An altar to Artaud
Artaud, the man who could not think his thoughts, the man that snatches thought from nothingness, that builds his work with bones, fingernails, screams, curses and blessings in a voodoo writing, writing spat from his anatomy, from his solar plexus, this man condemned to strings of psychiatric neologisms which he fights to the death from his fragmented reality, the man impaled by fifty electroshocks without anaesthetics, of life punctuated by suffering, this man would have attained last year one hundred years of suffering. One hundred years of impaled solitude.
Artaud, who through his Theatre of Cruelty proposes a theatre that would inflame us, that would shake us like an unforgettable soul therapy, whose majority of plays are impossible to perform, is undoubtedly one of the most influential figures of modern theatre and contemporary thought, as well as a kind of precursor to the spirit of punk, the music of cruelty. Actor, writer, artist, theoretician but above all a poet, Artaud becomes the genius martyr that borders with the mystic in (e/scatological) intensity: visions, suffering, death, paranoia, ecstasy and adrenaline shots, his final words are bombs and viruses.
The life of Artaud constitutes a life search for purer and truer forms of expression. In search of the virtuality of the soul, of the work naked from narrative crutches, structures, preconceptions, challenging all forms of conventional and static expression, Artaud smashes everything, leaving us a few nails, a pure howl, a ritual dance with nothingness from which explodes the chaos of the conscience, nothingness, the monster that we keep at a distance.
Artaud moves into the space of fear, pokes where it hurts the most, he has nothing to lose, he has lost everything. In all creations, there is the possibility of abortion. Artaud engages in friendship with the monster of Frankenstein, dialogues, discusses, dances with him, accepts the beast without expectations of transformation: the beast is beautiful because it accepts itself in its ugliness. The poet empties concepts from their content and casts a spell on them so they can transmit all their contradictions simultaneously.
In his reality, Artaud´s thoughts are being stolen, a conspiracy of energies exists against him, he is being prosecuted like a jew, a witch, or a nigger. Forces are pushing him towards the psychiatric wards where he will spend nine years of his life, he is a genius and his contemporaries want to throw him into a well of silence. Artaud leaves his skin fighting against the forces besieging him. Little can a body do against the forces of dissolution.
The "Cahiers de Rodez", written during his incarceration at the loony-bin of Rodez, testify to the savage energy of a human being that has destroyed himself fighting against these forces, has died and resurrected to leave us the debris, the bones, the dust and above all a testimony that is an homage to both the resistance and the creative and destructive will of humanity.
His anxious writing rips the page, going beyond, opens a crack on the world's screen, on the hole of appearances and jumps into the empty in order to come back. Artaud, the cracked man, does not evade his cracks but exhibits them in their totality, licks his cracks of wounded dog, removes the stitches, starts barking, starts bleeding and the rose that he brings from his dream, which is a nightmare, is a real rose.
Last year was the centenary of Artaud´s birth (4th September 1896). Homages, conferences, ex-votos from the theatre, from the cinema, were offered. Amongst others, "My Life and Times with Antonin Artaud" by Gérard Mordillat. Based on the diary of Jaques Prévert, a tuburculous, unknown, rejected poet who would swap quantities of laudanum so that Artaud, from his privileged room at the asylum, would read his poems in return and who Artaud would push towards deliberate suffering for the sake of a total work of art, this is a sanitised film against which Artaud would have probably howled invectives.
In his reality, Artaud´s thoughts are being stolen, a conspiracy of energies exists against him, he is being prosecuted like a jew, a witch, or a nigger. Forces are pushing him towards the psychiatric wards where he will spend nine years of his life, he is a genius and his contemporaries want to throw him into a well of silence. Artaud leaves his skin fighting against the forces besieging him. Little can a body do against the forces of dissolution.
The "Cahiers de Rodez", written during his incarceration at the loony-bin of Rodez, testify to the savage energy of a human being that has destroyed himself fighting against these forces, has died and resurrected to leave us the debris, the bones, the dust and above all a testimony that is an homage to both the resistance and the creative and destructive will of humanity.
His anxious writing rips the page, going beyond, opens a crack on the world's screen, on the hole of appearances and jumps into the empty in order to come back. Artaud, the cracked man, does not evade his cracks but exhibits them in their totality, licks his cracks of wounded dog, removes the stitches, starts barking, starts bleeding and the rose that he brings from his dream, which is a nightmare, is a real rose.
Last year was the centenary of Artaud´s birth (4th September 1896). Homages, conferences, ex-votos from the theatre, from the cinema, were offered. Amongst others, "My Life and Times with Antonin Artaud" by Gérard Mordillat. Based on the diary of Jaques Prévert, a tuburculous, unknown, rejected poet who would swap quantities of laudanum so that Artaud, from his privileged room at the asylum, would read his poems in return and who Artaud would push towards deliberate suffering for the sake of a total work of art, this is a sanitised film against which Artaud would have probably howled invectives.
Laughing before the tragic can save our life. In fact laughter always saves us a bit. But there are tragic situations where one loses all sense of humour. There are situations that are not even tragic where all sense of humour is lost. If we are alive the tragic will impale us. Black humour is born from the absolute loss of sense of humour and its posterior recuperation. Recuperation that has gone through despair. In the "Cahiers de Rodez", before the continued presence of suffering, Artaud invents his daughters of the heart, complete beings with whom he fulfils the virtuality of his soul from love to sadism: his daughters of the heart are the children of the black humour born from despair. Artaud´s black humour, disseminated throughout his work, saves his life.
Artaud´s body dies in 1948 from a chloral overdose. His complete works comprehend twenty-two volumes, amongst which he leaves us "The Theatre and its Double", one of the most beautiful and sharp texts ever to be written about theatre, "Van Gogh Suicided by Society" where he articulates his idea on madness as an instrument of exclusion defined by language, the mentioned Cahiers, but above all, he leaves us with both a life and work lived as itinerary in search of the poetic manifestation of hypnotic piercing beauty.
Let´s conjure up from this page an altar to Artaud together with his daughters of the heart, Caterine, Ana, Yvonne, Cecile, Neneka and let´s place before his tomb of dejection: opium, laudanum, chloral, cigarettes, words, intensities, bones and nails.
1996 "Un Altar a Artaud", ICA, Ajoblanco, September.