dear club,
blessings to all from the midst of pride weekend in nyc. optimistically, I think queer people make up for all the glitter currently washing into the waterways by simultaneously putting so much energy into environmental remediation, civil rights, and general public service work. what is life on earth if not a constant compromise. boldly into terror and beauty we go...
Vulgar Domestic Waste Organs in review
thanks to all who came to our plastic waste seance last month. Some call these objects Plastorgans. I like "plastorgans" for its suggestion of the once-living quality of this material we use daily, inescapably part of our lives, our clothes, our food, our bodies, our wars, our 'prosperity.' We opened each vessel respectfully with a knife. Death again, or, an opening for speech. We attended quietly, waited for them to sing, shriek, hum. Some stayed silent as we watched, or listened, felt the air.
it was surprising every time. a faint howl... a hum a drone. we found ourselves instinctively holding waste aloft, dowsing for sound.
plastic is made of oil cracked open; oil condensed by eons and environmental circumstance from the bodies of many living things -mass extinction of planktons, plants, microorganisms, perhaps mollusks. I'm thinking a lot about the soul of objects. These ubiquitous plastic forms created expressly for the briefest life before disposal, whose molecular material is far far older than we can imagine... they deserve an audible acknowledgement of soul.
it’s almost time to set up the plastorgans (wind instruments made out of plastic bottles) - i can’t remember when exactly. If you know, please tell me. i've gathered a few links and guides to get us started. we usually have good luck with wind in gp, but open to doing this anywhere, even indoors where there is zero wind