January 24 - February 16, 1992

W139, Amsterdam

In the current culture of art and poetry alike, a little frisson is a dramatic moment. It would be idle to pretend that the determination of this culture can be wilfully transcended, or that some unilateral move to the centre of the stage could feasibly be justified by the spouting of heightened rhetoric or the expression of vivid and compelling images. The best we can do is to set a vigorous mannerism against the little dramas, the tepid feasts and the careful celebrations of insular and recessive culture. A technical change will be long delayed if it must attend upon some existential change, some significant and emancipating self-transformation. We therefore make a travesty of our difference, dressing in dirty sheets and speaking through masks. We do not thereby seek to dignify bathos, but to give expression to our shame.

Art & Language, 1982

As the poets swerve downward in time, they deceive themselves into believing they are tougher-minded than their precursors.

Harold Bloom, The Anxiety of Influence

Contents:


Introduction: A Desperate Time to Make Pictures

Caught in the Act by Dave Beech and Mark Hutchinson

Outings: Categorical Mistakes by Dave Beech and Mark Hutchinson

Not at Home by John Roberts