Monday, June 15, 2015
MY TENURE STORY
MY TENURE STORY: A PRETTY ACCURATE VERSION
When I was teaching in Texas, I didn't get tenure the first time I "CAME UP" for it....
As a result, I thought about my incredible students, my incredible salary, my incredible little home in Austin, my incredible health plan, my incredible grant to go to India and future grants, my incredible proximity to my teachers- the Mehtas, who I visited in Houston every weekend and I knew I needed to be proactive with my angry-disappointment. Was it sexism, ageism? Feminist colleagues and the most incredible and smart and intelligent professor of law on the teaching staff at UT Austin,t thought I had a "case" so I got lots of help, a tall, NY City telephone book pile of letters of support from around the world and my students protested ...all of this to rescind and change the minds of UT bosses so that I could get tenure. It was a media circus.
The frosting on the cake was a letter of "support" from then Governor George Bush, the painter, who was friends with an artist co-friend who asked "George" to write a letter to University of Texas Austin in my favor so that I could get tenure. George W did and it didn't seem to make a difference except that my case went up for approval the second time. It was not an instant GET OUT OF JAIL ticket but a second chance.
A month before a yes or no from up the hill which was looking like a YES, I was coming to the end of the semester and at one of the final classes, my students' assignment was to re-act/explain/re-perform a past performance from the History of Performance and a wonderful and bright and beautiful young man in my class turned out the lights and projected a slide or maybe it was a video of Vito Acconci performing SEEDBED, an event where Acconci masturbated under a made-for-him gallery sub-floor while the footsteps of the gallery goers overhead gave the signal for Acconci's pleasure-action. (Note that Marina Abromovic re-performed that one for her 7 PERFORMANCES OF OTHER PERFORMANCE ARTISTS PERFORMANCES show. (My title, not hers.) Here is where the plot thickens.
BACKSTORY:The woman from theatre who came to me after her first class in my class, in the spring , in bawling/tears, saying, in loose quote, "You have just undone my entire theatre training with your teachings in this class," might be, if I remember correctly, the one who told her parents that there was masturbation happening in my performance class, never interviewing me or my performance student who "approximated" masturbation and who was "approximating" in total darkness with his back or was it his side to us and his hand on his "lap." That was the straw that broke George Bush's letter-of-support-back and completely dislodged his good intentions and position of weight. That mother-to-the-president of UT Austin complaint undid a year of my trying to get tenure and completely irrelevanted all of my friends' hard work! So I went home to upstate NY and for two years, wrote, cried, screamed and slid into a haze and blur, wondering why I lost my fabulous job.
More back story: For a year before that event, I was feeling/hearing/knowing this message, "GO BE WITH YOUR FATHER!" And I didn't listen. It was very loud and still I didn't listen. The University of Texas listened to my voice for me and kicked me out so that I could go and be with my father and experience one of the most important/transformative events of my life; getting to know him and take care of him for the last 7 years of his life. I now thank Texas for not wanting me!!!!!! Karma listens and acts when hearts don't.
When I was teaching in Texas, I didn't get tenure the first time I "CAME UP" for it....
As a result, I thought about my incredible students, my incredible salary, my incredible little home in Austin, my incredible health plan, my incredible grant to go to India and future grants, my incredible proximity to my teachers- the Mehtas, who I visited in Houston every weekend and I knew I needed to be proactive with my angry-disappointment. Was it sexism, ageism? Feminist colleagues and the most incredible and smart and intelligent professor of law on the teaching staff at UT Austin,t thought I had a "case" so I got lots of help, a tall, NY City telephone book pile of letters of support from around the world and my students protested ...all of this to rescind and change the minds of UT bosses so that I could get tenure. It was a media circus.
The frosting on the cake was a letter of "support" from then Governor George Bush, the painter, who was friends with an artist co-friend who asked "George" to write a letter to University of Texas Austin in my favor so that I could get tenure. George W did and it didn't seem to make a difference except that my case went up for approval the second time. It was not an instant GET OUT OF JAIL ticket but a second chance.
A month before a yes or no from up the hill which was looking like a YES, I was coming to the end of the semester and at one of the final classes, my students' assignment was to re-act/explain/re-perform a past performance from the History of Performance and a wonderful and bright and beautiful young man in my class turned out the lights and projected a slide or maybe it was a video of Vito Acconci performing SEEDBED, an event where Acconci masturbated under a made-for-him gallery sub-floor while the footsteps of the gallery goers overhead gave the signal for Acconci's pleasure-action. (Note that Marina Abromovic re-performed that one for her 7 PERFORMANCES OF OTHER PERFORMANCE ARTISTS PERFORMANCES show. (My title, not hers.) Here is where the plot thickens.
BACKSTORY:The woman from theatre who came to me after her first class in my class, in the spring , in bawling/tears, saying, in loose quote, "You have just undone my entire theatre training with your teachings in this class," might be, if I remember correctly, the one who told her parents that there was masturbation happening in my performance class, never interviewing me or my performance student who "approximated" masturbation and who was "approximating" in total darkness with his back or was it his side to us and his hand on his "lap." That was the straw that broke George Bush's letter-of-support-back and completely dislodged his good intentions and position of weight. That mother-to-the-president of UT Austin complaint undid a year of my trying to get tenure and completely irrelevanted all of my friends' hard work! So I went home to upstate NY and for two years, wrote, cried, screamed and slid into a haze and blur, wondering why I lost my fabulous job.
More back story: For a year before that event, I was feeling/hearing/knowing this message, "GO BE WITH YOUR FATHER!" And I didn't listen. It was very loud and still I didn't listen. The University of Texas listened to my voice for me and kicked me out so that I could go and be with my father and experience one of the most important/transformative events of my life; getting to know him and take care of him for the last 7 years of his life. I now thank Texas for not wanting me!!!!!! Karma listens and acts when hearts don't.
WIKIPEDIA: LINDA MARY MONTANO
LINDA MARY MONTANO:WIKIPEDIA
LINDA MARY MONTANO (born January 18, 1942, Saugerties,NY) was raised in a devoutly Roman Catholic household, partly Irish and partly Italian, that was surrounded by artistic activity. Both her parents played in an orchestra but Linda’s fascination with Catholic ritual and desire to do humanitarian service led her to join the novitiate of the Maryknoll Sisters after one year studying at the College of New Rochelle. After two years with the order, however, Montano was suffering from severe anorexia, weighing only 80 pounds (36 kg), and she left the order to return to her former college, from which she graduated in 1965 as a sculptor.
During the rest of the 1960s, Linda continued to study and began performing, and by 1971 she was devoting herself exclusively to performance art. Around this time she married the photographer Mitchell Payne. During this period, Montano drifted away from the Catholic Church, but despite this loss faith, Montano was consistently to acknowledge the influence of her strict Catholic upbringing on her work – for instance in how the discipline of convent life and her family’s loyal work-ethic made her able to carry out extremely disciplined performances in her later career. Montano’s first major performance, Chicken Woman (1972) was based on her MFA sculpture show at the University of Wisconsin, Madison. There she exhibited 9 live chickens in 3, eight by sixteen foot long minimalist chicken wire cages on the roof of the art building. It was titled “The Chicken Show” from 1969.
Linda had moved to San Francisco 1970 with her husband, and it was there that she established herself with performances like “Handcuff” (1973 with Tom Marioni) where she was physically tied to other artists, and “Three Day Blindfold” (1974), where she lived for three days blindfolded and had to find her way around. The death of her husband led to further exploration of art as a healing modality (“Mitchells’ Death”, 1978) and she continued her art-theology dialogue by living in a Zen monastery for three years and to Ananda Ashram in the 1980s where she studied with Dr. Ramamurti Mishra for over 30 years. His influence and appreciation of her vision encouraged both her art and life. Upon meeting Taiwanese performance artist Tehching Hsieh, Montano did a remarkable collaboration whereby the two artists were bound to each other by a length of rope 24 hours a day for a whole year (from July 4, 1983 to July 3, 1984).
In the following seven years Montano did another ambitious project titled “Seven Years of Living Art”, in which she lived in her home in Kingston wearing strictly monochromatic clothing, spent a portion of every day in a coloured room, and listened to a designated tone, all of which corresponded to the energetic qualities of a specific chakra. She changed colour every year, and after the project was finished followed it up with “Another Seven Years of Living Art”, in part to memorialise her mother, Mildred Montano, who died in 1988 of colon cancer This time she did not use the colours, but aimed to focus on the same chakras. From 1998, Montano has given cycles to other artists, hoping to give three cycle to three arts each dating up to 2019. After this, Montano focused upon freelance teaching of performance art, caring for Henry Montano (her increasingly ill father) and counseling people again practicing “Art/Life Counseling”, a technique she used for seven years at The New Museum where curator Marcia Tucker had built a private room and allowed Montano to counsel people once a month in the window installation which was painted the same color that Montano wore for that year. At that time (1984-1991) Montano used tarot, palm and psychic readings as tools of discovery as well as attentive listening so that she could respond to the questions of her clients and she intended to find the most creative way to respond to their problems and difficulties. (Currently Montano still does “Art/Life/Laugher Counseling” but without the assistance of tarot, palm and psychic readings because they are forbidden by her current practice of Catholicism).
The influence of her father led Montano to return to Catholicism and ultimately to Church attendance, and since 2005 she has taken gathered prayer requests to more than ten Catholic pilgrimage sites throughout the world. Montano also meets with others in Catholic Churches for 3 hours silent retreats, re-seeing the concept of endurance from new Catholic-eyes. Since returning to Catholicism, Montano has made numerous videos exploring the faith, including Father Lebar: Catholic Priest and Exorcist; Saint Teresa Of Avila By Linda Mary Montano, and currently Mother Teresa of Calcutta. She also performs three-hour endurances, lip-syncing as Paul McMahon and Bob Dylan.
Her work investigates the relationship between art and life through intricate, life-altering ceremonies, some of which last for seven or more years. She is interested in the way artistic ritual, often staged as individual interactions or collaborative workshops, can be used to alter and enhance a person’s life and to create the opportunity for focus on spiritual energy states, silence and the cessation of art/life boundaries.
- See more at: http://www.lindamontano.com/artist-bio/#sthash.CF8qt5bM.dpuf
MONTANO: SINGING THE ART OF SINCLAIR AND MONASTERO
MONTANO: SINGING WITH OTHERS THE ART OF CYNTHIA SINCLAIR AND JOAN MONASTERO
INTERVIEW ELIZA SWANN AND LINDA MARY MONTANO
INTERVIEW: ELIZA SWANN AND LINDA MARY MONTANO
Perfect Wave Magazine is doing a special print edition for the New York Art Book Fair featuring the Golden Dome School. We're doing a kind of round robin panel discussion where participants all ask each other questions. A few of the participants had questions for you - your answers would be printed in Perfect Wave along with a picture of your work.
Here are the questions for you - answer any or all that you feel like answering - I'd love to have your input:
From Monica: I have been reading and re-reading your conversation with Eliza for BOMB and scribbling notes on all of it. You both mention the idea of intention: that is, using the self—more specifically, the self as represented by the body—as a catalyst for renewal, change. I know you have also worked with what you call “creative schizophrenia”: becoming other people within your own body, and then later practicing meditation to even get out of your body. I would refer to creative schizophrenia as a kind of spiritual practice, especially because it involves transformation.
Perfect Wave Magazine is doing a special print edition for the New York Art Book Fair featuring the Golden Dome School. We're doing a kind of round robin panel discussion where participants all ask each other questions. A few of the participants had questions for you - your answers would be printed in Perfect Wave along with a picture of your work.
Here are the questions for you - answer any or all that you feel like answering - I'd love to have your input:
From Monica: I have been reading and re-reading your conversation with Eliza for BOMB and scribbling notes on all of it. You both mention the idea of intention: that is, using the self—more specifically, the self as represented by the body—as a catalyst for renewal, change. I know you have also worked with what you call “creative schizophrenia”: becoming other people within your own body, and then later practicing meditation to even get out of your body. I would refer to creative schizophrenia as a kind of spiritual practice, especially because it involves transformation.
LINDA MARY MONTANO: When I sat in front of a video camera for a year in 1975, I talked to it as different people, all successful, all women, all wild, all somewhat wacky and ironical. WHY? I was in a very compromised emotional situation and completely unable to deal so I dealt the only way I knew how! By getting out of my mind because I was out of my mind! I became other people as art! SMART, I must say. And yes transformative because I kept at it and as another big emotional crisis occurred, I started becoming real, not imaginary people: Mother Theresa, Paul McMahon, Bob Dylan and Hillary Clinton. OK, now why? In retrospect, I see it as a way to practice being the "flesh-me." A way to prepare to let go of me via death and also theologically because from the point of view of all spiritual teachings, we are ONE and EVERYTHING . So, actually, I am preparing via my art to experience that ONE!
I am curious about how you corresponded with your inner child as you explored other “selves.” Did you “consult” with her? I like to think of the inner child as a core, a “rootedness” of the soul. In what ways was transforming your personality, or acknowledging its fluidity, healing for the internal, younger parts of yourself?
I am curious about how you corresponded with your inner child as you explored other “selves.” Did you “consult” with her? I like to think of the inner child as a core, a “rootedness” of the soul. In what ways was transforming your personality, or acknowledging its fluidity, healing for the internal, younger parts of yourself?
LINDA MARY MONTANO: I corresponded with the inner child by playing as she would, by allowing the flesh-Linda to be led by the intuitive one, the child one.
From Eliza: At the Golden Dome "High Priestess" session, we spent a lot of time with the Void, creating from the Void space, and invoking creation myths that overcome dualism and emphasize interconnectedness and interdependence. What is your Creation myth? How did the Universe get started, and how does your story of this beginning influence the way you make art?
From Eliza: At the Golden Dome "High Priestess" session, we spent a lot of time with the Void, creating from the Void space, and invoking creation myths that overcome dualism and emphasize interconnectedness and interdependence. What is your Creation myth? How did the Universe get started, and how does your story of this beginning influence the way you make art?
LINDA MARY MONTANO: Only when I am invited to DO, not think about this question, does it become real to and in me. I would have to spend a month in retreat and in workshop to be able to answer this question. In fact, I would like to hear about your experiences and solutions to this question since you all spent time IN IT.
From Monica: At the Golden Dome, we briefly touched on blockages, and the idea of communing with the Void as a means of overcoming creative blockage: creative, emotional, or otherwise. Entering the silence creates space, and it is within this space that certain transformative shifts can occur. Most of you create work that is performative or at least enacted with a beautiful fervor, allowing your artistic practice to merge with your life. On the other end of the spectrum, however, do you find value in stillness? Can feeling stuck and sitting within that space, in the quiet of temporary non-creation, also be transformative? I apologize if this is vague…I suppose I am really just asking a group of women I admire what they do when they feel stuck, or as if things aren’t flowing so continuously. I imagine that your individual relationships to this kind of dilemma have grown and shifted over time.
From Monica: At the Golden Dome, we briefly touched on blockages, and the idea of communing with the Void as a means of overcoming creative blockage: creative, emotional, or otherwise. Entering the silence creates space, and it is within this space that certain transformative shifts can occur. Most of you create work that is performative or at least enacted with a beautiful fervor, allowing your artistic practice to merge with your life. On the other end of the spectrum, however, do you find value in stillness? Can feeling stuck and sitting within that space, in the quiet of temporary non-creation, also be transformative? I apologize if this is vague…I suppose I am really just asking a group of women I admire what they do when they feel stuck, or as if things aren’t flowing so continuously. I imagine that your individual relationships to this kind of dilemma have grown and shifted over time.
LINDA MARY MONTANO: Stuck for me is never an issue. My concern is over do, not stuck not doing. I am like a fecund art-rabbit and can turn it out ad infinitum so I welcome "stuck!" Only when I think about my attitude of grasping and greedily wanting to make more and more and more, do I allow myself to taste the Void and the sweetness of silence. I am now coming to a place where sitting in that silence is preferable to "flow."
Frank Haines told me to contact you many moons ago because he felt that I would relate to the healing work that you were doing at the New Museum in the 80s with your special mode of "art/life" counseling. Can you describe what you were doing at the New Museum with healing, and how your healing process has changed since then?
LINDA MARY MONTANO: When I conceived 7 YEARS OF LIVING ART, I calculated into the process a once a month visit to NYC and asked THE NEW MUSEUM if they would host me for those seven years. Why? I knew that because I was living in Kingston NY, upstate, at that time, I would get ensconsed and caught up, up there, and would not go to the city and might get isolated, lonely and stale for those seven years. A trip to the city once a month would invigorate me so I made an art piece to give me what I needed! This was always my process: if I needed it I found a way to make art to give "it" to me.
My request to the Museum was answered, fate came to the rescue and the then curator, Marcia Tucker, who was a visionary and brave/smart woman offered me a separate ROOM at her museum for seven years! Yes, seven years! And I was able to make a seven year installation there consisting of a round table and two chairs. The room looked out over the street in back of the Museum whose name I've forgotten, but to get into the room, you came up three steps and entered a raised platform, about 5 feet wide and 7 feet deep. Large windows covered the outside wall and there was space just enough to fit two people in there. It was vertigo-making.
What happened in the room? At that time I was deep in my Yoga practices and certainly not steeped in Catholic theological bans on palm readings , tarot and psychic readings and so I happily, easily and without training, offered all three of these "items" in that performance, once a month for seven years and called it ART/LIFE COUNSELING. It was about proximity and closeness and intimacy and community of one-to-one via art. It was the art of person to person, the art of no object, the art of energy as art. I had a salt shaker on the table and would say, "Take this experience with a grain of sale," hoping that nobody would take me too seriously, or sue me, but of course some did take me seriously and were helped by what I did and said, and some came back monthly for stock market updates, marriage questions and the typical psychic reading, should I's: that is: should I move to___________? Should I marry_________________? Should I forgive____________? I had the balls and hubris and belief in my process and answered all questions without shyness or a higher degree in ,"How to read palms, 101."
Here's how I did it. I would take their hands, look at their palms and the faucet of some unknown and untaught "knowledge" would begin to pour out of my mouth. It was a high and I felt like the priest I used to go to, to feel better, via Catholic confession. This performance gave me back the power I had given away to the patriarchy and now I became the priest via art. It gave the other person who had joined me as art, a chance to be in touch with art/artist.
Many magical and some frightening things happened there. I will tell you two stories. Once a small boy brought his Russian mother into the room, translating for her, and whatever I said or did, saved her from committing suicide. They came back to report this, if I remember correctly, although this might be a wish and not real, the coming back part. The saving from suicide part is correct, though. I have no memory of how it happened or what I said to the little boy to tell his mother, but I have probably written about it and the information might be able to be found in my notes from 14 YEARS OF LVING ART, now at FALES library, in my archive at NYU. Another time a man came into the room which was doorless but very private and in the back of the Museum so sometimes nobody was around. He had a knife and threatened to kill me. I am still here. The memory of the details escapes me.
Let's jump ahead to the late 90's and my return to a version of Catholicism that edits my abilities and my psychic gifts. That is, I don't read palms or do tarot anymore but I do healings now and call them "Angel Clearings." Same thing, different label. And it is still called ART/LIFE COUNSELING. To this day, when I sneak a peek at an extraordinary palm, I almost burst, wanting to tell all to the person with the story in their hand! But instead, I just tell myself, not them.
LINDA MARY MONTANO: When I conceived 7 YEARS OF LIVING ART, I calculated into the process a once a month visit to NYC and asked THE NEW MUSEUM if they would host me for those seven years. Why? I knew that because I was living in Kingston NY, upstate, at that time, I would get ensconsed and caught up, up there, and would not go to the city and might get isolated, lonely and stale for those seven years. A trip to the city once a month would invigorate me so I made an art piece to give me what I needed! This was always my process: if I needed it I found a way to make art to give "it" to me.
My request to the Museum was answered, fate came to the rescue and the then curator, Marcia Tucker, who was a visionary and brave/smart woman offered me a separate ROOM at her museum for seven years! Yes, seven years! And I was able to make a seven year installation there consisting of a round table and two chairs. The room looked out over the street in back of the Museum whose name I've forgotten, but to get into the room, you came up three steps and entered a raised platform, about 5 feet wide and 7 feet deep. Large windows covered the outside wall and there was space just enough to fit two people in there. It was vertigo-making.
What happened in the room? At that time I was deep in my Yoga practices and certainly not steeped in Catholic theological bans on palm readings , tarot and psychic readings and so I happily, easily and without training, offered all three of these "items" in that performance, once a month for seven years and called it ART/LIFE COUNSELING. It was about proximity and closeness and intimacy and community of one-to-one via art. It was the art of person to person, the art of no object, the art of energy as art. I had a salt shaker on the table and would say, "Take this experience with a grain of sale," hoping that nobody would take me too seriously, or sue me, but of course some did take me seriously and were helped by what I did and said, and some came back monthly for stock market updates, marriage questions and the typical psychic reading, should I's: that is: should I move to___________? Should I marry_________________? Should I forgive____________? I had the balls and hubris and belief in my process and answered all questions without shyness or a higher degree in ,"How to read palms, 101."
Here's how I did it. I would take their hands, look at their palms and the faucet of some unknown and untaught "knowledge" would begin to pour out of my mouth. It was a high and I felt like the priest I used to go to, to feel better, via Catholic confession. This performance gave me back the power I had given away to the patriarchy and now I became the priest via art. It gave the other person who had joined me as art, a chance to be in touch with art/artist.
Many magical and some frightening things happened there. I will tell you two stories. Once a small boy brought his Russian mother into the room, translating for her, and whatever I said or did, saved her from committing suicide. They came back to report this, if I remember correctly, although this might be a wish and not real, the coming back part. The saving from suicide part is correct, though. I have no memory of how it happened or what I said to the little boy to tell his mother, but I have probably written about it and the information might be able to be found in my notes from 14 YEARS OF LVING ART, now at FALES library, in my archive at NYU. Another time a man came into the room which was doorless but very private and in the back of the Museum so sometimes nobody was around. He had a knife and threatened to kill me. I am still here. The memory of the details escapes me.
Let's jump ahead to the late 90's and my return to a version of Catholicism that edits my abilities and my psychic gifts. That is, I don't read palms or do tarot anymore but I do healings now and call them "Angel Clearings." Same thing, different label. And it is still called ART/LIFE COUNSELING. To this day, when I sneak a peek at an extraordinary palm, I almost burst, wanting to tell all to the person with the story in their hand! But instead, I just tell myself, not them.
PARTICIPANTS IN ANOTHER 21 YEARS OF LIVING ART
PARTICIPANTS IN ANOTHER 21 YEARS OF LIVING ART
ANOTHER 21 YEARS OF LIVING ART (1998-2019): LINDA MARY
MONTANO
MISSION STATEMENT: ANOTHER 21 YEARS OF LIVING ART
(1998-2019) is art that compassionately practices an
appreciation for life and is a durational continuation
of my exploration of the art of consciousness. The
artist/lifeists invited to this experience,
ecumenically choose their own unique methodologies and
explore their work while remaining in virtual/internet
communication with each other throughout their
practice of compassionately transforming their life,
via art. It is based on Linda MARY Montano’s endurance:
7 YEARS OF LIVING ART + ANOTHER 7 YEARS OF LIVING ART
= 14 YEARS OF LIVING ART, 12/8/1984—12/8/1998.
www.lindamontano.com,
www.vdb.org http://lindamarymontano.blogspot.com
DESCRIPTION: “When I finished 14 YEARS OF LIVING ART,
an art experience-endurance based on the 7 chakras, I
became so enamored of working with time that I wanted
to share that joy with others, and so I designed
ANOTHER 21 YEARS OF LIVING ART. I felt that other
artists could become virtual/internet art family and I
would feel as if I were in good company, with
like-minded friends, doing work based on time,
endurance and with reference to my past work, but
interpreted by each artist according to their
discipline, practice and personal aesthetic. I am
proud and honored to be in the company of the
following life-artists.” Linda M. Montano
PARTICIPANTS IN SECOND SEVEN YEARS OF ANOTHER 21 YEARS
OF LIVING ART:
MICHELLE BUSH: SEVEN YEARS OF POSITIVE OBSESSIONS,
12/8/2005-12/8/2012. I obsess on one
sentence/statement and colour in relation to the
chakras producing collaborative or interventionist and
performance pieces each year.
BARBARA CARRELLAS: EIGHT NEW/ANCIENT SACRAMENTS OF
PLEASURE AND CHANGE, 12/8/2004-12/8/2011. I create
chakra-based rituals which I celebrate on the eight
natural holidays (solstices, equinoxes, etc.) that
explore and celebrate the paradoxes between the fixed
commitments/initiations of the seven sacraments of the
Catholic church and the ever-changing, fluid realms of
intuition, pleasure and nature. EIGHT YEARS OF LIVING
ART, www.barbaracarrellas.com
SC DURKIN: SEVEN YEARS OF MUSIC, 12/8/2005-12/8/2012.
I endeavor to learn one musical instrument a year for
the next seven years. SEVEN YEARS OF MUSIC,
www.scdurkin.com
KOOSIL-JA HWANG: 12/8/2004-12/8/2011. www.dancekk.com
VERNITA N'COGNITA: 7 MORE UNTITLED YEARS OF WHEREVER
MY ART LEADS ME, 12/8/2004-12/8/2011. www.ncognita.com
ESTHER K. SMITH: THEIR HOUSE IS A MUSEUM,
12/8/2004-12/8/2011. Seven years in other people's
houses. EK SMITH MUSEUM, www.purgatorypiepress.com
KRISTA KELLY WALSH: SEVEN MIRRORS, 2006-2012. My work
is based on the Cabalist system of reading the will of
the seven planetarty spirits in the seven mirrors that
are made of seven metals and associated with the 7
days of the week, seven planets and cooresponding
themes. Each year I will make a corresponding mirror
and wear a bead of the same metal, make projects and
performances based on the themes of that metal.
SATELLITE PROJECT:
The satellite project is an ongoing congruent program
of artists/lifeists within ANOTHER 21 YEARS OF LIVING
ART.
PARTICIPANTS IN THE SATALITE PROJECT:
STEVEN REIGNS: S(T)EVEN YEARS, 1/12007-1/1/20014. I
intend to explore the connection between art, life,
and spirituality through writing practice, public
writing workshops, and publishing chapbooks. S(T)EVEN
YEARS SANCTUARY, www.stevenreigns.com
VICTORIA SINGH & KURTIS CHAMPION: SON/ART—CHAKRA COLOR
RITUALS, 7/7/04-7/7/11. Kurtis celebrates the chakra
colors of each 'year' with art projects on the 7th day
of each month.
ELIZABETH STEPHENS & ANNIE SPRINKLE: LOVE ART
LABORATORY—7 YEARS EXPLORING LOVE AS ART,
12/8/2004-12/8/2011. We make art about love. LOVE ART
LABORATORY, www.loveartlab.org
BLURB: BOOK BY LINDSAY KELLEY
BLURB FOR BOOK BY LINDSAY KELLEY
From her earliest memories of bologna being cut into unrecognizable shapes and given to her, a vegetarian at 4 years old, to the fascinating end story of her grandfather's enteral tube feeding, this fascinating tome mixes into it's "menu"; appliance lore, technological food scares, feminist raised fists, artists pot lucks and Neiman Marcus! Read it, study it, learn from it and if u have not already juiced your breakfast, try one of Kelley's receipes which food-app-tapas this important read.
Linda Mary Montano, Performance Artist
From her earliest memories of bologna being cut into unrecognizable shapes and given to her, a vegetarian at 4 years old, to the fascinating end story of her grandfather's enteral tube feeding, this fascinating tome mixes into it's "menu"; appliance lore, technological food scares, feminist raised fists, artists pot lucks and Neiman Marcus! Read it, study it, learn from it and if u have not already juiced your breakfast, try one of Kelley's receipes which food-app-tapas this important read.
Linda Mary Montano, Performance Artist
BACKSTORY OF ANOTHER 21 YEARS OF LIVING ART
BACKSTORY OF ANOTHER 21 YEARS OF LIVING ART 1998-2019
WHY I CREATED IT:
I was on a roll having completed 14 YEARS OF LIVING ART, 1984-1998; wearing one color clothes and experiencing thousands of disciplines/vows to keep me anchored in the 7 Chakras. I had also just finished a 7 year performance art teaching commitment at the University of Texas, Austin, 1992-1998, and as a cocky academeze, I believed that the next move in my process must be an imitation of my experience and so I developed what approximated a self-designed school based on my past 7 years as a "professor" and called the institution, ANOTHER 21 YEARS OF LIVING ART.
My motives were:
1. To extend my research to others.
2. To create an institution devoid of the stink of academia.
3. To allow others to be with me/near me virtually and online, not in the flesh.
4. To dissolve the teacher-student dyad and allow everyone to enjoy their own professorship.
5. To dislodge $ from the equation and offer the experience for free.
6. To make sure that nothing was demanded of the participants: no grades, no dissertations, no nothing if that was what they decided.
7. To make sure that it was fun.
WHAT HAPPENED:
As I write this, it is 2015, and the experience in non-teaching is almost over and as I look back, I am amazed at how organic it was . That is, it came into being, effulgently expanded and peacefully rescinded.
Here is how it happened; per usual, I put out a call for participants, advertising it, at Franklin Furnace. That had worked so perfectly when I had put out a call for THE SUMMER SAINT CAMP which I offered during 14 YEARS OF LIVING ART 1984-1998. Many, many came to be with me at THE ART LIFE INSTITUTE thanks to Franklin Furnace and Martha Wilson who let the art world know our needs, then communicated them to our tribe, inviting artists/lifeists to participate.
THE PARTICIPANTS:
During years 1-7, the "school" was in it's infancy. Betsea Caygill saw my request and neither she or I knew what to do, since it was a "school" that had just opened it's doors. We parted ways with blurred eyes and it took me 6 years to grow into my concept or better yet, it took time for me to let go of how to do it and let the concept have it's own life and mood and reasoning and laws. So here is the second Franklin Furnace call. It is included as written then:
WHY I CREATED IT:
I was on a roll having completed 14 YEARS OF LIVING ART, 1984-1998; wearing one color clothes and experiencing thousands of disciplines/vows to keep me anchored in the 7 Chakras. I had also just finished a 7 year performance art teaching commitment at the University of Texas, Austin, 1992-1998, and as a cocky academeze, I believed that the next move in my process must be an imitation of my experience and so I developed what approximated a self-designed school based on my past 7 years as a "professor" and called the institution, ANOTHER 21 YEARS OF LIVING ART.
My motives were:
1. To extend my research to others.
2. To create an institution devoid of the stink of academia.
3. To allow others to be with me/near me virtually and online, not in the flesh.
4. To dissolve the teacher-student dyad and allow everyone to enjoy their own professorship.
5. To dislodge $ from the equation and offer the experience for free.
6. To make sure that nothing was demanded of the participants: no grades, no dissertations, no nothing if that was what they decided.
7. To make sure that it was fun.
WHAT HAPPENED:
As I write this, it is 2015, and the experience in non-teaching is almost over and as I look back, I am amazed at how organic it was . That is, it came into being, effulgently expanded and peacefully rescinded.
Here is how it happened; per usual, I put out a call for participants, advertising it, at Franklin Furnace. That had worked so perfectly when I had put out a call for THE SUMMER SAINT CAMP which I offered during 14 YEARS OF LIVING ART 1984-1998. Many, many came to be with me at THE ART LIFE INSTITUTE thanks to Franklin Furnace and Martha Wilson who let the art world know our needs, then communicated them to our tribe, inviting artists/lifeists to participate.
THE PARTICIPANTS:
During years 1-7, the "school" was in it's infancy. Betsea Caygill saw my request and neither she or I knew what to do, since it was a "school" that had just opened it's doors. We parted ways with blurred eyes and it took me 6 years to grow into my concept or better yet, it took time for me to let go of how to do it and let the concept have it's own life and mood and reasoning and laws. So here is the second Franklin Furnace call. It is included as written then:
Linda Montano, FF Alumn, seeks a collaborator.
Do you want to collaborate with Linda M. Montano? Linda M. Montano is looking for someone who would like to perform the Second 7 years of 21 YEARS OF LIVING ART. After completing 14 YEARS OF LIVING ART, Montano gave the first seven years of 21 YEARS OF LIVING ART to Betsea Caygill and this Term will finish December 8, 2005. The next person will begin December 8,2005 and complete the performance December 8,2012.( Actually there were 12 participants in the second 7 years. Two people in the third seven years.)
What to do: you can do research on the seven sacraments, seven chakras, seven sins, the Kaballah, seven colors of the rainbow or any other intimate interest .It should be researched before the performance.
Look at www.bobsart.org to see some images of the ways I lived the 14 Years of my performance. You , of course, will do things your way. (this is now: www.lindamontano.com)
Design a safe, nurturing, help full to self and others vow that you will take for those seven years that will help your art/life.
What is expected: at the end of the performance, December 8, 2012, you will send me/email also, a seven page paper which consists of one page from a year-end report from each of the seven years.
What you get: A PERFORMANCE ART SAINT CERTIFICATE at the end of the Performance.
To apply:
Do you want to collaborate with Linda M. Montano? Linda M. Montano is looking for someone who would like to perform the Second 7 years of 21 YEARS OF LIVING ART. After completing 14 YEARS OF LIVING ART, Montano gave the first seven years of 21 YEARS OF LIVING ART to Betsea Caygill and this Term will finish December 8, 2005. The next person will begin December 8,2005 and complete the performance December 8,2012.( Actually there were 12 participants in the second 7 years. Two people in the third seven years.)
What to do: you can do research on the seven sacraments, seven chakras, seven sins, the Kaballah, seven colors of the rainbow or any other intimate interest .It should be researched before the performance.
Look at www.bobsart.org to see some images of the ways I lived the 14 Years of my performance. You , of course, will do things your way. (this is now: www.lindamontano.com)
Design a safe, nurturing, help full to self and others vow that you will take for those seven years that will help your art/life.
What is expected: at the end of the performance, December 8, 2012, you will send me/email also, a seven page paper which consists of one page from a year-end report from each of the seven years.
What you get: A PERFORMANCE ART SAINT CERTIFICATE at the end of the Performance.
To apply:
email Lindamontano@hotmail.com
_(End of announcement listed on Franklin Furnace, 2004 )___________________________________________________________________________________________________________
THE SECOND SEVEN YEARS:
It was time. The response was extraordinary. The following artists/lifeists are graduates of all 21 years:
______________________________________________________________________________________________________________
PARTICIPANT IN THE FIRST SEVEN YEARS OF ANOTHER 21 YEARS OF LIVING ART: 1998-2005: BETSEA CAYGILL: LIVING LIFE ARTFULLY.
PARTICIPANTS IN SECOND SEVEN YEARS OF ANOTHER 21 YEARS OF LIVING ART: 2005-2012
MICHELLE BUSH: SEVEN YEARS OF POSITIVE OBSESSIONS, 12/8/2005-12/8/2012. I obsess on one sentence/statement and colour in relation to the chakras producing collaborative or interventionist and performance pieces each year.
BARBARA CARRELLAS: EIGHT NEW/ANCIENT SACRAMENTS OF PLEASURE AND CHANGE, 12/8/2004-12/8/2011. I create chakra-based rituals which I celebrate on the eight natural holidays (solstices, equinoxes, etc.) that explore and celebrate the paradoxes between the fixed commitments/initiations of the seven sacraments of the Catholic church and the ever-changing, fluid realms of intuition, pleasure and nature. EIGHT YEARS OF LIVING ART, www.barbaracarrellas.com
SC DURKIN: SEVEN YEARS OF MUSIC, 12/8/2005-12/8/2012. I endeavor to learn one musical instrument a year for the next seven years. SEVEN YEARS OF MUSIC, www.scdurkin.com
KOOSIL-JA HWANG: 12/8/2004-12/8/2011. www.dancekk.com
VERNITA N'COGNITA: 7 MORE UNTITLED YEARS OF WHEREVER MY ART LEADS ME, 12/8/2004-12/8/2011. www.ncognita.com
ESTHER K. SMITH: THEIR HOUSE IS A MUSEUM, 12/8/2004-12/8/2011. Seven years in other people's houses. EK SMITH MUSEUM, www.purgatorypiepress.com
KRISTA KELLY WALSH: SEVEN MIRRORS, 2006-2012. My work is based on the Cabalist system of reading the will of the seven planetarty spirits in the seven mirrors that are made of seven metals and associated with the 7 days of the week, seven planets and cooresponding themes. Each year I will make a corresponding mirror and wear a bead of the same metal, make projects and performances based on the themes of that metal.
SATELLITE PROJECT:
The satellite project is an ongoing congruent program of artists/lifeists within ANOTHER 21 YEARS OF LIVING ART.
PARTICIPANTS IN THE SATALITE PROJECT:
STEVEN REIGNS: S(T)EVEN YEARS, 1/12007-1/1/20014. I intend to explore the connection between art, life, and spirituality through writing practice, public writing workshops, and publishing chapbooks. S(T)EVEN YEARS SANCTUARY, www.stevenreigns.com
VICTORIA SINGH & KURTIS CHAMPION: SON/ART—CHAKRA COLOR RITUALS, 7/7/04-7/7/11. Kurtis celebrates the chakra colors of each 'year' with art projects on the 7th day of each month.
ELIZABETH STEPHENS & ANNIE SPRINKLE: LOVE ART LABORATORY—7 YEARS EXPLORING LOVE AS ART, 12/8/2004-12/8/2011. We make art about love. LOVE ART LABORATORY, www.loveartlab.org
PARTICIPANTS IN THE THIRD SEVEN YEARS OF ANOTHER 21 YEARS OF LIVING ART: 2012-2019
EK SMITH; CLEANING/SINGING/DRAWING I will divide my living/working space into 7 sections. Each year, for 7 years, I will clean and organize my space, singing as I work, and documenting my experiences with an ongoing series of drawings.
PARTICIPANTS IN SECOND SEVEN YEARS OF ANOTHER 21 YEARS OF LIVING ART: 2005-2012
MICHELLE BUSH: SEVEN YEARS OF POSITIVE OBSESSIONS, 12/8/2005-12/8/2012. I obsess on one sentence/statement and colour in relation to the chakras producing collaborative or interventionist and performance pieces each year.
BARBARA CARRELLAS: EIGHT NEW/ANCIENT SACRAMENTS OF PLEASURE AND CHANGE, 12/8/2004-12/8/2011. I create chakra-based rituals which I celebrate on the eight natural holidays (solstices, equinoxes, etc.) that explore and celebrate the paradoxes between the fixed commitments/initiations of the seven sacraments of the Catholic church and the ever-changing, fluid realms of intuition, pleasure and nature. EIGHT YEARS OF LIVING ART, www.barbaracarrellas.com
SC DURKIN: SEVEN YEARS OF MUSIC, 12/8/2005-12/8/2012. I endeavor to learn one musical instrument a year for the next seven years. SEVEN YEARS OF MUSIC, www.scdurkin.com
KOOSIL-JA HWANG: 12/8/2004-12/8/2011. www.dancekk.com
VERNITA N'COGNITA: 7 MORE UNTITLED YEARS OF WHEREVER MY ART LEADS ME, 12/8/2004-12/8/2011. www.ncognita.com
ESTHER K. SMITH: THEIR HOUSE IS A MUSEUM, 12/8/2004-12/8/2011. Seven years in other people's houses. EK SMITH MUSEUM, www.purgatorypiepress.com
KRISTA KELLY WALSH: SEVEN MIRRORS, 2006-2012. My work is based on the Cabalist system of reading the will of the seven planetarty spirits in the seven mirrors that are made of seven metals and associated with the 7 days of the week, seven planets and cooresponding themes. Each year I will make a corresponding mirror and wear a bead of the same metal, make projects and performances based on the themes of that metal.
SATELLITE PROJECT:
The satellite project is an ongoing congruent program of artists/lifeists within ANOTHER 21 YEARS OF LIVING ART.
PARTICIPANTS IN THE SATALITE PROJECT:
STEVEN REIGNS: S(T)EVEN YEARS, 1/12007-1/1/20014. I intend to explore the connection between art, life, and spirituality through writing practice, public writing workshops, and publishing chapbooks. S(T)EVEN YEARS SANCTUARY, www.stevenreigns.com
VICTORIA SINGH & KURTIS CHAMPION: SON/ART—CHAKRA COLOR RITUALS, 7/7/04-7/7/11. Kurtis celebrates the chakra colors of each 'year' with art projects on the 7th day of each month.
ELIZABETH STEPHENS & ANNIE SPRINKLE: LOVE ART LABORATORY—7 YEARS EXPLORING LOVE AS ART, 12/8/2004-12/8/2011. We make art about love. LOVE ART LABORATORY, www.loveartlab.org
PARTICIPANTS IN THE THIRD SEVEN YEARS OF ANOTHER 21 YEARS OF LIVING ART: 2012-2019
EK SMITH; CLEANING/SINGING/DRAWING I will divide my living/working space into 7 sections. Each year, for 7 years, I will clean and organize my space, singing as I work, and documenting my experiences with an ongoing series of drawings.
NELLS FASTY:"Seven Years of Forgetting" is a 7 year performance, 2012-2019. I will choose a new number everyday based on trying to forget the previous day's number that had been chosen. Each year, the numerical results will be turned into a musical composition using computer software to interpret the data. ___________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________
We 12 blossomed, flourished, excelled, soared, flew high, embraced and as art-lovers, were in continual and thrice daily email contact. Sometimes phone. In retrospect, maybe the timing was more appropriate because my father had just died and I NEEDED community and virtual "students" (really co-teachers). Not sure.
Or was it because the concept was ripe? Or was it because the "school" was mirroring other low-res graduate art schools which appeal to already established artists who come together twice a year and then work apart from the institution via skype/email/internet? Or was it because the internet is giving birth to multi-level interactive virtual communities and teaching modalities and our "school" hitched itself to this cultural wave? All I know is that we rode that wave hard.
THE LAST SEVEN YEARS :
As usual, I put out the call via Franklin Furnace, but no, maybe this time Facebook. Yes, now I remember, Facebook also. Facebook my companion and friend and letter carrier and stamp and dictionary and glossary and camera and gallery and meeting place. Many applied. I chose two, wondering what was happening. Was I becoming institutional? Greedy? Self-conscious? No more fun? Judgmental? Distastefully corporate? Not good. Why do I say this?
BECAUSE:
1. I put a number limit on participants , and committed the sin of academia and exclusion. Not good.
2. I began thinking, hey, I could make money with this and even stated in the admission policy that I would charge $100 a year. Another not good .
3. I was in position of "authority" and said no to people who wanted to be in the "school" and that gave me flashbacks to sitting on committees while in academia and saying yes and no and judging peers and re-visiting that trauma was a real clue that the idea had run it's course but I was committed to ANOTHER 21 YEARS OF LIVING ART!!!! Now what could I do? There were 7 more years!
All of these gut feelings indicated that the "school" had:
1. Been born
2. Blossomed
3. Was evolving in a way I never imagined
A GREAT ENDING
There are now two artists who are completing the last seven years: EK Smith (repeating school for 14 years) and Nells Festy. We have a great time. No expectations. Are there for each other if we want. We meet on Facebook. The crescendo is kind.
WHAT I LEARNED FROM THIS ENDURANCE:
1. Giving myself time-based performances and endurances has insured my real-time existence. Reminds me to live and that I am alive.
2. We had a ball.
3. I'm BEYOND ecstatic that we went to school together and know we wont meet for a reunion because we understand that we are being primed for the robotic/virtual future, not flesh or face-time.
3. Time flies.
4. The universe is a school and we are all on the same page.
5. Facebook, Twitter, Skype, Instagram, Netflix are school enough.
6. I'm enjoying my semi-retirement.
7. I now go to school at the gym and take SENIOR STRETCH.
Linda Mary Montano , Saugerties NY, 2015
We 12 blossomed, flourished, excelled, soared, flew high, embraced and as art-lovers, were in continual and thrice daily email contact. Sometimes phone. In retrospect, maybe the timing was more appropriate because my father had just died and I NEEDED community and virtual "students" (really co-teachers). Not sure.
Or was it because the concept was ripe? Or was it because the "school" was mirroring other low-res graduate art schools which appeal to already established artists who come together twice a year and then work apart from the institution via skype/email/internet? Or was it because the internet is giving birth to multi-level interactive virtual communities and teaching modalities and our "school" hitched itself to this cultural wave? All I know is that we rode that wave hard.
THE LAST SEVEN YEARS :
As usual, I put out the call via Franklin Furnace, but no, maybe this time Facebook. Yes, now I remember, Facebook also. Facebook my companion and friend and letter carrier and stamp and dictionary and glossary and camera and gallery and meeting place. Many applied. I chose two, wondering what was happening. Was I becoming institutional? Greedy? Self-conscious? No more fun? Judgmental? Distastefully corporate? Not good. Why do I say this?
BECAUSE:
1. I put a number limit on participants , and committed the sin of academia and exclusion. Not good.
2. I began thinking, hey, I could make money with this and even stated in the admission policy that I would charge $100 a year. Another not good .
3. I was in position of "authority" and said no to people who wanted to be in the "school" and that gave me flashbacks to sitting on committees while in academia and saying yes and no and judging peers and re-visiting that trauma was a real clue that the idea had run it's course but I was committed to ANOTHER 21 YEARS OF LIVING ART!!!! Now what could I do? There were 7 more years!
All of these gut feelings indicated that the "school" had:
1. Been born
2. Blossomed
3. Was evolving in a way I never imagined
A GREAT ENDING
There are now two artists who are completing the last seven years: EK Smith (repeating school for 14 years) and Nells Festy. We have a great time. No expectations. Are there for each other if we want. We meet on Facebook. The crescendo is kind.
WHAT I LEARNED FROM THIS ENDURANCE:
1. Giving myself time-based performances and endurances has insured my real-time existence. Reminds me to live and that I am alive.
2. We had a ball.
3. I'm BEYOND ecstatic that we went to school together and know we wont meet for a reunion because we understand that we are being primed for the robotic/virtual future, not flesh or face-time.
3. Time flies.
4. The universe is a school and we are all on the same page.
5. Facebook, Twitter, Skype, Instagram, Netflix are school enough.
6. I'm enjoying my semi-retirement.
7. I now go to school at the gym and take SENIOR STRETCH.
Linda Mary Montano , Saugerties NY, 2015
LINDA MARY MONTANO&PAUL McMAHON AT GRACE EXHIBITION SPACE, BROOKLYN
LINDA AS PAUL: LINDA MARY MONTANO AND PAUL McMAHON WILL SHARE WITH YOU:
A ONE HOUR GLANDATHON IN MEMORY OF CHRIS BURDEN AND RACHEL ROSENTHAL
LINDA MARY MONTANO has been "being Paul " for many years and she is also, Mother Theresa, Hillary Clinton and Bob Dylan sometimes. For this Glandathon performance, Linda and Paul will sing thanks to the seven glands of the body and Montano will lip-synch, as Paul sings his songs . We offer this performance in memory of performance artists, Chris Burden and Rachel Rosenthal. We thank JILL & HOAK for hosting us at GRACE.
LINDA MARY MONTANAO: Montano has lived performance, endured as performance, taught performance , written about performance and videotaped as performance. All can be found for free on You Tube; at Fales Library, NYU, where her archive resides and if you don't want to go out, you can see her work on her webpage; www.lindamontano.com.
PAUL McMAHON: McMAHON is one of the legendary Bards of Woodstock, NY, where he performs; composes music; heals; officiates at his Sunday Church; gives food, care and shelter to his twin daughters and appears at Woodstock and NYC venues as THE ROCK AND ROLL THERAPIST. McMahon, a love guru, is real!
THE BULLY FAIRY-TALE
THE BULLY FAIRY-TALE
"BULLY" WITH LOVE & FUN
Once upon a time in a very ancient old village, there lived a very tiny little baby boy . He grew up to be not tiny, but full sized, like a regular person, and he always thought that life would be perfectly fine but there was a big problem: everyone picked on him. We won't mention names here. We won't mention who it was. We won't mention the number of times but it was thousands of people, thousands of times and a gazillion bad things happened to this once wee, tiny boy child.
One night, he had a dream and the teacher in that vision said to him, " Make them laugh and then they can't do deplorable things to you anymore." So, tiny as he was, he made them laugh so hard they cried at every holiday: Thanksgiving, Christmas, New Years. They laughed in every school room and in the playground. They laughed at wedding receptions and at funerals because he jumped around and sang and talked in accents. They laughed and laughed and sometimes wet their pants they laughed so hard. They laughed and forgot how to do despicable things to him. It was working, he thought! So over and over he practiced his strategy, not really realizing that he was bullying them back, but with fun!
Let's skip ahead, 50 years, and watch this once wee, tiny boy child now hiding inside a man and see how he uses his gift. Do you want to join me? Basically, he did not forget to use his secret magical power once he turned grey and tired. Let me give you an example. One fine clear day, an older cousin invited him to lunch, a delicious lunch and yet during their time together, fill in the bland, the name of the cousin, dropped negative bully bombs into the now man's soup, spreading trauma all over his tieramasu and dreadful bad words into his ice tea The daggers of insult followed them both into the parking lot and the man, once boy, said nothing, just smiled, and when he went home and felt the tsunami of pain, he said to himself, " Once upon a time, I knew what to do. I made everyone laugh/love me. Hmmmm I will have to do the same. I will have to bully her back but with fun and love, just the way I did when I was a wee, tiny one."
So he called fill in the blank on the phone and said, " Oh loving , lovely, gorgeous , beautiful, wonderful and wise cousin. What a wonderful lunch we had and how perfect it was to see you and spend time with you and be mirthful and delighted with you!" And then he heard the cousin's now nice voice say nice things and he thought to himself, " Haaaaaaa you can't hurt me now. I have Aikido-ed you with love-fun and deflected your attack of pain."
Back home, resting on his down and comfortable couch, he realized that there would be more occasions to refine his technique and use his gift of substituting flowers for poison ivy and it came, soon enough! In fact the bell tolled for him and this time his timing was off and his technique a bit stale and he fell into lawyer mode as he spoke about a misunderstanding with an elder-friend..... immediately defending himself, repeating himself, interpreting himself, making sense of his ill thought out position when a quick, "I'm sorry that I offended you when my "unconscious words," as you call them, hurt you," could have solved it all immediately. Instead, the conversation between them went on and on and heated up and over and it was NOT win-win even after they hung up the phone and he thought to himself, "I know how I can win! This elder has unfairly corrected me( of course she thought just the opposite) and won't give in. I won't give in either. Hmmmmm let me appeal to her vanity. I will make a beautiful and lovely picture of her, She loves herself so much. She will love, love and love this and it will make her love, love and love me because she is so vain, vain and more vain and arrogant. So when I send her this picture I made of her, I will WIN! She hurt me, because she said I spoke from my negative unconscious, but she is so wrong and I will make her love me! She bullied me with pain, was unreasonable, and so now, I will "bully" her with love-fun." Problem solved? Not really, because she also felt bullied/misunderstood by him but that is another story, not for now.
To conclude: The elder received his picture of her. She looked real fine in it and for a minute or two, she got so sucked into her ardent love of her own image that he painted and she thought; I look so wonderful, I look so cute, I look so sweet, I look so young, I am so adored, I look so fantastic, I am so right, he is so wrong, I am so appreciated, I am soooo loved....but then STOP! Let's play WIN-WIN here. I will not be sucked into this trap! I will let him know that I have smelled out his technique for deflecting my anger and getting me to love him, and now I know what I will do: in the future when anyone makes a painful slip into negative unconsciousness around me, or when a motorist is texting and almost hits me, or when my computer crashes because someone gave me an internet virus, or when trains are conspiracy theoried to collision, or when my body betrays me and cousins insult me, I will also practice the path of "BULLY" WITH LOVE AND FUN.
Once upon a time in a very ancient old village, there lived a very tiny little baby boy . He grew up to be not tiny, but full sized, like a regular person, and he always thought that life would be perfectly fine but there was a big problem: everyone picked on him. We won't mention names here. We won't mention who it was. We won't mention the number of times but it was thousands of people, thousands of times and a gazillion bad things happened to this once wee, tiny boy child.
One night, he had a dream and the teacher in that vision said to him, " Make them laugh and then they can't do deplorable things to you anymore." So, tiny as he was, he made them laugh so hard they cried at every holiday: Thanksgiving, Christmas, New Years. They laughed in every school room and in the playground. They laughed at wedding receptions and at funerals because he jumped around and sang and talked in accents. They laughed and laughed and sometimes wet their pants they laughed so hard. They laughed and forgot how to do despicable things to him. It was working, he thought! So over and over he practiced his strategy, not really realizing that he was bullying them back, but with fun!
Let's skip ahead, 50 years, and watch this once wee, tiny boy child now hiding inside a man and see how he uses his gift. Do you want to join me? Basically, he did not forget to use his secret magical power once he turned grey and tired. Let me give you an example. One fine clear day, an older cousin invited him to lunch, a delicious lunch and yet during their time together, fill in the bland, the name of the cousin, dropped negative bully bombs into the now man's soup, spreading trauma all over his tieramasu and dreadful bad words into his ice tea The daggers of insult followed them both into the parking lot and the man, once boy, said nothing, just smiled, and when he went home and felt the tsunami of pain, he said to himself, " Once upon a time, I knew what to do. I made everyone laugh/love me. Hmmmm I will have to do the same. I will have to bully her back but with fun and love, just the way I did when I was a wee, tiny one."
So he called fill in the blank on the phone and said, " Oh loving , lovely, gorgeous , beautiful, wonderful and wise cousin. What a wonderful lunch we had and how perfect it was to see you and spend time with you and be mirthful and delighted with you!" And then he heard the cousin's now nice voice say nice things and he thought to himself, " Haaaaaaa you can't hurt me now. I have Aikido-ed you with love-fun and deflected your attack of pain."
Back home, resting on his down and comfortable couch, he realized that there would be more occasions to refine his technique and use his gift of substituting flowers for poison ivy and it came, soon enough! In fact the bell tolled for him and this time his timing was off and his technique a bit stale and he fell into lawyer mode as he spoke about a misunderstanding with an elder-friend..... immediately defending himself, repeating himself, interpreting himself, making sense of his ill thought out position when a quick, "I'm sorry that I offended you when my "unconscious words," as you call them, hurt you," could have solved it all immediately. Instead, the conversation between them went on and on and heated up and over and it was NOT win-win even after they hung up the phone and he thought to himself, "I know how I can win! This elder has unfairly corrected me( of course she thought just the opposite) and won't give in. I won't give in either. Hmmmmm let me appeal to her vanity. I will make a beautiful and lovely picture of her, She loves herself so much. She will love, love and love this and it will make her love, love and love me because she is so vain, vain and more vain and arrogant. So when I send her this picture I made of her, I will WIN! She hurt me, because she said I spoke from my negative unconscious, but she is so wrong and I will make her love me! She bullied me with pain, was unreasonable, and so now, I will "bully" her with love-fun." Problem solved? Not really, because she also felt bullied/misunderstood by him but that is another story, not for now.
To conclude: The elder received his picture of her. She looked real fine in it and for a minute or two, she got so sucked into her ardent love of her own image that he painted and she thought; I look so wonderful, I look so cute, I look so sweet, I look so young, I am so adored, I look so fantastic, I am so right, he is so wrong, I am so appreciated, I am soooo loved....but then STOP! Let's play WIN-WIN here. I will not be sucked into this trap! I will let him know that I have smelled out his technique for deflecting my anger and getting me to love him, and now I know what I will do: in the future when anyone makes a painful slip into negative unconsciousness around me, or when a motorist is texting and almost hits me, or when my computer crashes because someone gave me an internet virus, or when trains are conspiracy theoried to collision, or when my body betrays me and cousins insult me, I will also practice the path of "BULLY" WITH LOVE AND FUN.
And from that day forward, all was OK and everyone practiced the "BULLY" WITH LOVE AND FUN TECHNIQUE and became forever young and beautiful and wise and talented and lived happily ever after in the land of EVERLASTING PLAY.
Linda Mary Montano
Justice University, 2015
MOTHER'S LOVE: FOR BONNIE AND DENISE
FOR BONNIE AND DENISE ON MOTHER'S DAY
CIRCLE OF MOTHER LOVE
WE CIRCLE
WE FEEL
WE LOVE
WE ARE
WE POOP
CIRCLE OF MOTHER LOVE
WE CIRCLE
WE FEEL
WE LOVE
WE ARE
WE POOP
THE SEVEN GLANDS: FOR A PUBLICATION
THE SEVEN GLANDS: FOR A PUBLICATION
WE ALLLLLLLLLLLL ARE BORN WITH SEVEN GLANDS
O PITUITARY
O PINEAL
O THYROID
O THYMUS
O ADRENALS
O PANCREAS
O OVARIES / TESTES
Linda Mary Montano 2015
WE ALLLLLLLLLLLL ARE BORN WITH SEVEN GLANDS
O PITUITARY
O PINEAL
O THYROID
O THYMUS
O ADRENALS
O PANCREAS
O OVARIES / TESTES
Linda Mary Montano 2015
MY RESPONSE TO LINDA WEINTRAUB AT FALES LAUNCH: ABOUT DAD ART
LINDA WEINTRAUB: DAD ART, FALES LIBRARY, NYU, APRIL 14,2015: MY RESPONSE
With thanks to Marvin Taylor, Director of NYU-Fales Library and Special Collections & to Lisa Darms, Senior Archivist, on April 14, 2015, my archive was launched. It was a glorious event which included a panel of colleague-artists: Kathy Brew, Linda Weintraub, virtual Martha Wilson (via Britta Wheeler as Montano & Miss Toni Silver as Wilson) and Karen Finley. Each panelist talked about my work and the night concluded with my video-performance as Bob Dylan. Please go to Fales Library-Internet site if you wish to download the entire program/see the panelists presentations, and to also research the listing of all of the papers in my archive which Emily King, graduate assistant, has brilliantly catalogued.
The purpose of this paper, is to talk about panelist Linda Weintraub's description of her experience when she visited me while I "performed" DAD ART, a 7 year interaction with my father, Henry Montano. Her presentation at Fales was actually instructive and new for me probably because I had not allowed my time with my father to become public for many years since I consider it a ritual of mourning and not "art." The way Linda explained it, and her experience of being "part" of it, was extremely moving. She described DAD ART as "PRAYER."
Months before the panel, I had sent emails to Linda, telling her that being with my father for those 7 years was: LIFE-LIFE. And LIFE-ART. And not ART-ART or ART-LIFE. We talked about ART-ART as commodity and DAD ART as mourning. That night, at the panel, I cried as she sensitively told DAD ART stories and wove into her presentation: theory and practice, life and art and even the neurobiology of my father's post-hemorrhagic stroke which gave birth to his ability to make fabulous, abstact-Zen-like expressionist paintings for over an hour a day, every day, in slow motion and with impeccably focused attention. His brush would suspend over the paper, then incrementally, slowly, the color would emerge. Everyone could see that my Dad, the musician, not the visual artist, used/resurrected his deep need to express beauty, despite his injuries-challenges. Losing everything, he became everything.
KT SHORB VORTEX VIDEO COMPILATION
KT SHORB: VIDEO FROM VORTEX PERFORMANCE;
LINDA MARY MONTANO: SINGING THE PSALMS FOR 7 HOURS A DAY FOR 7 DAYS AS MOTHER THERESA
https://drive.google.com/file/d/0B_ebxFhfyDZpQ18wQ09sWVptcTQ/view?usp=sharing
LINDA MARY MONTANO: SINGING THE PSALMS FOR 7 HOURS A DAY FOR 7 DAYS AS MOTHER THERESA
https://drive.google.com/file/d/0B_ebxFhfyDZpQ18wQ09sWVptcTQ/view?usp=sharing
RESUME FOR COLLEGE OF NEW ROCHELLE BOOKLET
RESUME USED AT THE COLLEGE OF NEW ROCHELL REUNION BOOKLET
Linda Mary Montano, 9 John St, Saugerties NY 12477, lindamontano@Hotmail.com. Still performing but now not as imaginary selves(Lamar Breton, Dr Jane Gooding etc) but as real others: Mother Theresa, Bob Dylan, Linda Ronstadt and a Woodstock musician, Paul McMahon. I owe it all to Mother Mary Jane Robertshaw, our art professor at CNR, who turned me loose and gave me the keys to freedom: art. I will always be in gratitude to her and her ability to humorously nurture and inspire love for the creative process. My work is free for all, so to speak: tons of videos on you tube (check out NURSE, NIURSE by Linda Mary Montano) and 135 boxes of "papers" just became available for research/perusal at Fales Library NYU. I am now learning to perform as a LIFEIST.
Linda Mary Montano, 9 John St, Saugerties NY 12477, lindamontano@Hotmail.com. Still performing but now not as imaginary selves(Lamar Breton, Dr Jane Gooding etc) but as real others: Mother Theresa, Bob Dylan, Linda Ronstadt and a Woodstock musician, Paul McMahon. I owe it all to Mother Mary Jane Robertshaw, our art professor at CNR, who turned me loose and gave me the keys to freedom: art. I will always be in gratitude to her and her ability to humorously nurture and inspire love for the creative process. My work is free for all, so to speak: tons of videos on you tube (check out NURSE, NIURSE by Linda Mary Montano) and 135 boxes of "papers" just became available for research/perusal at Fales Library NYU. I am now learning to perform as a LIFEIST.
FRANKLIN FURNACE POST FIOR ANOTHER 21 YEARS OF LIVING ART: SECOND 7 YEARS.
1. Linda Montano, FF Alumn, seeks collaborator for ANOTHER 21 YEARS OF LIVING ART
Do you want to collaborate with Linda M. Montano? Linda M. Montano is looking for someone who would like to perform the Second 7 years of 21 years of living art. After completing 14 years of Living art, Montano gave the next seven years to Betsea Caygill and this Term will finish December 8,2005. The next person will begin December 8,2005 and complete the performance December 8,2012.
What to do: research on the seven sacraments, seven chakras, seven sins, the Kaballah, seven colors of the rainbow or any other intimate interest should Be researched before the performance.
Look at www.bobsart.org(non operative 2015) to see some images of the ways I lived the 14 Years of my performance. you , of course, will do things your way.
Design a safe, nurturing, help full to self and others vow that you will take for those seven years that will help your art/life.
What is expected: at the end of the performance, December 8, 2012, you will send me/email also, a seven page paper which consists of one page year end reports from each of the seven years.
What you get: a performance art saint certificate at the end of the Performance.
To apply: email
Lindamontano@hotmail.com
For performances, art/life counseling, teaching, videos:
Linda M. Montano
The art/life institute
185 abeel st
Kingston , n.y. 12401
845-338-2813
www.vdb.org
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)
