level, on the spot. Such was the Demarco
effect.
I mention Sam because one of the photographs shows him swanning around
in the foreground. I identified with him since we are both 30 years equidistant
from the age when one is politically and socially engagé as Sartre
would insist. I also remember that German is on his curriculum and it is
around the writings of German Jews born around the end of he last century
that my language-consciousness circles. I don't mean that I'm learning
German. I mean my science has been absorbed in Cupitt's theology which
has been inspired by his language studies. My understanding of old age
is based on Joseph Heller's "Closing Time", a work of literature
and sequel to "Catch 22" (another endless stream of words), and
, finally, Walter Benjamin has shown me that Naming is the paradigm
of human creativeness.
Thanks to translators I can enclose two English sentences, parables by
Kafka, which I hope Sam likes, and also The Ninth Elegy of Rilke's Duino
Elegies. Why can't Demarco take it more easy on the politics, the organising
energies, on looking after universities ? - and accept the laurels, go
through the flower arch knowing that he has been heard among the Angelic
Orders and countless students.
Jim Holden. 1997
(Jim Holden offered this 'advice' note for reading Rilke: "Can
be read silently to oneself thus missing the entire 'poetic' potential
and failing to set in vibration the air of the planet on which we depend".)
Rilke's Duino Elegies, The Ninth Elegy (extracts);
"Yet the wanderer too doesn't bring from mountain to valley
a handful of earth, of for all untellable earth, but only
a word he has won, pure, the yellow and blue
gentian. Are we, perhaps, here just for saying: House,
Bridge, Fountain, Gate, Jug, Fruit tree, Window, -
possibly: Pillar, Tower? . . . . but for saying , remember,
oh, for such saying as never the things themselves
hoped so intensely to be. Is it not the secret purpose
of this sly Earth, in urging a pair of lovers,
just to make everything leap with ecstasy in them ?"
"Here is the time for the Tellable, here is its home.
Speak and proclaim. More than ever
things that we can live with are falling away, for that
which is oustingly taking their place is an imageless act."
Kafka
Leoparden brechen in den Temfel
und saufen die Opferkrüge leer;
- etc
Leopards break into the temple
and drink to the dregs what is in the
sacrificial pitchers; this is repeated over
and over again; finally it can be
calculated in advance, and it becomes
a part of the ceremony. (Kafka)
Poseidon wurde überdrüssig seine Meere. Der
Dreizack entfiel ihm. Still sass er an felsiger Küste und
eine von seiner Gegenwart betäubte Möve zog schwan-
kende Kreise um sein Haupt.
Poseidon became bored with his sea. He let fall his
trident. Silently he sat on the rocky coast and a gull,
dazed by his presence, described wavering circles
around his head. (Kafka)
Jim Holden is an artist, potter, scientist, engineer, philosopher,
gardener. He formerly worked at the National Engineering Laboratory in
East Kilbride. He lives in rural Lanarkshire, in Scotland, working in his
pottery/studio, particularily with the native clay, placing his ceramic
artifacts in the living landscape.
The illustration above shows ceramic work by Jim Holden.
photo: J Kraska
INDEX
Richard Demarco
55 Statements of Support (a selection)
PROF. ANDREW TAIT. F.R.S.E.
23.8.97. GLASGOW, SCOTLAND
I CANNOT BELIEVE THAT THE (EDINBURGH) COUNCIL ARE BENT ON DESTROYING ONE
OF THE MOST INNOVATIVE CENTRES FOR ART IN SCOTLAND. DEMARCO HAS BUILT A
REPUTATION OVER MANY YEARS AND HAS DONE MUCH TO PUT EDINBURGH ON THE MAP.
IS THIS THE REWARD ?
I FIND THIS LETTER OF EVICTION BOTH RUDE AND AGAINST ANY PROMOTION OF THE
ARTS.
* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *
* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *
VALA THORSDITTIR
23.8.97. ACTRESS, REYKAVIK, ICELAND
AFTER HAVING PERFORMED IN THIS VENUE FOR A WEEK AND ALSO BEING AROUND EDINBURGH
TO SEE OTHER PLAYS AND ART, I MUST SAY THAT THE SUGGESTION OF CLOSING DOWN
THE FOUNDATION IS AN OUTRAGE. THE WORK IN THIS BUILDING IS A VERY IMPORTANT
TRIBUTE TO CULTURE AND A TRIBUTE TO COLLABORATION BETWEEN COUNTRIES IN
THE WORLD, SHOWING OUTSTANDING TALENT AND COURAGE
* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *
* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *
LILIAN F. BRZOSKA
2.9.97. TUTOR/WRITER/PERFORMER, EDINBURGH, SCOTLAND
IN THIS BASEMENT, DARK AND LOWLY, SPACE WAS MADE FOR ANGELS, WHOLLY INCARNATE.
BREST-LITOVSK CONJOINED WITH POLAND, HIGHLAND HILLS SPOKE TO THE LOWLANDS.
ALL OUR GUARDS WERE DOWN. SPARKLING MOMENTS, LIT WITH LOVE DISINTEGRATE
THE IRON GLOVE OF GOVERNANCE DESIGNED TO CRUSH. VASTNESS CREATED IN PIN
PRICK OF LIGHT GALVANISING ACTIONS OF PATHOS AND DELIGHT, GATHERED TOGETHER
THE ARTISTS OF MIGHT COMMITTED TO GALLOPING HOME WITH THE TRUTH. COLUMCILLE
BREACHED THE BOUNDARIES, RIDING IN ON SEA HORSE FOAM CONNECTING CELTIC
BEINGS NOW WITH THE GLOAMIN' O' IONA'S SEA-LAPPED SHORES. SCORES OF ARTISTS,
SPIRIT-LED, BUILT ON ARTS FOUNDATION BEYOND THE DREAD OF EXTINCTION. GATHERED
TOGETHER UNDER ONE ROOF, PROOF OF THE PRESENCE OF SOMETHING DIVINE GIFTING
EACH HUMAN WITH DROPLETS SUBLIME, FORMING AN ALTERED CONSCIOUSNESS SPACE
IN WHICH VISION IS HONOURED WITH GOODWILL AND GRACE. SUCH AN OASIS FOR
THOSE WHO WERE PARCHED, ARCHED BY THE CARE OF A BEACON OF LIGHT.
RICKY DEMARCO - MAY SPIRIT GIVE THEE MIGHT.
* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *
* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *
CLAIRE CRAIG
23.8.97. TEACHER, GLASGOW, SCOTLAND
WITH RICHARD DEMARCO YOU CAN SURF THE WHOLE OF THE HUMAN NET IN PERSON.
* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *
* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *
DANIEL CHEIKETZ
23.8.97. ALEXANDER TECHNIQUE TEACHER, LONDON, ENGLAND
DURING MY SHORT STAY IN EDINBURGH IT HAS BECOME CLEAR TO ME WHAT AN IMPORTANT
CONTRIBUTION TO THE ARTS THE DEMARCO FOUNDATION IS MAKING IN THIS CITY.
GIVING OPPORTUNITY AND SUPPORT TO YOUNG ARTISTS AND ENRICHING THE LIVES
OF MANY. I SINCERELY HOPE IT WILL BE ALLOWED TO CONTINUE MAKING THIS CONTRIBUTION.
* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *
* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *
GEORGIE WEEDON
24.8.97. STUDENT, OXON, ENGLAND
THE DEMARCO FOUNDATION IS A FANTASTIC CENTRE FOR YOUTH ARTS PERFORMANCE.
AFTER ONE WEEK OF PERFORMING THERE ON A DAILY BASIS, ITS ATMOSPHERE AND
SPIRIT REALLY GRABBED ME. TO LOSE SUCH A SPECIAL BUILDING WOULD BE TRAGIC.
THE DISAPPOINTMENT WOULD BE FELT BY MANY.
* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *
* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *
DR. ESTELA WELLDON
23.8.97. CONSULTANT PSYCHIATRIST, HARLEY STREET, LONDON
I WAS LOOKING FORWARD TO HAVING THE EXPERIENCE OF THE DEMARCO INSTITUTION
AFTER HAVING HEARD ABOUT HIS WORK ALL OVER EUROPE WHERE HE IS CONSIDERED
TO BE THE MOST INSPIRING INFLUENCE IN THE EDINBURGH FESTIVAL SINCE THE
1960s.
IMAGINE MY SHOCK AND STATE OF INDIGNATION WHEN, AFTER VISITING THIS AUGUST
AND CELEBRATED INSTITUTION, I WAS SHOWN THE MOST LUDICROUSLY WRITTEN LETTER
(OF EVICTION) WHICH SHOWS SUCH A COMPLETE DISREGARD IN THIS MAN, HIS WORK,
THE INSTITUTION HE HAS CREATED AND THE FACT THAT HE HAS BEEN LARGELY RESPONSIBLE
FOR THE GREAT SUCCESS OF THE EDINBURGH FESTIVAL. THE LETTER AND ITS CONTENTS
REVEALS A SURPRISINGLY SHORT VISION FOR THE FUTURE. IGNORANCE AND MEDIOCRITY
ARE THE FOES TO BE WITNESSED IN THIS HISTORIC MOMENT.
* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *
* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *
HANNAH MOLONEY
24.8.97. STUDENT, READING, ENGLAND
IT WOULD BE NOTHING LESS THEN A CRIME TO DESTROY THE HOME OF SUCH PIECES
OF ART, AND POTENTIAL THEATRE. IT WAS MY FIRST TIME AT THE EDINBURGH FESTIVAL
THIS YEAR AND I WAS FORTUNATE ENOUGH TO BE IN A PLAY AT 'THE BLUE THEATRE'
IN ST. MARY'S.
OUR PLAY 'THE HOUSE OF BERNARDA ALBA' EXCELLED IN THAT THEATRE. OUR OWN
PERFORMING ARTS CENTRE AT OUR SCHOOL IS ALMOST BRAND NEW AND IS FAR SUPERIOR
TO THE 'BLUE THEATRE', BUT IT COULD NEVER PRODUCE THE SAME ENERGY, ENTHUSIASM
AND 'CLAUSTROPHOBIA' THAT THIS PLAY NEEDED AS THE 'BLUE THEATRE' DID.
ST. MARY'S CENTRE IS A UNIQUE PLACE - THE HOME OF ART. ART IS AN EXPRESSION
OF LIFE. WITHOUT IT WE ARE TRAPPED. THERE ARE FEW PLACES LIKE THE DEMARCO
EUROPEAN ARTS FOUNDATION. DON'T HELP TO MAKE THEM EXTINCT
* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *
* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *
PHILIP REEVES
3.9.97. ARTIST, GLASGOW, SCOTLAND
THE 'FOR SALE' NOTICE SHOULD BE WITHDRAWN AND THE EDINBURGH ARTS COUNCIL
SHOULD GIVE FULL SUPPORT TO RICHARD DEMARCO'S LOTTERY BID FOR ST. MARY'S
SCHOOL.
* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *
* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *
ELZBIETA MAJOCHA
24.8.97. UNIVERSITY LECTURER, EDINBURGH, SCOTLAND.
A FEW YEARS AGO I GOT HOLD OF A NEWSPAPER INTERVIEW FROM A POLISH NEWSPAPER
WITH RICHARD DEMARCO. FROM IT I LEARNT HOW IMPORTANT HIS WORK HAS BEEN
FOR PROMOTING EASTERN EUROPEAN ART. BEING POLISH MYSELF I REJOICED. AND
THIS YEAR I'VE HAD A CHANCE TO BREATHE THE 'AIR OF AN ART TEMPLE' SOMETHING
THAT NO OTHER ART VENUE IN THIS CITY HAS CREATED. CLOSING DOWN THIS CENTRE
WOULD BE AN IRRECOVERABLE LOSS.
* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *
* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *
ANN HERDMAN
28.8.97. DANDELION TRUST , ORKNEY, SCOTLAND
AS LIFE BREATHES LIFE SO NOTHING CAN BE BROKEN. AN EMPTY SPACE AT A STILL
POINT TURNING - HERE....HAVE I FOUND THE HEART OF THE FESTIVAL.
* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *
* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *
LAURIE O'BRIEN
22.8.97. STUDENT/TECHNICIAN BRAMPTON, ENGLAND
IT IS THROUGH RICHARD THAT I WAS ABLE TO COME UP THIS YEAR TO THE FESTIVAL
AND EXPERIENCE IT FOR THE FIRST TIME. I HAVE BEEN WORKING AT DEMARCO'S
AS PART OF THE TECHNICAL SUPPORT STAFF FOR THE VISITING THEATRE COMPANIES
AND RUNNING THAT SIDE OF THE THEATRE. THE EXPERIENCE I HAVE GAINED IN THE
PAST FEW WEEKS IS INVALUABLE BOTH TO MY FUTURE CAREER AND MY EXPERIENCE
OF HOW TO WORK WITH DIFFERENT PEOPLE.
I OWE RICHARD A GREAT DEBT OF GRATITUDE AND WITHOUT DEMARCO'S BOTH MYSELF
AND OTHERS WOULD NOT HAVE THIS CHANCE.
* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *
* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *
JACKIE McGLONE
15.9.97. JOURNALIST, EDINBURGH,SCOTLAND
WITHOUT RICHARD DEMARCO'S BRILLIANT CREATIVE ENERGY, THE EDINBURGH FESTIVAL
FRINGE WOULD BE THE POORER. NOT ONLY DOES THE DEA FOUNDATION ADD TO THE
GAIETY OF THE NATION, IT BRINGS INTELLECTUAL VIGOUR AND PASSIONATE DEBATE
TO EDINBURGH. WHO CAN FORGET BEUYS, KANTOR, CARMEN FUNEBRE...
* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *
* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *
CHARLES McKEAN
15.9.97. PROFESSOR OF ARCHITECTURE, EDINBURGH, SCOTLAND
WHAT DEMARCO HAS BROUGHT TO EDINBURGH IS WORTH INFINITELY MORE THAN THE
RENT OF AN OLD SCHOOL. IT IS AN INTERNATIONAL REPUTATION FOR EXPERIMENT,
DISCOVERY AND CULTURE, IN OPPOSITION TO THE CITY'S OLD REPUTATION FOR PAROCHIALISM,
THE LOSS OF DEMARCO COULD SPELL MUCH WORSE THAN THE LOSS OF RENT.
* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *
* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *
KATE HIGGENBOTTOM
23.8.97. STUDENT, OXFORD, ENGLAND
THE DEA FOUNDATION HAS PROVIDED AN IRREPLACEABLE OPPORTUNITY FOR MY THEATRE
GROUP -THE NIGHT WOOD COMPANY- TO PRESENT THEIR WORK. IT IS VITAL THAT
SMALL THEATRE GROUPS HAVE THIS KIND OF OPPORTUNITY, OTHERWISE THEY WILL
FAIL TO EXIST. WE ARE GRATEFUL TO RICHARD DEMARCO AND THE WHOLE FOUNDATION
FOR ALLOWING US RECOGNITION AND SUPPORT. THIS MUST REMAIN POSSIBLE FOR
OTHER GROUPS.
* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *
* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *
IAN M. FRASER
28.10.97. RETIRED DEAN, SELLY OAK COLLEGE, BIRMINGHAM,
ENGLAND
THE CONTRIBUTION WHICH RICKY DEMARCO HAS MADE TO SCOTLAND AND PARTICULARLY
TO EDINBURGH, HAS PUT HIM IN THE FRONT LINE OF ITALO-SCOTS WHO HAVE ENRICHED
OUR CULTURAL LIFE OVER THIS CENTURY. HIS IMAGINATION, DRIVE AND THE COHERENCE
OF HIS THINKING WHICH HAVE ALWAYS EMPHASISED THE UNITY OF MATERIAL AND
SPIRITUAL BEING, HAVE PUT ALL OF US IN HIS DEBT. WHEN EUROPE WAS DIVIDED,
HE WAS KEEPING LINES OPEN WITH EASTERN EUROPE, MAKING THE POSSIBILITY OF
UNITY MORE REAL AND RICH WHEN WALLS CAME DOWN. HE HAS ALWAYS OVEREXTENDED
HIMSELF, TAKING ON TOO MUCH AND SOMEHOW, MIRACULOUSLY, PULLING OFF THE
IMPOSSIBLE.
THE BEST HONOUR WHICH COULD BE ASCRIBED TO HIM WOULD BE TO PROVIDE A SECURE
BASE FROM WHICH TO CONTINUE TO ENRICH OUR LIFE.
* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *
* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *
ABBOT DONALD McGLYNN
9.9.97. MONK, PRIEST, NUNRAW ABBEY, SCOTLAND
THE TEST OF YEARS HAS PROVED THE UNIQUE ROLE OF THE DEMARCO GALLERY IN
EDINBURGH AND IN THE INTERNATIONAL FESTIVAL. ITS CHAMPIONING OF NEGLECTED
HUMAN VALUES LINKS IT INEVITABLY WITH THE ASTONISHING SHARING OF THE HIDDEN
AND FORGOTTEN VIRTUES OF HUMAN SENSITIVITY INSPIRED BY THE DEATH OF PRINCESS
DIANA.
IT WOULD BE A VERY FITTING MEMORIAL TO AN UNFORGETTABLE LADY IF THE DEMARCO
GALLERY WERE ERECTED IN HONOUR OF DIANA, PRINCESS OF WALES.
* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *
* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *
SIGEEVA NEWTE
24.8.97. TECHNICIAN, SURREY, ENGLAND
I HAVE WORKED AT DEAF DURING THE LAST TWO EDINBURGH FESTIVALS. WHILST WORKING
IN THIS BUILDING I HAVE ENJOYED THE OPPORTUNITY TO WORK WITH MANY INTERESTING
AND CREATIVE PEOPLE WHO HAVE CHOSEN THE CAREER OF ENTERTAINING AND LIBERATING
THE MINDS OF OTHERS. I BELIEVE THAT THE DEA FOUNDATION GIVES SOMETHING
SPECIAL TO THE PEOPLE WHO VISIT AND THAT IT WOULD BE A GREAT SHAME TO SEE
IT SUFFER DUE TO DIFFICULTIES OVER A BUILDING. ST. MARY'S IS A WONDERFUL
BUILDING AND EXHIBITIONS BRING IT TO LIFE IN AN AMAZING WAY. I WOULD LIKE
TO SEE IT OPEN FOR AT LEAST ANOTHER 35 YEARS ....IF NOT MORE......
PLEASE DO NOT CLOSE IT DOWN................
* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *
* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *
ANTHONY HAMPTON
2.9.97. THEATRE PRACTITIONER , SOMERSET, ENGLAND
THREE YEARS AGO RICHARD INVITED ME TO STAGE A PLAY AT THIS THEATRE DURING
THE FESTIVAL. I HAD WRITTEN AND DIRECTED THE ENTIRE PRODUCTION AT THE AGE
OF 18. IT WAS THE BEGINNING OF EVERYTHING FOR ME; THERE IS NO OTHER 'VENUE'
OR ANY KIND OF ARTS PLATFORM THAT I HAVE KNOWN OF WHICH COULD HAVE DONE
WHAT THE DEA FOUNDATION HAS DONE FOR ME, AND I KNOW I AM NOT BY ANY MEANS
ALONE IN THESE FEELINGS.
THE DEA FOUNDATION DOES INDEED OPERATE IN A WAY THAT SEEMS TOO DIFFERENT
FOR AUTHORITIES TO BE ABLE TO COPE WITH, BUT IT IS THE RESPONSIBILITY OF
THESE AUTHORITIES TO LOOK BEYOND THE MERE BUREAUCRACIES AND SEE THE SHEER
GRAVITY AND MASSIVE LONG TERM POTENTIAL. BE PATIENT AND HAVE FAITH IN THIS
WONDERFUL PLACE.
* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *
* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *
H.H. BORTHWICK
28.8.97. RETIRED NURSE, OXTON, SCOTLAND
I THINK RICHARD DEMARCO HAS DONE AND IS DOING THE MOST REMARKABLE AND DYNAMIC
FORM OF A CONTRIBUTION TO KEEPING ARTS MOVING. WHAT VALUE CAN BE PUT ON
A CITY CENTRE FOR OUR ENERGETIC YOUNG PEOPLE TODAY. THEIR TALENTS MUST
BE CHANNELLED INTO CONSTRUCTIVE AND MIND STRETCHING ACTIONS. OTHERWISE
BOREDOM AND DISMAY WILL LEAD TO DESTRUCTIVE ACTIONS...DRUGS...CRIME...SUICIDE.
TO SEE THE CRAIGMILLAR DRAMA GROUP BRINGING SUCH DELIGHT HAPPINESS AND
DRAWING OUT TALENT IN YOUNG 9 AND OLDER UNDERPRIVILEGED PEOPLE IS A DELIGHT.
A FEW YEARS AGO A YOUNG GROUP FROM INDIA WERE GIVEN THE OPPORTUNITY TO
PERFORM IN A FRINGE PRODUCTION IN ST. MARY'S. I KNEW SEVERAL OF THESE PEOPLE.
IT ENCOURAGED THEM TO GO FURTHER. TWO OF THEM LAST YEAR PRODUCED LIZ LOCHEAD'S
"BLOOD AND ICE" IN HAMPSTEAD TO PACKED HOUSES. ONE IS ACTING
VERY SUCCESSFULLY IN U.S.A. ONE HAS BEEN TAKEN UNDER THE WING OF JUDI DENCH.
IT WAS ST. MARY'S THAT GAVE THEM CONFIDENCE.
* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *
* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *
DAVID TURNER
23 .8.97. TEACHER, EDINBURGH, SCOTLAND
THE WEALTH OF VISUALLY INTERACTIVE ARTS ON DISPLAY IS A LANDMARK OF CULTURE
IN THE FESTIVAL CITY.
* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *
* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *
JAMES MARRIOT
10.9.97. SCULPTOR, LONDON, ENGLAND
RICHARD DEMARCO IS INDISPUTABLY ONE OF THE MOST IMPORTANT FORCES IN THE
BRITISH ARTS WORLD. IT IS ABSURD THAT THE SCOTTISH ARTS COUNCIL AND NOW
EDINBURGH COUNCIL SHOULD CONTINUE TO HOUND HIM IN THIS WAY. WHY DOESN'T
A NEWLY ENLIVENED SCOTLAND RECOGNISE ONE OF THE MOST ENLIGHTENED ONES AND
GIVE HIM THE HONOUR DUE TO HIM.
* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *
* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *
SARAH CLARK
29.8.97. STUDENT, HUNTS, ENGLAND
OUR TRIP TO THE FRINGE HELD AT THIS VENUE WAS INVALUABLE EXPERIENCE AND
GREAT FUN. IT WOULD BE SUCH A GREAT SHAME TO SEE SO EXCELLENT A SPACE DISAPPEAR.
RICHARD DEMARCO'S WORK IS AN INSPIRATION TO ALL THOSE INVOLVED IN YOUTH
THEATRE AND HIS ACHIEVEMENTS EMPHASISE HOW IMPORTANT IT IS TO CONTINUE
GIVING OPPORTUNITIES TO PEOPLE LIKE US.
* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *
* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *
ANN THERESE DEVINE
30.9.97. ARTIST, GLASGOW, SCOTLAND
FOR ME, RICHARD DEMARCO HAS KEPT THE HEART OF ART IN ALL ITS FORMS AND
EXPRESSIONS ALIVE AND BEATING - HE CONTINUES TO PUSH OUT THE BOUNDARIES
OF DISCOVERY, RECREATING NEW AND VALUABLE EXPERIENCES WHEREVER HE IS, FOR
ARTISTS, PERFORMERS, AND ALL MEMBERS OF SOCIETY- THIS SCHOOL IS THE PLACE
WHERE WE CAN ALL COME TO BE FED WITH THE LIFE OF ART WHICH HE HAS BROUGHT.
* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *
* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *
TANYA BUCHANAN
23.8.97. OCCUPATIONAL THERAPIST, EDINBURGH, SCOTLAND
WHAT AN UNBELIEVABLE RUDE AND DISRESPECTFUL LETTER TO MR RICHARD DEMARCO.
FOR THE CITY OF EDINBURGH TO REMOVE ONE OF THE FOUNDATIONS OF EDINBURGH
WITH SUCH CALLOUS REGARD FOR ALL THE WORK, ENTHUSIASM AND LIFE THAT THIS
ONE MAN HAS BESTOWED ON EDINBURGH AND SCOTLAND, IN THE WORLD OF THE ARTIST
AND THE DREAMER. HOW DARE YOU MAKE HIM "QUIT' LOOK AT WHAT YOU HAVE
BEFORE YOU LOSE IT FOREVER.
* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *
* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *
ARLENE ISBISTER
28.9.97. ARTIST, ORKNEY, SCOTLAND
THE NEED FOR CENTRES WHERE ART CAN BREATHE AND FUNCTION AS A LIVING PROCESS
AND WHERE DIVERSE CULTURES, DISCIPLINES AND COMMUNITIES MEET HAS NEVER
BEEN GREATER THAN IT IS TODAY. IN MY EXPERIENCE RICHARD DEMARCO'S SUSTAINED
WORK AND SPONTANEOUS ENERGY AT BOTH THE FORMER BLACKFRIARS STREET AND ST.
MARY'S IS AN ESSENTIAL NUCLEUS FOR CREATIVE AND INTERDISCIPLINARY EVENTS
ALLOWING A UNIQUE MIX OF PEOPLE TO COME TOGETHER BREAKING DOWN CULTURAL,
SOCIAL AND INTERNATIONAL BARRIERS FOR US ALL.
A TALE OR A STATUE OR A SONG IS NOT MADE TO GIVE A MOMENTS FLEETING PLEASURE
TO SUPERIOR CULTURED MINDS; THEY ARE ABSOLUTELY NECESSARY FOR THE WELL
BEING AND HEALTH OF A COMMUNITY. "WITHOUT GOOD ART - VISION - A PEOPLE
PERISHES". (GEORGE MACKAY BROWN - A PORTRAIT OF ORKNEY).
* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *
* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *
TERRY NEWMAN
29.8.97. ARTIST, DORSET, ENGLAND
"WITNESS OF EXISTENCE" WAS ONE OF THE GREATEST MOMENTS AT ST.
MARY'S - THAT IS TOGETHER WITH THE EVER PRESENT SPIRIT OF JOSEPH BEUYS.
* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *
* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *
ALISTAIR MACGREGOR
15.10.97. ARTIST/TEACHER , INVERNESS, SCOTLAND
OVER THE LAST QUARTER OF A CENTURY, WHENEVER I VISITED THE DEMARCO GALLERY
I WAS INVARIABLY STIMULATED, SOMETIMES MYSTIFIED, ALWAYS CHALLENGED BY
WHAT I SAW WITHIN ITS VARIOUS ADDRESSES. FAR REACHING IN ITS SCOPE, I THOUGHT
OF IT AS AN OUTPOST OF THE AVANTGARDE. I STILL DO AS OPPOSED TO THE PAROCHIALISM
OF MUCH ELSE IN THE CITY.
PARTICULARLY MEMORABLE WAS THE EXHIBITION "WITNESSES OF EXISTENCE"
BY THE ARTISTS OF SARAJEVO WHO I HAD THE PRIVILEGE OF MEETING. I TRUST
THAT AS THIS DOOR CLOSES ANOTHER WILL OPEN. SCOTLAND WILL BE MUCH THE POORER
IF NOT.
* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *
* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *
M. MORRIS
1.8.97. ARTS PRODUCER, LONDON, ENGLAND
16 YEARS...........5 BUILDINGS...........1 HOME, PLEASE ! (ST. MARY'S PREFERABLY.)
* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *
* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *
DAVID STEVENSON
22.8.97. FASHION ORGANISER , WILTS, ENGLAND
RICHARD NEEDS HELP TO REPEAT THE BEST WORK IN EDINBURGH
* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *
* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *
VICTORIA HARVEY
23.8.97. STUDENT, NOTTINGHAM, ENGLAND
THE DEA FOUNDATION HAS GIVEN THE 'TRIDENT THEATRE COMPANY' AN EXCELLENT
OPPORTUNITY TO PERFORM IN THE FRINGE FESTIVAL. IT HAS BEEN A GREAT EXPERIENCE
ONE THAT WILL BE INVALUABLE IN LATER LIFE. LOOKING FORWARD TO COMING AGAIN.
* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *
* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *
ROSS DEVLIN
23.8.97. ACTOR/MUSICIAN, NOTTINGHAM/ENGLAND
A PROFESSIONAL EXPERIENCE IN THE DEMARCO ART FOUNDATION - IT IS A PLACE
I WOULD NOT LIKE TO SEE FADE OUT. NICE ONE, CHEERS.
* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *
* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *
JAMES DEDGSON
23.8.97. STUDENT, DERBY, ENGLAND
THE FOUNDATION GAVE ME THE CULTURAL INSIGHT WHICH I HAVE YEARNED FOR, BUT
FAILED TO FIND IN MY OWN AND OTHER COUNCILS. IT WILL BE A GREAT LOSS IF
THIS 'ATTRACTION' IS LOST
* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *
* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *
NIGEL COUSIN
23.8.97. STUDENT, NOTTINGHAM, ENGLAND
THE VERVE MEANT IT POSSIBLE FOR OUR PRODUCTION TO TAKE PLACE AND FOR US
TO EXPERIENCE THE EDINBURGH FESTIVAL AT SUCH AN EARLY AGE.
IT WAS A GREAT EXPERIENCE. TO MR DEMARCO WE OWE A LOT OF THANKS.
* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *
* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *
AMY WARDEN
23.8.97. STUDENT, NOTTINGHAM, ENGLAND
MR. DEMARCO HAS GIVEN US, A SCHOOL PRODUCTION, A GREAT OPPORTUNITY TO PERFORM
IN A WORLD WIDE FESTIVAL. I FEEL THIS HAS BROADENED MY HORIZONS, WITHOUT
THE FOUNDATION IT WOULD NOT HAVE BEEN POSSIBLE.
* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *
* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *
ANNA MARSHALL
23.8.97. STUDENT, NOTTINGHAM, ENGLAND
PERFORMING AT THE DEMARCO ART FOUNDATION HAS BEEN A UNIQUE AND UNFORGETTABLE
EXPERIENCE FOR ME AND WITHOUT RICHARD DEMARCO AND HIS ART FOUNDATION, I
WOULD HAVE NEVER HAD SUCH AN OPPORTUNITY.
* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *
* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *
CHRIS COOK
23.8.97. STUDENT, HUNTINGDON, ENGLAND
THE EXPERIENCE GAINED FROM WORKING IN A PROFESSIONAL GROUP WAS UNIQUE,
AND THE ADDED PRESSURE OF THIS RESULTED IN GREATER PERFORMANCES FROM ALL.
THIS HAS BEEN AN INSPIRATIONAL VISIT AND HAS GIVEN ME THE FOCUS FOR MY
FUTURE CAREER. THANK YOU FOR THIS OPPORTUNITY.
* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *
* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *
KENNY MUNRO
3.10.97. ARTIST, ORMISTON, SCOTLAND
I WISH TO OFFER THE FOLLOWING SUGGESTIONS; DIRECT ACTION -
MAKE APPROACHES TO THOSE MINISTERS ACTIVELY PROMOTING THE SCOTTISH PARLIAMENT.
SEEK AN AUDIENCE WITH SCOTTISH SECRETARY DONALD DEWAR. COMPILE AN OUTLINE
OF YOUR NEXT 'FIVE YEAR PLAN [WHICH NO DOUBT YOU ALREADY HAVE] INDICATING
CULTURAL, EDUCATIONAL PROGRAMME WITH INDICATION OF INCOME EXPENDITURE.
SEND COPIES, WITH HASTE TO THE FOLLOWING;
TONY BLAIR, DONALD DEWAR, GORDON BROWN, ROBIN COOK...
AND YOUR MEDIA CONTACTS SUCH AS SHEENA MACDONALD, KIRSTY, MURRAY GRIGOR
ETC.
EMPHASISING THE POTENTIAL FOR EDUCATIONAL ACTIVITIES, SUCH AS WORKSHOPS
IN THEATRE, SCULPTURE, PAINTING, SCIENCE/ART EVENTS AND SUMMER SCHOOLS
AS PART OF YOUR FUTURE PROGRAMME. AND OF COURSE, AS WE KNOW, STRESSING
THE IMPORTANCE OF ESTABLISHING A SOLID LEASE AGREEMENT TO ENABLE YOUR LOTTERY
APPLICATION.
MOST IMPORTANTLY, RAISING THE FUNDAMENTAL SIGNIFICANCE OF THE FOUNDATION
TO THE CULTURAL CORE OF THE EVOLVING CREATIVE RESOURCES FOR EUROPE IN CONJUNCTION
WITH THE NEW SCOTTISH PARLIAMENT.
SO THAT IS HOW I FEEL ABOUT THINGS AFTER VISITING ST. MARY'S TODAY.
* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *
* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *
ERLAND CLUSTON
9.10.97. JOURNALIST, EDINBURGH, SCOTLAND
SO HIS LAST SHOW WAS BASED ON A BRUNO SCHULZ STORY. THE COUNCIL SHOULD
REMEMBER WHAT HAPPENED TO MR SCHULZ, AND REFLECT.
* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *
* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *
GEORGE WYLLIE
SCUL?TOR, SCOTLAND
DO I SUPPORT RICHARD DEMARCO ? OF COURSE I DO !!!!!
* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *
* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *
SHIELA CALVIN
28.8.97. ARTS ADMINISTRATOR, EDINBURGH, SCOTLAND
RICKY,
I HAVE KNOWN YOU FOR MORE THAN 35 YEARS AND MARVELLED AT YOUR UNIQUE AND
PRECIOUS VISION, STAMINA, DETERMINATION, HUMILITY - ABOVE ALL THAT. I HAVE
UNFORGETTABLE MEMORIES OF YOUR ACHIEVEMENTS AT THE ORIGINAL TRAVERSE THEATRE
IN JAMES COURT, AT MELVILLE CRESCENT, BLACKFRIARS, ON SEA AND ON LAND -
AND MOST RECENTLY OF THE EXTRAORDINARY SPACES YOU HAVE CREATED AT ST. MARY'S.
I HAVE MET ACTORS, WRITERS, DIRECTORS, COOKS, CRITICS, PHOTOGRAPHERS, FROM
ALL CORNERS OF THE WORLD, AND THEY HAVE COME THERE BECAUSE OF WHAT YOU
AND YOUR COLLEAGUES CREATED. I AM DEVASTATED THAT THIS MARVELLOUS BUILDING
AND THE ENERGIES IT HAS RELEASED ARE TO BE DISCARDED SO CARELESSLY..
* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *
* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *
CHRISTOPHER RICHARDSON
27.8.97. THEATRE CONSULTANT, LONDON, ENGLAND
RICKY HAS SURPRISED AND DELIGHTED THE WORLD WITH VISUAL AND TECHNICAL EXCITEMENTS
FOR A LONG TIME. SCOTLAND AND THE CITY OF EDINBURGH NEED HIS INFLUENCE
INTO THE MILLENNIUM.
* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *
* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *
NICK HOUNSLOW
23.8.97. STUDENT, DERBY, ENGLAND
TO COME FROM A SMALL SCHOOL PRODUCTION TO THE EDINBURGH FESTIVAL WAS A
FANTASTIC EXPERIENCE FOR US ALL HERE. WE OWE IT TO RICHARD DEMARCO WHO
GAVE US THIS OPPORTUNITY HERE IN HIS THEATRE. THIS UNIQUE EXPERIENCE WAS
BEYOND A A LOT OF OUR DREAMS AND THE SUPERB RESPONSE WE HAD WAS DUE TO
DEMARCO AND HIS SUPERB PUBLICITY TECHNIQUES. THANK YOU, IT WAS AN EXPERIENCE
I WILL NEVER FORGET FOR AS LONG AS I LIVE.
* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *
* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *
MIL LUBROTH
23.8.97. ARTIST/PAINTER /PRINTMAKER, MADRID. SPAIN
I FIRST MET RICHARD DEMARCO IN THE LATE EIGHTIES - HE BEING ON A TRIP WITH
SEVERAL OF HIS YOUNG PROTEGES TO POLAND, AND I HAVING EXHIBITS OF MY WORK
IN WARSAW AND KRAKOW. WITH MUCH ENTHUSIASM HE INVITED ME TO JOIN HIS GROUP
IN VISITING THE ART SCENE (EXHIBITS ETC.)IN WARSAW WHICH I DID GLADLY.
I KNEW NOTHING ABOUT HIM OR THE PEOPLE (ABOUT 20-25?) HE WAS SHEPHERDING
- BUT THE ENTHUSIASM ON ALL SIDES WAS VERY EVIDENT. I CORRESPONDED WITH
MR. DEMARCO CONCERNING EXHIBITS IN SCOTLAND- AND HE MORE THAN ONCE EXTENDED
HIS CONCERN FOR THOSE WORKING IN THE ARTS. I HAVE JUST VISITED ST.MARY'S
FOR THE FIRST TIME AND I AM APPALLED TO LEARN OF THE LACK OF FINANCIAL
SUPPORT THIS PIONEER IS SUFFERING.
* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *
* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *
W. LEVY
26.8.97. G.P.(VET), LONDON
EDINBURGH AND THE EIF HAVE BREEN ENRICHED, AND THE VISITORS STIMULATED,
FOR SO MANY YEARS BY DEMARCO WITH A WIDE CHOICE OF ARTISTIC MANIFESTATIONS,
AND THE LOSS WOULD BE FELT EQUALLY BY THE VISITORS AS THE INHABITANTS.
* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *
* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *
VICTORIA HARVEY
23.9.97. STUDENT, NOTTINGHAM.
THE DEA FOUNDATION HAS GIVEN THE 'TRIDENT THEATRE COMPANY" AN EXCELLENT
OPPORTUNITY TO PERFORM IN THE FRINGE FESTIVAL. IT HAS BEEN A GREAT EXPERIENCE
- ONE THAT WILL BE INVALUABLE IN LATER LIFE. LOOKING FORWARD TO COMING
AGAIN.
* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *
* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *
WILLIAM WALLS
22.8.97. SCHOOLMASTER, NOTTINGHAM
THE TREMENDOUS VARIETY OF PIONEERING ART AND DRAMA AT ST. MARY'S HAS MADE
THE DEMARCO EUROPEAN ARTS FOUNDATION A BEATING PULSE WITHIN EUROPE AND
A BRINGER OF ENLIGHTENMENT, THROUGHOUT THE WORLD, TO THE PEOPLE WHO HAVE
VISITED. THE EXHIBITION CELEBRATING THE 1400TH ANNIVERSARY OF THE BIRTH
OF ST. COLUMBA IS A CASE IN POINT.
* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *
* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *
DR. NICOLA GORDON BOWE
1.9.97. ART HISTORIAN LECTURER, NATIONAL COLLEGE ART,
DUBLIN, IRELAND.
RICHARD DEMARCO HAS SINGLEHANDEDLY DONE MORE THAN ANY INDIVIDUAL IN BRITAIN
(Let alone Scotland) TO CREATE, STIMULATE AND REALISE PIONEERING, AVANT-GARDE
ARTISTIC ENTERPRISE, EXPRESSION AND ACHIEVEMENT SINCE THE WAR, BY OPENING
OUT A UNIQUELY SPIRITED, COURAGEOUS AND FAR REACHING INTERNATIONAL DEBATE.
* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *
* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *
CHRISTINE WIGGINS
1.9.97. ARTS ADMINISTRATOR, LIVERPOOL, ENGLAND.
I HAVE KNOWN RICKY DEMARCO SINCE HIS EARLY PIONEERING DAYS IN THE MID 60s
WHEN HE FIRST BROUGHT AVANT GARDE ART FROM THE REST OF THE UK AND EASTERN
EUROPE (IN THOSE DAYS 'BEHIND THE IRON CURTAIN") TO EDINBURGH. SINCE
THEN AND IN SPITE OF NEVER ENDING FUNDING PROBLEMS, HE HAS WORKED TIRELESSLY
TO PROMOTE THE VISUAL AND PERFORMING ARTS BOTH HERE AND IN EUROPE. HE HAS
BECOME A LEGEND IN HIS OWN LIFE TIME. MENTION EDINBURGH AND INVARIABLY
PEOPLE WILL SAY 'DO YOU KNOW RICHARD DEMARCO?" THE FOUNDATION FESTIVAL
EXHIBITION THIS YEAR HAS BEEN OUTSTANDING AND HIS PERFORMING ARTS PROGRAMME
IS ALWAYS INNOVATIVE AND EXCITING. ST MARY'S IS IDEAL SPACE FOR THE FOUNDATION.
RICKY HAS MADE IT SO. IF HE IS MADE TO QUIT, EDINBURGH WILL ALMOST CERTAINLY
LOSE HIM FOR EVER, AND ONLY AFTERWARDS WILL THEY REALISE WHAT A GRAVE MISTAKE
THEY HAVE MADE.
* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *
* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *
GILES RAMSAY
27 8.97. DRAMA TEACHER , NOTTINGHAM, ENGLAND.
OVER THE YEARS RICHARD HAS BROUGHT ART AND JOY TO THOUSANDS OF PEOPLE IN
EDINBURGH AND THROUGHOUT THE WORLD, FOR MANY HE GAVE THEM THEIR FIRST CHANCE
- EVEN IF THIS IRRITATES SOME, IT SHOULD AND MUST BE ALLOWED TO CONTINUE.
* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *
* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *
DR. SANDRA GRANT
23.8.97. DIRECTOR, SCOTTISH HEALTH ADVISORY SERVICE, GLASGOW,
SCOTLAND
I FIRST WENT TO AN EXHIBITION OF RICKY DEMARCO'S IN 1966 WHEN I WAS A STUDENT
IN EDINBURGH WHEN HE WAS A BREATH OF FRESH AIR BRINGING MODERN ART TO THEIR
CITY. OVER THE DECADES SINCE HE HAS BEEN GUARANTEED TO BRING INNOVATION,
CONTROVERSY AND DEBATE WITH VISUAL AND PERFORMING ARTS OF A HIGH CALIBRE.
HE WOULD NO DOUBT HATE THE TERM THAT HE IS AND INSTITUTION BUT IF ONE CAN
FIND A BETTER TERM FOR THE ENDLESS AVANT-GARDE I DON'T KNOW IT. I CAME
TO SEE THE EXHIBITIONS AT THE FESTIVAL AND OF COURSE CAME HERE. TO FIND
THIS PLACE THREATENED WITH CLOSURE (OR ACTUALLY FACING CLOSURE) I FIND
OBSCENE. THIS IS A MISGUIDED AND INEPT DECISION.
* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *
* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *
CAROLINE TISDALL
9.9.97. WRITER, LONDON
OVER THE PAST 30 YEARS DEMARCO HAS BROUGHT MORE CULTURAL PRESTIGE TO EDINBURGH
FROM HOME AND ABROAD THAN ANY OTHER INDIVIDUAL. HE PUT THE CITY ON THE
INTERNATIONAL ART WORLD MAP. EUROPE, EASTERN EUROPE, THE CELTIC WORLD,
THE NEW WORLD, ALL WERE BROUGHT TO YOU AT A FRACTION OF THE COST ANY INSTITUTION
WOULD HAVE RUN UP.
SO LET'S STOP THE NONSENSE......
YES:- GIVE DEMARCO A BUILDING AT LAST.
YES:- GIVE HIM AN ADMINISTRATOR FOR YOUR ACCOUNTABILITY.
* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *
* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *
JOHN & VI HUGHES
15.9.97. RESEARCHER, RUSKIN COLLEGE, OXFORD
WITH OUR BEST WISHES FOR A GOOD FLITTING AND TO A DESTINATION
THAT WILL OFFER EVEN MORE POSSIBILITIES FOR YOUR ADVENTUROUS AND LARGE
HEARTED WORKS.
WE ONCE HEARD HUGH MACDIARMID DISTINGUISH BRILLIANTLY BETWEEN THE COSMOPOLITAN
AND THE INTERNATIONAL
LETS HOPE THE NEW SCOTLAND WILL WELCOME AND SUPPORT YOUR DEDICATION TO
INTERNATIONALISM. WE REMEMBER THE PASSIONATE PERFECTION OF THE YOUNG POLISH
STUDENT THEATRE, THE TOUCHING STRIVING TOWARDS THE ART OF THE 15 YEAR OLDS
FROM WAR TORN YUGOSLAVIA, AND THE GENEROUS HUMANISM OF JIMMY BOYLE'S SCULPTURES.
THANK YOU AND GOOD LUCK.
* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *
* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *
DAVID HARDING
10.9.97. ARTIST/LECTURER, GLASGOW
I HAVE BEEN AWAY DURING THIS FESTIVAL AND SO MISSED THE EXHIBITIONS BUT
FOR ME THE ART 7 SCIENCE BASED ON THE WORKS OF JAMES CLARK MAXWELL, AND
ORGANISED WITH ASCENT, WAS ONE OF THE VERY BEST CONFERENCES I HAVE EVER
ATTENDED. HOW DOES DEMARCO DO IT EVERY TIME???
WELL ALMOST!!!
* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *
* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *
MELANIE DE BLANK
28.8.97. COMPANY DIRECTOR , LONDON
ON EVERY NIGHT DURING THE FIRST WEEK I TOOK MY YOUNGEST DAUGHTER UP TO
THE FESTIVAL IN 1994 AND SHE INSISTED THAT SHE HAD TO BE SITTING ON A STRAW
BALE IN THE COURTYARD OF ST.MARY'S SCHOOL WATCHING THE MAGNIFICENT ESTONIAN
PRODUCTION OF ROMEO & JULIET, AND EVERY NIGHT HER LITTLE TEAR STRAINED
FACE GLOWED WITH EXCITEMENT.
WE KNOW WE WILL FIND GOOD THEATRE WHEREVER RICHARD DEMARCO IS BECAUSE HE
IS A MAN WHO UNDERSTANDS THE ESSENCE OF THE HUMAN SOUL AND FEEDS US. HIS
COURAGE, SINGLEMINDEDNESS AND GENEROSITY ARE A GREAT EXAMPLE OF HOW A LIFE
SHOULD BE LIVED. HE LIGHTS UP OUR LIVES WITH HIS VISION AND SPIRIT AND
MUST BE ALLOWED TO CONTINUE TO IGNITE THE FIRES THAT MAKE US HUMAN.
* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *
* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *
For biographical notes of Richard Demarco, visit Roberta Lemon's Web site:
http://www.lemon-enterprises.com/demarco.htm
Newspaper and magazine articles on Demarco
issues.
Giles Sutherland. The Scotsman on 11 December 1996. "Culturally,
as a nation, we will be judged on how we have treated Mr Richard Demarco"
Iain Gale. Scotland on Sunday, 15 December 1996. "the Scots face
future vilification as cultural reactionaries,"
Nigel Osborne. Article. The Scotsman 26 August 1997 "Stamp on Demarco
and you tread on angels..."
Iain Gale. Article. Scotland on Sunday. "Artist in revolt".
31 August 1997. Joseph Beuys' aim was to transform the way we all see and
think, an agenda that has been nothing short of revolutionary...
Robert McDowell. The Herald 24 August, 1997. letters. "A Visual
Feast.."
Maeve Hall, Northern Ireland. Brian Ferran, Chief Executive, Arts Council
of Northern Ireland.The Herald 4 September 1997. Letters:
" In Defence of Demarco" Joyce MacMillan. The Herald, 29 August
1997. "When there's no time quite like the present. Joyce MacMillan
considers the plight of Fringe impresario Richard Demarco, master of the
art of stopping us in our tracks and forcing us to look again".
John Haldane. The Tablet. 30 August 1997.
Giles Sutherland. The Scotsman 26 August 1997. "Integration: Honouring
Columcille. Demarco Gallery".
Scotland on Sunday. August 31 1997. "Festival Critics Awards".
Pavel Büchler- "Bad News" -Variant
- Vol 2, No. 2 Spring 1997. "According to press reports, Scotland
faces a nearly certain condemnation in the history textbooks of the twenty-first
century...."
The Herald. September 1997. "Demarco sees gallery
he built up fall to developers", John McEachran. Photo "Under
Offer" arch by Dan Tuffs.
Edinburgh Evening News, October 1 1997. "Arts guru sits tight as
eviction D-day passes", Mark Campanile. Photograph of "Under Offer"
arch.
Edinburgh Evening News, October 25 1997. "Vandals target arts guru
base", Mark Campanile. Report on destruction of "Under Offer"
arch sculpture
ArtWork, 88 October/November 1997
"Under Offer" Arch. Reference by Murray Grigor to the floral
arch installation at Demarco European Art Foundation, Edinburgh, Photograph
by JK.
INDEX
"UNDER OFFER"
Albany Street Arch
(20 September 1997)
THE DEMARCO EUROPEAN ART FOUNDATION
Installation
John Kraska assisted
by Tena Cummings
With many thanks for their invaluable assistance to;
Zoë Squair, Margaret Watt, George Wyllie, Pat James, Frank Watt, Eva
Szymczak, Steve Robb, Lee Gershuny, Renny Nisbet and Sam Watt; Dalserf
and Clatty Brae farms, Lanarkshire.
John Kraska
With the help of my friends I created a sculptural installation at the
entrance to Richard Demarco's gallery and theatre spaces in Edinburgh's
Albany Street. The ten foot high sculpture in the form of an arch entirely
covered in flowers, sheaves of barley and oats, wild rose hips, rowan and
other autumnal fruits surprised and delighted those who discovered it,
but for some, it symbolised more sombre issues as film-maker and "cultural
agitator" Murray Grigor said;
"Now in the current era of mass marketing those creative few
who can capture what is new and vital as it flies past them often fall
foul of the funding bodies bent on business plan projections for three
years hence. There is nothing more poignant to be seen in Edinburgh today
than the art work now shrouding the once busy entrance of Richard Demarco's
Gallery in York Lane/ Albany Street, foreclosed by Edinburgh Council in
the cultural clearances of our time."
The archway was prepared in the yard that was once the playground of
St Mary's school which since 1992 has been home to hundreds of theatre
performances and many exhibitions. The voluptuous colour and texture of
the arch design stood in stark contrast to the reserved Georgian architecture
of Albany Street, acting as a shock to the senses - but the artwork was
not only sensational in its visual immediacy and in its seasonal appeal,
it also contained a message laid in a mosaic of yellow chrysanthemums -
"UNDER OFFER" - which echoed the projecting sign fixed to the
top-floor window above. Edinburgh City Council is in the process of selling
off the art centre to a property developer to be converted into luxury
flats, which would leave Richard Demarco's European Art Foundation and
its substantial archives homeless. He has been issued with an eviction
order, and the "offer" to pass "under" the welcoming
floral archway notified of the virtual inevitability of this building's
loss as a PLACE of art and theatre.
The siting of this sculpture transformed the street. People paused
in their journeys to become momentarily lost in the sensual attraction
of this compilation of nature's harvest, both cultivated and wild. Neighbours,
adjacent office workers, tourists, churchgoers, late night revellers, arts
people, all joined in the dialogue about the reason for the arch, to ask
how it was made and to give thought to the loss of the building as a home
of art - also to add written statements of support for Demarco's predicament.
Amongst those who took up the discussion were French Canadian visitors,
Dutch florists, a Belgian comparing the floral carpet in the old square
of Brussels, an Edinburgh poet who shared a poem about our polluted land,
an Edinburgh gent who advised on close inspection that the barley sheaves
required fire-proofing, former school pupils of the building's previous
life (little loved it seems) as St Mary's School (Cathedral Schools-rebuilt
1914, as the entrance mosaic explains), a woman who connected the arch
to folk festival in Bathgate where tissue-paper flowers are traditionally
used, a film animator who saw Balinese street ceremony resemblances; The
architect Izi Metstein identified it with John Piper's well-head dressing
in (if I recall rightly) Cambridgeshire; others who found Slavic, Indian,
African and Mexican reminiscences - "at first I thought it was the
Hari Krishna people, but now I see. We can't afford to lose Richard."
"Wonderful", murmured some Russians. "Beautiful", so
many simply offered. A New York theatre producer understood the arch form
to represent the balance of opposing energies residing in the earth - an
Albany yin and yang. By the sixth day hundreds had stopped to dwell and
to talk under this folk arch.
The arch took on a position as the locus of exchange and as the boundary
between the private/ interior and the public/exterior. There was a front
and a back, but only for those who passed below the silvered depth to discover
the obverse side, tangled, loose, burgeoning, dark, wild - the antithesis
to the ordered and sweet frontal symmetry. The back was shadowy, silhouetted,
an enclosure of the semi-public space, the intervening space that normally
sits casually and carelessly considered in our urban streetscape. The archway
here crushed that indifference, emphatically confirming the demarcation
line while inviting passage under and behind. The door beyond acquired
a new function as notice board, site of news and posters. With its appeal
to an exceptionally wide range of viewers, the archway signalled what the
community, local and international, is losing in the realms of performance,
theatre, and visual arts when the building falls to redevelopment.
"Under Offer" evolved through my participation in the recent
DEA Foundation Edinburgh Festival Fringe Exhibition, "Scottish Artists
in the Demarco Archives 1966 - 1997", where my cast works drew from
the subject of the archive and of documentation, particularly Polish sources
of research, such as the artists and critics of the Foksal Gallery, Warsaw,
shown by the Demarco Gallery in several influential past exhibitions in
Edinburgh.
The Demarco archives, still undergoing cataloguing, form a significant
Scottish national cultural record and resource. This collection reflects
the Foksal artists and writers proposition of Living Archives (Zywe Archiwum)
where the collected material was conceived as active, to be worked through
and dug in like the contents of a compost heap, or to be treated as deep
sea salvage, to be sunk and raised again (the Polish artists actually did
this!), with the caution that the process of continually expanding documentation
inexorably tends to supplant the creation of new and original work - an
irresistible trap that could only ultimately be met by denial.
This archway, repository of nature's pigment and texture stood for the
arch in Arch iwum, an expression of the repeating
cycle of growth, fruition and decay, a full and ripe skin on the verge
of atrophy, to become parchment-dry and eventual dust. In an obituary notice
in The Independent, 18 September 1997, James Kirkup wrote that the Japanese
poet, artist and essayist, Koi Nagata "learned from the great mediaeval
Noh dramatist Zeami to appreciate the beauty of decay. Zeami said: "What
is interesting is that the flower becomes withered." Nagata said:
"That sort of beauty in decline is more interesting to me, because
there is energy in that decline. I always have a longing to witness the
death of the flowers and plants before my very eyes. Most people try to
see flowers blooming in their prime, but I desire to see them at their
end." In his "haiku of the beauty of decay": Koi Nagata
wrote:
"The withered grasses -
without a house to live in,
my life burns hotter".
Will Scottish art and cultural life burn the hotter for want of
a house, an art lover's house to live in ? In refusing Demarco, in refusing
us, the hundreds of artists from here and beyond, the resources and facilities
to continue our work and researches, in diminishing our access to our audiences,
whose interests are being served ? Remember that the artists in our society
loom large amongst the excluded , are the poor in
the statistics that describe the ever widening gap between the haves and
the have-nots. How should we respond to a social order that discriminates
against creativity ?
From the top of the arch projected a cut out figure - head metamorphosing
into a palette, adjustable hands clasping aloft a dried branch of biennial
Scotch Thistle , the uppermost pinnacle of the work. Below
that in measure, flourishing out of balancing pilasters, fountains of oats
over barley waves. Some warned that the artists work would not survive
a night, but who'd dare trash such a fragile monument that harks back to
the binding of land and art ? As Hugh MacDiarmid wrote, and he wrote no
end of things about thistles:
"the thistle yet'll unite man and the infinite". (Hugh
MacDiarmid: A Drunk Man Looks at the Thistle)
The sky's the limit in our idea-full heads. In 1979 the Polish thinkers
sent the following words to us via Richard Demarco (Demarco has served
as a vehicle, a conduit). "It is the artist who calls forth the PLACE.
Whoever is in it is its maker. It is only in the PLACE and not outside
of it that "art is created by all."" "with the slightest
moment of inattention it will be absorbed into its surroundings....."
Who has been remiss ? Whose "inattention" will result in the
potent spaces of St Mary's being reabsorbed into the mundanity of luxury
flats and car parking? One could attempt to apportion blame - x% to Demarco's
over busy, over fertile under-funded schedule, y% to the public's surfeit
of comforting distractions, z% to the kudos driven prejudice of the institutional
establishments (of government and media), with the principal protagonists
locked like rutting stags in futile territorial conflict. As this arc for
Demarco made clear, the people love and appreciate art as
they love air.Why is this simple truth denied?
Well, that's how I had described things until a week after its 'unveiling',
when the painted plywood "Art Figure" atop the arch was stolen
during the night. This figure incidentally was part of an co-creation many
years ago with Scottish artist Tommy Lydon. and also linked to The Square
Yard creator in Glasgow, Alan Singleton. I should have paid greater heed
to the Foksal writers warning. A moment's "inattention" and the
figure had been "absorbed" into some unknown surroundings, but
I couldn't accept the loss of the Art Figure as a serious reversal. I made
a black-painted, articulated, cardboard substitute,"(SUB)", a
shadow brother. Created in response to loss and inextricably linked to
its original, "(SUB)" continued to act out a variety of parts
within the echoing corridors and former classrooms of Demarco's all-but-lost
theatre of St Mary's, signalling by semaphoric gesture through an invisible
umbilical cord to its abducted original. Shadow and figure should not remain
parted.
Described by Richard Demarco as a "shrine" and a "gentle
protest", the archway was placed at the pavement edge trusting that
it would be respected, and that had been 99.% the case; it was made both
to celebrate and to confront and inform a public, - but worse
was to follow. After five weeks, when the bright, luscious dahlias and
chrysanthemums had gradually withered, yet still with the faded elegance
of an over-worn threadbare tailored costume... mysteriously and shockingly,
in the night, the sculpture was set on fire and destroyed.
Suddenly Albany Street seemed empty. A calculated risk had been taken and
seemingly all had been lost, but art, after all, does not wholly fulfil
itself without a public seeing, engaging and responding to it, even if
that response is one of unaccountable violence. In Scotland's capital city,
the work had induced both the greatest sympathy and the greatest mischief.
The seed-bearing grasses, our lives, had briefly burned the hotter.
Once more we lifted ourselves. From the debris of this sacrificial container
and passageway, barley and oat seeds were gleaned (to be planted in the
Spring). The entrance was swept clean; the front door repainted, its brass
letterbox polished, and an exquisite chisel-outlined "33" door
numberplate recovered from underneath five layers of paint. The door then
opened into a new series of rapidly formed exhibition spaces, repainted,
lit, transformed out of adversity, showing paintings from
the Demarco Archives and a new "Arch" related exhibition. Office
and boxed archives had moved from the ranging spaces of the school to this
compact and more readily defended sector. Additionally, in basement rooms
of number "33", in this reconstituting process of withdrawal,
a new Grotowski-esque PLACE of theatre edged into being, one incidentally
that is still resonating to the recent Festival Fringe presences of Polish
actress Zofia Kalinska and actor Jacek Zawadzki. One more short season
beckonned; one more 'last' act for the Mystery
School .
"We have to contribute to the good.", says playwright Ariel Dorfmann
, and, "We have to create the spaces not only for the vast majority,
but for ourselves, to transgress the way we habitually think, to explore
the complicated topics".
Watch this space.......
John Kraska.
December, 1997
DEA Foundation St.Mary's School, 33 Albany Street, Edinburgh EH1
3HY
Tel: 0131 557 0707 Fax: 0131 557 5972
JOHN KRASKA, 104 Hill Street, Glasgow G3 6UA, Scotland, U.K.
Tel: 0141 332 5257. Tel: 0141 332 0565. To fax - Telephone 332
0565 and ask for fax mode.
E Mail: kraska@tones.demon.co.uk
INDEX
The Mystery School
DECEMBER 1st - 14th 1997
A PROGRAM OF PERFORMANCES, WORKSHOPS, AND EXHIBITIONS BY
JACEK ZAWADZKI, MIRACLE PRODUCTIONS, THE ELEMENTS, ROBERTA LEMON,
MARGO DAREL, JOHN KRASKA, THE DEMARCO ARCHIVE.
Programme and Events
THE ELEMENTS
A WEALTH OF DIFFERENCE
Wednesday, 3rd Dec. 1997
Improvised story/drama presented by members of The Elements'
Workshop. Aliens from another galaxy search for "goodness" in
Edinburgh. If they can't find it, they will destroy the city. If they find
"goodness," they will take it with them to another universe.
Audience discussion follows.
THEATRE OF BEING:Workshop
: Performing Arts as Meditation
Workshop Leaders: Lee Gershuny and Jacek Zawadzki
Open to participants and observers at all levels of experience and ability.
A fun, challenging way to develop your creative potential from the inside
out. Play with whatever imagery and real elements are present through improvised
drama, dance, story-telling and music. Become author, actor and director
of your own role in the group myth. Please bring musical instruments, puppets,
masks and any other props to enhance improvisations.
Saturday 6th & 13th Dec.
DEAF
A site-specific, improvised story/drama. Theme: Exile and Eviction.
Devised and presented by The Elements Performance Ensemble:
Jacek Zawadzki, Lilian Brzoska, Martin Lowe, Ewa Szymczak &
Leeala. (all members of the Ensemble participate in the
Saturday Workshops)
Sundays, 7th & 14th Dec.
EXHIBITIONS
Paintings from the DEMARCO GALLERY ARCHIVE
The "UNDER OFFER" Arch - JOHN KRASKA installation
and photographic works
JACEK ZAWADZKI
(TEATR KANA, SZCZECIN, POLAND)
Moscow Petushki
''Zawadzki's theatrical art gives this adaptation
of Erofeyev's masterpiece a
physical presence unseen before...using his unique particular body language..."
Based on the poem by VENEDICT EROFEYEV
The train from MOSCOW-PETUSHKI will depart from 33
ALBANY STREET, EDINBURGH , on the evenings of
Fri. 5TH, 9th December at 20.30 hrs,
and on the 6th and 10th of December at
18.30 hrs, having already visited stations at SZCZECIN
('89), BERLIN ('90), POZNAN ('92), LONDON ('94), AMSTERDAM ('95), LOS ANGELES
and SAN DIEGO ('97)
(Workshops: Fri 5th Dec. & Tues 9th Dec. at 14.00
- 16.30 hrs)
ALAN JACKSON*LILIAN BRZOSKA
Poetry Reading
Inspired poets - Alan Jackson and Lilian Brzoska travel
to spiritual realms, deep, high and wide. they walk and talk with humour,
wit and intensity in true troubadour tradition. It's a miracle they have
survived long enough to meet.
Monday 1st Dec.8pm & Friday 5th Dec.10pm.
ROBERTA LEMON: Anais Anagram
Written by KATHRYN WILLSTEED . Music: "Say Love"
from "West Side Stories" (Verve) by Jeff Lorber. Australian writer
collaborates with British actress to take a serious look at that "rara
aris" Anais Nin and her complex sexual identity. A half-hour one act,
one voice drama that takes a voyage into the labyrinth of Nin's incest
and breaks the code of her diary.
Performing 2nd/4th/6th/10th/11th/12th Dec.
MARGOT DARU:Mysteries of the Grail
Workshop :
An experiential workshop exploring Arthurian Realms in fact and fiction
in light of the Grail legends.
Sunday 7th Dec. 2.30-5.00pm.
Box Office/Info: Zoë Squair. Tel: 0131 557 0707. Fax: 0131
557 5972
THE DEMARCO EUROPEAN ART FOUNDATION
DEA Foundation, St.Mary's School, 33 Albany Street, Edinburgh EH1
3HY
* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *
* * * *
INDEX
This day, 2nd September 1997
IN THE GALLERY
by
Lilian Kennedy Brzoska
of Miracle Productions
and Several Guardian Spirits who DO EXIST.
Ricky Demarco Strives
Once again, to be
Taken seriously by
The estate agents of
Edinburgh City Council
Nearing the Edge of the
Abyss in which
Painters,
Photographers, Artists
Live from day to day
Edging the Eternal,
Simply to Survive.
Here I sit, amongst the poetry of peoples' work, poised to guard the
open door, creating an entrance which otherwise would not exist, at this
moment, in the now of all changing, among the pictures of all moments,
in the space where glyphs appear upon this blank page, a new age counsellor,
a bard of our land, in the tradition, marginalised, while this stand is
taken against the wolves of ravening greed who need to build more yuppy
flats rather than have International Artists relations succeed. Do I need
to be here ? It would appear I do. So what is it in me that sat me on this
chair, aware of the charge of being meaningless in a world where dripping
diamonds seems to be the icon of success ?
THE VOICES ENGAGE; THE CHILDREN
"Bless you girl and thank you. We are here too, we who walk with
you through this frozen wasteland of tomorrow's children, branded with
disaster, in the palms of our hands. We who suffered the fury and the rages
of those who snuffed out life. We stood here, weak and lonely, with only
the hope one would come who could free us. Sanctuary we have found in you,
sound in you, through which we can journey to our maker. Thank-you for
having been here, for BEING HERE NOW.
THE KNIGHT
"Yes, we know the Tories are in government everywhere, even when
the labour flag is flown, because everywhere they own, or think to own,
all that is of value in the material sphere. The ear of God is with us
now, yet the Lamb of God is shorn in the hope his fleece will carry gold
in the pockets of the forlorn, who wonder in Albeghensian heresy and triumph
over the Golden Dawn. It's all a game you see, all a game to men like me
who sweep aside eternity in a mit of chain mail, believing only in might,
though I'm blind to all my mother ever told me of the nature of the kind.
It's a mindset only. It's a jazz-band blowing trumpets. It's a vastness
of endless unknowing this space of Giant's Divine.
ME AGAIN
"The Giant's Causeway comes to mind, a prince with two motherless
sons and the kind of vibration I find in me when another inhabits my so,so
fearful flesh, to grind again the wheat-chaff and resist the sense of hopelessness
I feel at the yield of my life being this one moment in time to sit in
this cold room, guarding, saying prayers, through layers of unseen beings,
brought alive again in drama to haunt the wicked and wish the willing well.
The spell has been cast, through which "the last days of this building
as archive" was born in the greed of developers. What do they develop
here ? Is it a place where fear will leave its occupants, as they close
their rich doors behind them, slamming out their working lives in a way
which cannot be with artistes of all degrees who's knees hold the news
of tomorrow, who's hearts have the love of all beings living within, despite
all efforts to close them down, shut them up, lock them out and shiver
their timbers ?
Igloos have been built to keep the Eskimos warm, so we were taught, yet
naught was taught of targets to be reached, of radioactive leaching which
might bid a whale beach itself up the Forth estuary and teach a dolphin
how to attack a porpoise for the newspapers to flash.
All about cash, all this focus to freeze out the news of dramatic changes
within all those who do listen to the witterings of birds, to the awesome
choirs of angels and to the thrum of Mother Earth's drum, as she hurtles
us through space and time, sublimely unaware of the prophets of our time
because their work is heralded as all consuming rubbish by those whose
words are read, whose pictures are deemed rich pickings by the press, who'd
rather see a pretty dress worn with a stylish, warm smile than a freshly
caught mercury laden cuttle fish, and who'd blame them,, served up on a
silvered dish who's rad count is a might suspicious.
The trick is to pretend it doesn't exist, to preserve the pretence careful
planning, of healthy canning, and conditions of necessity are born by others
anyway, so why worry ? Why work at all this lying in a bastion when the
bastion will crumble from within ? Did the cruel Pharaohs have the same
blindness ? Does it always affect the rich and powerful the same way ?
Do they never feel the moment when the tide turns because their crowns
are too tight or because they do not feel Canute's wisdom to be worth a
light ? Was tomorrow born of yesterday's fears so long ago it cannot be
seen to change or will tomorrows miracles present us with a brighter now
? Who's in charge of all the co-creative warring ? What's in trust to us
to tumble through? Will someone press the button with no warning which
flames us all from here to the Outer Blue ? Will the only fair witness
left be you ?
Here in this troubled world, there is a peace to be found within, by resting
the mind on objects, or on subjects which bliss and bless, which take us
all beyond the distress of living without pleasure, with dark pressure,
dimming doubt, lights out and limits on. Beyond the limits of this too
solid flesh we journey, in the outer spheres where black holes flash lit,
flame, where Jupiter turns in orange-brown twirling and suns are born that
do not have a name. How do we frame this, our experience of living in the
shame of leaving behind our great Source Being for a sortie upon a planet
so rich in resources we needs must plunder it in such a wrathful way to
sanitise our experience of rain which brings brain-death to lovers of the
sun and sun-stroke to those whom rain doth bless? A jester and a clown
we are, who star in our own show.
THE VOICES AGAIN
Slow down now.
Burt Baccarach. { music playing }
I tell you, only those who Golden Glow can survive this, only those who
Golden Glow can survive this glimmering grey. Away with you my child and
shine. Shine. Shine.
Do not whine, just laugh at the design of it, the military precision of
it all.
The call box is in the Hall.
The will fox is on the Ball.
The bill box is in the Fire
The focus shocks ! It is
Higher than an Enema and
Lower than a Castle stand.
The command of attention is a Divine Thing.
ME NOW
The ricochet of the blast of consciousness can selfishness wipe away,
yet today, can anyone say what tomorrow will bring when the future king
motherless must be in a sea of outrage where pages will be written without
a word of Spirit or of Soul for one whose goal will be as head of a fraternity
known as the Church of England, where chopping off heads was common and
where limits know no bounds. Where, oh where is succour to be found if
he cannot hear the sound of Angels singing, or hear his Mamma call him
darling in the night without being thought insane. All this pain, created
over death of one now knows there is no death and no denying the Sacredness
of Life in All Things. Her Heart Sings, yet grieves for her sons, who's
limits put upon them jail them for life within the windows of the world's
press and knives out for viscious attacks upon their personal proclivities.
Where is hell when all that ought to be well is ill and all that illness
is, is declared well in the rotting minds of those whom spirit spells as
lost ? At what cost does this gallery close upon the noses of those whose
acts of International Grace are cancelled, as if not worth a place upon
a time of life particular to their calls to display their souls upon walls
to uplift, or be despised ?
Jan van Cleef. The Old Thief and the Young Sister.
The Mystery School of the Tumbrils was born in the minds of the Masters
of Rome who did not want the Sun King Home when his sister came to call.
It was all so incestuous ! It was all so sick. It was a Kick in the ass
for the monarchy presaged by a brick through a community window.
Wind up your windows
Bolt down your doors
Celebrate your sunny side
Deliberate with whores.
STRAY VOICE
How can you abandon your daughter?
Where can you pick up a dis-ease ?
In the crispy crinkly shining Seas around the Isle of Man. Man, it's a
disaster!
BACK TO ME;
Johnny Kraska's work upon the table. Last time I saw him I was in Walter's
flat and he held out the carrot of cooperation for some Polish connection,
then never got back to me. Seems an odd thing to find his statement here,
at the end of another age. Last time Queen Elizabeth flats came down. This
time St. Mary's School would seem to be closing. The Love/Hate relationship
between artists and the social structures within which we live, the structures
some of them created, the building the ideas and the crew it takes to gift
the world their work outside someone's living room, or studio, in which
they come to be. And what, if anything, A PLACE TO WRITE, does this society
give me, this society of artists whose work is money bound once it hits
the walls.
All so very confusing
All so very amusing
All so very contradictory
All so very belly-rumbling
All so Colosseum Crumbling
All so fancy-free.
A bird flew down to comfort me.
Alan Tall on the pen I see.
ALAN
"Johnny Kraska's a freen' o' mine. A'm an artist just ez divine.
Ah didnae hae ez mammy's fine livin' room. Ah hid a singul end tae deal
wae. Ah hid a croon beat doon wae shoon worn oot oan cerpetless flairs.
A moon
wiznae part o'ma life, A-mun Ra or a moon buggy. A wiz a puggy-wuggy drawin'
pints o' blood fae ma ma's arms wae gein ma brither a fright. Thank you
an' Good night.
LILIAN
Stars were born, not made.
ALAN
Sheep were shorn, not laid and darkness held nae fear fur yea ! Whaur
wir you made ?
LILIAN
Near McGrouther's sausage factory,
ALAN
In a school for clever wains, makin' sure yer mammy'd never worry her
brains oot aboot yer futur'. Ah soon saw tae that, Sooty ! Ah, soon saw
tae that ! Moocher wae nae future. That's whit a made o' yew. You deliberately
went oot tae the butchers tae buy wee square sausages fur me. A'm thankin'
yea. Ee's turnilt yea. The faither o' the chaiple's tumilt yea. He'll never
set yer free, yea'll hae tae escape, same ez the last time. Yea see ?"
LILIAN
Naw. Ah dinnae see. No yet. Kin you help me ?
VOICE
Aye wize wan, Aye. Say "Foreby..
LILIAN
"Foreby." It wiz Marion's voice in reply.
VOICES
Kennet
Sam Kennet
Kitty Campbell and Joyce McVeine
LILIAN
Introduction to a new age Miracle Worker, retired, who has found that
no matter how many miracles were sired, more and more were required, so
she sat back and thought,"What kind of lies have I bought which have
brought me to this sorry pass ?"
SAM
Of course lass, this pass is not sorry, nor need you worry because losses
and gains cannot be seen from the level o' the Green Man, only from the
radius o' the Star o' the Sea an' she is o'er much delighted wae yee !
MARY
Blossoms come an blossoms Go but curds an'whey come every day. Bless
you for bein' an angel tae oor Mary ! ..............Mary Cairney xxx her
mother
ME;
At this point I had to leave the gallery. Since then I've met with Lee
Gershuny and Theatre of Being, Johnny Kraska and Alan Jackson. We are all
continuing to establish the Miracle Production begun in St. Mary's School.
I have begun recording in Rosslyn Chapel. Alan and I are working together
to read our poetry to The World, Lee and I are working together regularly
at St.Ninian's in Stockbridge as "Theatre of Being" works and
performs into its new forms and structures. Once more, Phoenix-like we
all arise from the ashes, thanking RICKY for his trust in LIFE and his
Love of artists.
His support grows new roses of success. May he flourish in our Co-creative
Garden.
* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *
* * * * * * * * * * * * *
INDEX
1966- DEMARCO ARCHIVES -1997
Exhibition- August/September
1997
Demarco European Art Foundation
St. Mary's School, 3 York Lane/Albany Street
Edinburgh
"The Idiosyncratic Focus Of Conflicts"
John Kraska
In 1966, the same year that Richard Demarco started his Edinburgh
gallery, students ascending those ever narrowing steps of the Glasgow School
of Art were handed a copy of Gombrich's Story of Art , the
bible of the institution. Glasgow had clung to the antique values in art;
inbred, parochial, desperately pretending that still life, figure composition
and the life model was the end of the matter. Acrylic paint was scorned,
minimalism hurled contemptuously aside, 'constructions' expelled, exploration
dismissed. The modern American and European movements were hidden from
sight. Painterly and sculptural academism (Scottish/ French sub-variant),
was the order of the day, the territories marked out in palette-knifed
flicks of vermilion oil paint and debris excavated from the carving of
Roman lettering.
Outside of the Scottish arts institutions conditions for the artist were
bleak. Against such a stultifyingly narrow Scottish cultural climate, Richard
Demarco embarked, not it seems simply to present what then passed as art,
but to ask "what is art ?" In 1968 he responded to youth and
rebelliousness by hosting the Scottish Young Contemporaries exhibition
in his Melville Crescent gallery in Edinburgh - the prizewinners, myself
amongst them, then going on to show in Mike Kustow's Institute of Contemporary
Arts in London (ICA). Young Scottish Artists were on the British art map,
'69 edition.
Meanwhile, thirty years of experiences have come but not quite gone...
there's that collected residue of stuff and mental tentacles that writhes
together like Pliny's spittle-secreting Druidic serpents; insinuating essences
that can be gathered, harvested, revealed as embryonic influences, dead
ends and leaps of faith; testaments and markers, crated oracles and shelved
legions of bits.
To contemplate the development of the Demarco Archives one cannot but refer
to the Demarco Gallery's 1979 exhibition by one of its parallel existences,
the Galeria Foksal PSP, Warsaw, also founded in 1966. The Foksal
artists and critics had relentlessly analysed the position of the avantgarde
through a series of exhibitions events and performances in Poland and abroad.
They had developed a vocabulary and language to discuss and describe art,
the artist, and society, that was remarkable for its continually self-critical
honesty and freedom of expression, if salted with a dose of Slavic irony
- remember that this was on that side of the Cold War Iron
Curtain. In the Edinburgh catalogue Wieslaw Borowski and Andrzej
Turowski wrote,
"Ekspozycja....jest równoczesnie dyskusja z wlasna pozycja
Galerii" ("The exhibition.. is at the same time an exhibition
and a discussion of the position of the Gallery.") But not merely
discussion, rather,
"krytyczna dyskusja" ("critical discussion"
); and,"Czynimy to tym razem odgrzebujac dokumenty". ("This
time we do by displaying documents").
In a Foksal text from "The Gallery Against Documentation"
(1971 - 72), a demarcation line was established, presaging
an argument that in this time of computer text and image proliferation
reverberates all the more loudly;
".....and so we are keeping a file of everything ! We pretend to preserve
artistic ideas, while what we have actually got is a confusion of artistically
useless 'vestiges'. We prepare another portion of materials for unlimited
manipulations. We hand it over to officers of the mass media. We trade
in DOCUMENTS on a huge scale and we do incalculable barter deals.....Documentation
as the last link in the chain of transmission becomes THE FORM of a work
of art. It cannot be destroyed - it must be denied !
The Foksal proposition that the gallery existed as "Zywe Archiwum",
"Living Archives", 1971, would fall victim, as was
anticipated in "The Inevitability And Failure Of The Archives"
, to persistent investigation;
"we turned all doubts inwards on ourselves" ; "Living Archives"
now fail to be a sufficient ground for current and prospective artistic
researches" .."This is an exhibition of documents of art; its
archives serving to assert the claims of artistic facts and offering a
chance to grasp the continuous character of art in its development".
The Foksal saw itself as an institutional delinquent "floating
in an irrational dimension" , vulnerable to the flow of art, resisting
the currency of compromise. There is more than a hint of Richard Demarco
in this restlessness, in his constant relocations, reworkings and new departures,
and the sense of simultaneously advancing to new ground while being the
target of multiple attacks.
Richard Demarco also brought to Scotland the work of artist and writer
Stanislaw Ignacy Witkiewicz (Witkacy, 1885-1939) whose prominence
was revived by Tadeusz Kantor through his Cricot 11 theatre.
In his play, They , written in 1920, Witkiewicz has Callisto
Balandash, connoisseur of the "visual arts" and gallery proprietor,
face the agents of the "authorities", fronted by Tefuan, the
founder of the new religion of Absolute Automation;
BALANDASH (stubbornly) Your values are all delusions, and
I sneer at them. The only true value in our times is over there - (he points
to the pictures ) my pictures, the works of the great martyrs, the true
martyrs to the metaphysical navel, wretched maniacs and not the
victims of a few petty social ideas, whether Christian, Buddhist, or Trade
Union - what's the difference? Do you understand, Mr Tefuan?
TEFUAN. "Shut up, you punk! I'm an enemy of the arts and chairman
of an association for combating art in all its aspects, except those which
further the future development of a new and better humanity. Tomorrow we'll
have your picture gallery registered and evaluated by competent authorities.
I can assure you, I'll pass judgment on everything" ..... "We
want to destroy the very source of evil - and that source is Art. Art is
the only stick in the spokes of the carriage wheel bearing mankind forward
to complete automation. Once we have destroyed the embryo, we'll all be
able to sleep soundly"..... " we're going to appraise your picture
gallery right down to the last impressionist, take an inventory and condemn
it all to be destroyed...."
To lose one's gallery, and the collection seems bad enough, but then Balandash
was, "for the good of humanity" , to be required to renounce
"voluntarily" his love of "all these new movements".
As the play nears its end, Balandash's degradation is complete. His gallery
destroyed, he is being led off to prison on trumped up charges to which
he falsely volunteers guilt; at this moment he discards his last remaining
social guise,
"I don't want to be a member of any society or any gang of thieves;
I don't even want to be an artist, which I longed to be throughout all
of my miserable life. I want to be myself, that's all".
Can one imagine Richard Demarco without the "Gallery" tag? For
Witkiewicz's Balandash, for Richard Demarco, for the Foksal artists, the
Gallery has represented "the idiosyncratic focus of conflicts".
Richard Demarco instinctively understood the arguments and expressiveness
of the Poles at a critical time as they began to emerge from the shocks
of successive periods of subjection by their over-powerful neighbours.
Through his receptivity he lent weight to their cautious and hazardous
gravitation towards European reintegration. The Foksal group called for
resistance to the pseudo-avantgarde, to false authority, and for recognition
and nurturance of the "PLACE" - the tenuous physical/psychical
zone where art could exist. Scottish artists and critics have seldom described
the engagement in art in such an interpenetrating way, where an evolving
commentary interweaves through the production and display processes, the
combining of theory and practice. There seems so much in consequence that
the Scots have not explored and described, so much that has been rendered
taboo (as much by insinuation of worthlessness as by discernible instruction)
; so much mediocrity promoted unchallenged. Our creative conformity has
seemed so complete, and that is why Richard Demarco's insistent and individual
tone, his audacity in creating an arena, a moving PLACE where art can exist,
has served the Scots (and others) so well - better than their timorous
arts establishment deserves.
Throughout their history, Poles have been crushed by the Tyrant time and
time again, and have learnt some singular lessons in the process. Impresario
Demarco paved the way for their artists to tease us with surging expositions
of their own blasted heritage and hopes, in a language of survival and
deft transformations. As the Demarco Archives assume a more concrete form,
Richard will undoubtedly reflect on Galeria Foksal's struggles;
"To describe and describe again...is the only ridicule that is left
to us: inventories and catalogues are the ultimate feat of irony by which
we can answer all the wasted histories, all defeated persons, all empty
meanings. Objects, which are the kingdom of the spurious take their vengeance
for the untouchable spiritual world that had subdued us before".
"Everything is hanging on a single hair". proclaimed Tadeusz
Kantor in a Foksal exhibition, 1973 ; it was Kantor who, in
Atelier '72 , a Demarco Gallery exhibition of contemporary
Polish art, created a work that was merely a line on floor and wall. With
a nod (one must suspect) to the good name of his host Richard Demarco,
he titled it "A Demarcation Line". In the Atelier '72 catalogue,
Kantor drew a dotted line -
"A Demarcation Line must be made everywhere and always, quickly
and firmly, as it will function anyway whatever we choose to do, automatically
and relentlessly, leaving us at this side or the other....."
On either side of the Demarcation Line he listed opposing qualities; e.g.
on the left - "opinion makers", "mass producing", "tamed"
, ....; to the right - "the neglected", "not afraid to be
ridiculous", "helpless",..... If I can push my suspicion
a little further and speculate on Richard Demarco's stance on this Demarcotion
(?) Line, where on earth does he stand ? "Presumptuous",
"with testimonials" , on the left ? "The risk-taking",
"impossible" , to the right ? The last word will have to be drawn
from Kantor's diagram, that is, that Richard Demarco is neither one side
nor the other, but is a Line that is uncannily tracing its own route.
A chance encounter in Glasgow's only all-night cafe, Insomnia
, produced a surprise text that I reproduce here. I was reading from the
catalogue of Witkiewicz's photographic exhibition that had been shown in
Glasgow's Third Eye Centre (another former strong link in the East European/
Scottish arts connections - and Chris Carrell's comet-like New
Beginnings East European arts publishing venture), when I became
aware of a shadow, which transformed into a waiter lost in the text of
my open book. Francis Hagan had studied Polish theatre during an
eight month research period in Poland, and was looking at comparative developments
in Romanian theatre. He kindly typed these extracts from his thesis, "Falling
Amongst Angelic Ruins"
"It could be argued that Kantor, like Odysseus, must return again
and again within the Ithaca of écriture and discourse - not as the
unified subject of academia but precisely as a partial, fragmented and
ruined moment engaging with but never being overcome by such discourse.
The legacy of Tadeusz Kantor cannot be as a sublime moment in theatre history
caught upon the photographic plate of a certain romanticism. Instead, Kantor,
now textualised via the video and documentary collections of the Cricoteka
Archive, for example, must shadow such history as the 'poor tramp' or vagabond
of theatre. It is precisely in his absence that Tadeusz Kantor most fully
becomes present".
"Thus, in the theatre of Tadeusz Kantor, the ruin emerges as the symbol
or motif which most proclaims his theme and desire - the ruin of the living
and the dead in the poor spaces of his imagination - yet it is a symbol
created out of a ruination which can have no end; no resolve. As such,
this symbol must itself become ruined or wrecked - and it is this process
(which moves from a formal, closed mode into an insecure, open one and
back again) which casts Kantor's gestures and his works into the sublime
sea of representation and pain".
(Excerpt from a document submitted by Francis Hagan to
the Cricoteka Archive, Kraków. March, 1996.)
The Scottish artist/writer who most closely and continually commented on
the flow of Polish art and who figures most prominently in Demarco Gallery
catalogue essays is Cordelia Oliver. Her late husband George
Oliver documented these 'foreign' forays through his precise photography,
creating an incomparable visual record. Cordelia Oliver wrote in the Atelier
'72 Demarco Gallery catalogue,
"Poland has always seemed to find the means to bite back creatively.
In her literature, her art, in the theatre, she has known, as though by
deep intuition, that a grassroots position is of vital importance. In a
sense this exhibition, fluid, disturbing, unpredictable, ranging far beyond
the confining Demarco Gallery walls, is symbolic of that institution itself,
straining as it is against the conventional image of an art gallery".
The radical nature of the issues confronted 25 years back led Cordelia
Oliver to question if art as we know it "has much further
to go ?" Jerzy Nowosielski, the Polish painter, speaking
at Kantor's graveside in Kraków in 1990 hinted at a response in
stating, "stuki nie mozna posiasc ani oswoic"
That is, "art cannot be possessed or tamed". We
can seek it, or it may seek us !
John Kraska August 1997
"The Idiosyncratic Focus of Conflicts", published
10 August 1997, to accompany four 'cast paintings' by John Kraska, "Zywe
Archiwum", in the Demarco Archives 1966-1997 Edinburgh International
Festival Fringe exhibition.
Zywe Archiwum - The Square Yard
( with reference to calligraphy by Hiroake Kimura )
INDEX
JOHN KRASKA, 104 HILL STREET, GLASGOW. G3 6UA. SCOTLAND, U.K.
Tel: 44 (0)141 332 0565
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