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.

click for video/audio of our plastorgans singing

We installed a group of them at the pier at the end of n12th street in williamsburg. If you pass through, let us know if you hear them!

book nook with Lady Ludd

If you've been within hearing range of my voice recently, you've already heard about this book; Blood in the Machine by Brian Merchant, a history of the Luddite movement of the 1810s in England and its reflection in our current era of aggressive tech for automation of work and workers. This book came out right when I was getting curious about the original Luddite movement, and I finally got around to listening to the whole thing while at work assembling parts for upscale lighting fixtures this year. Very funny to be working a boutique factory job while listening to the grievances and rebellion of workers pressed into factory labor 214 years ago. I really really highly recommend this book. There's too much to say about it today, so I'll come back to it again later with more time and connections to weave for you. The Luddites were local, discrete, self organizing workers with no single leader. In fact, anyone could inhabit the role of Ned Ludd or Lady Ludd in words, costume, or temporary leadership of an army of machine-breakers. A common image is the one below found for me by Isaac from the NYPL picture collection- a Luddite in drag departing from a scene of a factory in flames.

Summer of Ludd, and a Ventology training

All NYC area trash clubbers should know about this huge event coming up this week, from June 28 - July 5. I'm very intrigued by the Luddite movement group leading this homemade festival, Summer of Ludd. Bianca and I have gone to one of their spectacles of protest and education at the bottom of central park, ending with putting a hex on the glass cube apple store by chanting and dancing around it holding hands, stopping people from getting easily in or out. I am very curious about what this group will do next. You can even call the Summer of Ludd hotline at (347) 814-5194 to find out where to get their guidebook for the week - that's how I found mine truly in the middle of writing this newsletter.

Please, clubber, if you attend any portion of this weeks festival, report back to us at Trash Club. Our own Tricia Enns will be leading a Ventology (the observation and study of urban vent infrastructure) training on Thursday the 2nd at 8pm, precise starting point to be decided on the day of and written on the festival whiteboard in Tompkins Sq Park.

thanks for reading as usual. much love to all&happy pride,

xoxo,

trash club