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Alan Moore on Austin Osman Spare

By Gregon

Alan Moore on BBC2 discussing the artistic and occult genius of Austin Osman Spare:

Greg
Editor
Greg is the owner-editor of The Daily Grail, as well as the author of a number of books including Stop Worrying, There Probably is an Afterlife.
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7 Comments

  1. Spooky
    Hi Greg,
    You are very quick here, i watched the culture show on bbc 2 earlier this evening and 5 hours later you put up a clipped item from that show.
    I must admit Spare was unknown to me until today, and i was impressed by the work that was shown in the item, even read his extensive wiki entry.

    Hmm i added a link to the wiki page but that seems to have triggered the spamfilter..might have to look into that Greg.

  3. art of spirit
    In my own works and drawings I’ve experienced the same things Mr. Spare had. When the host is describing the painting which seems to depict past lives or how it seems like Spare’s hands where being “guided” by unseen forces. I remember during one of my art courses in college having to draw something for a project we were working on and having a complete block in my mind. So I simply put my pen down and said to myself, “okay you draw something.” I was being sarcastic, but I did feel my hand moving seemingly with very little of my own control, and suddenly a very symbolic image of my own psyche coming into mind. When I was finished I heard a “voice” in my mind say “Self.” In every piece of art we see, from sculpture to paintings and so on, about 90% is created from the consciousness alone. I can be a skeptic of what I experience with my own drawings and explain them, but unless you have experienced them, you will always be a skeptic to these unseen ways. Life is an initiation, art is the catalyst.

  4. Austin Spare
    Austin Spare is one of the most interesting artists to this date in my opinion, along with Alex Grey. This video has truly inspired me to write some music tonight in the “magic” state.

  5. It really works
    I agree wholeheartedly with Moore about magickal art having the ability to re-connect oneself with the original state of consciousness it was created under. About five years ago I went on a bender from alien abduction literature to Crowley and DMT. I was creating a very charged mental space for all things weird and it reflected heavily in my artwork, which incorporated a lot of pseudo automatic methods in addition to featuring a large ecology of entities that were not of the physical variety. I just rediscovered one of my drawing “grimoires” from that period the other day, and just the simple act of flipping the pages and getting lost in the lines of the drawings began to kick start the ol’ spirit molecules inside me once again.

    I found a pretty interesting Spare collection of drawings along with his writings/philosophy in a compendium a small publisher had put together several years ago. Spare’s magickal writings have to be the most dense and “occulted” I’ve come across, but my oh my how beautiful his artistry is.

    I think anyone who’s interested in Spare should definetely try to find the Genesis P-Orridge article “Virtual Mirrors in Solid Time” (I believe that’s the title) that is included in the disinfo compilation “The Book of Lies”. A very interesting read on his style and a theory that his methods had the ability to imprint the essence or spirit of the subject he was capturing onto the canvas. There’s also a great backstory regarding one of the most influential figures in his life, a woman by the name of Mrs. Patterson. I’m not entirely sure, but the female figure who’s face is melding with the male in the first shot of the above video may be her based on one of Genesis’ descriptions of one of his more famous pieces.

  6. altered states…
    …of consciousness, are not really altered like most people like to think. They’re just as normal as any other state of consciousness. The difference is emotional intensity. We all experience states of being that are more or less intense than others. Some folks figure out how to capture those intense states and use the energy to (as the magicians like to say) cause change in their reality in accordance to THEIR will. But let’s be honest here, some people like to cause the change, but are unaware of their will…so what you get is this: a person causing change in reality. Spare was adept at this.

    Yes he was a magician. Yes he caused change in reality in accordance to his own will…BUT…his will was not adept. His technique for causing change was masterful, but his will was like most other artists…flighty (subject to flights of fancy), irresponsible, irrational, and chaotic.

    Now, I’ll be the first to say that there is nothing at all, at all wrong with chaos magic…and here’s my but again…BUT he leaned a little too far to the left….a little too much right brain activity, and not nearly enough left brain activity.

    Genius needs a grounding agent…something to make it useful…something to make it valuable…something to hareekee meekee might eye, loopy loopy right eye, a heecha for a chunka please.

    jus sayin…

    Dustin

    1. Magicians just want to have
      Magicians just want to have fun too. There is nothing more fun than the irrational, chaotic, and flighty. Magic was never a solemn affair, and indulging the puerile can be a way of dodging the kind of self importance that can cause real damage.

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