Online exhibtion: http://www.clubinternet.org/. (Refreshing the page = new work). This first ‘issue’ is carefully curated by Harm van den Dorpel.

Or as they call it: prss-release, carefully collected RSS-feeds presented as PDF: http://www.prss-release.org. Might seem a superfluous thing to do at first thought, but it exactly gives those volatile blog-posts an extra ‘substance’. I’d love to have a piece of software that would collect and design my rss-feeds into, well, what one can compare to a magazine… I dearly miss good typography and lay-out in my rss-feeds.

(And yes, I am one of those readers that does tinker with the fonts in the OSX-mailprogram to achieve better readability).

Reading matter: the new issue of De Gids, devoted to the Dutch writer/poet JJ Slauerhoff, who at the moment is probably best known for writing a bunch of poems (in the 1920s/30s) that were set to music by the popular Portugese singer Christina Branco – because she regarder them as a prime example of saudade. (The introduction mentions the popularity of Slauerhoff amongst punks in the 1980s, and the existence of a Dutch 1980s band ‘Slauerhoff, but strangely does not mention Christina Branco).

Many people read Slauerhoff early in their ‘literary reading career’. So did I. He has a romantic ‘image’ – travelled to and wrote a lot about China, identified more or less with Camoens. His Collected Prose amongst the first literary books I bought. This issue presents a very nice opportunity to dive into his work again.

And then I couldn’t resist buying the Raster (another literary magazine), because it’s about two German writers that I have never really read, two famous outsiders: Andreas Kluge and Wolfgang Koeppen. Kluge never appealed to me, not his movies, not his television-programs (very intellectually left-wing political, strangely enough transmitted by the commercial channel RTL in the nineties), not his theoretical work. Though I know people who are absolutely ‘fans’, and he is detected by my ‘radar’. Koeppen I simply never read until today, I guess because Arno Schmidt and Uwe Johnson were ‘higher’ on my list.

More reading matter: Mark Twain’s entertaining A Connecticut Yankee at King Arthur’s Court, and LP Boons pitch black Memoires van de Heer Daegeman – both cheaply acquired at the Queens Day freemarket. I was wondering if I might have read Twain’s book in a children’s version as a child, it seemed all so familiar…

Was at DNK yesterday night – where I heard some wonderful music again. The talks during the break touched on the topic of subsidy and money, maybe it was because it was on my mind, but it was on Robert van Heumen’s mind too, I guess (as he’s from STEIM), and I can imagine Thomas Peutz’ (of Smart) thoughts were going in that direction too (although I did not talk to him). (Btw: the subsidizing of V2_ – where I works 3 days a week – by the city of Rotterdam is part of a dirty political game between the town council and the advising committee).

The evening started with a composition by the young Spanish composer Angel Arranz, for cello and electronics – wonderfully played by Jan Willem Troost (cello) and the composer himself: Punto Intenso contra Remisso. The program text quotes Derrida on the pharmakon – probably because of the relationship between the electronic sounds and the acoustic cello. What I heard was a piece with a very good, clear, almost traditional compositional quality and with many well-stated musical ideas, and a smart interaction between the cello and the electronics. 23 minutes long, and not one dull moment. They received a well-deserved long applause.

After the break the duo of Keir Neuringer and Carlos Iturralde played 3 improvised pieces. The first was for alto saxophone and electric guitar, both ‘amplified’ with electronics as is usual nowadays. Hitting pretty much common and well-known ground, that is, if you know this type of music, they did play an enticing piece. After that both took place behind the knobs of assorted pedals, controllers and a small mixing deck for a well-structured, concentrated dialogue in noise. I don’ think it is necessary to state that they did not fall into the trap of just increasing the volume and go-go-go, as it’s normal to compose on the spot with different layers of noise, and they did it well. Only the last piece was a bit of a let-down. Keir Neuringer again was turning the knobs, Carlos Iturralde was triggering and playing with images (photographs of dictators: Hitler, Stalin, Sadam Hoessein), and not only where the images and the image-processing very clicheed, he seemed to struggle with it too. Musically the last piece did not come off the ground. In fact, that third piece was just bad. But well, that can happen (and I’ve seen worse elsewhere, in bigger venues).

It wasn’t looking very good w.r.t. the public funding of art in Amsterdam, but now that the definite decisions have been made for the allocation money by the arts council of Amsterdam – for the next 4 years – I am suprised about my own reaction. Browsing and reading through the evaluation at http://www.kunstraad.nl/ I slowly begin to feel sick and depressed.

Yes I know, not getting the money should never be the end of an organisation and one should look optimistically to the future. Yes I know, not every organisation will be so lucky to get the money. That’s the way it is.

But. Consider this. I love new, adventurous music, I love the forms of electro-acoustic improvised and composed that have been developed internationally somewhere between (classical) contemporary music, electronic music, laptop music (and noise). That is according to me the foremost, most important form of music. It is featured nowhere in Amsterdam, except at DNK.

DNK will receive no money. The written advice is extremely negative. It states that DNK operates too much on its own, is incrowd and is not ambitious. I am chairman of the board of DNK and apparently our subsidy request was not good enough, as we are extremely ambituous – but in order to achieve those ambitions more money is needed, as musicians and ensembles that we’d like to invite, and are not playing anywhere in Amsterdam, cost money. We are ambitiuous and that is why we recently moved to the larger space of Smart Project Space. We’d like to feature sound art too (do exhibtions). Incrowd? Is incrowd a synonym for a steady public? Every monday an audience of 30 to 120. And DNK does collaborate with other organisations (STEIM, Conservatory Amsterdam, Sonology The Hague, N-Collective etc.) – or is ‘working too much on one’s own’ a synonym for curatorial control?

I love music II. Another place I visit regularly for concert is the renowned STEIM. STEIM will get no money.

I love new music and art. Sonic Acts will receive no money. Again the advice is very negative. Curious is that it mentions the lack of a ‘chief curator’ in the organisation (‘hoofdredacteur’), whereas this person is present: it’s Lucas van der Velden.

Again, it can happen that one’s plans are not well received, or that the committees have decided that those plans do not fit the current culture. It might not be my choice, but well, that’s the way it is.

What makes it so depressing is not only that almost all of the institutions for which I have a heart, that I visit, that I would give my money to, and/or for which I work will receive ZERO euro’s, it’s that overall the somewhat more ‘commercial’ (public friendly?) venues and initiatives do receive some money, and the more adventurous one’s don’t. We truly live in conservatives times.

Very depressing is also that a large part of what is erroneously called e-culture over here will not receive funding – though they are without doubt exactly in the centre of todays culture. I already mentioned STEIM, but also De Waag (asked for half a million) doesn’t receive anything. Mediamatic was lucky, after an initial negative advice, they will receive part of what they asked for. Phew.

The impression one gets is that 1. Amsterdam did not have enough money to fund its art. 2. Old-fashioned institutes with large buildings and organisations do get money – but receive a fair deal of criticism on their programming – which is not adventurous enough! 3. The arts council seems to be unable to allocate funding to truly contemporary culture, it tends to fund what has already a defined and safe place in culture.

Well, to be honest: 1. seems to be the most important issue.

In case you reader, say to me: “but haven’t you got a superb new building for new music?” I have to say: the programming of the big Nieuwe Muziekgebouw aan ‘t IJ is conservative. Nothing against a good Feldman-festival, nothing against nice mouth-harp-music, nothing against a good performance of some Nancarrow, but the current forms of (new innovative) music are not featured there. In terms of new music they have completely lost touch.

DNK fills that gap. But DNK is not funded.

Well. I am surprised that I wrote this, as I am surprised that it makes me feel sick. Of course all this does not signify the end of good art in Amsterdam, not the end of exciting new developments, not the end of laboratories where new art, technology, music is made. But this certainly does not help.

Writing this down though helps to make me feel better.

Ah well, and then the introduction to the advices reads: “Het is verheugend te constateren dat het stadsbestuur Amsterdam wil herpositioneren als een metropool van internationale allure. De stad wil zich een weg terug veroveren in de Top 5 van Europa.” [They are happy that the city wants to get back to the top 5 in Europe]. Ha, with this policy that aim will not be reached…

It’s a pity.

Ah well, let’s end on a positive note: PIPS:Lab, an artist collective that does new media arts and develops technology (they have a studio in the building where I live, Marci Panis) was lucky. They asked for 85.000, and will receive the amount they asked for. From all the advices I read, they are the only ones to get the amount they asked for.

Tomorrow I will be in Genk, in Belgian Limburg. Speaking here: http://www.experiency.be, about story-networks and locative art.

Catching a tiny bit of the ATACD-seminars at V2_: http://www.atacd.net/. ANT, mapping and representations of data. For an idea of what this is about: http://www.demoscience.org/.

Google knows too much about me, or thinks it does. Searching for pages about Dos Passos, the American writer, I find, on the first page of search results, a page with reviews – in English – of books on cycling: http://www.bobkestrut.com/category/book-review/. Whoa?

Just ordered George Lewis’ history of the AACM, A Power Stronger Than Itself
The AACM and American Experimental Music. Seems to be out, though Amazon still lists it as ‘not yet published’. I have been listening a lot to music from that scene the past year, so I’m craving for some ‘deeper’ information. Also curious what George Lewis has to say. The very first concert of free improv music that I witnessed was George Lewis + Gerry Hemingway and I love his sound on the trombone. Though I am sometimes put off by his writings, he can be heavy-handed (?) when he does theory. Here’s an excerpt: http://www.press.uchicago.edu/Misc/Chicago/476957.html

I rarely choose to read a book on account of a review in the papers. Of course sometimes (rarely) I’m reminded by a review that a book has come out. But in those case I have already decided I was going to read it – or not. There are other recommendation sources.

Last week I read E. L. Doctorow’s Book of Daniel (1971) because of a nice little essay in the Review-section of The Guardian. I was impressed.

Last year I read Jonathan Raban’s Surveillance after reading a review in The Guardian which made me curious.

No, this is not an entry on ‘recommendation systems’ (friends, blogs, other books, literary history, social networks, Amazon).

No, this is not an entry on the dire state of reviewing (in the newspapers).

I just thought there are 3 types of (good) novels (not counting the bad ones) after realizing that I did not have the desire to re-read The Book of Daniel however impressed I was.

1. novels that you read with pleasure; and as long as you read, you feel that your time is well spent. But after finishing such a novel, you forget about it.

2. novels that you read with pleasure, feeling very impressed. After finishing you will talk about such a novel to others, and you will remember something of it actively for a long time. Yet you do feel that you will never feel inclined to re-read it.

3. novels that after finishing leave you desiring to re-read them. Because you know there is so much more to discover.

Surveillance for me is category 1.
The Book of Daniel is category 2.
The Recognitions (William Gaddis) is category 3.

Then there is category 4. That’s Finnegans Wake. Books you would like to read for ever.

BTW The Book of Daniel is concerned with the history of Leftism in the United States, bridging the Rosenberg-case (and thus socialism/communism) with the Sixties protest movement through a fictional son & daughter of the Isaacsons (= Rosenbergs). Interestingly, the real children of the Rosenbergs did not seem suffer at all from all the psychological ‘damage’ that characterizes the protagonists of Doctorows novel. (See for this Garber & Walkowitz Secret Agents).