-The Aftermath and the Aftereffects of Yesteryear

von am 24. April 2018 um 13:21
Veröffentlicht in: Epigrams

The Aftermath and the Aftereffects of Yesteryear

Being in Third-Reich-Austria at an early age,
and then returning to my birthplace 24 years later,
afforded me a unique historical view.

My piece bearing the title
Violence Under the Guise of Art
contains aspects of the Aftermath and Aftereffects
of the Third Reich that have not yet
been brought to the fore.

The present is a key to the past
and vice versa.

The Aftermath and the Aftereffects
exceed being a Shadow and an Echo.

Is Actionism a follow-up
of days gone-by
that have actually
not quite gone by?

Was the Brown Baton passed on?
Did the Actionists grab it
and fill the gap?

Is Actionism the old spirit
in a new garb?
I answer in the affirmative!

Violence has been integrated into the arts
and poses as a protest against violence.

Actionist anti-humanist deeds and declarations
cry out for comparisons.

Comparing today’s diction to yesteryear’s
more than makes the case.

Actionism is not a catharsis for barbarism.
It is a bona-fide ideology and mode of behavior,

Advocates espouse extreme forms of violence
with no holds barred,
and they are providers as well as doers.

Actionist violence borders on crime,
and at times transcends that border.

The dedication to promulgating inhumanity
is unadulterated.

You have to hand it
to the hucksters of the cause.
They lay it on the line.
Their forerunners had inhibitions
about declaring themselves.

Violence Under the Guise of Art
is a money-making operation.

Sado-masochism sells.
Sadism is a bestseller.

The idea of packaging violence as art is brilliant,
and labeling it as anti-fascism
is a stroke of genius.

 

Actionism and Revisionism

Revisionists are those who expound
Brown ideology through a Beige filter.

The fact that the Revisionists
have latched onto attacking Actionism is self-evident!
They are provided with a smoke screen
for their own surreptitious dealings.

The Revisionists do not want to admit
what has inspired Violence Under the Guise of Art,
namely Third-Reich anti-humanism and barbarism.

Revisionists concentrate on excesses of the Left
and soft-pedal the crimes of the Brown past,
as well as those of the contemporary Hard-Right.

The fact that the Revisionists have latched onto this
is self-evident!

By “opposing“ Actionism,
the Revisionists help perpetuate it.

These “rival” factions “complement each other.
They are competitors, rather than adversaries.

No advocate of
Violence Under the Guise of Art
was ever prepared
to discuss these matters.

A demagogue cannot turn a lie into the truth,
nor can he turn the truth into a lie.

Violence Under the Guise of Art
is grist for the Revisionist mill.
What a boon and a blessing for them!

Calling attention to the sado-masochistic
events of the Actionists
provides the Revisionists with a smoke screen
for their own dealings.

A Revisionist is opposed to violence
when it is perpetuated
by those of another political hue.

Actually, the two “rival” factions
“complement” each other.

Actionists and Revisionists are competitors,
rather than adversaries.

Demagogues don’t always lie.
They use the truth
when it serves their purposes.

Demagogues combine lies
with half-truths and the truth.

Sometimes the wrong man
says the right thing
for the wrong cause.

A demagogue cannot turn a lie into the truth,
nor can he turn the truth into a lie.

You can conjure up falsehoods,
but you cannot conjure up facts.

The proponents of
Violence under the Guise of Art
do not engage in a debate,
since they know that they do not have
a polemical leg to stand on.

The powers-that-be approve or accept
the “questionable” goings on
as exotic aberrations in the realm of art.

It is not an easy matter
to defend the indefensible.
(See statements by Mühl and Nitsch,
and their “official” promoters,
as well as courtroom documentations!)

No doubt about it.
Third Reich inhumanity
was the precursor
of today’s Actionist cult in the arts.

As it is, everything is hunky-dory.
The anti-fascists are fighting fascism,
the purveyors and perpetrators
of Violence under the Guise of Art
are enjoying international fame
and you come along
and attempt to gum up the works.
No wonder they do their best
to cancel the critic out.

* * *

Die Nachwirkungen vergangener Tage

Ich habe das Dritte Reich
In sehr jungen Jahren erfahren,
und ich bin noch dabei,
Nachkriegsösterreich
als Remigrant zu erleben.
Vielleicht kann ich dadurch
manches schärfer sehen.

Die Gegenwart ist ein Schlüssel
zur Vergangenheit –
und auch umgekehrt.

Antifaschismus und Antihumanismus
sind Gegensätze.

Gewalt wurde in die Kunst integriert
und stellt sich als Protest gegen Gewalt dar.

Gewalt und menschliche Erniedrigung
sind durch den Aktionismus ein Bestandteil
der hiesigen antifaschistischen Bewegung geworden.

Bei den Aktionisten
wird Gewalt nicht nur dargestellt,
sondern auch verübt.

Aktionismus grenzt an Kriminalität,
und hie und da wird diese Grenze überschritten.

Aktionismus ist der alte Geist
in einem neuen Gewand.

Gewalt und Kunst zu kombinieren
ist ein Zauberstück.

Sadomasochismus ist ein Renner!
Sadismus ist ein Bestseller!

Die Sache läuft blended.
Die Aktionisten agieren als Antifaschisten
und haben als Künstler interational Annerkennung errungen.
Und du kommst her und versuchst alles zu vermiesen.
Kein Wunder, daß sie den Kritiker ausschalten wollen.

 

Ein „Segen“ für den Revisionismus

Gewalt-Kunst ist ein „Segen“ für die Revisionisten
und Revisionistischer-Gegnerschaft ist ein „Segen“
für die Gewalt-Kunst-Förderer.

Gewalt unter dem Deckmantel der Kunst
ist Wasser auf die revisionistischen Mühlen.

Ein Revisionist ist nicht gegen Gewalt,
er ist nur dagegen, wenn sie
in einem anderen politischen Lager zu Hause ist.

Dadurch, daß die Revisionisten
sich gegen den Aktionismus stellen,
wird es verewigt.

Aktionisten und Revisionisten
sind,nicht Gegner, sondern Konkurenten.

Demagogen lügen nicht immer.
Sie erzählen die Wahrheit,
wenn es ihren Zwecken dient.

Demagogen mischen Lügen und Halbwahrheiten
mit der Wahrheit. Sie verwenden die Wahrheit
wenn es für ihre Zwecken dienbar ist.

Ein Demagoge kann weder eine Lüge
in die Wahrheit verdrehen,
noch kann er die Wahrheit
in eine Lüge verdrehen.

Kein Lügner lügt immer.
Eine kaputte Uhr zeigt die richtige Zeit
zweimal am Tag.

Manchmal sagt der falsche Mann
das Richtige
für die falsche Sache.

Manchmal wird die Lüge
durch eine Wahrhet gedient.

Indem die Revisionisten den Aktionismus anprangern,
helfen sie mit, ihn aufrecht zu erhalten.

– Herbert Kuhner

-Unterwegs mit/En Route with Herbert Kuhner

von am 20. April 2018 um 12:30
Veröffentlicht in: Text

Stepping out of line is a movement
my feet can’t seem to avoid making.
I’ve always said that I wanted to have smooth sailing,
but I couldn’t help rocking the boat.
Rocking seems to be in my genes.


Wenn man aus der Reihe tanzt, kann man ins Verderben tanzen.
Ich tanze gern, und manche werden behaupten,
daß mein Tanz ein Tanz der Erfindungen und Unwahrheiten ist,
und daß die Tatsachen, die ich beschreibe,
überhaupt keine Tatsachen sind.
Sollen sie! Ich muß gar nichts erfinden.
Die Geschichte ist mir mit allen Absurditäten geliefert worden.


* * *

The first three years of my life in the second district of Vienna were idyllic. I remember going to the Prater with aunts and uncles for rides on the carousel. When Austria was annexed to Nazi Germany in 1938, drastic changes occurred, and the mood mutated to fear and apprehension. The death knell for old Europe and European Jewry rang out.The shtetl and the other Jewish locations would soon be history. They would be doomed forever.

The shtetl would become a location that would only be sung and written about with nostalgia.

(from Felled by Friendly Fire: a Memoir)

* * *

Die ersten drei Jahre meines Lebens im zweiten Wiener Gemeindebezirk, der Leopoldstadt, waren idyllisch. Ich erinnere mich an „Pratertage“ mit Eltern, Tanten und Onkeln – und an das Ringelspiel. So verbrachte ich die ersten drei Jahre meines Lebens.

Als Österreich 1938 von Nazi-Deutschland annektiert wurde, hat sich alles verändert. Die Stimmung war trüb und voller Angst. Da war es aus mit dem Prater.

Das war der Todesglockenschlag für das alte Europa und die europäischen Juden.

Das Schtetl und die anderen jüdischen Orte würden bald Geschichte sein – für immer weg. Über das Schtetl wird nur mehr gesungen und geschrieben werden – mit Nostalgie für das Verlorene.
(aus Sorglose Tage und Jahre in der Heimat, eine Autobiographie)

Die ersten drei Jahre meines Lebens im zweiten Wiener Gemeindebezirk, der Leopoldstadt, waren idyllisch. Ich erinnere mich an „Pratertage“ mit Eltern, Tanten und Onkeln – und an das Ringelspiel. So verbrachte ich die ersten drei Jahre meines Lebens.

Als Österreich 1938 von Nazi-Deutschland annektiert wurde, hat sich alles verändert. Die Stimmung war trüb und voller Angst. Da war es aus mit dem Prater.

Das war der Todesglockenschlag für das alte Europa und die europäischen Juden.

Das Schtetl und die anderen jüdischen Orte würden bald Geschichte sein – für immer weg. Über das Schtetl wird nur mehr gesungen und geschrieben werden – mit Nostalgie für das Verlorene.

(aus Sorglose Tage und Jahre in der Heimat, eine Autobiographie)

 

 Fritz

Fritz is a filmmaker in every sense of the word. He carries through from beginning to end. He’s his own director, cameraman, cutter and what-have-you. When he starts out, he knows where he’s going and he gets there by the hard work of doing the best he can. He has the ability, and the ability has to be there to start with, but it takes more than ability to create a work of art. It takes motivation and drive. Fritz knows his craft, and he never uses technique for its own sake or lets it dominate him. He has mastered the technical aspects, and he is always in command. He uses cinematic tricks, but when he uses them they aren’t tricks. He knows how to integrate them, and they always fit. They’re never obtrusive or irritating. Fritz has a natural feeling for composition and he knows that breaking the rules means adhering to rules. Fritz is a magician and not a conjurer. Making the magic entails hard and meticulous work. A conjurer uses sleight of hand. With Fritz, the magic is genuine. Fritz is a small giant.

* * *

Fritz ist ein Filmemacher im wahren Sinne des Wortes. Er ist konsequent von Anfang bis zum Ende. Er ist sein eigener Direktor, Kameramann, Cutter und Stab. Wenn er anfängt weiß er, wohin der Weg geht und er kommt dort mit harter Arbeit an. Er gibt immer sein Bestes. Er ist fähig. Fähigkeit ist eine Notwendigkeit, aber Fähigkeit allein reicht nicht. Man braucht Motivation und Ausdauer.Fritz kennt sein Fach, aber er läßt sich nicht von den technischen Aspekten beherrschen. Er verwendet Technik nicht allein für sich. Er verwendet kinomatograhischen Tricks, aber wenn er sie verwendet, sind sie keine Tricks. Er integriert sie und sie sind nicht störend oder irritierend. Sie passen. Fritz hat einen natürlichen Sinn für Komposition und er weiß, daß man die Regeln nur brechen kann, indem man Regeln befolgt. Fritz ist ein Zauberer, nicht ein Hexenmeister. Magie zu machen heißt harte Arbeit. Ein Hexenmeister verwendet Taschenspielertricks. Bei Fritz ist die Magie echt. Fritz ist ein kleiner Riese.

– Herbert Kuhner

 

-The High Art of Creative Cruelty

von am 8. April 2018 um 19:36
Veröffentlicht in: Polemics, Politics

The High Art of Creative Cruelty

“I could well envision that murder could be a component of a work of art; the artist’s accountability would be on another level….Thus, art can consist of a crime.” [1] Killing was and is beyond all moral judgments.” [2]
– Hermann Nitsch, Actionist artist

During the closing stages of the Great War the Turks indulged in what is referred to as the Armenian Genocide. The motivation for this event was their alleged lack of loyalty to the Turkish State – so the Armenians had it coming to them.

Denial seems to be the Turkish manner of dealing with these historical proceedings.

When journalists and authors attempt to bring attention to past events, they risk being sent to Kingdom Come.

The perpetrators did not engage in simple barbarism, but rather in the high art of creative cruelty. They were masters in finding unique ways of causing their victims to suffer.

The Soviets, on the other hand, simply executed their victims, starved them or worked them to death. This is simply primitive, unrefined murder. Killing was quick, starving was relatively slow and slave labor was supposed to last for as long as a victim could last. That’s simply not creative.

The National Socialists were influenced by their Turkish counterparts, and they carried on the tradition with numerous innovations.

The Ustascha made great efforts to outdo their Nazi allies and succeeded with flying colors.

The Japanese, not to be left on the sidelines, hit the mark in Nanking and elsewhere.

The French in Algeria did a good job of emulating the Germans they had previously fought.

Graduates of the School of the Americas practiced the fine arts on South American lefties and liberals, with the assistance of Henry the Kiss and the Tricky One with the benediction of Pope John Paul. And the Kiss-and-Tricky-Duo also make the grade by poisoning Vietnam with Agent Orange.

Ratko Mladić and Radovan Karadžić, a poet praised by Peter Handke, did a splendid job of mass murder. Slaughtering 8,000 men and boys is no simple matter, but they and their henchmen did it without balking or flinching.

And so on and so forth.

The high art of cruelty lives today, and thanks to the original Twentieth Century perpetrators,
their beneficiaries carry on in the tradition internationally.

Regretfully, the perpetrators are squeamish about having committed these deeds, as were their antecedents. They have the wrong attitude!

Why pray, be ashamed? There is nothing to be ashamed of. These perpetrators are artists in the true sense of the word. Innovators should always be proud.

Let us laud them and spread the good word!

Indeed today ISIS is not squeamish about dastardly deeds.

They are devout members of an Abrahamic sect. and between prayers, behead their victims, using a paring knife, and what’s more, they have revived the tried and true practice of crucifixion. Kudos are due to these masters of savagery.

Changing the Past

Who or what can change the past?
Not even the one they pray to can do that.
The act completed in the last fraction of a second
is both fact and history.

As the Bard says through Macbeth:
“What has been done cannot be undone.”

Balderdash!

You can wash it all away
and start out again with a clean slate.

Why should you be dogged by unflattering history?
You don’t always have to resort to out-and-out lies;
half-truths will do the trick.

There’s nothing chivalrous about killing civilians.
It’s not anything to be proud of.

But if, God forbid, it has happened, don’t dwell on it
and do your best to prevent others from dwelling on it!

Life is much more enjoyable
if you have an honorable past.
And if you don’t have one, you can create one.

Why be burdened by past events?
Just put them out of mind
and erase all records!

The Turks have deleted the genocide of the Armenians
from the Twentieth Century,
The Third Reich Revisionists
have transformed the concentration camps
into idyllic recreation centers.

Don’t fret! Just take their examples!

Addendum:

Japanese Right-Wingers are attempting to wipe
the Massacre of Nanking from the slate of history.
Kudos are due to these purifiers.
Way to go, guys!

– Herbert Kuhner

[1] Falter 24-30, 7, No. 30, 1998, p. 18.
[2] Paula Devarney: “Nitsch – Art of Killing,” Caellian, 9. Oct. 1970; Hermann Nitsch: Das rote Tuch – Das Orgien Mysterien Theater – Im Spiegel der Presse 1960-1988, Freibord, Vienna, 1988, p. 106.

-Gabriel

von am 4. April 2018 um 18:34
Veröffentlicht in: Polemics

Gabriel

CLICK HERE 1934 Enric Madriguera – Blow Gabriel Blow (Tony Sacco, vocal)

Ich habe den Namen Gabriel immer mit dem Typen mit Flügeln und einem Horn verbunden.

Blow, Gabriel, Blow ist einer der wunderbaren Schlager aus Anything Goes von Cole Porter.

“Blow, Gabriel, blow!
Come on and blow, Gabriel, blow!
I wanna join your happy band.”

Jetzt hat der Name eine neue Konnotation. Es gibt einen Gabriel, der bei einer Band spielt, wo ich niemals mitspielen könnte. Diese Band ist nicht „happy“, dafür ist sie in der Kultur eine sehr einflußreiche. Sie ist eine „Familien“-Band, die ziemlich miese Musik macht.

Gabriel, ein einflußreicher österreichischer Rechtsanwalt, tadelte die Herausgeberin einer Sammlung „Klagelieder“ österreichisch-jüdischer Autoren, weil auch mein Gesang im Buch zu finden ist.

Gabriel hat denselben Hintergrund wie ich, und, obwohl wir uns nie begegneten, bin ich davon überzeugt, daß wir sonst nichts Gemeinsames haben.

Als ich dies einer Kollegin erzählte, die von Juden nicht besonders begeistert ist, sagte sie: „Siehst du was ich meine! Wer weiß, wenn du nicht wärst, was du bist, wärst du vielleicht auch ein Antisemit“.

„Oh“, antwortete ich, „das hielt manche, die wir kennen, nicht davon zurück.“ Dann nannte ich mehrere österreichische Schriftsteller und einen sehr prominenten Politiker.

Ich zitierte Henry Morgan, den Humoristen, nicht den Seeräuber: „Jeder ist ein Antisemit außer einigen Juden, aber die sind ihrer nicht sicher“.

Und ich fügte hinzu: Juden sind die besten Antisemiten, weil sie wissen, wovon sie reden!

* * *

 

Gabriel

I’ve always associated the name Gabriel with the guy with wings and a horn.

 Blow, Gabriel! Blow! is one of the great hits in Cole Porter’s Anything Goes.

 “Blow, Gabriel! blow!
Come on and blow, Gabriel, blow!
I wanna join your happy band.”

 Now the name has a new connotation. There’s a Gabriel who plays in a band that I wouldn’t want to join, a band that’s not “happy,” but a band that calls the cultural shots in Austria. It’s a band that’s a “family,” and the music they play is pretty damn lousy.

An eminent Austrian barrister of prevailed on editor of a collection of “sad songs” by Austrian Jewish authors that I should not have sung my song in it, after the fact.

Gabriel has the same background as I, and although we never met, I am sure that we have nothing else in common.

When I related this to a writer I know, who is not enamored of Jews, she said: “See what I mean! Maybe if you weren’t what you are, you might be an anti-Semite.”

“Oh, I replied that didn’t stop so-and-so and so-and-so-and so.” Actually I named some Austrian fellow writers and a very, very prominent politician.

And I then quoted Henry Morgan, the humorist – not the pirate: “Everybody is an anti-Semite, except a few Jews, and they’re not sure.”

Then I added: Jews make the best anti-Semites, because they know what they’re talking about!

-Epigram

von am 31. März 2018 um 15:58
Veröffentlicht in: Epigrams

Comparisons

Being in Third-Reich-Austria at an early age,
and then returning to my birthplace 24 years later,
afforded me a unique historical view.

My piece bearing the title
Violence Under the Guise of Art
contains aspects of the Aftermath and Aftereffects
of the Third Reich that have not yet
been brought to the fore.

The present is a key to the past
and vice versa.

The Aftermath and the Aftereffects
exceed being a Shadow and an Echo.

Is Actionism* a follow-up
of days gone-by
that have actually
not quite gone by?

Was the Brown Baton passed on?
Did the Actionists grab it
and fill the gap?

Is Actionism the old spirit
in a new garb?

Violence has been integrated into the arts
and poses as a protest against violence
of a brown hue..

Actionist anti-humanist deeds and declarations
cry out for comparisons.

Comparing today’s diction to yesteryear’s
more than makes the case

Actionism is not a catharsis for barbarism.
It is a bona-fide ideology and mode of behavior.
.
The perpetrators of the Third Rich
showed the Actionists the way.

Advocates of Actionism espouse
extreme forms of violence
with no holds barred.

Actionist dedication t
o promulgating inhumanity
is unadulterated.

Actionists are providers
as well as doers.

Actionist violence borders on crime,
and at times
transcends that border.

Violence Under the Guise of Art
is a money-making operation.

Sado-masochism sells.
Sadism is a bestseller!

You have to hand it to the hucksters;
their forerunners had inhibitions
about declaring themselves.
They have none.

The idea of packaging violence as art is brilliant,
and labeling it as anti-fascism
is a stroke of genius.

It is not an easy matter
to defend the indefensible
(even for a genius).

The powers-that-be
present the tormenting of man and beast,
as well as the abuse of minors and children,
successfully (so far).as ant-fascistic art.

The proponents of Actionism
do not engage in a debate,
since they know that they do not have
a polemical leg to stand on.
Thus there is no alternative
to cancelling the critic out.

As it is, everything is hunky-dory.
The anti-fascists are fighting fascism,
the purveyors and perpetrators
of Violence under the Guise of Art
are enjoying international fame
and someone comes along
and tries to gum up the works.
No wonder they do their best
to cancel the critic out.

I give them an A+
for effort.

No doubt about it.
Third Reich inhumanity was the precursor
to today’s Actionist cult in the arts.

The Third Reich fought
almost to the last man and the last bullet.
If barbarism had been declared as art,
the enthusiasm would have been even greater,

more is here

 

*Vienna-Actionism