Category: Writing
…from a trip down south, June 2007…
I wandered onto the following trailer late last night…
American philosopher Richard Rorty died June 8. Here’s a link to a brief news report (Rorty obit), and a small excerpt that says a lot about Rorty’s inspiration particularly for me:
“Rorty forged ahead on the path cleared by American pragmatists, particularly John Dewey, in asserting that ideas are tools; the ones we call ‘true’ are simply those that help us cope best with our present circumstances. Politically liberal, he especially admired Dewey’s focus on social activism—his famous urging that intellectuals shift their attention from ‘the problems of philosophy’ to ‘the problems of men.'”
The blogosphere as it currently exists is that infinite warehouse of proverbial monkeys tapping on typewriters until Shakespeare randomly coalesces on page like a chaos fractal. In this scenario, art happens by accident, not design.
Raza Aztlán turns taggers into muralists
“From one art form to another: bombing with spraycans to painting with brushes”
San Antonio Current, 28 May – 3 June 1998
Smoke from crops burning in Mexico brings the faint taste of pesticides on this steamy and overcast day. Mixing with the stench of a nearby fried chicken stand and the cigarettes five teens are smoking spray-paint laces the chemical fuzz in the air like icing.
…from the News Brief vault…
“Benjamin Ortiz rides with cycling’s guerrilla gang”
NewCity, 11 May 1995
Last October, thirty cyclists riding under the name Critical Mass drove up Michigan Avenue from the Art Institute, blocking north-bound automobile traffic in order to promote human-powered transportation. On May 6, the group re-forms for its second run, meant to coincide with a downtown rally, against the “Contract on America.”
Download my first Tribune article (30 Oct. 2005) as a PDF file.
I moved to the Bay Area in 1992 for grad school with the idea of becoming a professor, but instead I wandered down the wrong path with the criminal element on campus – petty thieves, small-time hustlers, gangbangers, and drug fiends – always on the verge of dropping out, on the same turf where Ken Kesey and the Merry Pranksters first dropped acid with the Grateful Dead.
