Fly Robin Fly
Jan
Winkelmann
A grey railway station
somewhere in the former GDR, now FRG, on a wintry Sunday morning in the year after
the Y2K bug was supposed to break out. The view out of the window of the local
trains empty open-plan carriage (with its harmonious beige colour scheme)
possesses a remarkable, three-quarter depression potential. The acoustic
accompaniment of Thievery Corporations The Mirror Conspiracy playing from the
notebook is all that offers some degree of comfort. Reminiscences of more
colourful times arise, the misty grey landscape sweeps by the window like a
projection screen, also resembling an empty stage with an expansive wasteland
of artificial fog. Remembering a recent performance, the writer imagines what
it would look like if 200 half-naked go-go dancers, standing in the middle of a
field covered in morning dew, were to slowly undress to the rhythm of ABBAs
Dancing Queen. A chubby waitress from the Mitropa onboard restaurant stumbles
along the aisle offering passengers the inimitable instant coffee typically
served on trains, each cup equipped with a wooden stick that gives the coffee a
further matchless flavour. Change trains. Wittenberge, the railway station no
less dreary than the other human void already experienced this morning. The
metallic steel blue nail polish of the conductor, mindlessly cancelling tickets
with a punch, brings to mind an episode from a recently seen trash movie: the
hero, wearing a pair of metallic blue latex pants (in perfect harmony with the
conductors nail varnish) dragged his evening prey home to his two-storey loft,
to experience, in the moment of most intense erotic entanglement, its turning
into more than the opposite of what it had appeared to be: the slightly plump
blonde (whom he had picked up in the first place only because he was drunk) was
suddenly quiet, proceeding to explain that she unfortunately had to give herself
her daily collagen injection to freshen up the shape of her lips, but that this
operation neednt disturb matters and that they can then continue on from where
they left off before. But Something Slightly Different/From the Beginning After
the End, to mention the title of an exhibition addressing aspects of reality,
its making and its artificiality with reference to Lolo Ferrari, displays human
beings not only as the subject of their own self-constitution but primarily as
increasingly artificial products formed by multifarious factors – in turn
determined by socio-cultural relationships, i.e. patterns of
behaviour/representation mechanisms – as reflected on a daily basis by the mass
media, consumerism, its brands and glossy magazines. In this connection, the
words of the late silicon beauty mentioned above seem exemplary: There are
moments when I disconnect from reality. Then I can do anything, absolutely
anything. I swallow pills. I throw myself out of the windows. Dying seems very
easy then. I really hate reality. I want to be wholly artificial. I adore being
operated on. Welcome to total degeneration. May artificiality deliver us from
the evils of reality! You will see where that leads us.
The powdered landscape beyond
the greenish tainted window (now of the intercity express) brought back to
memory the nocturnal odyssey he had just recently experienced, on the way home
from a feudal dinner party in the aristocratic setting of a palace on the banks
of the Elbe, which he had spent between an incessantly babbling intellectual to
his left and a cheery yet exceedingly shy PR manageress to his right, although
on this day he wasnt at the height of his charming small talk abilities.
Anyway, he began to imagine that the blanket of fresh snow now covering the
motorway was in fact of Bolivian marching powder, greedily inhaled by thousands
of kneeling or lying people through assorted pipes and hoses protruding from
their noses. He was particularly pleased at the thought that this audience was
recruited from the (innately garrulous) art mob that not rarely indulges in
such hedonistic practices, and how metaphorical its abandoning itself out of
sheer greed, as if worshipping an idol, to the powers of the white powder would
appear. Similarly, he was enchanted by the idea of a mass hallucination whilst
collecting magic mushrooms in the Czech woods. Presumably heralded from better
times or whatever, the slogan I love drugs – written in the sky in coloured
smoke by a squadron of aircraft from a nearby military airport – gradually
becomes visible through the sparse foliage. Yet it ultimately likens an
unsuccessful attempt at applying the I love ( Heidelberg, NY, Kufstein)
caption, originally derived from tourist merchandising, to indicate how normal
and carefree our use of external stimulants is. As we already know, this is
particularly but not exclusively, true of the generation of approximately
twenty-year-olds, consistently seeking (as techno culture gradually degenerated
into dull mainstream since the early 1990s) to satisfy its uncritical longing
for genuinely authentic moments through music with a compelling bass line,
ecstatic dance and ultimately through the amplifying effect of synthetic drugs,
to – thus transfigured – subsequently surrender to the fictitious inebriation of
a more immediate sense of reality. Each pill of Ecstasy should be accompanied
by an information sheet with the following words: Welcome to the frequent-flyer
programme Higher and Higher. Unfortunately you alone are responsible for your
illusions. The probability that you will feel like shit tomorrow is relatively
high. However, we wish you a lot of fun and a safe landing.
The bald-headed bodybuilders
in their black beanies sitting diagonally opposite do not look as if they
indulge in any of the above-mentioned habits, yet they do appear to have
consumed (either orally or intravenously) certain other substances – combined
with serious weight training – to visibly change their bodies. They are amusing
themselves about the story of a guy whom they visited a few days ago to tell
him, politely yet emphatically, that the bird he picked up recently in the
groovy setting of a luxury disco is unfortunately their bosss girlfriend.
Therefore it would really be a pity if the smart guys current ignorance of
their bosss growing ill tempers would result in unpredictable risks. Whether or
not influenced by similar scenes in movies or on television that had left a
lasting impression, the good chap decided to forthwith avoid the young woman -
who was indeed likeable, yet not that important and scintillating as to justify
such a risk. Recounting such unspeakable anecdotes makes the beanie-wearers
seem like future guests of an afternoon TV talk show. Real life and media
reality seem to intermingle to an increasingly impressive blend. Andy Warhols
oft-cited vision In the future everybody will be famous for 15 minutes has
already long become the curse for a whole generation of obsessively
sensation-seeking simpletons. The liberal, educated citizen might expect Andy
to turn in his grave at the thought of such excesses. Not at all! He would
probably shout with joy in front of the TV, and declare watching television as
the definitive experience of reality, for this is the resulting reality of his
prophecies. Until now, nobody could have imagined what this pitiable form of
fifteen-minute fame would ultimately look like. Another example of heightened
exhibitionism coupled with the TV-presenters gesture of consternation
(well-rehearsed yet not genuine) is now flickering on one of the eight monitors
in the Business Lounge at Frankfurt airport: a young woman recounts an
unbelievable odyssey starting with a flirt whilst on vacation in southern
Europe upon which she had been maltreated most inhumanely, the resulting
martyrdom of which she was only able to escape from with a great deal of luck.
The story itself was already shocking enough, yet the casual, gossipy style of
her account and the feigned, protestant consternation of her hosts responses to
it made the whole show unbearable, turning it into a prime example of perverted
TV culture, which – very much like the pursuits of the bacchanal hedonists
cited earlier – is based on a longing for genuine experiences of reality and
thereby aptly reflects the chronic deficiency symptoms of an entire generation
lost in the labyrinths of the present.
The tension between personal
and social identity, the ambivalence of self-addiction and a sense of social
belonging occasionally bring forth decidedly strange fruit. This happened to
acquaintances of mine who (unsuccessfully) tried to get together for years on
end, because the girl – trapped in the conventions of her upbringing and in the
corset of her flattering social status (in the form of an albeit not really
happy, yet still supporting and thus comfortable relationship) – was
pathologically incapable of deciding in favour of the guy who had conquered her
heart by sending her a self-composed ringing tone based on Boney Ms ancient hit
Sunny via SMS in commemoration of their first kiss during this song. The purely
speculative wish of a common future along the lines of they lived happily ever
after ultimately imploded like a tiny universe when the girl unintentionally
found herself with a bun in the oven (mind you, this ill was not caused by the
one who had waited so patiently for her). In the decisive moment, his plan to
kill himself by drinking a test-tube (stolen from the university clinic) of
cholera bacteria seemed to him as being too introverted and not really
spectacular enough. Instead, he bought himself a new pair of Gucci sunglasses
and screwed the girls sister. Once again, the realm of purportedly profound,
honest and genuine emotion was splendidly revealed as a set of constructs
representing a reality primarily formed by external influences. Unfortunately,
one seldom questions the perception one has of oneself and reality in relation
to ones immediate social surroundings. Similarly, the various different
mechanisms and strategies that mark the world at the turn of the millennium,
determining socio-cultural opinions and values, are rarely the object of
substantial reflection. Both the uncritical affirmation of the assorted input
of pre-packaged experiences through advertising, television and movies, as well
as the bits and pieces of pop culture, obsessively celebrated in consumerist
excesses in a world of mental prisons and mindsets, have become more important
than contemplation and the reflection of inner values. Unfortunately, this
often results in such tragic situations as the one described above. Amen.
Departure time. Shit. No
wonder that more passengers travelling economy class – as one often reads
nowadays – die of sudden thromboses. The guy sitting behind me constantly
complains about my reclined seat. What an absolute idiot! Although it is strictly
forbidden to phone on board, he turned his mobile on to make an apparently very
important call about a text that hasnt yet but urgently needs to be written:
Whats all that shit about the text! Ive asked you a thousand times to get the
thing finished. Get a move on, we need to publish the book. The charming flight
attendants, with furrowed brows and appalled expressions, immediately rush over
to the disrespectful young man with a comb in the back pocket of his trousers.
I then settle matters by getting the outraged guy a drink at the bar near the
emergency exit. As I am occasionally subjected to similar situations with
impatient editors and fictitiously urgent deadlines I go about explaining to
him the other side of publishing: and after making it to the absolutely final
deadline, after storing the final version of the text (written and edited at
night under fatigue-induced hallucinations) and sending it off via email, its a
bit bewildering that minor changes to the text can still be made three weeks
after the date of the publications going to press. But apart from that, dont
you also sometimes feel that it would have done many texts a world of good to
never have been printed in the first place? In response to my lecture he tells
me about his girlfriend, whose name I cant remember, only that it goes back to
a guy named Sichem in the Old Testament, after whose lover she was named.
Anyway, we order a Mango Madness, a beverage the flight attendant has obviously
never heard of. Of course we could be like the others by ordering a tomato
juice. Have you ever thought about why so many people drink tomato juice on
airplanes? If one were to take this to make a projection of the percentage of
tomato juice consumed per capita of the population, one could conceivably come
up with a good idea for a start-up: Lets produce tomato juice! Unfortunately, I
dont like tomato juice. But I love tomato soup, especially clear tomato soup
the way my father makes it. Taste-wise his soup and the thick Campbells tomato
soup (served recently by one of Andy Warhols superstars) are worlds apart. A
chilly morning. The taxi stops somewhere on 89th Street. The morning was
preceded by a long night, somewhere in a cool, very fancy club. Loads of
glamorous, extremely sexy girls, lots of drag queens showing off for the sake
of showing off, the hottest of house music and assorted, mainly chemical
stimulants account for multiple synaesthesia and keep the place alive. In
comparison, Studio 54 must have been like an egg-and-spoon race at a childrens
birthday party. My companion, with his shirt unbuttoned down to his navel,
seems to want to make a personal reference to the wild seventies. The evening,
the night, the morning: an ongoing study in sociology. The celebrity machine
ups the revs, and the consumer roundabout spins with an increasingly
breathtaking velocity here comes the Supernova nonverbal sign systems suppress
verbal communication, the overpowering life-style codes of the prestigious
consumers take over for the night the dance for a thousand golden calves
Welcome to the Pleasuredome! Cut. Im ten minutes late. A blood-drenched
handkerchief in my hand. Ahoy! The person who organised this meeting is
standing shivering in the morning sun, holding a bunch of flowers in the
colours of the home country in southwest Europe of the distinguished elderly
woman who is expecting us for breakfast. The uniformed doorman phones to say
that we have arrived, we then take the lift up to the penthouse boasting a view
over frozen Central Park. There is an approximately three-by-three-metre
version of Drellas Flowers on the wall; next to it, like everywhere else in the
apartment, various, mainly antique knick-knacks. Beyond my personal interest,
my eagerness for knowledge (heightened as it was through my preparations for a
lecture on the Factory) of details from the legendary time at the legendary
Factory around the legendary Warhol was turned down by the superstar – who had
indeed aged in the meantime – by referring me to her book published in 1990 as
a work that would successfully answer all the questions I had just, and hadnt
yet, asked. She wants to talk to us about her art instead. But I dont. My
companion, just as unhinged after a long night of drinking, takes over command
of the situation. He takes two of the cans of Campbells soup standing in an
impeccably tidy row on the kitchen cupboard. After eating their contents, he
has the lady sign them in her shaky handwriting. Disillusionment far and wide.
She had once been in the midst of the avant-garde, very much with her finger on
the pulse of the times, or indeed well ahead of it, and she had actively
participated in the world of fame, glitz and glamour: what remains today is
more than sobering. A fate to which not only artists entourages and muses are
subject, but also one which catches up with the artists themselves in their
late work (however, this primarily seems to be a 20th century phenomenon). The
visit to Guggenheim Soho a day earlier confirmed this theory yet again. Warhols
Last Supper on display in all conceivable – and unbearable – variations:
effeminate, commercial, anaemic, boring. The carefully signed soup can ended up
in a bin on 88th Street. My companion spent the following night in the
emergency room and missed his flight home.
(Translated by Oliver Kossack)
Published in: Martin
Eder – The Return of the Anti-Soft, Cat. Städtische Kunstsammlungen Augsburg,
2001
© 2001 Jan Winkelmann