metropolis m

Communes
A revision of a section of a book

This text is an attempt to define the starting point of a consideration of a notional commune environment. It relates to a specific set of conditions. A point between the end of the Second World War and the first Cold War and a specific American experience that tried to resolve the idea of communal experimentation without the DNA of Marxism. The current situation in the USA is one where the idea of Nationalism was never understood, developed or critiqued. God Bless America is merely countered on the progressive left by God Bless Everyone. The fetish of the pioneering and the involved/disengaged with the rest of the states, is at the root of the American commune mentality that produced both Hippy communes and the working environment of Microsoft. Its existence is a distraction and veil that turns us all away from the reality of the danger of unacknowledged nationalism. This is a revised fiction that suggests a moment when the commune could still have been redirected and relevant. A group of people turning past an outcrop and seeing the commune again. [Group here could refer to both the characters in a book like Walden Two (B.F. Skinner, MacMillan, 1948) or some other notional ‘any group’ which could be considering options in relation to the potential of revised forms of living and working. They are not necessarily founders or pioneers but rather they are coming/going to check.] People in a desert place, who had been trying to escape from being shown everything, coming back to have a look once more, coming back to check everything. [The desert place is possible somewhere in the South Western United States, but it is important that it could be in any desert location and that there is a theoretical flicker between multiple locations. The idea of escaping from being shown everything derives from the idea that the ‘group’ had been recently involved in war or conflict but not necessarily through choice. It is also crucial at this point to indicate that it is not the first time that they are considered the potential of communal forms of living. That we are starting to witness a return to some place that has already been visited and checked out.] To see the semi-autonomous, survivalist place that had to be tested, checked and played with – requiring a ship-like departure and return, to see the clumped low buildings fading then coming close once more. [It is clear that the location is towards the extreme end of communal living and that the ideology of the place is nebulous and constantly shifting. It could be open to reinterpretation at many points. Occasionally veering towards the survivalist. The notion of varied points of view is crucial here. Some moments are ideologically and literally close up, others are addressed from some middle distance.] Needing to know what the place looked like from a distance and always holding close the idea that there might be no return. There had been moments when they had strayed off the parallel path yet had always cut back to ensure eventual return to the commune. [This indicates a scepticism on the part of ‘the group’ an uncertainty about the value of unquestioningly going along with the idea of relocation and removal from the main drive of the broader society.] An environment that lacked a particular sentimentality. A particular memory. Loaded with the debris of their earlier work. And now refreshed as a new place. A flashed reminder of what it had been at the outset. [Their departure to view the communal environment from a distance is motivated by the need to check whether or not it has assumed an image beyond that which exists at the heart of their thinking. It is marked purely by work rather than design at this point. By viewing it at a distance they can somehow gauge both the way its non-design has developed in terms of functionality but also see how many traces have been left of play and pattern.]They have returned to try and recreate something, jump start their procedures, get going once more with some projection of a rinsed place or new location. [There is a contradiction at the heart of the short reflective journey. At some level it has been a trip that embodies their scepticism about the commune at any level. It is also a way to Revitalise their involvement and make certain soft decisions about whether or how to continue at all. There is some sense of desperation here, an indication or suggestion that the commune is on the verge of collapse or at least entering a period of stasis and a certain moment of recognisable entropy.] To catch the idea of a commune, a functional rationalist commune that can really work and be productive.[Their motivations are to find new forms of production and exchange, not to merely exit the culture.] Trying to function without falling into certain traps. Retaining a semi-autonomous relationship to the outside world in order to make a point about what might be possible. [They are aware of the fact that the involvement in communal activity may result in a perversion of progressive ideas. Therefore all their gestures acknowledge critique then relate to whatever happens to be taking place in the world outside the commune.] For all the time that they had been involved, something had been missed and a degree of play had been avoided. At all times testing and checking had been the root of their involvement, but now they also wanted to catch the moments that had been glossed over. And after a few days outside they had picked up a new form of dry exchange. Games and play taking form as distracted yet sharpened discourse. [They want to challenge every construction that they have previously come up with to provide an environmentwhere they van develop new forms of production bit often achieve this through distraction techniques. They create ways to play and these play techniques produce new relationships that they are sure will provide less alienated ways to operate. It is clear that we are dealing with a degree of recent failure that is being acknowledged and now they are staring again.] Now they wanted to go back and return some favours. Lock themselves down with less talk and less listening. Go in through the gates again but this time to offer some models for exchange that slide beyond the dynamic contentment of the compound. Tie up and root around in some systems that had been subjugated by their eagerness to merely prove their parallel system could work. Function was not the long-term problem. The production of ideas was flagging and weakening under the weight of self-justification. They were not ready to be sub cultural, but something more complicated, more relaxing, more diffident. [It would appear that they were overly involved in defining the existence of the commune as a thing in itself. Revelling in the commune ness of a situation. So their return will be an attempt to find a way to provide the variability that they are really searching for. A way to create a place that can spin off in a number of directions instead of continuing along a predictable path.]They specialise in arresting their own procedures before seeing them activated. This commune is a place where the design of the trays is better than in the outside world. [This is a direct reference to the behaviouralist/design issues that are brought up in Walden Two and also indicative within this fragmented narrative of the value of the place, which are practical and everyday as much as they are sweepingly idealistic and broadly politicised.] Where people are free because they cannot really communicate, where they are free because they are stuck. This is a place where they produce new forms of classically derived music, keeping things locked in a region of quality and disengagement. [The notion that ‘classical music’ might be of more important than visual culture, other than design, is something that sweeps through certain philosophical discussion in the mid-to-late twentieth century. The participants in the commune described here both accept the focus on the continuing tradition of classical music and wonder why their sense of play and distraction is limited to that alone within the general terms of the commune.] Distraction and play in this place are always unnecessarily complicated. Setting themselves in one year and flashing back to another. [There is a sense in which a constant projection is taking place, back towards what could have been and forwards towards what should take place. But also out in a flood of directions, a desire to fill up the available dips and cracks in the surrounding culture.] Creating love stories. Going to sleep one day and waking up again at another time. [A reference to the book Looking Backward ( Edward Bellamy, 1888)] Making things out of other things. Taking each other apart and putting each other together again. [Constant criticism of their position.] Picturing a perfect projection of a communal afternoon. Sitting by the window, looking out as people move objects from one place to another. [The work of the commune takes place at a slow patient pace. It is continual and ongoing. It is something to do and to reflect upon. Also something to watch and take pleasure in.] Some revision and relocation of utopian communities is bound to take place, but has now been transferred. [and delayed and set into constant suspension and permanent renewal.]

Liam Gillick

Recente artikelen