Tag: infinity land press

Martin Bladh & Karolina Urbaniak – The Torture of the 100 Pieces – Book Review

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On August 25, 2021

In Book Reviews

Authors: Martin Bladh & Karolina Urbaniak
Title: The Torture of the 100 Pieces
Text: Martin Bladh
Photography: Karolina Urbaniak
Foreword: Jack Sargeant
Publisher: Infinity Land Press
Released: 2020
Format: Hardbound, 280 pages, over 100 illustrations, 200x200mm

 

 

 

NSFW / Trigger Warning!!!!

 

 

 

The Torture of the 100 Pieces takes us on a visual journey across eight years and the landscape of Martin Bladh’s flesh. We follow this journey through the gaze of Karolina Urbaniak’s camera lens. The book uses as reference, George Bataille’s obsession with Lingchi, an ancient Chinese method of torture, which was brought to his attention by a set of photographs, gifted to Bataille by the psychoanalyst/psychiatrist Adrien Borel. These photos display the execution of Fu Chou Li by Lingchi or ‘death of 100 cuts’. These photos fascinated Bataille for the rest of his life, and he spoke of them often, which in turn led Martin Bladh to develop his own obsession with the photos and theme.

It is not at all unlikely that Martin Bladh would decide to undergo such an intense series of acts/performances in order to craft such a unique book as this. Going back to his first publicly released experimentations with short film, we see Bladh in 2009’s DES (included in Epicurean Escapism I) experimenting with the visual aesthetics of his own death and mutilation. However, at that point in time, Bladh was using insinuation and paints/makeup/chalk in order to bring these concepts to realization for the audience. We had to use our imagination a bit in order to get the full effect.

It wouldn’t be long after the DES short-film, before Bladh began to take these themes a drastic step further. Inflicting actual bodily harms upon himself, and allowing Karolina Urbaniak to document the wounds…

So, The Torture of the 100 Pieces is a literal documentation of the tortures of Martin Bladh, through the selection of 100 photographs. We are given the visceral and often repulsing images in an incredibly clear and magnified presentation. Karolina Urbaniak really shines with this release. Her photography skills have graced the covers of several excellent albums, as well as the pages of an ever-increasing number of books, almost exclusively through Bladh & Urbaniak’s own Infinity Land Press. Karolina Urbaniak has previously honed her skills in the use of macro-lenses, which bring into detailed focused incredibly tiny subject matter. This skill/technique lent itself especially well to the works in this book. Some of the photography takes a step back, we can see portions of an arm or a quadrant of the torso. Yet, other photographs are extremely magnified and detailed, closing in on a tiny wound, which may only cover a very miniscule area of the body, but in which the colors of the incised, burnt, or bruised are brilliantly displayed.

The subject itself is grotesque. It would/should turn the stomach of many. But, for those that are brave enough to take a tour of the ‘woundscape’ of Martin Bladh’s body, you are in for a truly once in a lifetime experience. To my knowledge, no other artist has taken these themes remotely close to the lengths Bladh has within The Torture of the 100 Pieces. Images like these would only previously have been seen in rare instances within the pages of some true-crime book, medical journal, or the like. The closest we can come to seeing a willing participant create such acts/art is in the chaotic life of G.G. Allin, who infamously took to the stage in order to do a reading, which instead descended into an alcohol-fueled assault on his own flesh with a halved beer can. But, that performance was chaotic and spontaneous, in no way did it appear deliberate, and certainly not considering aesthetically worthwhile documentation.

Bladh and Urbaniak have delivered a true horror in these pages. But, the way they have done it is as methodical as a clinical trial, documenting every step in a process which doesn’t always have a clear conclusion. Often, Bladh inflicts the damages upon himself, and Urbaniak takes the role of photographer. But, at other times Urbaniak is forced by logistical necessity to take the reins of the act of violence. When necessary, she inflicts the wounds, then returns to her camera, to document the handiwork.

While the images themselves are absolutely the main focus of this book, they are not its entirety. There is a lengthy intro section of the book. Starting with a thoughtful essay by Jack Sargeant, the stage and audience expectations are set for the horrors that are to follow. We get a historical look at similar acts/documentations and a clear picture of Bladh’s visual and literary motivations for such a hellish journey. The introduction is followed by a lengthy back and forth, a conversation which never happened, but is superimposed upon the pages nonetheless, between Bladh and Georges Bataille.

Georges Bataille -1943

Moving forward, we are presented with a format which follows through the majority of the book: a chosen selection of writings on the left page and one of the 100 selected photographs of Bladh’s mutilated body on the right. Bladh chose each of the text snippets from his extensive collection relating to this topic. We are presented with snippets from many of his own previous works, like Marty Page (which I reviewed here), To Putrefaction and The Rorschach Text, to name a few. But there are also a great deal of other authors chosen: many quotes from Georges Batille, some from Antonin Artaud, Stephen Barber, Dennis Cooper, Elliot Leyton, and many more. Some from newspaper clips, some from medical texts, others from biographies of serial killers. Brought together in a controlled chaos, similar in stylistic execution to that of Bladh’s own collages, like the one pictured below from his brilliant book, DarkLeaks: The Ripper Genome. (which I reviewed here)

The actual body of the work is divided into eleven sections, which separate the photographs and chosen texts into some semblance of a thematic categorization. Sections with titles like ‘A User’s Guide’, ‘Practice & Injury’, ‘(Ab)use of Power’, and ‘The Stage of Terror’, show different aspects of the work. For instance: I would say section IX: The Theatre of Atrocity is quite beautiful in its presentation. If such a word could ever be used for such horrors. The wounds in this section take on brilliant colors, truly beautiful to witness, if one can separate the actual content from the aesthetics with which it is captured by the infinite talents of Karolina Urbaniak. Swirls of bright purple, pink and red co-mingle, with absolutely no indication of what the wound may be, or where on the body it is located. Totally abstract and removed from our ability to understand it’s greater horrors hidden within, we are able to focus solely on its aesthetic beauty.

While the images are arguably horrific from the very start, they seem to get more grotesque as we move further into the book. Growing up with “cutters”, I have seen many gnarly wounds created by the knife. Since the first section is dedicated to these sort of wounds, I was not particularly surprised or horrified by the content, though it was still fascinating. However, as I moved deeper into the book, the ‘originality’ of the wounds became more and more apparent. As the originality increased, so too did my level of horror in witnessing such imagery. Imagining the thoughts and feelings of Bladh as he underwent many of these ordeals was almost too much to bear at times.

The above mentioned increase in tension, on a psychological level, was brought to a climax in the final pages of the book. The end is dedicated to selected entries from Bladh’s ‘Wound Journal’. Here we are presented with descriptions of the instruments of destruction which were used to inflict the wound (for example: sandpaper, wire, staple-gun, hot-iron, etc.), date of infliction, location, timestamps, descriptions of the acts of inflictions, levels of pain experienced. Then these are often followed up with descriptions of the time-frame and process of ‘clean-up’.

Where as the majority of the book managed to keep the body-horror somewhat separated from the reader, in that the specific wounds, locations, and means of infliction were never explained to us, this final ‘Wound Journal’ made it impossible for one to remain at a distance. Reading the hourly and daily ordeals which followed these inflictions allowed/forced me to experience the horror that Martin Bladh was feeling, to some extent. One could never truly appreciate the lengths he went to, in order to deliver this work; but, the ‘Wound Journal’ brought me a bit closer than I was fully comfortable/prepared to be in these endeavors.

This feels like the culmination of so many of Martin Bladh’s works and themes, throughout the last two decades. Since the early days of IRM, we’ve grown accustomed to Bladh’s morbid fascination with body-horror. In the early days it was through his lyrics. Then later it became even more apparent to us through his short-films. Now, since the foundation of Infinity Land Press, Bladh has drawn us closer and closer to his ultimate performance. It could be obvious, in hindsight, that he was working on this behind the scenes, during the creation of albums like IRM – Closure, and books like Marty Page. But, honestly, I couldn’t have imagined (and still barely can) the lengths that Martin Bladh would go to, in order to share his ultimate vision of this Theatre of Cruelty with his audience. I truly hope that this experience has given him some level of closure in this direct physical involvement with his art. It is disturbing to imagine how much further he could/would go in the pursuit of his conception of art. This is truly a work of art, a body of art, a horrifically mutilated body of art, which fans/followers of his work just can’t afford to pass up on. This is Bladh’s blood, flesh and tears given to us, his legion of disturbed art-viewers. He has put more into this work than, dare I say, any other artist I could imagine. The cutting-off-of-the-ear famously done by Vincent van Gogh literally feels like child’s play in comparison to the oft-repeated deeds captured in this book.

I think there is something great to be said about these ordeals being done by a man that appears to be properly sane. These acts weren’t committed by a lunatic, in the midst of a psychotic frenzy, or an alcoholic deep in a fog, not even realizing what they are doing. This was deliberately planned, prepared for, and documented by Martin Bladh and his Infinity Land Press partner Karolina Urbaniak. The acts never seem to be regretted afterward, the two never seem to have second-guessed the project, once commencing work. As mentioned at the beginning of the book, this isn’t S&M, there is no underlying sexual gratification that we aren’t noticing. This book was crafted specifically for a purpose, and the fact that eight years later it has been released through their own publishing house, which has already built up such a reputation for high quality content, now feels like it was all meant to lead to the release of this book.

Highly recommended but only only only for the strong of heart, mind and stomach. Seriously…

Reviewed by: Michael Barnett

Bladh / Urbaniak – On The New Revelations Of Being – Review

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On April 8, 2019

In Book Reviews, Uncategorized

Authors: Martin Bladh / Karolina Urbaniak
Title: On the New Revelations of Being
Release date: December 2018
Publisher: Infinity Land Press
Libretto & voice – Martin Bladh
Sound, visuals & production – Karolina Urbaniak​

On The New Revelations of Being is a multimedia work based on Antonin Artaud’s apocalyptic manifesto from 1937. It envisions the end of the world and the death of God through a series of cataclysmic occurrences of Artaudian cruelty. The piece was originally performed as a part of Artaud & Sound: To Have Done with the Judgment of God, at the Visconti Studio, London, on 15th September 2018. This final event in a series of events marking the 70th anniversary of Artaud’s death, after previous events at Cabinet and Whitechapel Gallery, focused on Artaud’s experiments with sound and noise, and on contemporary responses to them. This CD/DVD set contains the full audio recording, the backdrop film and the full libretto from the performance.

On The New Revelations Of Being is quite a bit different from the usual products that we’ve come to expect from Infinity Land Press. However, the quality and attention to detail are no less spectacular than the rest. Infinity Land Press, the publishing house run by Martin Bladh and Karolina Urbaniak has come to be known for its books focused on topics that are often outside the comfort zone of most publishers. Transgressive to say the least. But, unlike some other companies working in this transgressive environment, Infinity Land Press doesn’t ignore the artistic for the sake of the shocking.

Thatcher’s Tomb by Stephen Barber and Three Nails, Four Wounds by Hector Meinhof (read our interview with Meinhof here) are both examples of this dynamic. Often horrifying and demented stories stand equally with the high levels of writing capabilities of their authors. So often the more transgressive a book, the more juvenile sounding the author. Which for me totally ruins the experience, and has stopped me in my tracks from writing several reviews of books which I went into reading with too high of high expectations. That has yet to be the case for a book from Infinity Land Press. Nor, has it been the case for the majority of the books I’ve read by their friends over at Amphetamine Sulphate. Though I would say Infinity Land Press definitely seeks a higher standard and manages to achieve it time after time.

On The New Revelations Of Being breaks from the standard formats usually incorporated by Infinity Land Press in several ways. It is a truly multi-media work. The content spans a brief but still impressive booklet, an audio CD and a DVD. As one might imagine, it’s impossible to consume all three of these at the same time. However, they are all different versions of the same thing. This at first might seem a bit counter intuitive. But, it ends up working out very nicely.

The first thing that must be understood about On The New Revelations Of Being is that it is a sort of quasi-play. Performed via vocals, visuals, and soundscapes. Karolina Urbaniak contributes the backing music and sound-effects, as well as the creation and/or compilation of all the visuals. The booklet works in the way that a programme from a play would. It includes some information about each of the artists as well as the transcripts of Bladh’s words. So the booklet/programme should be used alongside either the CD or the DVD. Both CD and DVD contain the same piece, but one can be taken along with you in the car and the other can be viewed on your television. Of course, I recommend the DVD for the full experience, but I’ve also quite enjoyed listening to the CD version on long drives.

It must be said, though at this point shouldn’t be surprising, that this piece is going to contain visuals and topics which the average person might find quite upsetting, even traumatic. I won’t go into detail on the topics covered nor the footage shown within, because that would take the fun away for those of you willing to take the journey. I realize more and more that my reviews are not a place to summarize a product, they are a place for readers to find recommendations and technical specifications of a release. I personally don’t read or watch previews of shows/films because they insist on ruining the surprise. I will try to never do that to you guys.

The literary content of this project, as well as it’s execution by Martin Bladh, are both the expected evolutions of Bladh’s repertoire. He covers the apocalyptic, the literary, and the victim/executioner in increasingly sophisticated and honed ways. His writing is becoming increasingly poetic, not meaning that it is showy for the sake of looking refined, but that it is becoming sharper, more potent, more vicious, while simultaneously holding a beauty that is all distinctly Bladhian.

We are lucky to have the transcript of his words in the programme, it is very helpful because at times his voice can fall to a very light whisper and at other times a thundering roar, worthy and occasionally reminiscent of his IRM legacy. While the whispers can fall to an almost inaudible level, he gives each word its due attention. There is no sense of it being muffled. Even at the lowest of volumes his vocal performance is potent. And kudos to their recording/production skills for managing to capture those whispered words so clearly. It really adds to the feel of the performance.

I’m quite impressed with the continued honing of Karolina Urbaniak’s musical capabilities. She has likely learned some of these tricks of the trade in her many years covering the post-industrial / power-electronics scenes and also possibly from Martin Bladh more specifically, and he may or may not have learned some of them from Jarl, or more likely Bladh and Jarl learned these things side-by-side through their many years together as the lauded IRM. Regardless of where, why, or how Urbaniak came into the role of music/soundscape creator, she is showing serious signs of professionalism, this doesn’t sound like the haphazard early works of a noise artist, it sounds like the proper score to the apocalyptic events being describe therein. Urbaniak’s talents in audio/visual combination are the most evident during the section of the piece where Martin is screaming “Shit. God.” repeatedly. Urbaniak splices together a collage of video footage of various disastrous events: volcanoes erupting, lions tearing at the flesh of their prey, waves crashing upon rocks, building demolitions, and so on. At first we are able to discern the sounds from each other, as they match up with the video footage of similar events, but as the video footage moves faster the sounds begin to melt into each other and we are cast into a totally enthralling cacophony of post-industrial noise.

On The New Revelations Of Being is certainly not the normal or expected fare of Infinity Land Press. But in subject matter and quality of execution, it is right on par with the rest of their catalog of releases. As with every release I’ve held by them thus far, I would highly recommend On The New Revelations Of Being to those willing to step outside the box and experience a unique journey through the twisted but beautiful minds of its creators.

Written by: Michael Barnett

All photos taken from On The New Revelations Of Being and are used exclusively by permission of Karolina Urbaniak. All rights reserved by Infinity Land Press.

Hector Meinhof – Interview

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On December 11, 2018

In Interviews

Hector Meinhof is an author and musician out of Sweden that has recently released his debut book, Three Nails, Four Wounds through Infinity Land Press. Outside his writing, Meinhof is known for his work as a classically-trained percussionist. He’s performed as part of Kroumata, a percussion ensemble. He’s also part of the scenic music duo, Hidden Mother. He is a collector of  antique photography, specialized in post-mortem, medical and religious themes.

This book had a real impact on me, more so than with many/most books I’ve read in recent years. There is a perfect melange of macabre photography with a strange story that takes place in an asylum, centered on seven 11 year old girls. The story is filled with brilliant allusions to an apocalypse, mental/physical disability, old-fashion asylum conditions, and a dark and twisted conception of Christianity. Mingled with this is a very unique writing style, a blend of dialogues, poetry, and prose which all come together with the images to form an incredibly powerful experience.

Hector Meinhof has written a book that is both beautiful and cruel. His poetic prose and the doom-laden pictures from his extensive collection of vintage photographs have bled into one tortured, corporeal unity. This is the illustrated scripture for the new dark ages, it will be read and beheld again and again. – Martin Bladh

I decided that only reviewing the book wouldn’t do this work enough justice. I wanted to delve into the topics a bit deeper with Meinhof and find out a bit more about this promising new artist to the literary world. There will be a review coming along soon, but for now I highly recommend this book! Enjoy, and thank you all for your continued support of This Is Darkness and the works we cover!

Interviewee: Hector Meinhof
Conducted by: Michael Barnett

Michael: First off, thank you very much for agreeing to the interview. Three Nails, Four Wounds was my first introduction to your art-form and I must say I am incredibly impressed. I rarely am eager to go right back to the beginning of a book and start reading again, immediately after finishing it. But this the case with Three Nails, Four Wounds.

Hector: Thank you for those kind words, Michael. I’m looking forward to hearing your questions. Let’s dig into it!

Michael: Christianity plays a major role throughout the narrative of Three Nails, Four Wounds. What is your particular relationship with religion? Do you fascinate on it from afar, or do you hold some beliefs?

Hector: I did not have a religious upbringing at all (by the way: Sweden is mostly protestant). I thought religion was the most boring subject when I went to school. I didn’t care about these things until my 30s when I started to read about Christian mysticism. People on the fringe of society have always interested me and all those eccentric mystics – the saints, the stigmatics, Christ-erotics, those crazy nose-bleeding nuns, levitating, fasting, suffering, flagellating themselves – really struck me as the most extreme way of life ever recorded in the human history. It also made me aware of my Christian heritage. In the West – especially in Europe – we are all cultural Christians whether we like it or not. It’s not just the architecture, music, art, philosophy – but it’s in our way of thinking, in how we perceive things. So, whether you believe Christ was crucified for our sins or that he was “incompetence hanging on a tree” [Anton Szandor LaVey] it doesn’t really matter – we are what we are because of Christianity. In Scandinavia, Christendom is of course mixed with Norse mythology (look at the Norwegian stave churches with their dragons).  Personally, I don’t have a problem with our Christian heritage, it has given birth to astonishing art, literature and philosophy, a rich set-up of archetypes that can guide and inspire, and the church’s demand for control wasn’t strong enough to keep the light of science from creeping in.

Michael: Martin has mentioned in the Afterword that it took you a great deal of time to find your individual writing voice. Do you think you’ve finally found that voice with Three Nails, Four Wounds?

Hector: That’s a good question. There are so many books in the world – is it even possible to create something new? Since I can’t do better work than Dante, Göthe, Shakespeare, Bronte,  Dostoevsky, Huysmans, Rilke, Woolf, Proust, Camus, Bataille, Zürn, Ungar and Wittkop, already have done, I need to find themes, or a combination of themes, that haven’t been explored (at least not the way I do it); combine that with a personal style regarding language and form – then maybe you can create something that at least could be perceived as original. I had been writing for many years, but never thought anything turned out good enough for publishing. This time I thought it did. I guess this is my voice then – but I suspect that it will change over time. It took a long time for me to learn how to write, let’s leave it at that.

Let me add that when I started to write “Three Nails, Four Wounds” I knew that I wanted the story to take place in a hospital, and that although the religious themes would be there (like a skeleton of the book), my main focus was to find ways to express feelings of despair, pain, loneliness, self-harm, suicidal thoughts, a frustrated stutterer full of things to say lacking the ability to talk freely, and mental illness in general. I didn’t want it to be a conventional novel (building up characters, etc.), and I wanted a slightly surreal tone in the girls’ speech – that was my biggest problem: how to make them talk like they were from another dimension of life. So, I got the idea of using old poems (written ca. 15 years ago) as lines – and that’s how I found the tone in the dialogue. At one stage, I did consider composing the book entirely of lines of dialogue, but it felt too constructed.

From Three Nails, Four Wounds

Michael: Was Three Nails, Four Wounds part of this process of finding your voice, or did you begin the book after you felt that you were in this proper mindset and had found a narrative voice suitable to continue with a more intensified and directed focus?

Hector: I guess “Three Nails” was part of the process. I wrote the book, read it, and felt for the first time that this book made it through the needle eye of my ambitions. I was ready. Twenty years from now, I will hopefully be a much better writer and then I will probably see flaws in this first book of mine – but I do believe that I will stand behind it and defend it.

Michael: Would you like to elaborate on some of the ideas that you were working on when writing this book?

Hector: My heroines, the seven 11-year-old girls, are not victims of anything, they act without hesitation, they are not afraid of the present. And many people are afraid of the present. A psychologist (I can’t remember who) talked about a man, happily married with children for 15 years. One day, his wife tells him that she has had an affair for the last five years and that she wants a divorce. The man is shocked. He says: “But I thought we were happy – when we had dinner last weekend, our holidays in France, when we visited your parents… Now, it’s like I don’t know myself anymore” – and the man had a breakdown. Happy memories turned into memories of deceit. His wife’s betrayal had changed his past, his history. So, the present can change the past, and that’s why it’s scary. In the present, we lack control. Everyday unexpected things can happen. Someone might walk up to you and say or do something that changes your past – and then we don’t know who we are anymore. The seven 11-year-old girls don’t remember, maybe they don’t have a past at all – and they are not afraid of anything.

My heroines are female because I think Woman has a certain inclination to spirituality – and most important: they use their body to express this spirituality. Reading about, for example, Mechthild von Magdeburg (which is quoted in the book), there is a very physical side to her belief in God. She talks about Christ more as a physical lover rather than something unreachable. The female saints bleed, they experience stigmata, they fast, they throw up objects, they levitate; when their bodies are dead they smell of flowers, when their hearts are dissected we find patterns and symbols inside. It seems to me, that female mystics use their flesh in a way male mystics don’t (there are, of course, exceptions). Their worship is like an art-form – and makes me think of contemporary performance artists, such as Marina Abramovic, especially her work in the 1970s.

Editor’s Note: An interesting article, if you want to learn more about some of Marina Abramovic’s work in the 70s.
https://www.elitereaders.com/performance-artist-marina-abramovic-social-experiment/?cn-reloaded=1

Hector: My heroines are children because I wanted them to be virgins. You could say that I use the seven 11-year-old girls as a cliché of the innocent childhood, not yet affected by social rules, sensual not sexual etc. But there’s a deeper meaning to it: their virginality – and I’m not talking about the bodily aspect of the term, but rather as a mental state. The virgin is self-enclosed, remote, secluded, turned inwards, doesn’t please others, penetrating only her own body, sterile, uncontaminated. Virginity as a state of mind is a sort of resistance. Let me quote from a book I just read [Images of the Untouched, 1982] about how to make a unicorn trap. You place the virgin in a forest, “with her breast uncovered, and by its scent the unicorn perceives it; then it comes to the virgin and kisses her breast, falls asleep on her lap and so comes to its death.” You could interpret the unicorn as “the spirit”, and the ”unicorn trap” as a way to unite the spirit with the body. “The virginal nourishes the spirit, while spirit makes the virginal psyche pregnant.” So, virginity as a state of mind is to be pregnant – that is: creative. In some cultures, the menstrual blood is viewed as a manifestation of creative power, especially a girl’s first menstruation. So, in my book you can see what happens when seven 11-year-old psychic virgins start acting, breaking the snow-white silence and awakening the avalanche.

Michael: There are hints that this book may not take place in a century-old past, as may seem more obvious, but that it is a look into the future. A possible warning about our coming struggles as humanity, as we wrestle with the ramifications of our systematic destruction of our own planet and existence. Do you see this as a sort of apocalyptic warning, a sort of prophecy?  Something more abstract than this?  Or do you prefer to let the reader sort these details out on their own?

Hector: Timewise, the book takes place in all eras (including the future). I think that in our culture we have lost the belief (and understanding) in sacrifice as a means for change.  I wanted to remind people of that. I have a really bad feeling about the future. On the other hand: the way I read the book, it actually has a happy ending. I believe that in the end of the book [spoiler alert! -> when the seven girls torture themselves to death, this sacrifice actually saves the town and the people in it. <- spoiler alert!] Let me just add that I don’t have an agenda – political or religious – with my work, you might see it as an intellectual preparation for the approaching darkness.

From Three Nails, Four Wounds

Michael: Were there any worries about the subject matter/visual content of Three Nails, Four Wounds?  It is, of course, packed with some quite macabre imagery, unavoidable considering the themes of the photographic content.

Hector: Not really. I did suggest that we black out the eyes of the disabled children, because those photos were taken in the 1940-50s (so they could still be alive, although I doubt it). It is, of course, a bit weird that photographs taken in the 19th century – for private use or as documentation – are now viewed as art. I see them as historic artifacts worthy of our attention, as memento mori objects, as our past, our collective memory.

From Three Nails, Four Wounds

Michael: It seems reasonably obvious that Infinite Land Press wouldn’t take issue with pressing such an intense release, as it is really the culture of their company. But, what of the hapless consumer that stumbles across your work. The person that had no clue what to expect. Do you have any preferred reaction/emotion you’d like to see coming from them?

Hector: I think the hapless consumer will be alright. If he or she doesn’t like my book they can just throw it away. People get offended by different things, some by photos of the dead, some by naked breasts, some by stupidity. I cannot limit myself by the fears of others. I saw ”The Shining” [Kubrick 1980] when I was ten, and I couldn’t sleep for days. I got extreme anxiety when I had to watch an anti-drug movie in school, where a woman injected heroin into her neck. But I survived – and rather than prosecute the people behind these ”childhood traumas” I feel grateful for being exposed to great art (The Shining) and brutal reality (syringe in neck). And no, I do not have any preferred reactions from a reader – all emotions are welcome.

From Three Nails, Four Wounds

Michael: “The Shining” was the first film that I appreciated more deeply and intuitively. A horror that could overcome the viewer on multiple levels. I, also, wouldn’t have had it any other way. Now that you are moving in the published world, do you have plans for more publications to follow in the foreseeable future?

Hector: I am currently writing a new book. Infinity Land Press is interested. I need at least one more year to finish it. The plan is to get it out in 2020.

Michael: Have you been holding back ideas with the anticipation of coming into your own as a writer, or have you been working through material as it presents itself?

Hector: The latter, I believe. Writing for me is very intuitive. I don’t know what’s going on inside my head when I’m working. It’s a mystery to me – and I like that.

Michael: Martin Bladh mentions that you found inspiration in a passage from the ancient Roman historian Plutarch, in which fear of being carried naked through the market stopped a sudden phenomenon of the Miletus townswomen impulsively hanging themselves. Was this an interesting tidbit you found? Or do you have a deeper fascination with Roman history/stories/mythology?

Hector: I would like to learn more about Roman history, but the Plutarch story was just something that I stumbled upon and felt was connected to my book.

From Three Nails, Four Wounds

Michael: During my studies of Roman history at university, I found the stories: ‘The Golden Ass’ by Apuleius, ‘Satyricon’ by Petronius, and ‘The Satires’ by Juvenal, to all be the most resoundingly interesting. But there is a never-ending torrent of literature worth reading. One must be selective with their time, especially in modernity when vacation and retirement are imaginary concepts for most people. (At least here, in the U.S.)

Hector: I agree, there are so many books to read! Think about a man like Thomas Aquinas in the 13th century. He read all books that existed in his time, he possessed all knowledge there was in the world and could grasp the whole intellectual effort made by mankind. You could say that he knew everything. Today that would not be possible – and knowledge is consequently fragmented upon various experts. And now I have contributed to the ever growing pile of books in the world with my own book…  I would guess that psychic virgins are very selective readers (or they probably don’t read at all).

Michael: What are your thoughts on Francesca Woodman’s perspective on her art?  Do you think it was auto-biographical in nature? Do you think her still largely unreleased body of work would inform us better on this matter?

Francesca Woodman, Space 2, 1976.

Hector: I was around 20 years old when I discovered Francesca Woodman. It had a great impact on me back then, but I haven’t thought about her for some years now. I don’t want to speculate about her work, if it was auto-biographical or not – it is what it is, for us to enjoy. But there is something mysterious about her, both in her work and her as a person. A feeling of something untold. I saw that documentary [The Woodmans, 2011] a few years ago, it had a weird atmosphere – her father photographing young Francesca-like women, like he was repeating (or continuing) his dead daughter’s work. The documentary didn’t really give much new information, but it was nice to see bits from her performance videos, and to hear her “Minnie Mouse” voice.  When she jumped out of a window at her New York apartment she did not leave a suicide note, but in a letter to a friend she wrote: “My life at this point is like very old coffee-cup sediment and I would rather die young leaving various accomplishments, i.e. some work, my friendship with you, some other artefacts intact, instead of pell-mell erasing all of these delicate things.”  That tells us quite a bit regarding her aim for perfection. I do hope we will get to see the rest of her work someday, but I wouldn’t count on it.

Michael: Have you found any current photographers that are able to capture her level of emotion in their works which you found so profound with Francesca Woodman?

Hector: For the last ten years or so my focus has been on antique photography, so I’m not really up to date on contemporary artists. But if you want pain, I can recommend the saint-like Spanish photographer David Nebreda.

Michael: Again, in the Afterword, Martin mentions your original fondness for film directors like Pasolini, Dreyer, Bergman and Tarkovsky. Who are some of your more modern favorites? I’m, personally, a huge fan of the works of Lars von Trier and David Lynch, quite a bit above most other current filmmakers, though I’m always looking for some young talents to carry the torch for the next generation.

Hector: When I started writing, film was an important source of influence. I went to a movie theater (that showed classics and art house films) almost every day. But as with contemporary photographs, nowadays I’m not really up-to-date with what’s going on. I like Michael Haneke’s films, Tarr and Alexander Sokurov. If I should name a Swedish director, it would be Ruben Östlund. Sorry, don’t come to me if you want tips on photographers or directors! When I was younger, I searched for influences everywhere, nowadays I try to avoid influences – the thoughts inside my own head are enough.

Vintage hidden mother photographs from Three Nails, Four Wounds.

Michael: How has your collection progressed since you started procuring 19th and early 20th century photography? Do you just find this sort of stuff on the internet, or do you attend auctions and other markets for finding such niche photography? I imagine there must be so much of this stuff out there, waiting in attics for some horrified descendant to one day unpack, and they wouldn’t have the slightest clue what to do with an oddity like this.

Hector: I think my interest in buying antique photographs started when I saw a “hidden mother” on eBay. I realized that there were a lot of interesting photos on the market. Pretty soon, I started to buy post-mortems, and then medical photos, and then religious themes. Most of them I bought at on-line auctions like eBay, but I have also gotten to know photo collectors from around the world. It’s a small community and we know each other’s interests, we sell and trade with each other. Some of the photos in the book make me uncomfortable too, looking back I think this was a way for me to come to terms with certain fears, and to learn to see beauty even in the nastiest subjects. I like to look at kittens too.

From Meinhof’s personal collection.

Michael: I imagine a hobby like collecting 19th – early 20th century post-mortem photography wouldn’t present itself in a vacuum. Do you have any other interesting collections you’d like to mention?

Hector: Well, that would be old books – but beyond that I don’t really think that I’m such a hoarder. On the other hand, if I had a lot of money, I could easily imagine myself surrounded with exquisite antiques – cylinder music boxes, medieval paintings, large vellum books, talking machines, phonographs, 17th century medical models in ivory, religious objects and relics from saints – in my little castle in the Swiss alps…

Michael: That sounds like a wonderful way of spending a fortune! Has your particular environment had an impact on your artistic direction?  As you are Swedish, it is understandable that the works of Ingmar Bergman would come to you at an earlier age than for someone like myself growing up in a rather traditional American family.

Hector: Bergman was important, films like Persona, Hour of the Wolf, Cries and Whispers, had a huge impact on me. Not just visually, but also his treatment of the Swedish language. But most of all, this feeling of independence and freedom; that you can create a piece of art with its own inner logic regarding form and content, not following the manual and not caring about what other people think or say. And, since I have been working with hardcore contemporary art music for my whole adult life, I think (although I cannot explain exactly how) that this has influenced my sense of form and structure. Xenakis, Stockhausen, Cage, Lucier, Ligeti, Sciarrino, Whitehouse…

From Three Nails, Four Wounds

Michael: What are your feelings on Infinity Land Press? Are you happy with the book and Martin and Karolina?

Hector: I had met Martin once before in connection with the recording of the CD Closure… by his post-industrial band IRM. They wanted some additional percussion on the album and, via a mutual friend, I got the job. A few years later when I had finished Three Nails, I heard that Martin had moved to London and started Infinity Land Press, together with Karolina. I sent him the manuscript and he replied like 24 hours later that he wanted to publish it – I was stunned! Martin and Karolina are very professional, both are artists themselves, so we have the same understanding of where the boundaries in our different roles (writer – publisher) should be. I think Karolina’s design of the book is very tasteful and Martin provided a thoughtful afterword that gives the reader some background to the thematic aspects of the book. And of course, the translators Marianne Griolet and John Macmillan were crucial for the birth of this book as a physical object. To produce a book with over 100 photos is expensive, and I wanted it to be affordable (especially since this is my debut), and I think that ILP managed to make a book that feels luxurious without costing a fortune. I am very happy with the result, it’s a little gem. And the reception has been fantastic, I’m humbled by all the praise from my readers.

Michael: I think you hit your goal nicely. I forgot the book was under £20, it certainly feels like a more expensive and very well-made product.  Do you see any other publisher out there working on projects of these sorts?

Hector: I think you know more about publishers than I do, Michael. But we have, for example, Kiddiepunk [Michael Salerno], and Amphetamine Sulphate [Philip Best]. I was happy that Wakefield Press released two books by Gabrielle Wittkop a few years ago.

Michael: I am learning new things every day. I am constantly finding new artists, publishers, film directors, that are changing my ideas on art and its limits. I just try to bring the zine’s readers along in my process of discovery. You never know where the next hidden gem will decide to shine and reveal itself. I find that an artist’s particular set of interests can often unlock a whole new world of interests to their followers. So, I thank you for sharing some insight, not only into your own work and process, but also into the things that brought you to become the artist you are today. I thank you again for your time, and I’ll leave the final words to you!

Hector: The pleasure was mine, Michael. Thank you for spreading the New Gospel! My final words… well, the aborted calf is shaved and skinned. The skin is stretched over the firmament: In the afternoon sun, people cease to cast shadows. In the town square, the puppet theater closes for the day. The puppet master pulls off the puppets and discovers that his hands are soaked with blood. You see, this is for real.

Purchase Three Nails, Four Wounds here.

Hector Meinhof Links

Official Website
Facebook
Instagram
Youtube
Hidden Mothers band site

Antonin Artaud – Artaud 1937 Apocalypse – Book Review

By

On August 24, 2018

In Book Reviews

Title: Artaud 1937 Apocalypse:
Antonin Artaud – Letters From Ireland – 14 August to 21 September 1937
Translated & Edited by: Stephen Barber, with notes and an Afterword
Photographs by: Karolina Urbaniak
Artworks by: Martin Bladh
Published by: Infinity Land Press
Release date: May 2018
Pages: 120

Cover art by Martin Bladh

Artaud 1937 Apocalypse publishes the letters Antonin Artaud sent to several of his correspondents during the period in 1937 when Artaud was visiting Ireland. Artaud left Paris for the island of Inishmore off the western coast of Ireland, then proceeded on to Galway and Dublin. During this time, Artaud sent a number of intriguing letters to a select few of his friends and correspondents. In these letters Artaud gives their recipients a general outline of his new purpose in life, and his reason for traveling to Ireland. The disturbing content of these letters is the body of and inspiration for this book, which is now able to be utilized by a much greater audience, as it has recently entered the public domain.

Until the release of this book my knowledge of Antonin Artaud and his work was lacking. I opted to begin reading the book before digging too deeply into the biography of the man. As I read, I realized this book and this man are both incredibly complex and interesting topics. So I decided to take a deep dive into his life and his works. What I found was a man of singular peculiarity. A man that could be equally as charming as he was denigrating. Yet, even with his strong anti-social tendencies and his phases of increased mania, Artaud managed to keep a devoted group of close friends and followers throughout his life, and to leave a lasting legacy after his death. These opposing forces are likely to be at least partially responsible for Artaud’s variety of art in its many forms. As I learned more about the man, and then began to read the book again, a greater appreciation for it certainly arose.

Endpaper collages by Martin Bladh

Speaking at the Theatre Sarah-Bernhardt at the ‘Evening Devoted to the Works of Antonin Artaud’ on 7 June 1946, Louis Jouvet said, “Artaud described long ago with unusually acute foresight, the essence of theater, what the theater may be like tomorrow, what the future holds for such forms as radio and films. In a work called The Theater and Its Double, this true seer formulated the essence of what we are all seeking in our own ways today. He forecast the genres now being revised. On language, acting, actors and direction, on expression and psychology in drama, Artaud wrote incisive predictions and, as far as dramatic phenomena can be defined, definitive ones.” Jouvet is referring here to Artaud’s analysis of the world of theatre during their time, as well as the concept and affect of his ‘Theatre of Cruelty’ which is described in the Encyclopædia Britannica as a “communion between actor and audience in a magic exorcism; gestures, sounds, unusual scenery, and lighting combine to form a language, superior to words, that can be used to subvert thought and logic and to shock the spectator into seeing the baseness of his world.”

Yet, Artaud 1937 Apocalypse doesn’t really deal with any of the topics of art. It instead focuses solely on Artaud’s vision of a coming apocalypse, in which he sees himself as the primary antagonizer of the lost masses and their false conceptions of the holy realms. His vision is an amalgamation of Christian and Hindu concepts of a triad of divine power. Both of which are one and the same, and both of which are misunderstood, as he sees it, by the followers of said faiths. In his letters Artaud not only illustrates his own role in this coming apocalypse, but he explains to his friends how they are also connected to the upcoming events, and how the elements of the heavens themselves will war amongst each other. The letters can vary from a quick warning of some upcoming event to a detailed explanation of how and why various of his correspondents should abandon their current preoccupations and join him in this effort which he sees as the difference between a new beginning and the end of everything. Some letters include spells, protective or destructive, depending upon the recipient. Many of the letters included pleas for money, something Artaud was desperately lacking from this period forward.

Photography by Karolina Urbaniak

Interestingly enough, the events of this book, of course, took place not long before the second World War. The apocalypse may not have unfolded as Artaud had imagined it would, but some version of an apocalypse certainly left its mark on humanity during those years. Ironically, I suppose, Artaud actually had no influence on WWII whatsoever, as he spent the entirety of the war in a series of psychiatric hospitals. During this period, he was repeatedly subjected to electro-convulsive therapy numbering in the dozens of “treatments”, which they likely used on him, at least occasionally, as punishment for unwanted behavior. Needless to say, this trip to Ireland, and then his immediate institutionalization upon return to France is likely the most chaotic and troubling part of his life.

Infinity Land Press took no shortcuts on this one. While the book is only 120 pages in length, there is plenty of interesting information here to absorb, over multiple readings. The book is hard-bound with a bound silk bookmark. The cover-art, created by Martin Bladh (IRM, Skin Area, Infinity Land Press), is a collage consisting of three images of Artaud’s face, each from a different period. There are also collages by Martin Bladh on each of the inner endpapers. Karolina Urbaniak provides the utterly magnificent photographs dispersed throughout the book. She took all these photos herself, on a trip to Ireland, in preparation for the book, where she followed the path of Artaud’s historical travels. The power of these photos in the narrative can’t be understated. Urbaniak captures scenes that seem almost otherworldly in their uniqueness. Jagged rocks protruding from the ground as far as the eye can see, violent waves colliding forcing a torrent of water into the sky, and the foundations of long forgotten structures make up the subject matter of these photographs and paint a vivid picture of the world Artaud was witnessing around himself during this period.

Photography by Karolina Urbaniak

The final element to this book is the work of Stephen Barber. Barber has been an authority on the works and correspondences of Antonin Artaud for years. His contribution here takes Artaud 1937 Apocalypse from an aesthetically pleasing collection of letters to a well rounded English translation and commentary. Artaud wrote all these letters in French, so one of the major undertakings of this book was to create an English translation which would still capture the electrifying wording used by Artaud. Though I don’t speak French, and therefore can’t have a true judgment here, from my history in Ancient Greek and Latin translation, Barber seems to have done an excellent job of creating wording which will feel natural to English speakers, yet also captures that brilliance/insanity of Artaud’s wording. Barber’s contributions are rounded-out with an Afterword, which was very helpful for me, in understanding the greater context of this work. He has also provided notes throughout the book, making it a potent resource for English reading scholars on the topic of Antonin Artaud.

We won’t all get the full appreciation immediately from this work. As I mentioned before, Antonin Artaud is a complex man, one that worked in a variety of different creative fields, and left his mark on more than one of them. But this is a wonderful place to get into his works for the first time. Having this version of Artaud in mind as I dug much deeper into his legacy, it made for a more interesting journey, similar to the “in media res” (into the middle of things) situation, I would equate my experience with a movie starting in the action of some later scene, then taking you back to the beginnings to explain the lead-up to this event. With that said, I would highly recommend Artaud 1937 Apocalypse to die-hard lovers of Artaud. But, it will also be an enlightening work for those new to Artaud, and possibly the catalyst for a greater journey into the works of Artaud and/or his friends, such as André Breton, in the surrealist movement. The physical book is a delight to witness and the content within is no less appealing.

Review written by: Michael Barnett

Book design by Karolina Urbaniak

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