FOUR WORKS
BY TIM GAZE

ASEMIC WRITING & ART
A NEW STREAM OF CULTURE

I'm an Australian writer. My quest to express the difficult things inside me has led me from conventional prose to experimental prose, experimental poetry and now to a form of experimental calligraphy which I term "asemic writing".

The word "asemic" was taught me by an American poet, Jim Leftwich. In discussing a tendency in contemporary experimental poetry, he commented that the most radical poets are heading towards an "asemic" text: that is, a text with no semantic information, yet in some sense still a text.

Using my intuition, I have uncovered a range of work which I'd describe as part of an asemic tradition.

The artist and poet Henri Michaux produced intuitive ink drawings, some of which resemble handwriting. His "mouvements" (published Face aux verrous, Gallimard) spring to mind. Many of his poetry books contain these images.

One of the founders of the CoBrA movement, the poet Christian Dotremont, invented a style of illegible calligraphy which he termed "logogrammes". He wrote words, but was concerned only for the energy of the brushstrokes, and the possibility of beauty, rather than legibility. I have so little knowledge of French, that for me, his works have the same effect as if they were deliberately asemic. A large collection of logogrammes was published in Logbook (Yves Rivière, 1974)

Brion Gysin and William Burroughs produced some experimental calligraphy, both with brush and pen. Some of these are reproduced in Ports of Entry (Thames and Hudson). Gysin combined Japanese and Arabic characters in some of his. Burroughs' brushwork hints at letters or numerals, but is illegible.

The African American naïve artist J B Murray produced paintings containing "spirit writing", a form of illegible writing that he said he received from God. He could interpret the meaning of his writing by looking at it through a bottle of holy water. His works are collected in folk art museums. In the Hand of the Holy Spirit (Mercer) has reproductions of some of his work.

I had known Jim Leftwich as the editor of the poetry journal Juxta, and as a contributor to journals such as Lost and Found Times, before he used the word "asemic". His experimental, illegible handwriting on pages 18 and 19 of Lost and Found Times #39 (Nov '97) was a catalyst in changing how I conceived of writing, language and poetry.

I travelled in Indonesia in 1998, planning to write about my experiences at length. When I returned to Australia, my emotions were so tangled that I could not even begin to express myself. However, I found myself making marks and doodles with pen and pencil. After a few months, I had sufficient material to produce a 4 page, A4 size pamphlet, together with some work sent me by Leftwich, and some graffiti-inspired texta designs by a young friend, Tom van den Bok, titled asemic ~ volume 1.

In 1999, I began to experiment with large textas, and later with a Chinese brush and ink. My work developed. The strongest texta designs I collected in 1st book of asemic texts.

Calling upon contacts in the visual poetry and mail art networks, I compiled a little magazine titled asemic. Not all of the work in this first issue of the magazine is truly asemic, but none of them is susceptible to conventional reading tactics.

A copy of my 1st book landed in the hands of Paul Silvia, coproprietor of Broken Boulder Press. He and his partner were enthusiastic to publish a chapbook of my asemic work. I submitted a large stack of photocopies, sufficient for 2 volumes. The Oxygen of Truth, volume 1 was published in July 2000, and volume 2 in January 2001.

Also in 1999, I made contact with Cornelis Vleeskens, a Dutch-born writer, artist and poet resident in Australia. He was aware of Michaux and Dotremont. He was already an accomplished experimental calligrapher. His work is reminiscent of Chinese and Japanese calligraphy, as well as Michaux and Dotremont, and is not intended to be legible.

My research into Chinese calligraphy has uncovered another connection: "crazy grass style". This wildest style of Chinese callgraphy is often illegible, but contains strong emotional energy and sinuous beauty.

Some modern (post WW2) Japanese calligraphers and visual artists tended in this illegible direction, too: the Bokujinkai group, and the Gutai group.

In October 2000, I published asemic magazine #2,1. Again, not all content is strictly asemic, but certainly is not legible to people who can only read the Roman alphabet. Among the contributors is the Belgian intuitive artist Louise Tournay, who produces many pages of automatic asemic handwriting.

Ken Harris, co-editor of Juxta magazine with Leftwich, also produces much asemic work. He and Jim have collaborated on some large format works using pen and crayon. Harris also produces many asemic designs on index cards.

Many other experimental poets are beginning to work in this area.

What is asemic writing, and what is its use?

I had no idea what I was doing when I began making marks which appeared to be a form of writing. I stood back and watched myself at work. Slowly, I'm coming to understand what they might be.

Writing does not just contain semantic information. It also contains aesthetic information (when seen as a shape or image) and emotional information (such as a graphologist would analyze). Because it eliminates the semantic information, asemic writing brings the emotional and aesthetic content to the foreground. By contrast, email is writing almost devoid of aesthetic and emotional content, apart from what the words contain.

Asemic works play with our minds, enticing us to attempt to "read" them. Some asemic works make the viewer hover between "reading" (as a text) and "looking" (as a picture). This is a very interesting state. They form a bridge between art and writing. In Chinese culture, poetry, painting and calligraphy are deemed to be closely related arts. Here is a Western analogue.

Taking a grand step back, I suggest that world literary culture has swung to an extreme of yang. That is, semantic content, theories of textual interpretation, and expensively produced and marketed publications dominate. Rigid, leftbrain logic is in the ascendant.

I am a champion of yin culture: intuition, instinct, magic, dreams, the irrational. A more fluid, feminine approach. This culture seems to spread by little magazines, chapbooks, mail art and word of mouth.

Asemic writing says what I cannot say in words. It seems closer to the formless void from which we humans generate our meanings.

I'm not a scholar, just a writer and poet. These words are improvised on a tuesday morning, to attempt to begin to show you about asemic writing.

Tim Gaze
16 january 2001

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BEEBEARD

Beebeard, the man with a beard of bees, breathed out. Buzz & wings & striped bodies in the air. Duck, because a pair of bees flew straight at you.

Beebeard lifted his wand, a gnarled root made smooth by time.

"Time like honey," he chanted. "Flow on!"

What does he know? He knows the secrets of all flowers: their scent, their sweetness, how they reproduce. He knows the enemies of bees: birds, beetles, ants, wasps. He knows how honey is made: he's seen the Queen at work.

In the heat of the day, Beebeard bathes in the river. The bees desert him before he immerses himself.

Cooler, he pads up the sand, over the stones, to the tree stump.

Lights his pipe. The bees return, in ones & twos, 'til his face is again covered with buzz & fuzz.

Beebeard.

Tim Gaze
feb 2002

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HUMANS BEFORE LANGUAGE

Once upon a time, there was no such thing as language. There were no stories. There wasn't even any speech or writing.

People weren't quite people yet. They were just highly intelligent, apelike animals.

Over the years, decades, centuries, millennia, the cleverest human apes invented new ways to use sound. Already, they made special sounds when they were happy, sad, or angry. They made loud, hollering sounds to get others' attention. They made aggressive sounds to try to frighten away enemies. And they made sounds when they mated.

Language probably began in many separate places over a huge period of time. But who knows? Perhaps a single genius sparked off language, and her or his invention slowly spread and evolved through groups of human apes who learned how to use it.

With language, people became people. When a human ape learned enough language, she or he became able to think in words. A human ape was no longer an animal, but something new.

With words came stories. Also with words came ideas. That lump up there is called a "mountain". A mountain is "big".

I've overstepped the mark. Stories were probably already being told by gesticulations, facial expressions and tracing patterns in the dust. And don't ideas come in a flash, then slowly accrete into words?

Our minds have been exposed to language from an early age. We would have to lose language, in order to understand our own ancestors before they could think in words.

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THOUGHTS

WHO OWNS THE ENGLISH LANGUAGE?

Everybody who cares to use it.

Academics, particularly lexicographers, linguists and literary theorists, give an impression that they own language. They pretend that they understand how it works, and that there are "correct" and "incorrect" ways to use language.

Get fucked!

We use language as we will. However, most people have been indoctrinated by parents', teachers' and academics' ideas about language. This indoctrination restricts their usage.

There are always new ways to use language. Academics can only describe it as used in the past.

The future of language is in your hands.

 
WHAT IS POETRY?

Poetry can't be circumscribed. One description is: poetry is language which sings.

I believe that poetry is thousands of years ancient, and emerged from excited, intoxicated people. This ancient poetry was sacred.

Much "poetry" is designed to appease current academic fashions. It has no spirit. It comes from a shallow place.

Robert Graves suggested that true poetry is an invocation of the Goddess, and raises the hairs on the back of your neck. His idea resonates with me.

Although I consider myself a writer more than a poet, I've experienced a state where my everyday self is silenced, and words emerge from somewhere else. This is poetry.

 
ON ESSAYS

The essay form is too long and stylised.

Ideas erupt into words. Most ideas can be expressed in a sentence or two. Perhaps they can be clarified in a few extra paragraphs.

Beyond this short exposition, any attempt to illuminate an idea becomes a verbal game, weighed down by the essay form, as enacted by millions of previous essay writers.

I don't trust essays. To bulk an essay to a respectable length, the original idea is sidetracked by reference to other texts, and clothed in the scaffold of the essay form.

Remove this bulk, and see the tiny naked idea hidden underneath.

My attempts to essay the truth are simple: speak an idea into words, clarify it a little, then stop.

 
"DISCOURSE"

All spoken language emerges from the conversational discourse.

All written language is directly or indirectly descended from prehistoric rock art.

Universities promulgate a complex series of mythologies. One mythology concerns language.

Language is older than universities.

Some of us understand the nature of language at a deeper level.