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The history of the twentieth century has ben marked all along by some
great excesses: genocides, the destruction of nature, the creation of
atomic energy, an exceptional growth in life expectancy with its corresponding
-and dangerous- population growth...And along with these things, among
others, the excesses of art and artists: the avant-garde and neo-avant-garde
movements which, against all logic, have manged to prosper and bring
their ideas across to society. The great processes of dematerialisation-abstraction,
and their opposites, concretion-materialisation, which have given way
to the coneptualisation of aesthetic components, and the materialisation
of the concepts., with liberty serving as the ultimate drug. The result
of this has been the conquest of an amplified artistic field, in which
the different art forms (from visual poetry to performance art, and
including polypoetry and spoken music, installation and body-art and
several impossible projects) have developed new ways of seeing, hearing,
thinking and analysing... This revolution (the most effective and least
tragic of the century) is far from over. In fact, the work of those
men and women who were at the centre of the artistic revolutions of
the twenties and sixties, have freed us from radicalism and from the
avant-garde. The avant-garde is no longer a strategy of destruction-recreation.
The aesthetic liberation of the sixties was complemented by the ethical
liberation of the eighties. Art, as a system of systems cannot be subjected
to an unmovable system of values. The need to create new codes has become
a common good. 150 years after Lauteamont stated that poetry should
be made by everyone, this utopia has become a possibility within the
reach of any art form. We are entering a new era in which the sense
of history shall change. Within this situation, as we face the twenty-first
century, poetry is to carry the burden of a great resposibility, as
it has in the most crucial moments of the present century. Its defense
of creativity as opposed to norms, authorities and other mechanisms
of the trnscendent powers, makes it the natural terrain of the aesthetic
experiences that acieve a true sense of liberty without mediation.
Excess
If, as a whole, the story of mankind can be seen as a long series of
excesses and misdeeds, the present century, now nearing its end, is
fully deserving of a high place in the list of wanton deeds. It may
be that the mere accumulation of history or technological advance have
given rise to genocides committed in a systematic way (one would say
in a civilized way though the word is incompatible with cruelty); to
the destruction of nature as part of the ideology of progress; to the
creation -and use- of atomic energy, and biological and chemical weapons...
At the same time, over the last one hundred years we have experienced
the most exceptional and permanent rise in life expectancy and quality
ever since mankind was born, with a corresponding- and dangerous- rise
in the world population... If one also mentions the social, ideological,
scientific, etc. changes..., the catalogue of excesses will be truly
awesome.
This is particularly so if one takes into account -because of its amplitude,
depth and consequences- a new aspect: the excesses of art in comparison
with those in previous centuries. Continuing postulates and ideas initiated
the previous century, taking some other, older ideas (some of them as
old as a thousand years), the avant-garde movements of the first two
decades of this century materialised a revolutionary change in the areas
of artistic forms, the very concept of culture, the basic ideas of the
relationship between the individual and society, etc. A small group
of men and women, as poorly funded as they were lacking in social support,
decided to face the establishment, the ideas that had predominated over
the last four hundred years, all in the name of utopias which, however
inane, primitive, even childish, were possessed with energy. Against
all expectations, not only did they not disappear without a trace, but
actaully managed to achieve a certain social attention, and remained
active up to the thirties, exercising a considerable influence in all
art forms. What is more: the movement that was invented on the basis
of the most utilitarian findings of these avant-garde movements (Surrealism)
managed to make its transcendent version exercise a great influence
within all areas of European and American culture for decades and extending
to all social levels.
The Neo-Avant-Garde
However, it was not until the sixties that the most truly revolutionary
postulates of the first avant-garde movements managed to find their
fullest expression. Contrary to what appears in official histories,
the so-called neo-avant-garde movements of the sixties were not merely
epigonal or mere prolongations of something that already existed. The
work done by Expressionism, Futurism, Cubism, Dadaism, etc. was revolutionary,
that is to say, fundamentally destructive. On a wider scale, it subverted
the codes that had been dominant until then. Only a few figures went
beyond mere destruction and started to elaborate new new codes with
a universal value.. Such is the case of Russolo, Tzara, Mondrian, Van
Doesburg, etc... Other artists, whose importance was highly relative
within such movements, went even further and tried to find an approximation
between art and life.. Such is the case of Duchamp and Schwitters.
Following World War ll, new movemnts and groups and solitary artists
developed the most productive pathways of these initial avant-garde
movements: Lettrisme, Musique Concrète, Concrète Poetry,
Action Painting, etc... The sixties saw a take-over of those areas that
had merely been hinted at by the pioneers. With an experiental orientation
and an almost fundamentalist ethics, several generations of artists
developed new aesthetic forms, which clearly implied a new concept of
aesthetics, their place in society, their components, their meaning...
It can be said that if the first artistic avant-garde movements discovered
a new world, and the post-war movements initiated its exploration, the
neo-avant-gardes of the sixties completed the maps, occupied the lands
and founded a new form of civilization. It is therefore time to revise
the traditional point of view which, initially, considered historical
avant-garde movements as having failed and died out, and, subsequently,
in view of the bouyancy of avant-garde tendencies in the sixties and
seventies, went on to consider that what had happened was that they
had merely imitated or benefited from what these movements had contributed.
Materialization
From a more formal standpoint, the history of art forms in the twentieth
century can be analyzed within the processs of de-materialization -
abstraction - conceptualization, and its opposites, personalization
- concretion - materialization. In the sixties, these lines of investigation
gained in extreme radicalization to the point of reaching the conceptualization
of the aesthetic components, and the materialization of the following
concepts: The aesthetic object as an idea, and ideas as aesthetic objects...
All of this took place within an orgy of liberty (the true drug of the
arts in the twentieth century). And also within a whirlwind of creativity:
the pure form of artistic or aesthetic thinking, as one of the most
characteristic productive activities of human beings, not so different
in its morphogenesis and behaviour from scientific thinking, or magical
or philiosophical thinking.
Liberation
The final product of the eighties has been the conquest of an extensive
field for the new art forms. from the different forms of visual poetry
to performances, as well as polypoetry and spoken music, installations,
land art, body art, impossible projects, even mail art, personal mythologies...,
the scene has undergone a true mutation, giving way to new forms of
seeing, hearing, thinking, analyzing...
The evolution of art and society in the eighties and nineties, even
though it gave the impression of endeavouring to eliminate these contributions,
actually assimilated and even consumed them in their least innovative
aspects. For these reasons, those who were most pessimistic about the
“end of the avant-garde” were pleased with themselves.
However, this revolution (the most effective and least bloody of the
century) is far from over. Just as in the thirties, just as towards
the end of the seventies, a certain concealment took place due to the
arrival of a new generation and for the purpose of achieving the shorter-term
goals. In some way or other, experimentalism, and even the excesses
of the sixties avant-garde, did succeed in liberating us all from radicalism
and from the infantile pathologies that result from all revolutions.
From the eighties onwards, the avant-garde has ceased to slavishly follow
the old destruction-recreation strategy. Having a space of its own,
it has aimed the interests of the authors towards the development of
productions that no longer take more-or-less avant-garde ideologies
as an inevitable point of reference.
What is essesntial and determining in aesthetic activity is no longer
innovation for its own sake. Nor is it the creation of impact, the production
of spectacles or the manufacturing of supposedly transcendental objects.
The spiritualist contents, both mystical and mythologising, that have
long been attached to the avant-garde, have been jettisoned over the
last two decades. Such is the splendorous example of mail art.
In fact, it could be said that that the aesthetic liberation of the
sixties has been completed with the ethical liberation of the eighties.
We are not talking, of course, of the “anyhting goes” attitude
of a seditious post-modernism, but rather of the attitude of the best
modernist tradition that “everything is realtive and interdependent”.
Systems
The advances in psychology, human sciences, computer sciences, etc...,
have succeeded in giving names and justifications to all the processes
used by the avant-garde that were subjected to experimentation by artists
of every latitude... We can now show that all systems invented by man
are axiological, and that the interrelation between systems is constant,
which means that art, as a system of systems cannot be tied to a series
of fixed values or grand formulae, commisar authorities or any kind
of powers, whether already established or to be established in the future.
Only from the authenticity of individual conscience, along with the
knowledge of the new repertoires (from the simplest and most objective
to the most complex and technified) can the new productions be consumed
and then evaluated, (and not merely from the standpoint of individual
“taste”, as a new entity that gives form to the irrational,
and to the supposed exceptionality of the subjective).
Utopia
Creativity can no longer be associated to symbolism and transcendentalism
as in traditional art, let alone to technique, difficulty or artifice.
This language is irretrievably played out (except for those who use
it to justify the permanence of those in power). Now the duty to create
new codes and repertoires, to change those that already exist, whether
it is by inventing or denaturing them, has become a common good. All
that is needed is determination, willingness and -especially- authenticity.
Creativity in the late twentieth century will only be disclosed to those
who commit themselves to it.
150 years after Count Latremont proposed a more-than-millenary utopia
(“poetry should be made by everyone”), this has become a reality
within one’s reach, and not only for poetry, but for any artform.
The availability of techniques, materials and methods of individual
authenticity place every individual in equal conditions to (or with
certain advantages over) professional artists. The possibilities opened
up by the new technologies, along with the development of a conscience
that is becoming more and more widespread of the importance of the consumer-interpreter,
and the knowledge of the new aesthetic ideas, show us that the fulfillment
of this utopia has merely begun this century, and that its natural development
will take place next century. We are facing the beginning of a new era,
about to witness a change of direction in the history of culture., that
is to say, of Western societies themselves.
As we face this future, poetry must carry the burden of the greatest
responsibility, as in the most crucial moments of the twentieth century.
Poets have accepted an exceptionally important role within the revolutionary
processes of culture, invariably questioning the norms of tradition,
and helping in the task of uncovering the new forms adapted to change.
The special position of poets (almost invariably outside the obligations
of professionality) can also help defend (in terms of the exceptional
components of present-day society) a fluid relationship between the
new artistic forms and the traditional systems, inasmuch as they rid
themselves of their transcendent components, and become merely aesthetic
productions once again.
The defense poets have made -in the name of the very idea of poetry-
of creativity before norms, dogmas, the authority... along with other
common mechanisms of the transcendent powers, give them the position
of natural caretakers of the new situation. Within this situation, each
individual will be able to face himself, without depending on the norms
of transcendency (that is to say, the threat of alienation), to reach
via the aesthetic experience (in its different levels) the true sense
of a non-mediated freedom.
FERNANDO MILLÁN Villarrodrigo (Jaén) 24.8.1944. Desde 1953 reside en Madrid.
Estudios de Filosofía. Tras un periodo adolescente en el que
publica poemas discursivos, contacta con Julio Campal en 1964, y colabora
con él hasta su muerte en 1968. A partir de ese año inicia
una labor que consta de tres partes: Actividades de promoción
de los planteamientos de vanguardia; producción experimental
de poemas visuales, objetos sonoros y textos sintácticos y narrativos,
libros objeto...; y al mismo tiempo investigación teórica,
análisis y crítica de la poesía experimental y
el arte contemporáneo. Miembro fundador del grupo N.O. (1968-1973).
Su actividad pública se concreta en dos etapas: 1968-1983; y
desde 1992 a la actualidad. En estos años ha sido conferenciante,
editor (de libros y revistas), comisario de exposiciones, ha realizado
programas de radio, articulista, etc... En la segunda etapa ha realizado
también performances, talleres, etc... Su aportación más
conocida como analista es el libro La escritura en libertad (Edit Alianza)
Madrid 1975. Parte de su producción experimental, conectada siempre
con sus plateamientos teóricos, ha sido recogida en seis libros
aparecidos desde 1969. Ha participado en numerosas exposiciones colectivas,
y ha celebrado cuatro individuales. En el libro Vanguardias y vanguardismos
ante el siglo XXI (Ardora express, Madrid 1999) se recoge un amplio
análisis de la historia del arte en los ltimos treinta años,
asícomo una descripción de su propia obra de creación,
y sus ideas sobre el presente y el futuro de la vanaguardia artística.
Muestras de su obra han sido recogidas en antologías editadas
en España, USA, Italia, Francia, Yugoeslavia, Alemania, etc...
Los estudios historicos de la literatura española de los últimos
veinte años, incluyen análisis de su trabajo, y le consideran
una figura fundamental dentro de la "generación del 68", y de
la vanguardia española de la postguerra. Entre sus últimas
actividades destaca el Taller "La materialización de la poesía",
realizado en el Centro Andaluz de Arte Contemporáneo (Sevilla,
30 de mayo - 18 de junio). |
