Coocoo!
Coocoo!
Only mountain and forest
and a subtle sensation of joy
Ausson, France / April 2012
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Pressed in form by what is being remembered as ‘the other’,
the cracking of the pot is inevitable.
Ausson, France / April 2012
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They say that today is my birthday.
They say that a couple of years ago I have been born.
Everybody says that.
Noone I met so far would deny that they have been born.
Some celebrate their birthday, some don’t.
But all seem to follow this singular lifeline.
Why?
Because they say.
Ausson, France / March 2012
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Glandage, France / February 2012
Gats, France / February 2012
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before words
before time
a newborn
Berlin, Germany, January 2012
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When it dawns on you that there is absolutely nothing wrong with you just as you are
when it dawns on you that the human habit to attach to concepts and ideas is completely absurd and causes major suffering
you will know where to find me
you will have found me
and you and I will disappear
and so will all rivers and mountains and earthquakes and soft and sunny mornings
The Natural Circus -gathering- / Lars Schmidt Michael Metzler David Rothenberg / Berlin / Oct 2011
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The Natural Circus / Lars Schmidt - a gathering - feat. David Rothenberg + Michael Metzler
Lars Schmidt is a poet, multidisciplinary artist, and dancer at the margins of art, (deep) ecological thinking and practical know-how for sustainable living.
He is the initiator and facilitator of processes/projects like The Natural Circus, Art, Ecology & Education or Cultural Revolutionaries2009.
Having explored the creative process in many different art forms and countries, and with his understanding as permaculture designer, he introduces and facilitates ways of thought and expression that work with, rather than against natural dynamics. www.passiveactivism.net
David Rothenberg is a well of creativiy. Next to making music with whales, birds or musicians like Glen Velez, he is a recording artist of the ECM label.
David is also a philosopher-naturalist and the author of numerous books including ‘Why birds sing’ and ‘Thousand miles song’. www.davidrothenberg.net www.thousandmilesong.com
We are beyond meeting you and I
We will never meet
I am what is now
And so are you
You are what is now
Not what you see
Not what you experience
Not what you meet
But what is
Call it love, call it life, call it miracle
Call it what you will
It will be hiding in the very texture of your words
I will be hiding in the very texture of your words
Berlin, Germany, September 2011
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There is no-thing that is not The Natural Circus
Berlin, Germany, September 2011
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Mehring/Mosel, Germany, September 2011
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la Méditerranée, France, September 2011
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‘I’ is unthinkable and ultimately cannot be stated
It is as much the wind that moves the leaf of clover, as it is the sensation of me as an individual
Toulouse, France, August 2011
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Life happens
Who wants it this or that way?
Who looses freedom?
Are you really a person, living in a country?
Toulouse, France, August 2011
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Thunder
Rain river rocks
Flireflies, teaching impermanence
Toulouse, France, August 2011
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And you, in your state of awe, do you call beauty by its name?
And you, in your state of awe, is not beauty all there is?
Toulouse, France, August 2011
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Music dance poetry the land
rest work dance cook work
dance music poetry people
solitude nature solitude people
poetry the land wilderness company
Wasn’t it all connected once, embedded in human experience?
Owning a memory is a way
of splitting up wholeness
If there is the pleasure of meeting
there must be the pain of alienation
To say: This happens to me,
is a way of splitting up wholeness
Buenos Aires / Argentina, May 2011
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If you want to travel, travel
if you want to sit still, sit still
if you want to dream, dream
essencially it makes no difference
Buenos Aires / Argentina, May 2011
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Out of which corner time appears?
There were answers
and they disappeared
and left and leave me without name
without direction
and leave me where I am
Buenos Aires / Argentina, April 2011
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Buenos Aires / Argentina
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A tree with its roots in the air
How does it feed itself?
- Is this not part of the story?
Buenos Aires / Argentina, April 2011
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Montevideo / Uruguay, April 2011
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Atlantic / Uruguay, April 2011
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A little cricket
It appears here, it appears there
Buenos Aires / Argentina, March2011
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Buenos Aires / Argentina, March 2011
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People are not people, trees are not trees
I was musing about a proposal for an eco-art residency, and have to say, that if I speak from my heart, I do not see how I will ever be eligible to be supported by any sort of art funding.
The ‘the art of living’ is not being funded, and yet, the art of living is what it is all about for me.
Having explored various areas of artistic expression and engagement, this is what it all comes down to.
It is the ultimate harbour of all quests or attempts.
That does not mean that there are no other activities (artistic or not), it just means that these activities finally will be looked at in a different light.
What am I talking about?
Let’s have a look.
What is the interest of art?
Specifically art that now deals with environmental issues?
What is the interest of environmental activism?
To change things? To influence (the public mind, politicians, the climate…)? To raise awareness? To ‘heal the earth’? To express ourselves? To achieve something of some sort?…
However: does this all not change continuously?
The goals, the values, our state of mind, our state of health, the weather…
Is this all not dependend on the way we perceive things?
Are our environmental problems (in fact: all our problems) not the result of perceiving us separate from nature, separate from life, with the power to influence her or it in the way we choose and decide?
And, if we look closely, is this really possible?
Are we ourselves not objects of continuous change, completely interdependent and dependend on the influences we experience(d)?
What is the difference between ourselves and nature?
What is the difference between ourselves and life?
Before changing the world and its problems, should we not try to understand who we really are?
Thus, would not the primary action of dealing with any environmental problem (any problem) be, to enquire within - and come to the insight that we are not who we think we are.
But that, in fact, we ARE nature, inseparable from its flow and interactions and feedbacks.
And that we are not living, but that we are life itself.
Thus, there are no separate entities, there is only a totality.
If there is only a totality, who is changing and influencing what and to what outcome?
If everything we perceive is temporary and constantly changing, phenomenal appearance (including ‘our’ thoughts and states of mind…), if everything is in constant flow, how can there be an ‘other’? How can there be an independent choice?
Is the ‘other’, the ‘environment’ not a concept that the mind created and that is agreed upon?
What would it mean if we are not who we think we are? If the world is not what we think it is?
Thus, the key question is: Who am I? Who or what is this “I” that perceives thoughts, emotions, sensations, world, any-thing…?
To me, this investigation is a research worth undertaking.
Actually, in my book, it is the only research really worth undertaking.
It contains all other research.
So why not propose this in the context of an art residency?
Where would be space for this in our universities?
The thing is, that in our society there always has to be an outcome, something to be shown, to be presented, research has to come up with papers for conferences, art has to come up with something that can be consumed in one way or the other. If this is not given, why support it, why pay for it?
And yet there is the inspiration for this research that cannot promise to produce anything, it is not sure that anything can be shown or presented, nor is there any acknowledgement or profit in sight. Not even a change.
There is a dominant urge for enquiry pointing directly at this ‘I’ that constantly tries to create circumstances to accomodate itself, that is constantly busy to keep things going, to find things out, to learn new stuff, to come up with new explanations and concepts, this ‘I’ that stays when you say ‘I’ and shut up afterwards. Who is this? Not the explanation - the object, but the subject, the ‘I’.
What is this? Where is it coming from?
There is the sensation that this is the only important thing to engage in.
Then you realize that this is a research that dissolves in itself. It is a research that is self-sufficient.
It’ll serve you nothing, if you want your art to be instrumental, or if anybody else wants your art to be instrumental. (However, it is likely to revolutionize the concept of ‘your art’…)
It’ll serve you nothing if you want anything from it, or anything with it.
Obviously, this research is not even a choice. It is inevitable. If the interest for it arises, it takes care of itself.
So why bother about art residencies or research posts at universities after all.
This is about being who I am, being who we are: nothing in particular, one with the moment that is being perceived, Being itself.
There is no environmental art.
There is no art of any kind.
There is no action with intention.
There is noone who ‘has a life’.
There is no individual self that could be expressing itself.
All expression is self-expression.
There is nothing else.
You are not who you think you are.
People are not people.
Trees are not trees.
There is no environment to be changed or fixed,
there is only the call to let the appropriate action emerge.
Every action with intension is the result of misperception.
It is coming from the mind that identifies itself with an entity, a certain image, a certain concept.
The original state of mind is pure.
It is the attachment to thoughts and concepts, to emotions and sensation, the identification with them that blurrs it.
And where are greed, search for profit, destruction, injustice come into the picture? One might ask. Is this all not happening?
What about the pain I feel witnessing all that, or maybe even being a victim of aggression and exploitation myself?
Again: All this results out of the identification of the perceiver with the perceived.
There is only pain being felt, there is only injustice being perceived.
There is no individual to which this is happening.
Let it happen.
Find out who you are.
Once this is realized in its profundity, it not only becomes clear that the world is sacred and complete and cannot be changed, but also that there is no person that could act.
As a wise man once put it: Events happen, deeds are being done, but there is noone who executes them.
This realization IS peace, it means residing in the completeness.
It becomes clear that neither peace nor sustainability are states that can be achieved or reached.
Even the mal-perception, the identification with the perceived is being realized as part of the everchanging manifestation of the dance of life, -free of judgement, free of identification and attachment.
“I” is not personal. Nothing is personal.
Everything just is as it is.
Look, and find out that you cannot be named, that you cannot be found.
Still then: Where am I coming from?
What is my source?
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Who would be able to name the unperceivable, yet everpresent?
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There was this guy that once stated that: The universe creates itself out of nothing.
Realize the present tense? Get the scope?
Before engaging in all the efforts to change your life (once more), you can start here, having a close look at the “I” that is perceiving all this.
Realizing that all that is being perceived is changing continuously.
While staying who you are: The unnamable, unperceivable, timeless source of every-thing.
There will be no expectations.
There will be no interference with ‘The Natural Circus’, with the dance of life.
It will be as it will be, everchanging, ever new.
Deeds will be done, actions will happen.
And yet, nothing ever happens, noone will act.
There is no person.
There is only what is. Complete, one, now.
That is all. That is love. That is you.
The Natural Circus on the road / Argentina, Jan-March 2011
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Witnessed abundance of nature
lush, fertile valleys
fishes in cristal rivers
moaning young cows and the smell of burned hair
brandmarks and bloody hands
testicles in a plastic bowl
Patagonia, Argentina / February 2011
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Patagonia / Argentina, February 2011
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Buenos Aires / Argentina, January 2011
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What if the ideal size of a state would be that of a village?
The bus has been sold
A project to share knowledge on sustainable, simple living and to provide food and shelter has been formulated
A yurte has been build
Friends have been found
A place to put the shelter, to create a garden, to graze the animals has been offered
Local authorities did not approve of the project
Thus, the right to self-sustenance is being refused
Not enough attachment to the area
not enough faith in the surrounding society, to go for civil disobedience
Acknowledging the conventions of the surrounding culture
Do you know when the next raindrop will fall off the doorframe?
‘Owning land’ - a commonly accepted concept that the earth is private property of human beings
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Principles of Earth Democracy
…4. All beings have a natural right to sustenance. All members of the earth community, including all humans, have the right to sustenance — to food and water, to a safe and clean habitat, to security of ecological space. Resources vital to sustenance must stay in the commons. The right to sustenance is a natural right because it is the right to life. These rights are not given by states or corporations, nor can they be extinguished by state or corporate action. No state or corporation has the right to erode or undermine these natural rights or enclose the commons that sustain life.
Excerpt from
Earth Democracy : Justice, Sustainability, and Peace
By Vandana Shiva
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In the Okanagan, our understanding of the land is that it’s not just that we’re part of the land, it’s not just that we’re part of the vast system that operates the land, but that the land is us. In our language, the word for our bodies contains the word for land, so when I say that word, it means that not only is my ability to think and to dream present in that word but the last part of that word also means ‘the land’.
Jeanette Armstrong
found in ‘Original Instructions - Indigenous Teachings for a Sustainable Future’, edited by Melissa K. Nelson
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Does the land belong to you, or do you belong to the land?
What a pleasure to wake up next to a field or the woods!
What a pleasure to have your meals outside,
to be with wind, animals, clouds, stars…
July 2010
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Isn’t that ‘thing’ I call cloud really a process, a constant transformation?
Isn’t that ‘thing’ we call human being really the same as a cloud?
Is not everything we name, sense, think, experience - even the earth herself, even the universe, just as this body, just as this thought -
not the same as a cloud?
When does all appear? Where does all appear?
What if there would be no difference between ‘my life’ and ‘this field’?
Am I not being moved? Do I breathe willingly? Who is this ‘I’ that claims to be acting?
