Disgust Display Series, aka The Spit Museum, The Fart Museum, The Piss Museum, The Crack Museum
(2005)
Series of “Museums” which are really an amalgam of works by various artists, filmmakers, writers featured (Vito Acconci, Franz Kafka, Christian Marclay, Michael Snow, Igor Vamos, and myself) which focus on a specific bodily function/action.
Presentation History
– 2005 Hasselt (installation, EXCESS, Z33). (Curator Pieter van Bogaert. Display design by Ann Clicteur)
THE FART MUSEUM
(untitled) 45rpm 7″single. Christian Marclay
Published by Robert Shiffler Collection and Archive in Greenville Ohio in 1996. Used by permission of the artist. Statement from Marclay: This vinyl record was done using the original recording made for a sound installation which I first installed in 1992 in Paris at the Jennifer Flay gallery. In 1994 it was installed at Fri-Art Centre d’art contemporain Kunsthalle, Fribourg. In Paris it was part of my solo show titled The Wind Section, including sculptures made with stools and wind instrument. The show had several a scatological references. But the piece was meant to be installed in an empty space with an hidden sound system, such as in Fribourg. The farts are recorded on a CD and played on a random setting. The farts are very intermittent with long silences in between, as opposed to the record which is a condensed version.
South Winds (2003) CD cover. Christof Migone
Cover design by Christof Migone & Eric Mattson. The inside image is of the port of Marseilles (where Joseph Pujol, aka Le Petomane, came from). Record Label: Oral (Montréal).
South Winds (2003) CD audio. Christof Migone
Recorded: 2002 in Brooklyn. Mixed: 2002 in Montréal.
South Winds presents the results of a recording session Christof Migone undertook with Le Petomane (Joseph Pujol 1857-1945). Le Petomane performed his fart fantasia at the Moulin Rouge in Paris where, to much acclaim, he would imitate musical instruments and with his ‘second mouth’ hum recognisable tunes. For South Winds, Le Petomane and Migone to explore these somatic winds as a response to Artaud’s ontological formulation: “the depth of my being is the volume of my body.” Both Artaud and Pujol were brought up in Marseilles, city in the path of the infamous Mistral, a wind which “has the ill-natured habit of scattering roof tiles about, knocking down chimneys, blowing small children into canals, tumbling walls onto the unsuspecting natives.” South Winds has the same impetuous effect, it confirms that the body is a noisy place. The body emits and transmits, it cannot contain itself. South Winds is an essay on the flatulent and the incontinent.
Le Petomane stills
From a film originally done by Edison and included in the Petomane documentary by Igor Vamos. Caption used in the Aural Cultures book where these images where used to accompany my essay on farts: Joseph Pujol performing for Edison’s “kinetophonolfactograph” during the 1900 Paris World Fair. From Igor Vamos documentary film “Le Petomane: Fin de siècle fartiste”. New York: The Cinema Guild, 1998. Courtesy of The Cinema Guild.
Le Petomane: Fin-de-siècle Fartiste (1998) (56:00). Igor Vamos
Video. Used by permission of the director. Film distributed by the Cinema Guild (New York).
THE CRACK MUSEUM
Crackers (1997) text. Christof Migone
Crackers began in 1997 as residency project for Gallery 101 in Ottawa. Participants were solicited through the radio, classified ads in the weekly paper, and via the Gallery’s membership. The recording sessions consisted of an interview succeeded by a cracking session. Participants: Germaine Koh, Justine Akman, Marguerite Dehler, Tony Daye, Sarah Dobbin, Vera Greenwood, Louise Levergneux, Michael Sutton.
Letters to Milena. Franz Kafka
Excerpt from the book: […] “nechápu” — “I don’t understand” A peculiar word in Czech and even more so in your mouth, it’s so severe, callous, cold-eyed, parsimonious, and above all nutcracker-like; three times in the word the jaws crack upon one another, or more correctly : the first syllable makes an attempt to seize the nut, it won’t work, then the second syllable tears the mouth wide open, now the nut fits into it, and the third syllable cracks, d’you hear the teeth. […]
Crackers (2001) CD cover. Christof Migone
CD Design: Dawson Prater. Drawings: Onya Hogan-Finlay. Record label: Locust (Chicago).
Crackers (2001) CD audio. Christof Migone
Recorded: 1997 in Ottawa. Edited: 1998 in Québec City. Mixed: 2000 in Montréal. Record label: Locust (Chicago). Exclusive source: source: sounds of cracking knuckles, knees, wrists, jaws, toes, ankles, backs, necks, wrists, elbows, hips.
Do you crack your fingers? your neck? your back? your knees? your elbows? your ankles? your hips? your jaws? your toes? your…? A joint is the locale where bones articulate a tension. Crackers are compulsive about the release of that tension. A crack is incontinent. A cracker too. As the sound of the cracks echo, some wince, others feel relief. A crack is a body nonsequitur, a bone edit, a broken break.
Cinecrackers (2005) (work in progress) (1:06). Christof Migone
Scenes from films where someone (or something) cracks. Excerpts so far (more are being sought, contact the artist at <cm@christofmigone.com> if you know of any others): Woyzeck (Werner Herzog 1978), Kung Fu Hustle (Stephen Chow 2005), Dodgeball (Rawson M. Turber 2004), Blade Runner (Ridley Scott 1982), Once Upon A Time In The West (Sergio Leone 1968), Repulsion (Roman Polanski 1965).
THE PISS MUSEUM
P (text)(2005.) Christof Migone
On January 18 2005, I began to record myself saying ‘P’ everytime I went to pee, I did this until I reached 1000 (June 15 2005).
P (audio)(2005) (60:00). Christof Migone
On January 18 2005, I began to record myself saying ‘P’ everytime I went to pee, I did this until I reached 1000 (June 15 2005). The 3576 hours (149 days) it took are reduced here to 1 hour. The spacing between each ‘P’ you hear is proportional to the original span between each time I went to the bathroom. The max/msp programming to produce the proportional playback was done by Meriol Lehmann at Avatar, Québec City.
P (video/audio)(2005) (1:08) Christof Migone
On January 18 2005, I began to record myself saying ‘P’ everytime I went to pee, I did this until I reached 1000 (June 15 2005). The 214560 minutes (149 days) it took are reduced here to 1 minute. The spacing between each ‘P’ you hear is proportional to the original span between each time I went to the bathroom. The max/msp programming to produce the proportional playback was done by Meriol Lehmann at Avatar, Québec City. The 1000 visual Ps where done by Christof Migone in Final Cut Pro.
Piss Duet (1974). Michael Snow
Excerpt from Michael Snow’s film “Rameau’s Nephew By Diderot (Thanx to Dennis Young) By Wilma Schoen.” Used by permissionn of the artist.
THE SPIT MUSEUM
Spit (1998) text. Christof Migone
Spit (1997-1998) bottle. Christof Migone
Waterways: Four Saliva Studies (2001) CD cover. Vito Acconci/undo
CD in custom cardboard box with video stills of each Acconci study covered by hand in silver paint + dried spit on inside cover. Design by Christof Migone and Alexandre St-Onge.
Waterways: Four Saliva Studies (2001) CD audio. Vito Acconci/undo
This release includes the soundtrack to Acconci’s 1971 video “Waterways: Four Saliva Studies” + a remix by undo (Christof Migone and Alexandre St-Onge) entitled “Vito Acconci’s undoing.”
Waterways: Four Saliva Studies (1971) (22:27) Vito Acconci
Description of the video from EAI: Waterways comprises four minimalist exercises in which Acconci explores the formal, visual and dynamic properties of saliva in a controlled performance situation. Using extreme close-ups and amplified sound to force the viewer into the space of his body, he experiments with his mouth as a container for saliva, holding it in as long as possible, trying to catch it in his hands. By using a bodily fluid as art-making material, Acconci pushes the anti-aesthetic of body art to its radical extreme.
