Art Metropole

#05118

A Neoist Research Project

Artist

N.O. Cantsin

Format

Artists' Books

Details

Softcover

Size

14.5 × 21 × 2 cm

Length

246 

Forget about certainties. Forget about authors. Forget about fancy graphic design. Forget about colors. Forget about greyscale. Forget even about page numbers. This is a Neoist book and its content was meant to radically break the rules in the eighties. And it still does. It’s a comprehensive anthology of Neoism through an abundance of writings and strictly black and white pictures, in a xeroxed-like look. The flux of poetic, radical subversive and imaginative text about Neoist literature, philosophy and performances flows in a single 8bit font with minimum variations, reminiscent of an endless dot matrix print on a fanfold. All the hidden Monty Cantsin and Karen Eliot (both collective names) in Europe and North America will find quite a few familiar covers of the seminal “Smile” zine, some celebrated and some more obscure texts, and barely recognizable friends during some of the most imaginative performances you could think of. But then is it just old stuff? Not really. There’s a lot to learn about communication in Neoist practices. In five sections (activations, apt fest, language, Neoism and replication) there are strategies, experiences, (dangerous) practices that enable individuals to help subvert the media’s ability to manipulate and stupefy. In fact being Neoistic at the antipodes of dogmatism used to give an almost absolute freedom of action to the (connected) individual. Surely it’s worth knowing more about one of the most contradictory art movements, which despite its initial predictions is here to stay.