Michael Chaves - The Conjuring. Last Rites (2025)

Now, this one is a really funny one. A really good mixture of senile Christian fundamentalism and good old horror slapstick that scares maybe demonic gold hamsters. The more appropriate title would have been rather: 

The Conjuring. Yikes, my mirror is possessed.

The good thing first: this film is only four hours long. Or at least it feels like this.  A good length for little a cinematic nap. Don't be afraid to miss something. This film was conceived for wooden posts. And have the handkerchiefs ready. The chief excorcists are retiring. But relax: there is a super cute couple ready to take over. The nearly stillborn daughter and now a supergirl medium and her Ex-cop husband are there to inherit mummy and daddy's business. Thanks heaven, that we still have the Holy christian family.

When will The Conjuring. The Revenge of the demonic Tomatoes be released. The Idea: maybe this time tomatos are possessed and they are about to infiltrate the Burger and French Fries Industry. Where is the Holy Mustard to save us?

And of course everything is based on true storys.

 

Thoughts of the Day #31/2011: Robert Smithson (2)

Robert Smithson (1938-1973)

(copyright owners please read: p.s. at the bottom of this post, thank you)

Dear Readers,

today it is time again for a few thoughts by one of the greatest american artists of all times: Robert Smithson. This time I have chosen a few passages about mirrors  (for the connection of HNW and mirrors, see my review ):

Why do mirrors display a conspiracy of muteness concerning their very existence ? When does a displacement become a misplacement ? Those are forbidding questions that place comprehension in a predicament. The questions the mirrors ask always fall short of answers. Mirrors thrive on surds, and generate incapacity. Reflections fall onto the mirrors without logic, and in so doing invalidate every rational assertion. Inexpressible limits are on the other side of incidents, and they will never be grasped.

*******

The mirror itself is not subject to duration, because it is an ongoing abstraction that is always available and timeless. The reflections, on the other hand, are fleeting instances that evade measure. Space is the remains, or corpse, of time, it has dimensions. "Objects" are "sham space", the excrement of thought and language.

*******

Only when art is fragmented, discontinuous and incomplete can we know about that vacant eternity that excludes objects and determined meanings. The mirror and the transparent glass brings us to those designations that remain forever abolished in the colorless infinities of a static perception.

*******

The artificial ingenuity of time allows no return to nature. Mirrors in time are blind, while transparent glass picks up reflections in this spaceless region of inverse symmetry and shifting perspectives - the mirror reflects the blank surface in the suburbs of the mind. There is nothing to "understand" about such a region except the consciousness that makes understanding impossible.

*******

A mirror looking for its reflection but never quite finding it. 

*******

Timelessness is found in lapsed moments of perception, in the common pause that breaks apart into a sandstorm of pauses.

- Robert Smithson

P.S. All texts by Smithson are taken from the volume: Robert Smithson, Slideworks. Carlo Fura 1997.

Thoughts of the day #5/2011: Robert Smithson (1)

Robert Smithson (1938-1973)

(copyright owners please read: p.s. at the bottom of this post, thank you)

This is the first posting of the thoughts from one of the greatest american artists: Robert Smithson. I post these thoughts to show how wide the perspective of this blog is and will be. Since we always perceive with all our senses, I'll try to give here some examples to interrelate all artforms, thinking, poetry and music to deepen the possibilities of our experience with art, music, philosophy and literature. Maybe listening is not listening, thinking is not thinking , seeing is not seeing, and tasting not tasting.

Perception is more likely a synergetic effect of all your senses. This very easy to experience, put on your your favorite HNW-record and see (!) what happens. Robert Smithson writes about art:

"Art works out the inexplicable. Contrary to affirmations of nature, art is inclined to semblance and masks, it flourishes on discrepancy. It sustains itself not on differentiation, but on dedifferentiation, not on creation but on decreation, not on nature but denaturalization, etc. Judgements and opinions in the area of art are doubtful murmurs in mental mud"

Robert Smithson,

Mirror Displacement on a Compost Heap 1969

(Düsseldorf, Germany)

(I have made the photo myself from the book "Slideworks" (Carlo Frua 1997, p. 124))

"Unity is a natural idea, that belongs more to life (also called reality) and not to the terrible dualities of great art. Unity has its origin in chaos, while duality has its origin in the cosmic. And every cosmic system is a false one, that at time slips into the chaos of nature. This falseness must be protected from the murky waters of life's truth. Nothing is more corruptible than truth"

Thanks for reading my blog!

Have a nice day!

Stay tuned and expect the unexpected!

P.S. Dear copyright owners of this picture, please contact me, if you don't want to see your picture above in this context! Your picture will of course be instantly removed! Thank you. Smithson's thoughts are taken from the book "Slideworks"(Carlo Frua Italy 1997)