A Mere Outline for One Aspect of a Book on Mystery Catalysts, Guerrilla Playfare, neoism, booed usic, Mad Scientist Didactions, Acts of As-Beenism, So-Called Whatevers, Psychopathfinding, Uncerts, Air Dressing, Practicing Promotextuality, Imp Activism, CircumSubstantial Playing, etc..
in Pittsburgh 2:
The old software that I use to make these websites can't handle large webpages so by 2022 I'd maxed out my Pittsburgh entries. Hence, the Pittsburgh Mere Outline continues picking up from 2023 here.
455. "2023.06.30_16mm"
- a screening of some of my 16mm films made from 1980 to 1994
- Pittsburgh Sound + Image Essential Pittsburgh, Eberle Studios, Homestead, PA, us@
- Friday, June 30, 2023E.V.
- The event was free. The seating, being for about 40 people, was, perhaps, 2/3rds full. The attendees were givne a hand-out with releavnt pictures & a list of the films to be screened. The 1st film was a double projection of "Subtitles (16mm version)" onthe left & a video of a brain reseracher discussed fMRI data gotten by showing 2 volunteers a copy of "Subtitles" while they were being scanned. That was the 1st time that this had been presented correctly. The 2nd film, "Sound Along w/ t he Bounding Ball(s)" asked for audience participation in making the soundtrack. The audience was very spirited in its response. The 3rd film, "Bob Cobbing", was projected on a white spandex screen that I'd made for it. From behind, i grabbed the spandex & manipulated it. I also used 2 'party-lights' to complicate matters. Perhaps a highlight, for me, was when I used a strobe flash-light & 1. danced a Hula Dance in silhouette &, 2, did a partial strip-tease. This was another 1st. I spoke between & after each film, telling relevant stories meant to entertain & educate. Given that this may well be the last 16mm screening I ever give, I'd say that the audience got quite alot for their money.
To quote from the notes I wrote for the movie of this screening:
""2023.06.30_16mm" - 1920X1440, 30fps - 1:53:23
https://archive.org/details/2023.06.30-16mm
"2023.06.30_16mm": It seems like it's been at least 4 years that Steven Haines tried to arrange a screening of some of my 16mm films before we finally succeeded in pulling it all together. I've been making movies since 1975, starting with super-8mm. I added 1/2" reel-to-reel video to the mix in 1977. In 1980 I started making 16mm films but I didn't have my own camera until 1989. In 1995 that camera, a spring-wound Bolex, broke; 16mm was prohibitively expensive anyway at that point so I stopped making 16mm. Nonetheless, I made about 5 hours of 16mm during that time. Perhaps Steven & I will present more of my 16mm films in later programs. Once it became so easy to make acceptable quality digital movies that were easily transportable, 16mm became less practicable in contrast. For this 1st, &, possibly, last, of my 16mm programs in many a year, I screened several loops & then got into the main program:
"Double projection "Subtitles (16mm)" left, "What happens in the brain.." (vaudeo) right
""Sound Along w/ t he Bounding Ball(s)", audience participation
""Bob Cobbing", (16mm) left (spandex screen) - with rear projection manipulation & additional lighting
""National Cancer Institute Documentary"
""Ward of Mouth"
""Barfroom"
""Funny Farm Summit Meeting"
"This movie documents that screening. As with most or all of my documentaries, I'm not trying to reproduce a front-&-center experience because I think such approaches give a false sense of what an event is like. When an audience is at an event they're free to move around, to talk to people around them, etc - their heads aren't in vices with blinders on. They are exisiting in a non-flattened space. This document gives a variety of views, it's not just a frontal experience. As such, I hope it conveys more of what it's like to be a LIVE audience, having a LIVE experience. While the movie itself is unrealistic as far as what the audience could've perceived in the original situation, it's intended to inject a bit more LIFE into the flattened viewing experience."
457. "School of Negativity @ Bottom Feeder Books"
- the opening of the 1st exhibit of School of Negativity works by tENTATIVELY, a cONVENINECE at Ryan McLennan's Bottom Feeder Books & Gallery
- Pittsburgh, PA, us@
- Saturday, October 7, 2023E.V.
- "School of Negativity @ Bottom Feeder Books": The School of Negativity was founded by tENTATIVELY, a cONVENIENCE in July, 2020, to provide amusement for himself & his friend Breen Casey. They went to Lake E(e)rie provided with painterly tools & made (a) painting(s) of a blue lake & a blue sky with complimentary colors on black canvases. Since then, tENT has expanded on the idea a bit, thinking about different kinds of negatives. The basic idea is to think of Negativity in the sense of a film negative. Anything can be a negative, any negative can be a latent positive. Or not.
tENTATIVELY, a cONVENIENCE was born a llloooonnnggg time ago. During that long time, he's tried to live in accordance with his imagination in a Criminally Sane way. That's meant being a Psychopathfinder, a Jack-Off-Of-All-Trades, a Homonymphonemiac, a SPLEENIUS, an Imp Activist, a Practicing Promotextual, & many other neologisms. He's also the most prolific moviemaker in the entire history of moviemaking, currently weighing in with 729 movies, 229 of which are features. That's nothing to sneeze at.
The above post-card had been sent out to as much as 100 people to advertise the exhibit
Wanting to make the opening an experience beyond the usual see & be seen of most openings, the whole thing was calculated to be a bit 'off'. After seeing the diagonally hung sign in the window the next thing an attendee was likely to see was the shadow painting of an easel.
This was followed by a small TV with 2 sets of headphones presenting a movie of the making of this shadow painting & its predecessor.
728. "School of Negativity painting #6"
- 2 realizations: 1. An Undisclosed Location: May 11, 2023; 2. Bottom Feeder: October 2, 2023 - Thanks to Ryan McLenna of Bottom Feeder
- 1920 X 1440, 29.97fps, Stereo
- 43:21
- on my onesownthoughts YouTube channel here: https://youtu.be/7VhOEK10rtM
- on the Internet Archive here: https://archive.org/details/school-of-negativity-painting-6
It's also possible that an astute observor might've noticed a rubber stamp over the plates covering not-in-use outlets. More about that stamp later. Moving up the half-flight of steps past the 20 foot long ambiguous nonsense paitning on the floor into the bookstore proper one was likely to meet Ryan, the proprietor.
Heading to the door leading to the hallway to the gallery one might note the sign over the door.
In a transparent container on the wall to the left in the hallway were hand-outs that Ryan had printed out of text & an image that I've provided for a press release. Thanks to subsyantial effort by Ryan & myself, many people had been notified of the exhibit, including everyone in the local mass media that we were aware of. Not one of them wrote about it, not one of them attended the opening. It's my opinion that I'm blackballed by the liberal media & ignored, as usual, by the conservative media.
Upon entering the room, visitors were likely to be surprised to see me in full armor with a party light flickering from the eye slits & the cracks at the side of the visor. I directed the attendees to a small knight with a child's heat-transfer printer as its face that would've been spitting out a small piece of paper with the following image on it. Ryan was controlling this from his phone.
The new arrival was directed to tear off this "ticket" & to take it to a corner of the merchandise table where they were to rubber-stamp its backside with the same stamp that'd been used on the outlet covers.
From there, if they took the leftward path from the doorway hey would've seen Schoolof Negativity painting #1 & the movie documenting its making.
627. "School of Negativity"
- 1080P
- 6:29
- shot at Lake Erie & edited July, 2020
- on my onesownthoughts YouTube channel here: https://youtu.be/XZcHF6FWKf0
- on the Internet Archive here: https://archive.org/details/school-of-negativity
Form thre, the next movie to see was:
628. "Like a Decoy out of Water"
- using 43 instruments played by tENTATIVELY, a cONVENIENCE + 4 voice-overs from Dick Turner, Inquiring Librarian, & Phil Bradley
- 1080P
- 29:32
- shot September 4-6 at Rehoboth Beach & Cape Henlopen, DE
- edit finished around September 27, 2020
- on my onesownthoughts YouTube channel here: https://youtu.be/fYm6BkYlyIM
- on the Internet Archive here: https://archive.org/details/like-a-decoy-out-of-water
At least one photographer was moved to take one or more pictures of text off the screen for that. Inthe meantime, I had put a remote-controlled vibrator on a floor-tom head & covered & contained that with a down-side-up collander & then put the whole thing under the merch table where the bottom of the colander touched the bottom of the table. A few times only, I remotedly turned on the vibrator so that it produced a somewhat loud buzzing. I kept the remote controller in a fanny pack I was wearing over my armor. When drum was activated, the attendees were generally startled & looked around for the source, not immediately visible.
Moving on would've been School of Negativity painting #2: Impossible Traces". The painting was a photograph of me next to theImpossible Traces mural printed on canvas. I put one dab of acrylic yellow paint on the tip of the pictured paint-brush to make the image an actual painting for thosw who might object that it wasn't one otherwise.
photo: Calder Dudgeon
651. "School of Negativity Painting 02: Impossible Traces"
- a documentary of tENTATIVELY, a cONVENIENCE painting a mural in a room he's just built
- 1080p 29.97 stereo
- 20:32
- on my onesownthoughts YouTube channel here: https://youtu.be/4wq0uhmW5Zg
- on the Internet Archive here: https://archive.org/details/impossible-traces
Moving on to painting #3:
685. "School of Negativity: The Brains That Wouldn't Dry"
- shot in Little Buffalo State Park, PA, on April 29-April 30, 2022; shot in Ringing Rocks County Park, PA, & New Hope, PA, & Frenchtown, NJ, & at various canal points from May 1-5, 2022
- primitive animations made using DrawChat
- 1920 X 1440, 30fps, Stereo
- 12:15
- edit finished May 7, 2022
- on my onesownthoughts YouTube channel here: https://youtu.be/1UmZLXx0mxQ
- on the Internet Archive here: https://archive.org/details/the-brains-that-wouldnt-dry
In the meantime, of course, tENT got into conversations, sometimes aroud the merch table (where not a single thing sold) - as shown here where the knight talks with his old friend Mikey Seamans.
photo: Breen Lisi
718. "The Making Of "The Making Of "The Making Of"""
- shot primarily at Cabin 1, Raccoon Creek State Park by tENTATIVELY, a cONVENIENCE on April 28-30, 2023
- 1920 X 1440, 30fps Stereo
- 1:51:10
- on my onesownthoughts YouTube channel here: https://youtu.be/OCFFkN7COr4
- on the Internet Archive here: https://archive.org/details/the-making-of_202305
For this exhibition, tENT is deeply indebted to Ryan McLennan, the proprietor of Bottom Feeder Books, for his knowledge, his friendliness, his open-mindedness, his helpfullness, & for the all-around greatness of his bookstore. tENT is further indebted to Julie Gonzalez who took time out of her maddeningly busy schedule to help tENT get into the armor & to shoot footage of him moving around & playing percussion instruments wearing the armor (no mean feat). Then there's Breen Casey/Lisi who was there at Lake E(e)rie at the beginning & who took time out from HER maddening schedule to help me get in & out of the armor at the opening.
2 of the largest & most recent paintings were #s 7 & 8, each 20 feet long & hanging near the ceiling. For a much more complete documentation of the experience from conception to opening:
729. "School of Negativity @ Bottom Feeder Books"
- a movie about tENTATIVELY, a cONVENINECE's 1st painting exhibit in 40 years (at Bottom Feeder Books, proprietor: Ryan McLennan) broken into 5 parts:
one: the work
two: preparing
three: the proprietor
four: installing
five: the exhibit
- 2:00:16
- 1920X1440, 30fps, Stereo
- on my onesownthoughts YouTube channel here: https://youtu.be/Eeom6mQxBL4
- on the Internet Archive here: https://archive.org/details/son-bfb
photo: Breen Lisi
- October 21 & 27, 2023E.V. notes from tENTATIVELY, a cONVENIENCE
458. "Air Orchestra"
- as part of the Impossible show
- Brillobox, Pittsburgh, PA, us@
- Sunday, May 19, 2024E.V.
- "Air Orchestra": My friend Rob (Unfinished Symphonies) & his partner Jacque (& often with their friend Maurice) organizes yearly events around a theme. 2024's theme was "Impossible". When Rob invited me to participate I almost immediately was inspired & thought of the Air Orchestra. That seemed ambitious enough to be 'impossible', at least as a one-man show. The day before the event I had my head-hair shaved so that it formed a face on the back of my head. Prior to the performance I kept a hood up so that the haircut wouldn't show. SO, when I climbed the stage as the conductor I pulled the hood off & presented my Facial Hair as my Speaking Face. I had asked Rob to shoot footage of my presentation with my iJones (cellphone) but I forgot to give it to Rob before I started so he was reliant on his audience-right camcorder. This didn't get across the effect of the Facial Hair because it was seeing it in profile. No biggie. I had fun & the audience seemed to appreciate it. - May 31, 2024E.V. notes from tENTATIVELY, a cONVENIENCE
My Facial Hair in blurry close-up
Me getting the Air Orchestra's attention
Conductor cueing the air cellist
The air cellist holding his bow
The air violinst at work
The air conductor cueing the percussionist
Air Timpani
Air Gong
Air Keyed Percussion
The keys muted by hand
Painist cued by the Conductor
Air Pianist
Air Conductor cueing the air chorus
One of the Air Chorus members air signing
A different Air Chrous member singing
Air Conductor cueing the air clarinetist
Air Clarinetist
Air Trombonist playing a long slide downward
The Air Conductor thanking the audience
The Air Condcutor giving his bow
My entore 'performance' was roughly 2 & 1/2 minutes.
The movie of it, shot by Unfinished Symphonies & edited by tENTATIVELY, a cONVENIENCE is here:
"Air Orchestra" - 640X480, 29.97, Stereo - 3:02
https://archive.org/details/air-orchestra
Tags: Air Orchestra, tENTATIVELY a cONVENIENCE, Unfinished Symphonies, CMB Cold Spot, Brillobox, Impossible
Kenny Haney: seated photographer; tENTATIVELY, a cONVENIENCE: player; Roger Dannenberg: player; Ross Nugent: photographer showing waterfall
460. "Dual"
- featuring tENTATIVELY, a cONVENIENCE: foil electronics, cymbal walker, schalmei; Roger Dannenberg: trumpet
- Fall Run Park waterfall, Glenshaw, PA us@
- Saturday, October 19, 2024E.V.
Ross Nugent: panorama shot
- Around 2PM, Saturday, October 19, 2024, Ross Nugent; tENTATIVELY, a cONVENIENCE; & Roger Dannenberg lugged our gear from the Fall Run Park parkinglot approximately 3/4s of a mile to the park's waterfall & set up at the base of it. I had attached 7 cybals & one colander to a walker, thusly making a Cymbal Walker (as opposed to a "Cynbal Stand") so I carried that in. 3 days before I'd gotten some fencing supplies that included electrically wired foils used in competition. In some somewhat last-minute experimentation I wired a foil so that it would send a hum to an effects unit that would send a flanged hum to a small portable battery-powered amplifier. Depressing the button at the end of the foil would send the hum. The flange would determine the subtle pitch changes.
photo: Ross Nugent
photo: Kenny Haney
I started off using the foil to sound the percussion. Roger played trumpet, sometimes muted, sometimes not.
photo: Kenny Haney
photo: Ross Nugent
photo: Kenny Haney
In order to get firm depressions of the foil tip button I touched it to the rocks that I was standing on.
photo: tENTATIVELY, a cONVENIENCE
photo: Kenny Haney
In order to get a close-up shot of Roger's mouth playing the trumpet I had rigged a helmet with a 4K camcorder pointed down.
photo: Kenny Haney
After playing with the foil for awhile I took off my broccoli hat & wire fecning face mask & played the Cymbal Walker with a set of clear plastic sticks & a set of mallets.
photo left: Ross Nugent; photo right: Kenny Haney
photo: Ross Nugent
A few people in the park came along & witnessed our playing & applauded at the end.
phot: Kenny Haney
My switching to schalmei was the signal that we were about to stop.
photo: Ross Nugent
THE END.
- October 21, 2024 notes: tENTATIVELY, a cONVENIENCE
"Dual" - 1080p HD 30p, Stereo - 7:43
"Dual": One of my favorite parks in the Pittsburgh environs is Fall Run Park. With this in mind, I proposed to my friend & collaborator Roger Dannenberg that we play a duet at the foot of the waterfall there. We picked Saturday, October 19, 2024, to do this. I'd inherited 3 walkers & I realized that one of them would make a good portable cymbal stand. Mounting the cymbals & a colander I, at 1st, thought of calling the result the "Cymbalic" but then I decided on "Cymbal Walker" as a reference to Cymbal Stand. I've been wanting to do something with fencing gear too - partially because 50 years ago I'd studied fencing & even given a demonstration at a high school. SO, I bought some gear & rigged it so that when the foil tip button was depressed a hum signal would go to an effects unit set to a flange & from there to a portable amplifier. This enabled me to turn the fencing foil into a primitive electronic instrument. Roger played trumpet, sometimes muted. We played a quick duet at the foot of the falls. Due to various technical failures, the falls didn't show in the shots so I inserted it to give some sense of the environment. One fo the technical problems was an image instability in the camcorder I had strapped to my hand - this produced a wonderful special effect in which the image seems to flow. We had fun. Thanks to Kenny Haney for saving the day with his footage that could stand in for the footage that malfunctioned &/or was accidentally deleted - & to Ross Nugent for getting shots in which our placement at the bottom of the waterfall is shown. - October 19, 2024E.V. notes from tENTATIVELY, a cONVENIENCE
Tags: waterfall, Roger Dannenberg, tENTATIVELY a cONVENIENCE, trumpet, percussion, electronics, fencing, October 19 2024, free improvising, experimental usic, experimental music, experimental moviemaking, Ross Nugent, Kenny Haney, Adam Welch
461. "Fencing"
- Dianne & Dan's garden, Pittsburgh, PA, us@
- Sunday, June 1, 2025E.V.
- I'd been working on using a fencing foil as a controller for electronic sound since October, 2024. The 1st manifestation of that was a "Dual" that Roger Dannenberg & I performed at Fall Run Park on October, 2019. Roger was playing trumpet & I was playing fencing foil activated flanging & percussion mounted on a walker as well as a schalmei.
Roger was inspired by the foil electronics & offered to make a device to convert foil tip-button depressions into MIDI signals. Thanks to the usual impediment on my end of lack-of-money & to Roger's general business, the devlopment of the gear was slow-going. I labriously put together an Electronics Sleeve to mount the relevant gear on & Roger got some boxes more or less working & fabricated electronics shorts for attaching his gear to. I amassed the materials needed for both of us to be able to fence each other & we had some rehearsals.
Adding a 3rd character, "Te Hebephrenic" (partially in honor of "Blaster" Al Ackerman), I enlisted the aid of my neighbor, Dan Berg, & asked if we could perform at Diane & Dan's lovely garden.
SO, on Sunday, June 1, 2025, Roger & Dan & I gave a trial run,what I decided was a dress rehearsal rather than a full performance, to some neigbors that I'd text-messaged to announcing a "15 minute entertainment".
As I was setting up a camera, feedback started issuing from my gear & I shut off my amp. When I tried to turn it on again it wouldn't work. After som exasperation, I decided to go head with only Roger's gear working. Unfortunately, his foil tip wasn't activating electronics &, in general, hi synth seemed to be playing a sequece without relation to the foil.
We fenced, eventually Dan turned around, as instructed, & walked toward 'stage front', honking & squeezing a bulb horn & a squueze toy I'd mounted to the walker. He went between the 2 fencers, showing the sign on the front of the ealker to the (v)audience seated across th street. The sign said:
It's Always 6 O'Clock
Do You Know Where Your Parents Are?
I'd made this sign & attached it tothe walker in anticipation of an action intended for the 40th anniversary of neoism in Montréal in 2019. I'd been unable to present that action at the time.
Roger & I held our foils between our 2 stomachs & held our hands aloft. We then dropped the foils, turned the attendees, took our fencing masks off, & bowed.
- July 13, 2025 remembrace from tENTATIVELY, a cONVENIENCE
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