Ondertussen: Keir Neuringer 'One is One (Preludes & Fugues)'

September 14 thru October 26, 2008
Location: Hogewal 1-9

The former reception area of Stroom has been converted into a small exhibition space. On a regular basis there are presentations of artists who have received a subsidy in the categories Stroom PRO- and SPOT-grants. The informal exhibitions and presentations are intended to illustrate the diversity of the Stroom grant system. The program in the space is called Ondertussen (Meanwhile).

One is One (Preludes & Fugues)
Begun in 2004, One is One (Preludes & Fugues) is a collection of 48 performance texts, divided evenly into four books with the following titles:
Book I: Dodging Bullets
Book II: One is One
Book III: You Decide
Book IV: is Against
 
On a structural level the collection deals with the musicality of language and the language of music. Its arrangement is both linear and modular, and references numerous other works, thinkers, and ideas, sometimes more subtly, sometimes outright. It exists among and between the disciplines of music, literature, performance, theatre, and perhaps philosophy. (As the collection developed the visual aesthetic of pages filled with text was also an important component; after the first 24 texts were complete it was presented as part of an installation.) In its wide-ranging content One is One addresses the violence and untenability of civilization, social and personal confusion, ambiguity, morality, cynicism, and the will to do good, among many other issues. This is the note that precedes the collection in its manuscript form:
 
These are Acknowledgements & Dedications
Preludes & Fugues, Composed & Notated between December 2004 & September 2008 in accordance with certain structural principles (of JS Bach, of Evan Parker, & of Rosa Parks, for example), by one among the teeming privileged, the wretched reluctant, the well-fed starving, the colonizing colonized, one nonetheless mean & meek, born in New York & residing during the time of these works in The Netherlands, & offered humbly & solely by the author to no one in particular & anyone in general--including the reader, the performer, the listener & the arranger--with an interest in music; literature; the overlap of tradition & experimentation; form, content & aesthetics; codes, lists, love letters & talking aloud to oneself in public (while walking, for example, or standing, perhaps, on a stage); self defence & addressing adversity; creative discipline; intellectual rigor; style; the birth pangs of a post-civilized world & the quiet & constant threat of self-immolation.

Archive Ondertussen presentations

presentation Keir Neuringer
photo: Rob Kollaard
presentation Keir Neuringer (detail)
photo: Rob Kollaard